The Fixer Upper Part 30

We tucked it around Ella Kate's unmoving body. "What now?" he asked. "Do you want to wait for the EMTs, or go ahead and get her to a hospital?"

"Hospital," I said grimly. "The dispatcher couldn't tell me how soon an ambulance could get here."

While Tee drove, I opened the first-aid kit and found some yellowed cotton b.a.l.l.s and a bottle of rubbing alcohol. I dabbed the alcohol-soaked cotton on a nasty sc.r.a.pe on Ella Kate's cheek. She moaned softly.

"Ella Kate," I said, rubbing her hands between mine. "It's Dempsey. We found you. We're on the way to the hospital. Shorty's here. He's okay. You're gonna be okay too."

She was very cold and very still. But she was alive.

I called the 911 dispatcher while Tee drove, and she gave us directions to the nearest emergency room at the Medical Center of Central Georgia.

"How's she doing?" Tee called over his shoulder.

"She's breathing," I reported. "And maybe I'm imagining things, but I think I'm seeing a little color coming back to her face."

"Can you see any injuries?" he asked.

"Just the cut to her face," I said, "but G.o.d knows, I'm no doctor. How's Shorty doing?"

Tee reached out and patted the dog's head. "I think he's flat worn out," he said. "But he's breathing too, so I'm just gonna think positive thoughts and a.s.sume everybody is okay."

Fifteen minutes later, we saw the lights of the hospital's emergency room entrance. Tee pulled up to the ambulance ramp, a pair of wide double doors opened, and two orderlies rushed out with a gurney. Shorty gave a half-hearted warning bark when he saw his mistress being unloaded by strangers, but Tee quickly picked him up and held him close to his chest.

"Can you stay with Shorty while I go back with Ella Kate?" I asked.

He nodded agreement. "I saw a McDonald's as we were driving up. Maybe I'll go get us a couple of cheeseburgers."

Shorty whimpered softly. "I wouldn't give him much," I warned. "He has just had stomach surgery. Maybe just a piece of bun or something."

"Can I bring you something? It's been a h.e.l.l of a long night."

I shook my head no.

"Call me on my cell as soon as they give you a report on her, will you?" Tee asked. "I've got to give Dad an update. He's kinda fond of the old buzzard."

I promised I would, and he leaned in and gave me a quick kiss that seemed as natural as the hug that followed.

The next couple of hours were a blur. I gave the admissions clerk what little vital statistics I had on Ella Kate, along with the Medicare card I'd found in her pocketbook. I found a seat in a waiting room crowded with patients and families whose lives had been impacted by the storm. There was a cartoon show on the television, and lukewarm coffee from a machine. At some point, a young Pakistani woman in surgical scrubs came out to the emergency room waiting area to fill me in on Ella Kate's condition.

"Ms. Timmons-is she your mother?" Dr. Bhiwandi asked, sitting down in the empty chair next to mine.

"G.o.d forbid," I said with a laugh. "She's sort of a cousin, I've been told."

"But you are her next of kin, correct?"

It took a moment for me to absorb the idea, but I nodded, in a half-hearted way.

"Well, whatever relation you are to her, she is very fortunate that you went looking for her," Dr. Bhiwandi said briskly. "I think she's slightly concussed. She fell on the ice. She has contusions on her arms and backside, and she has a hairline fracture to her right hip."

"It's not broken?" I said anxiously.

"No," Dr. Bhiwandi said. "She's in some pain, and we've given her medicine for that. And she's somewhat dehydrated, so we're giving her IV fluids, as well as antibiotics because of the cuts and sc.r.a.pes. Other than that, your cousin seems surprisingly intact, and lucid, given her age and the circ.u.mstances of her rescue."

"Rescue? I wouldn't say it was really a rescue. She was missing, and my friend and I went looking for her, that's all. She's not really supposed to be driving. The sheriff took away her driver's license earlier this year."

"Ms. Timmons is seventy-nine," Dr. Bhiwandi said. "Or so she told me before she drifted off to sleep again. Believe me, at her age, and with her illness, she would not have survived for long in this cold if you and your friend had not found her. So I would call it a rescue, definitely. And what about her husband? How did he fare in this accident? She seemed quite concerned about him. Was he brought in here tonight too?"

"Oh, Ella Kate's not married," I said.

She frowned. "Shorty? That's who she was worried about. A friend, perhaps?"

"c.o.c.ker spaniel," I said. "I guess you'd say Shorty is her best friend. He was in the car with her. I think he's all right. If Ella Kate wakes up again, you can tell her Shorty's just fine."

"You can tell her yourself," Dr. Bhiwandi responded. She stood up and yawned. "Forgive me. It's been a very long night. We're waiting for a room to open up, and as soon as that happens, and she's had some sleep, you can have a nice visit with your cousin. I know she'll be anxious to see you."

"Well, maybe," I said, biting my lip at the memory of our last, angry exchange.

A high-pitched beep came from the pager on Dr. Bhiwandi's hip. She unclipped the pager, looked at its screen, and sighed. "I'm sorry. I seem to have a small crisis with another patient." She shook my hand, and turned and walked quickly back toward the treatment area. I was about to call Tee, to give him an update, but something the doctor had said struck me.

"Dr. Bhiwandi?" I called, rus.h.i.+ng toward the treatment room door. She stopped and turned around.

"Yes?"

"You said something about Ella Kate's illness? What illness is that?"

She raised an eyebrow, and her smooth, placid face was suddenly full of furrows.

"The breast cancer, of course."

The door opened, and a nurse popped her head out. "Dr. Bhiwandi?"

"Sorry," the doctor told the nurse. "Sorry," she told me. And then she was gone.

43.

I walked slowly back to the chair where I'd been sitting. A sullen-looking teenage girl was sitting there, holding a b.l.o.o.d.y towel to her right cheek. An infant slept in a baby carrier at her feet. The girl glowered up at me and I beat a hasty retreat.

Every seat in the emergency room waiting area was taken. Toddlers were whining, babies were crying, adults moaned and coughed and stared blankly at the droning television.

I found a vacant piece of wall and collapsed against it. My cell phone rang. It was Tee.

"Hey," he said. "I thought you were going to give me an update on Ella Kate."

"Sorry," I said. "Where are you?"

The outer door opened and Tee walked in. "Right here," he said.

I closed the phone and put it back in my pocket.

"She's all right," I said. "The doctor just now came out to talk to me. She's got a slight concussion, a hairline fracture to her right hip, and some bruises on her arms and b.u.t.t. She apparently fell on the ice. They're giving her IV fluids, pain meds, and antibiotics, and they'll admit her as soon as a bed is freed up."

"Thank G.o.d," Tee said, leaning up against the wall beside me. His hand glanced mine, and I pulled away.

"Tee. Ella Kate has breast cancer."

"What? Since when?"

"I don't know. The doctor just sort of casually mentioned it. I guess she a.s.sumed I already knew about it."

"You didn't."

"She never said a word about cancer to me. I mean, I took her to the drugstore, to pick up some prescriptions, but I just a.s.sumed they were for high blood pressure or something. I had no idea-"

Suddenly, my legs felt rubbery and my head was fuzzy. I sank down to the floor, pulling my knees up to my chest and resting my forehead on my knees.

Tee dropped down beside me. "Hey," he said, touching my shoulder. "Are you okay? Do I need to get a nurse or somebody?"

"I'm okay," I said. "Just...numb. It's a lot to take in." I looked up at him. "How about you? Did you eat something? Where's Shorty?"

"We split a Big Mac," Tee said. "I ate most of it though. I walked him in the parking lot for a little bit. He's obviously p.o.o.ped. I left him sleeping on the backseat of Dad's car."

"Did you talk to your dad?"

Tee nodded. "He was relieved to hear from me. I told him I'd call again in the morning, once we know more. He's gonna call a tow truck to pick up what's left of the Catfish."

I groaned. "It's probably totaled, huh?"

"DOA," he said cheerfully. "How about you? Want to get out of here? I got us a room for the night. There's a Comfort Inn right down the street. We can sneak Shorty in."

"Tee-" I started.

He cut me off at the pa.s.s. "There's no sense in trying to drive back to Guthrie tonight. The roads are still all messed up, and I figured you'd want to check on Ella Kate in the morning. No arguments, okay? The room's a double. You can have your own bed, and Shorty can bunk with me. Just us boys."

"All right." I struggled to my feet. He gave me a hand up. He was like that. Solid. "How come you're so nice to a b.i.t.c.h like me?" I asked.

He gave me a lopsided grin. "I'm a sucker for a pretty face."

I stripped down to my long johns and crawled into the bed. When I woke up in the morning, Tee was just coming into the room, with a wriggling bundle wrapped in Uncle Norbert's army blanket under his arm, a Styrofoam coffee cup in hand.

He put Shorty down on the floor, and the dog sat down on his haunches and solemnly surveyed the room. After a moment, he trotted over to my bed and put his paws on the edge of the mattress. I reached down and hauled him up and onto the bed. I reached over and scratched his ears. He sniffed my hand tentatively, then lay down on top of the covers.

"I guess this means we're friends," I told Tee. "I think this is the first time he's ever given me the time of day."

"Who, Shorty? He's not such a bad little mutt," Tee said, handing me the coffee. "At least he's housebroken. He got up at the dot of seven and started scratching at the door. We went outside, he did his thing, and then we went for coffee. We decided to let you sleep while you could."

I sat up in bed and pried the lid off the coffee. "Thank G.o.d," I said, taking a sip of the steaming brew. I looked up at him in surprise. "Not bad."

"We're in Macon, Dempsey," he said, sitting down on the bed opposite mine. "They've got Starbucks and running water and everything."

"That's not what I meant," I said, taking another sip. "How's the weather?"

"Not a cloud in the sky," Tee said. "The sun's s.h.i.+ning, most of the ice is gone. It's as if the storm didn't even happen."

"It happened," I said, making a face and holding up my hand, which had started to throb. Angry red streaks emanated from the jagged cut on the palm.

"You might need st.i.tches," Tee said. "Maybe you should let the ER docs look at it when we check on Ella Kate."

I yawned and stretched and swung my feet out of the bed. "I just want a shower," I said, heading for the bathroom.

I noticed with grat.i.tude that Tee was an exceptional bathroom sharer. The toilet seat was down. The sink had been wiped clean. His damp towel was folded and hung on the rod on the back of the door, and he'd left me clean towels, and more important, a toothbrush, on the bathroom counter.

Tee was lounging on his bed, watching SportsCenter on the television, when I came out of the bathroom, reasonably clean, although dressed in the previous day's clothes.

I sat down on the edge of his bed. "How come you're so perfect?" I asked, eyeing him suspiciously. "I treat you like c.r.a.p. And then you help rescue my extremely unpleasant cousin, take care of her dog, rent us a room for the night, bring me coffee in the morning, and even get me a toothbrush and toothpaste? All of this without trying to jump my bones? Are you for real?"

His eyes never left the television. An announcer in a bad plaid jacket was doing an in-depth a.n.a.lysis of the Atlanta Braves pitching staff.

"What?" he said absentmindedly.

I picked up the remote and clicked the television off. "Okay, so you're not perfect. You keep on watching television when somebody's talking to you. Did you even hear anything I just said?"

He took the remote away from me and switched the television on again. "d.a.m.n," he said. "Smoltzie's gone. We got no relievers, and n.o.body who can go the distance. And don't even get me started on the infield. We're toast. I don't know what the front office is thinking. We never should have let Andruw Jones go. He had a slump, but lots of guys have slumps."

"Tee?" I said, waving my hand in front of his eyes. "Anybody home? I'm trying to have a serious conversation here?"

He gave a deep, martyred sigh, and turned down the volume, although he did not turn the television off.

"I am a far from perfect man," he said finally, his eyes meeting mine. "My faults are legion. According to some women in my past, I have an unfortunate tendency to hog the covers. I'm absentminded. I might not remember your birthday until the day before, if I'm in the middle of a big case or work gets crazy, and I lose things, I mean, things like keys, cell phones, and sungla.s.ses. I lost a car once, in the parking lot at Lenox Square Mall, at Christmas. I don't like big loud parties, because I suck at small talk and I can't remember people's names. I crack my knuckles when I'm bored. I fall asleep in movie theaters, unless it's a James Bond movie. I won't eat raw oysters. They are an abomination against man, so don't even try to get me to try them. I feel the same way about lima beans and sus.h.i.+. But I'm loyal to a fault. And I really, really care about you, Dempsey. I keep thinking you're gonna wake up one morning, and realize that you care about me too, and you'll quit treating me like c.r.a.p."

I bit my lip.

He rolled his eyes and turned up the volume again. "Don't start crying on me again, okay?" Tee said. "I'm no good with criers."

I laid my forehead on his shoulder. He'd somehow managed to find himself a clean s.h.i.+rt. "I'll try not to be a crier," I said, in a tiny voice. "And Tee? I hate sus.h.i.+ too. And I really, really do care about you. Really."

"Good." He gave my shoulder an awkward pat. "Anyway," he said. "I kinda like the dog."

Ella Kate was sitting up in the hospital bed, spooning red Jell-O into her mouth at an alarming rate. Her iron gray hair was matted to her head, and she had a piece of gauze adhesive-taped to the cut on the side of her face, and an IV needle attached to her arm, which was blooming with ugly purplish-black bruises. Her other arm had a matching set of bruises.

I stood in the open doorway and knocked tentatively. "Ella Kate? Do you feel like company?"