Could I have been totally, brutally,
hypocritically
wrong?
The crisp air wakes Phil.
“Shut the flipping window!”
He’s hungry and cramped.
I find an encouraging smile.
“We’re almost home. Just coming
up on Lookout Pass. Couple hours.”
He burps. “Drop me in Coeur d’Alene, okay?
I’ve got a date with Krystal.”
I roll up the window and my eyes
at lover boy.
He unlocks his seatbelt, stretches,
bends forward and tunes in a country
western station, cranks it.
I turn it down.
He shakes his head, “That’s the grumpy
big sister I love. I wondered
where she went.”
I squeal around a corner. He hangs
on, mock terror. We both
laugh.
He slumps back, hands behind
his head, feet up on the dashboard,
grins massive enjoyment.
“So.” Phil bites his lower lip,
makes a loud sucking sound with his spit.
“You and Jaron? I told you so.”
I can’t keep this unrelenting hope
to myself. “I don’t know, Phil.”
He beats the rhythm on his knees.
“What’s not to know?”
I hunt through my heart, mind
and soul—but Jaron isn’t there.
“I don’t think I love him.”
It feels so good to say it—
let these whirling feelings
solidify in the clean mountain air.
Phil shakes his head. “You were just
playacting back there?”
I brake for another twisty corner.
“I was trying to convince him and myself
that I do, but there’s something in the way.”
Phil sits up, stomps his feet on the floor,
and slams his hands flat on the dash—
making me quiver, but I hang on to my wispy dream.
“I can’t believe this.” He glares at me.
“You’re going to mess up things with Jaron—
this is Jaron, Leesie—because of stupid jerk butt Michael? Flip, Leese.
The guy has screwed half of Asia by now,
and you want him back?”
“Don’t—” My hope wobbles under
his full frontal onslaught.
“That girl was a prostitute, Leese—”
“Shut up.” I fight to keep pictures of Michael’s
arms around that girl, her lips enmeshed with his,
her perfect body melding with his
from swamping me again. “Just, shut up!”
I grip the steering wheel, stare straight
ahead, clench my teeth. My foot gets
heavier and the pickup roars up over Lookout.
We’re heading downhill now—
picking up speed as gravity urges us forward.
The tires jitter over thousands of cracks
in the black asphalt.
Phil grabs my arm. “You want a husband
who does hookers?” The pickup swerves.
I jerk loose. “Stop it!” I scream.
who can’t keep it in his pants. It’s over.”
Phil’s locker room harshness shatters
the delicate castle I built in these clouds.
“You sniveling little brat, shut up!!”
I glare at him with venom—anger—loathing:
all our old acrimony reborn, redoubled.
“How dare you talk like that to me.”
Phil’s face twists in disgust.
“Open your flipping eyes!”
The pickup bumps and shudders.
Crap. I’m on the shoulder.
My right front wheel slips
off the pavement into soft gravel.
I jerk the wheel back the other way.
Too far, too fast at this speed. We
zig, screaming at each other,
back and forth across
two empty lanes that aren’t big enough.
I hit the brakes too late.
We smash into a cement barrier
with a jolt that launches Phil
through the front window,
explodes my airbag,
flinging my left hand into my face,
but doesn’t stop
the pickup from tipping off the side of the mountain
and smashing a path through a swath of young
pine trees.
I scream.
And scream.
Seconds become forever.
My body is flung against the seatbelt
over and over
as the truck rolls
out of control,
bam, my head bangs,
bam,
bam,
bam.
Silence.
Tinkling glass.
Hissing fluid.
Settling carnage.
I hang upside down,
covered in beads of windshield
and decimated baby pine trees,
held up by my seatbelt.
“Phil?” I reach over
to his empty seat. “Phil!”
My head explodes when I scream.
Sticky wet flows in my hair
and down my face. My left
hand throbs and my right arm won’t move.
My right fingers seem to work,
they pull themselves
to my seatbelt latch,
can’t punch the button.
There. Yes.
I crash to the ceiling.
Pain seers my right shoulder,
makes me puke, knifing agony
through my ribcage.
Why don’t I pass out?
The pickup shifts—
slides a few more feet.
When it stops, I gather my broken body,
push it through the windshield
that became thousands of tiny pellets
Phil? Oh, dear, dear God.
“Phil! Where are you?”
He doesn’t answer, the brat.
“Help me! Phil! Phil?”
There’s blood in my eyes.
My ankles crumple under my weight.
I sit alone on that mountain
in a violated grove
and pray,
Phil,
Phil,
Phil.
Chapter 32
AWAKENING
MICHAEL’S DIVE LOG—VOLUME #10
DIVE BUDDY: solo
DATE: 04/24
DIVE #:—
LOCATION: Los Angeles
DIVE SITE: LAX
WEATHER CONDITION: don’t know
WATER CONDITION: don’t know
DEPTH: don’t know
VISIBILITY: don’t know
WATER TEMP.: don’t know
BOTTOM TIME: don’t know
COMMENTS:
I stumble off the plane at LAX and try to call Leesie. I’ve got my phone, and my wallet and the clothes on my back. My scuba gear, my computer, and all that crap is back in my cabin on the Queen Nautica. Again.
No answer.
Nothing new there.
I don’t remember Leesie’s home phone number, so I call Gram.
“Hey, Gram. It’s me.”
“Michael?” She sounds horrible. “I’m so glad”—her voice breaks—“you called.” Sounds like she’s crying.
“What’s going on? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, But—”
“Freak. You scared me. I’m trying to find Leesie. Is she home? Have you seen her?”
“No. She isn’t home yet. There’s—” Gram breaks down and can’t continue.
“What is it?” I’m
filled up with real dread now, not just that uneasy haunting. “Listen, I’m in LA. I can be home in a few hours. I’m checking the flights now.”
Gram coughs and sniffs. “No. Don’t come down here. You better go to the hospital. She’ll need you.”
I stop walking down the airport hall. “Hospital?” Fear twists in my guts. “What’s happened?”
“Leesie drove that pickup off the side of Lookout Pass.”
I close my eyes, huddle over the phone. “No. She’s the best driver I know.”
“The Hunts left this morning for Kellogg. She’s in the hospital there. I have Stephie.”
“Is Leesie—” I can’t say it. “How bad, Gram?”
“She’s banged up—but she’s not critical.”
I crumple to my knees. The tears run down my face. People shove past me.
“There’s more.” She’s okay, what else matters? “It’s not good. Phil was with her. He didn’t make it.”
“Oh, my gosh. Poor, Leesie.” I’m on my feet, moving again, thinking like a robot. “How’s Stephie?”
“She doesn’t know yet.”
“What about Leesie’s mom?”
“She didn’t get out of the car. She was distraught.”
“And her dad?”
“Calm—in shock I guess. Red-rims around his eyes.”
“Phil’s dead?” I remember him planning eighty years with Krystal back in that wild graveyard on their farm. “I can’t believe it.”
“I’m praying for them.”
“Thanks, Gram. You do that. Where did you say they took her?”
“Kellogg—head east on I-90. You can’t miss it.”
“From Spokane? Head east?”
“Yeah.” Gram sniffs and manages to croak. “They were almost home.”
LEESIE’S MOST PRIVATE CHAPBOOK
POEM # 67, BROKEN
Light.
Colors moving.
Voices.
Pain blurring everything.
Nothing focuses.
Someone’s moaning.
Me? Maybe.
“Here, honey.”
A strange face.
A needle in my hand.
Then a voice I know.
Hands warm on my head.
Dad?
He strokes my cheek.
“Sleep, Leesie-girl. Sleep.”
“We love you, Leesie.
We love you.”
I struggle to speak.
Phil?
The sound doesn’t escape.
I’m drifting, drifting.
Pain recedes with the voices.
No faces return.
I move my head.
The moan gets louder.
“Lie still. Rest.”
Phil?
“Everything’s all right, now.”
Even Phil?
MICHAEL’S DIVE LOG—VOLUME #10
DIVE BUDDY: Leesie
DATE: 4/25
DIVE #:—
LOCATION: Kellogg, ID
DIVE SITE: Shoshone Medical Center
WEATHER CONDITION: misty
WATER CONDITION: none
DEPTH: overboard
VISIBILITY: clearer than I thought
WATER TEMP.: okay
BOTTOM TIME: all night
COMMENTS:
It’s midnight when I deplane in Spokane. The only way I could get here was through Seattle. Better than going through SLC or Vegas, but it took close to six hours. I could be halfway back to Hong Kong. I’m dead on my feet, haven’t seen a bed for two days. Maybe longer. I lost track. I’m too tired to rent a car and drive to Kellogg, but I’m standing in line at Avis anyway. I don’t even know the name of the hospital. But the place is almost Tekoa small.
“Kellogg?” The dude at the counter hands me keys and a bad map. “I-90 east. Probably take you an hour and a half.” He stares at my red eyes and haggard face. I wouldn’t blame him if he took the keys back.
I drive through Spokane, Coeur d’Alene, get lost in the inky night and effusion of stars overhead, pull into Kellogg around 2 AM. The only place open is a bar. I go in, ask a skinny waitress for directions to a hospital.
“You’ll be wanting Shoshone Medical Center.” She assesses me. “I heard there was a bad crash up on the pass. You know them?”
I don’t answer.
“It’s just up the road. Didn’t you see it when you came off the highway?”
I backtrack, find the place, park, tip back my head and close my eyes to gather myself for what waits for me inside this small, one story building with a heart-shaped stone fountain out front.
I must look pretty rough. They’ll take me for a patient. I get out and go in the front door. A girl in pale yellow scrubs sits at a desk in the lobby. “Can I help you?”
I’m still in shorts, T-shirt, and sandals. It’s below freezing out there. She’ll admit me as a nutcase.
“Leesie Hunt. They brought her in yesterday.”
She types keys. “Family only.”
“I’m her fiancé.” The lie sounds more true than anything I know. “I was bringing her this.” I pull the ring out and flash it for the girl. My voice gets tight. “I’ve been flying for like two days. I got to see her now.”
The girl gets dewy eyed. “Go on down.” She motions with her head toward a hallway and writes Leesie’s room number on a scrap of paper for me. “I’ll call the night nurse.”
I wander down the hall to a nurses’ station. I’ve never been in a hospital this tiny. Another nurse waits for me, sizes me up. “We didn’t expect you until the morning.”
Expect me? Maybe Gram called.
“Don’t make me wait.”
“No, of course not.” She guides me down the hall. “Her parents left a few hours ago, but she’s stirring a little bit. The brain swelling’s gone down faster than we expected. We’ve eased off her meds. She might come around.” She looks sideways at me. “I’d want you there when I woke up.”
Yeah, but will Leesie? “Does she know anything?”
The nurse shakes her head. “She’s been unconscious since they brought her in.”
“Should I tell her about her brother?”
“If she asks. Can you handle that?”
I nod.
The woman gets professional. “She’s got a fractured collar bone on the right side and three cracked ribs. They got her into surgery for her hand and nose right away. Her ankles were just sprained. The wound on her head came together nicely. The rest of the cuts were small. She was badly concussed, but she’s turned a corner there.”
“Did they tell you anything about Phil?”
“Dead on the scene. Ejected from the vehicle. No seatbelt.”
And I have to tell her that?
The nurse escorts me to a private room filled with flashing machines and a hospital bed. The thin, pale girl lying in the bed doesn’t look much like my beautiful Leesie. There’s plaster and gauze across her nose—but it doesn’t cover the angry bruising around her eyes. Her hair is shaved away from the gash that creeps down her forehead. Freak, she’ll hate that.
“Forty-two stitches,” the nurse whispers.
I search for something familiar. My eyes go to her left hand. It’s in a cast. No fingernail prints branding her mine.
“She’s got to lie still.” The nurse goes to a closet and takes down a pillow and blanket. “You understand me? No movement. We wrapped up her ribs and she’s got that brace on for her collar bone, but every movement will be painful for the next several days.” She hands me the bedding. “Try to get some rest. Call me if things start beeping.”
“And if she wakes up?”