Splendiferous!

NANOWRIMO Day 9: 1759 Words (13261 total)

I woke up the next morning to a nurse closing the door to Sue’s room as she exited. I leapt to my feet.

“How is she doing? Is she okay? Is she awake?”

The nurse smiled at me. “She’s still stable, yes I think so, and no she isn’t.” She touched my shoulder. “Good morning Mister Spillane. Why don’t you follow me and we’ll get you some coffee. That chair can’t have been a comfortable bed.” I nodded and followed her.

I had spent the night sleeping in the chair outside of Sue’s door. I had left explicit instructions that they should awake me immediately if her condition changed or if anything else was learned. Obviously this was not the case. I yawned, and accepted the coffee the Nurse got for me from the employee break room. It was black, very hot, and not much umph to it. I hate coffee. “Thanks.” She smiled at me again, and I headed back towards Sue’s room, sipping my nasty coffee as I went. Mmmmm, blessed caffeine.

Last night had been a real good time, and I realized afterwards that I had really needed it. I don’t know what that says about me, needing to get away from things when I had only been around them for a couple hours. But it was a good time. Last night it was just me, Joe, Pete, and Eddie.

Eddie looked great for someone fresh out of jail. Swore he was reformed, and living a productive life in society now, that Pete was his role model since he never got into any trouble. He was truly a model citizen. Or so he claimed. Time would tell on that one, but I suspected more than a little that Eddie would not mind performing a little bit of mischief if he got the chance. He got drunk last night, but didn’t do anything crazy. He was the only one of us who got drunk, actually.

Pete didn’t really open up about what he’d been up to. He really didn’t want to talk about the situation with Lauren or his wife (whose name is Ilyena. Definitely Russian.) other than saying that “things had changed.” Obviously he still had some issues to deal with, and that he would talk when he was ready. He drank plain old water. Joe joked that the “purified soul only needed simple sustenance,” like bread or water. Pete laughed a little about that, but Joe actually meant it. Pete was just one of those really good guys who was better than every body else. Call him righteous, Godly, a liar, or just plain old up tight, but you couldn’t get Pete to do anything wrong. Not even something that gave off the appearance of the possibility of being wrong in any way. Which is why the little love triangle that had developed was so curious. That just wasn’t the kind of thing that Pete would get into.

Joe and I both had sodas. Joe made some lighthearted jokes about everything, and went to join a couple of chicks who were batting eyes at us. Later on he called me over to go join them, which I did. Seems the blonde’s friend was interested. I wasn’t really interested, though. Not because of her, mind you. She had a nice body, and seemed like she knew how to have a good time. I just couldn’t get into it, what with everything going on. Joe went home with the blonde though. The man could charm anything with breasts. Well, maybe not really big fat guys.

I asked Pete to take care of Eddie and made my excuses to the nice young lady. She seemed disappointed, but I noticed Pete talking to her as I left. He would explain what I was in no mood to do. Another night, I would definitely have seen where it would lead. Maybe later on this week. And I could work the sympathy angle.

So I went back to the hospital and settled down in the extremely uncomfortable chair. Somehow I had fallen asleep. I tilted my head to the side, stretching it. It cracked very loudly. Ow. Maybe sleeping in the lobby would have been better.

I finished my coffee and got up to chuck it in the trash can. “He shoots!” The crushed paper cup bounced off the edge of the trash can.

“He misses.”

I turned at the voice to my left. It was Lauren. She was never the prettiest girl. In fact, she was just pretty enough that you might think she was pretty, if she was your type. She’d always been good, plain, down to earth Lauren. The kind of girl that would wait for her betrothed, or assumed betrothed, to return home so that they could get married, raise a family, and grow old together. Real nice girl. She bent down and picked up the errant projectile and tossed it into its destined final place of rest.

She came over, and neither of us said anything. She just hugged me, and I hugged back. It felt good to be hugged, especially by such an old friend. As we held each other, I thought about what it would be like to finally settle down with a girl like Lauren. Oh, I had “settled down” before, but the matches were always disasters, which didn’t make the settling down last very long. Lauren was the kind of person anyone could settle down with, and not be settling for what you could get. I liked Lauren. She was very “real”.

“Thanks Laur. I needed that.”

She smiled sadly as she let me go. “I know.” She put her head down, and said, “I’ve been praying for Sue, that she makes it out okay. And for your parents’ souls. And for you.” She looked up at me with a sad look in her eyes that matched her smile. “How are you?”

“Well, I’m doing okay.” She looked at me skeptically, and I realized I didn’t know how I was. I hadn’t really digested everything that had happened. How could I, in such a short time? “Well, maybe not. I don’t know how the hell I’m doing. I don’t know a lot of things right now.” She nodded, knowing that was the case all along. She had a real good ability to know exactly what you were thinking, especially if you didn’t even know. She’d do well in my line of work. She was a teacher, instead. I guess that ability worked well with keeping the kids in line. The eyes in the back of the teacher’s head type thing.

“Have you gone to see your parents yet?” she asked softly.

I shook my head. “I only got in last night.” Again, she nodded. It must be a real burden when you’re omniscient, having to ask questions and pretend you don’t already know the answer just so you don’t freak out the common mortals. She truly was a great person. She and Pete would have been a perfect match. I decided not to mention that unless she brought it up first. I respected her too much to bring up something that would probably cause her so much pain.

“Why don’t we go right now then?” she suggested.

“Right now? Well, I guess now is as good a time as any. Wait, ‘we’? You’re coming with me?”

She laughed softly. “Of course, silly.” She took my arm and guided me towards the exit. “You think you can handle anything without your friends? I’m surprised you were able to get here by yourself. You didn’t take a taxi the whole way, did you?” she teased me.

“Ha! I’m not that damn hopeless. Am I?”

She laughed again. “Oh, Mickey.” She shook her head. I forgot she doesn’t like swearing. I’d watch my tongue around her. Offending her would not have been a good idea. “No, you’re not entirely hopeless, though I do worry about you sometimes. You should come home more often.” From anyone else I would have taken that as faulting me for not being here at the time of the accident. But not from her. We reached her modest car, something only one living on the luxurious salary of a teacher could afford.

“I have been gone a long time.”

“We miss you, Mickey. All of us.”

“Yeah.” I really hadn’t been home at all. I wasn’t exactly avoiding it, I just enjoyed living in the city. That wasn’t really true. I don’t know why I never came back anymore. Maybe I couldn’t face my parents after she… God damn memories. I rubbed my shoulder. Some things in life I just will never understand.

Lauren glanced at me. But she didn’t say anything. That meant more to me than anything else anyone had done for me so far. Some things were just too painful to think about, especially right now.

We drove the rest of the way in silence. It wasn’t awkward, it was quite nice actually. Plus it was a short trip from the hospital, so it didn’t really get the chance to become awkward. Lauren got out, and I unbuckled my seat belt but stayed in the car. She came around to my side and knocked on the window. I rolled it down partially.

“You coming? Or do you plan on staying in my car all day?” I said nothing, just sitting there. Her voice softened. “Mickey, I know this is really hard. But you have to do this. Come on. Let’s go.” I sat for a moment longer, and then got out of the car. If she could deal with the loss (and betrayal?) of the love of her life, I could deal with this. She took my hand and squeezed it, and we walked to the door.




I got back in the car. That was one of the hardest things I had ever done. Lauren got back in the car and squeezed my leg. “You okay?”

“Yeah. I think so. Yeah. I am.” I was. “It was damn hard though.” She allowed me my swearing, for now. Though it wouldn’t continue, after this.

“I know. I’m proud of you. I know how hard that must have been.” She started the car. “I think you’re going to be okay. I’m glad.”

“Well, guess we’re doing closed caskets for the funeral.”

She glanced at me and smiled slightly. She knew if I was joking, no matter how sardonic and morbid it was, I would be okay. And I would be.