Lynn Bulock - To Trust a Stranger

That hope was starting to fade, but Jessie tried to keep it alive even in the face of the gravity of the situation. Several cubicles in the unit were filled with people, and a full complement of doctors and nurses attending to them. Laura hadn’t shown any clarity or recognition yet.

The officer tossed a mostly empty coffee cup into the waste can in the corner of the family lounge. Hospital staff had shooed them out of Laura’s cubicle and hadn’t let them back in yet. “What do you mean?”

“Your title. It’s obviously not just plain ‘Mr.’ Gardner. Are you a deputy, a detective, what?”

“Technically I’m a deputy, and also an investigator. I’ve passed the test for detective but haven’t gotten the promotion officially yet.” He looked as tired as Jessie felt. She watched him reach up and try to knead a knot out of his neck. In this windowless room, Jessie realized she had no idea what time of day it was.

Looking down at her watch for the first time in a long while, Jessie felt shock. They’d been at the hospital over seven hours. “You probably were off duty hours ago, weren’t you?”

The deputy shrugged. “In a case like this, it doesn’t matter. Besides, I brought you here. If I leave now, how will you get back home?”

“I won’t be going home for a while. Not until I talk to my sister, or…” Jessie couldn’t force herself to finish her sentence.

“Or she is past the point of talking,” Deputy Gardner finished. “I’m likely to stay until then, too.”

“You don’t think she’s going to make it, do you?” Jessie challenged.

His dark eyes flashed. “I’m not a doctor, so I can’t predict what will happen. But I’ll admit that things don’t look good. If she makes it, she’ll be in the hospital a long time. You realize that, don’t you?”

Jessie nodded. She felt the same way, but she couldn’t think about saying goodbye to her sister. Laura was the only family she had. What would happen if she died? “I just wish there was something I could do.”

“Other than pray I don’t think there’s anything that anybody, including most of the doctors, can do for her right now.”

“Pray? Do you really think that helps anybody?” Did someone like this man who saw all the evil in life really believe in prayer? It sounded as likely as one of the urban legends she researched.

“I think it helps.” The deputy’s face held no hint of a smile. “Many times I think it’s the only thing that helps.”

“Suit yourself. I can’t imagine something like that helping.”

He looked at her silently and lifted one shoulder, seeming to wordlessly indicate that he wasn’t going to argue with her. That was good. There didn’t seem to be anybody else on her side except this deputy. This wasn’t the time for them to pick a fight.

Deputy Gardner finally went home in the early hours of the morning. He tried one more time to get Jessie to let him take her home. “They’ll call you if anything changes. You need some rest,” he argued.

Her temper flared. “How do you know what I need? It isn’t your sister in the intensive care unit.” Jessie regretted her words the moment she said them. This man had stayed with her at the hospital for hours and here she was snarling at him.

It made her feel even worse when he seemed to be fighting tears. He brushed the back of one hand over his eyes and sighed. “You’re right. I’m sorry I suggested it. But I’ve been up for about twenty hours and I have to go home and get some sleep and a shower. I just thought you might want to do the same.”

Jessie tried to keep calm. “Honestly, thank you for your concern but I’ll stay. I’m afraid that if they called me I wouldn’t have time to get back here.”

He nodded. “It could be a possibility. Is there anything I can bring you when I come back?”

Her mind felt totally blank. “Maybe breakfast that didn’t come from a vending machine. And a roll of quarters or a cell phone charger.”

“I think I’ll go for the quarters. There isn’t anyplace on this floor that we’re supposed to use a cell phone.” Jessie felt grateful that he understood that much. She didn’t want to get any farther from Laura than she had to. Even the nurses were beginning to point out problems that Laura was experiencing. Jessie knew that wasn’t a good sign. After midnight a doctor had been in to examine her, and then told them solemnly that they wouldn’t be preparing her for debriding and skin graft surgery in the morning.

That was when Jessie knew she was waiting out a vigil that would only last a day or so…perhaps a lot less. “Maybe you should just go into work instead of coming back here. Start trying to find out who did this to my sister,” she blurted with more anger than she expected.

“There are folks doing that already. We’ve got fire inspectors and crime scene investigators sifting through everything at Bando’s apartment. Until they’re done we can’t do much else.”

“Okay, then. I’ll see you later.”

“Try to get some sleep. I know they’ll wake you up if you sleep in the family waiting room.” Jessie remembered seeing several recliners tucked into corners there and she could almost hear one calling her name.

“I’ll get some rest, as much as I can.” Jessie didn’t expect to sleep with everything going on, but was surprised how quickly exhaustion claimed her when she pulled a soft blanket over her in the vinyl chair.

It only felt like a few minutes later that someone was shaking her awake. “Ms. Barker? Laura’s more alert. And the doctor wants to let her off the ventilator soon so that she can talk a little if she’s able.”

Jessie came out of the blur of sleep, sitting up in the darkened room. The clock on the wall announced that someone had pulled the shades to block the morning sun. She felt thankful that the other families had vacated the room and let her sleep into daylight hours. She tried to digest the nurse’s words. Did taking Laura off the ventilator mean she was rallying or that this was a last time to talk?

“Is Deputy Gardner back? Or should you call him?”

“He’s on the way,” the young nurse said. “Now why don’t we find you a cup of coffee and a little time to wash up and you can go see your sister.”

Jessie took a few minutes to pull herself together. She tried to avoid really looking in the mirror, knowing she wouldn’t like what she saw. She felt haggard and haunted and knew from experience there would be circles under her eyes. Splashing cool water on her face, she found a comb in her purse and ran it through her hair.

Then she remembered who she would be seeing. This was her beautiful sister who was always after her to take better care of herself. Drawing a shaky breath, Jessie forced herself to do her hair with more attention and found a tube of lipstick in the bottom of her purse. She willed her hand not to shake as she put it on, and then went in to see Laura.

Jessie stifled a gasp when she saw her sister. Laura seemed to have gone downhill rapidly in the five hours or so that she’d been sleeping. Her face was even puffier than before, and bruises of all colors streaked everywhere. Still, there was a little more focus to her one good eye. Jessie saw that the head of Laura’s bed was raised so that she was lifted into a better position to breathe or speak.

The nurse who’d gotten Jessie from the family lounge positioned herself there, leaning over. “Laura? We’re going to take you off the ventilator like we talked about. You may not be able to stay off of it long, but this will give you a chance to talk to your sister.”

Then the nurse looked at Jessie. “I’m going to have to ask you to step to the doorway for just a moment so that we can take the breathing tube out. I’ll call you back in less than a minute.”

Jessie nodded, too upset to speak right now without letting Laura hear the panic she felt. She stepped to the other side of the curtain that made up the front wall of Laura’s cubicle. Outside Deputy Gardner was there again.

He didn’t look much more rested than she did. His hair was slicked back as if still wet from the shower and his blue shirt and red tie looked hastily put on. “Ms. Barker. They paged me at home. Are things worse?”

“It looks like it. They’re taking her off the ventilator so that she can talk.” Jessie felt her eyes fill with tears. “Do you want to speak to her first? I know you need to ask her questions about who did this.”

The investigator shook his head. “You need to talk to her before I do. She’s on enough pain medication that she may not be able to answer my questions anyway. Plus, she’ll probably panic if she sees a stranger first. When you’ve had a chance to talk, maybe I’ll come in.”

Jessie appreciated his kindness, but she knew that there might not be much time. She wanted him to get as much information as he could, to find out who had done this to her sister.

“You can come in with me now. I’ll tell her who you are. And after we’ve had a chance to talk I’ll let you have your time.” It was important that Laura talked to the deputy in case she could identify her attacker.

The nurse motioned them back in and Jessie went to the head of Laura’s bed, sitting in the chair next to her and making herself stay dry-eyed. “Hi, sweetie. It’s me. I’ll stay here as long as you want me to.” Her sister’s hand reached out and grasped hers with surprising strength. “And the man with me here is Deputy Steve Gardner. He’s one of the people investigating what happened yesterday.”

There were so many things she wanted to say to her sister. So many questions that she might never have time to ask. I will not cry now she promised herself. “I love you,” she told Laura. It was the most important thing she could say.

Laura’s breathing was rough and uneven. Her hand let go of Jessie’s and reached for her face. The effort failed before she made contact. “Jessie?” The word rasped out of her sister like a rusty gate swinging open. “You’re beautiful.” The effort of three words seemed to use all her strength. Jessie didn’t push for more. Instead she grasped Laura’s hand again gently and patted it as softly as possible.

Laura’s breathing became ragged and panic played across her ruined face. “We’re going to have to put you back on oxygen,” the nurse said as she stepped in. “I’m sorry you didn’t get to speak to her.” Jessie realized that the nurse was looking over her shoulder at the deputy.

“Next time,” he said.

Jessie felt like thanking him for his brave words. There probably wouldn’t be a next time, but there was no sense in saying that in front of Laura. In a few minutes her sister was breathing easier again, pure air going to her lungs and pain-killing drugs coursing through her system. Jessie sat in the hard plastic chair still patting Laura’s hand and willing herself not to cry. She felt so many regrets, and most of them went back more years than she wanted to admit.

Unbidden, her mind swirled back to an incident twenty years before. She could almost hear the leaves crunching under their feet as they walked home from school to the foster home where they shared a set of bunk beds.

Even then she’d been hard on her sister. “So you had that dream again. It’s just a dream, Laura. Nobody will ever believe it’s real. I’m not sure I even believe it’s real anymore.” Their foster mother, Mrs. Dinkins, always said that Jessie was the smart one and Laura was the pretty one. Being smart didn’t seem to matter even back then, because Laura could charm her way out of almost anything.