Sucker Punched
He couldn't take it back.
Nothing.
Not a single word.
Crane stared wide eyed for several seconds before scrambling from his hands and knees to an upright position. He skidded to where Adam had fallen and nearly crashed into his brother.
Careful!
Despite the terror of his situation Crane reminded himself to breathe deeply and gain control of his emotions. Already Crane spied a rivulet of blood creeping from under Adam's head. He licked his lips and used two fingers to feel for his brother's pulse. Reassured that he could detect a heartbeat Crane repositioned his fingers to Adam's Cupid's bow and closed his eyes. The exhaled air barely stirred against his fingers but even that pitiful amount meant Adam still breathed.
A wave of emotion slammed over him and Crane bit the edge of his lip to keep himself steadied. Crying or falling apart now wouldn't do anything but endanger Adam.
Endanger him more.
He had already catapulted his brother's life into this inescapable danger.
Why hadn't he halted his tantrum at any point before it produced irreversible damage? Not ten minutes ago Adam had reminded him sternly that by the age of twelve Crane should have completely outgrown tantrums.
A feeling of hopelessness paralyzed him.
To fight it Crane rose to his feet and scanned the horizon.
Victory! He could make out Brian's strong figure in the field below him working alongside Daniel. For a moment Crane stood frozen, afraid to let Adam out of his sight. Then rational thinking emerged and he yanked open the driver's side door of the family's battered pickup truck and shoved as hard as he could on the horn. Without releasing hold with his right arm Crane swung his left in an arc and prayed the sound would carry its insistent blast across the field.
It did!
Both Daniel and Brian whipped around to identify the noise.
Crane pumped his fist in the air. Brian and Daniel exchanged panicked glances and raced toward him. He watched every footfall they made as they closed the distance and focused so intently on their impending help that Brian had to reach in the truck and snatch Crane's hand off the horn.
"What?" Brian demanded. "What's happened?"
The abrupt silence proved nerve wracking. When Crane didn't respond Brian grabbed his younger brother by both arms and shook him. "Tell me!"
"Brian!" Daniel screamed from the truck's passenger side. "Over here! Adam's hurt and blood's everywhere…" The last of the eight year old's pronouncement dwindled into a whimper.
Brian released Crane so abruptly that Crane had to grab the door jamb to maintain his balance. He quickly jogged to the other side of the truck where Brian crouched beside Adam.
With his seventeen year old brother now in control Crane didn't try to fight tears. He wiped at his eyes as he offered, "I was throwing the hay bales up to him and one hit him in the chest and knocked him backwards out of the truck bed. It was an accident, Brian, I swear!"
Brian considered the overall scene. "Looks like he slammed his head on this boulder. We've got to be really proactive here. The risk of a concussion and brain swelling means we need to move. How long's he been out?"
"I don't know!" Crane began to cry and a wide eyed Daniel moved over to throw his arms around his brother. Crane pushed him away. "It's my fault, Brian, all my fault 'cause I was fussing and so mad at him 'cause…."
"Tell me later," Brian interrupted. "You two help me get Adam up and into the truck cab. We have to be quick to get him medical attention."
Brian leaned down and slid his arms under his older brother's legs and back. "Thank God for football training," he mumbled. "All right now," he turned to the boys. "Daniel, get the door open and slide onto the seat to help position him. Crane, get on the other side and give me a hand."
The boys scrambled into action and Brian kept firm hold on his brother as he braced himself to gather Adam's weight. He straightened and Crane absorbed as much of Adam's weight as he could from his own position.
The three worked efficiently.
Brian yanked off his hat and motioned toward the house. "Get down to the barn and house and tend to the other Itty Bitties and Guthrie. Crane, take charge until I get back."
To their credit, the younger two appeared to understand the gravity of the situation and they nodded in agreement. Then they stepped off of the road and watched wide eyed but silently as Brian climbed into the driver's seat, slammed the door, and gunned the engine as he raced down the road toward help.
Daniel kicked at the bundle of straw which had knocked Adam off balance. Half of the straw had fallen out and scattered across the shoulder. Weighted with guilt, Crane began rounding up fistfuls of loose straw and shoving them underneath the binding which criss-crossed the bale.
Wordlessly Daniel stooped to help and the boys finished in a couple of minutes. They shoved the bale back across the road to join the bales still waiting to be loaded onto the truck.
Crane regarded the straw. Only one load had actually made it onto the truck bed. Adam had leaned down to yank the second load as Crane thrust it upward.
Only he hadn't thrust it, had he?
No, angry that Adam refused to allow him to camp out with friends that weekend, Crane shoved his weight against the bale and caught Adam off balance. Adam tumbled backward out of the truck bed and slammed into the dirt and onto the rock.
"Come on," Crane directed Daniel. "We should hurry and clean up where you and Brian were working and head to the house."
Though he followed obediently, Daniel began to cry moments later. "How hurt is he? Is Adam gonna die like Mama and Daddy?"
Crane clenched his teeth as a stab of pain shot through him. Their family would never recover from the deaths of their parents but in the past year and a half- under Adam's guidance- they had started to heal.
Crane sucked in a breath. Now he had jeopardized the security of all seven McFaddens.
The twelve year old slipped an arm onto Daniel's shoulders. "Brian will call us soon and explain about the injury, about what the doctor says."
Daniel's frightened brown eyes met Crane's desperate blue ones. "Will Adam go to Heaven?"
"No," Crane replied sharply. "Adam won't die. God knows he has to come home to us. He won't go to Heaven for years and years."
Daniel didn't respond.
The boys worked efficiently to pack up the tools Brian and Daniel had abandoned minutes earlier and then trudged the rest of distance to the house. Daniel appeared reconciled to bad news and Crane added his brother's fatalism to his own shroud of guilt.
Once home Crane led the kids through the normal afternoon schedule and managed to feign optimism as he explained Adam's accident and Brian's rush to the hospital. Still, the younger boys found it difficult to comprehend why Adam would need medical attention at all. Ford insisted they all pray out loud and Crane readily participated, having prayed over and over again in his head since the accident.
The phone rang as they finished supper and Crane hurried to answer, halfway convinced Brian would announce Adam's death.
But he didn't.
Instead, the exhausted voice on the other end shared that the doctors diagnosed Adam's concussion as bad enough that he had to remain in the hospital at least a couple of days.
Crane repeated the news to the other boys but rather than calm them, the information catapulted their worry into full blown meltdowns steeped in undeterred bouts of fear.
They wanted Adam!
Crane tried his best to calm them and present positive scenarios but he found it difficult to sound convincing when he himself felt just as terrified. Bath time and bed time reached nightmarish proportions as the younger McFaddens insisted Crane fill the baths, read their stories, and hear their nighttime prayers the exact same way Adam did every night.
He couldn't do it.
He failed all the way around, and four little boys cried themselves to sleep because of him.
When an exhausted Brian crept into the house after ten o'clock Crane greeted him from his watch station on the couch. Brian slipped upstairs to check the little ones while Crane heated him food from supper.
Brian sank wearily into his chair and picked up his fork.
Crane slid into the seat across from him. "Tell me Brian, please. I know you're whipped and hungry and have got to sleep, but tell me the truth."
Brian swallowed a bite of potato. "Adam woke up and remembers the accident. He's lucid now and wants to come home but the doctors shot that down. He has a pretty bad concussion and they want him monitored just to make sure there's no brain bleed."
Crane licked his lips. "Ok."
Brian gulped a swallow of iced tea. "Adam wants to see you tomorrow, all of you, everybody, I mean."
Shame flooded him but Crane nodded and whispered, "Ok."
"You want to tell me?" Brian invited, breaking apart his roll. "I know I didn't let you explain this afternoon."
Crane pushed back from the table and stood. "Nothing to tell except I got really angry that Adam wouldn't let me camp out. I said some mean things to him like I wish I didn't have him for a brother and I wish I didn't have to live with him." Crane shifted from one foot to the other.
"Adam knows you didn't mean it," Brian comforted.
Crane ignored the solace. "Then to show how upset he'd made me I shoved the bale at him before he'd gotten situated. It knocked him backwards off the truck." Crane walked out of the room but turned back to add, "You know the rest."
Not until he had taken his shower and tiptoed into Adam's room did Crane allow himself to really and truly fall apart. He slid under the covers of his brother's bed and sobbed himself to sleep.
Despite Brian's cautions the younger boys raced pell mell into the hospital the next morning. Brian enlisted Crane's help to calm them before they actually descended upon Adam and between them they eventually ushered a sober Guthrie, Ford, Evan, and Daniel ahead of them.
Crane halted at the doorway and watched the boys gleefully flank Adam.
Big as Adam was the hospital bed swallowed him. An IV dripped into his arm and gauze bandaging wrapped the circumference of his skull. Crane spied the tell-tell black knots from stitches visible underneath the sterile covering.
Brian pulled the room's armchair up to the bed and Guthrie and Ford scampered up and used the cushions as a ladder to grab, then pat, Adam's arm. Daniel and Evan stationed themselves at Adam's other side. One gripped his brother's hand and the other stroked Adam's leg under the cover.
Brian perched on the radiator, his long legs crossed in front of him.
Strangely enough the boys remained speechless while they regarded their patriarch with relieved eyes. Adam spoke softly and soothingly and Crane watched as the fear dissipated in the group and the boys visibly relaxed.
Crane met his brother's eyes and Adam motioned to him. Instead of obeying Crane stayed put, casting his eyes downward to focus on the floor's linoleum.
A nurse padded in to check Adam's vitals and the children introduced themselves politely, grinning at Adam and preening like peacocks when she complimented their wonderful manners.
Once she left Adam inclined his head toward Brian and raised his eyebrows. "I think these boys deserve a treat. That same nurse told me earlier that the cafeteria has quite a selection of ice cream."
Within seconds the kids had deserted their posts and scrambled into the hall to follow Brian.
Adam waited until their voices trailed toward the elevator before he spoke. "Come to me, please Crane."
In reply, Crane shook his head as the words tumbled, "I didn't mean what I said and Adam I'm so sorry for what I did!"
"Come here," Adam repeated before adding firmly, "now, Crane."
Crane's troubled eyes met his brother's unreadable expression. He obeyed, stopping once he reached the foot of the bed.
Adam held up the arm with the IV and scooted himself so that his back rested against the safety rail. He repositioned the IV tubing and patted the space he had vacated. "Come to me."
Crane's lip wobbled and he whispered, "I don't want to hurt you."
"You won't hurt me. Come to me."
Crane slipped around the rail and levered himself onto the mattress. He moved onto his side, facing his brother.
Adam leaned down and spread the cover over both of them before kissing the top of the blond head.
Crane reached up and tousled the curls Adam had kissed. "I'm so sorry," Crane began to sob. "I didn't mean any of that, Adam. I love you and I…."
"Hush," Adam interrupted. He pulled Crane against him and began rubbing the thin back. "I forgive you and I'm not mad at you. I haven't been mad at all. I know you didn't mean what you said and did."
Adam stopped talking and waited patiently for the sobs to slow. When they finally did he tilted Crane's chin up and whispered, "Look at me."
Crane complied and Adam used a finger to swipe at the tears beading his little brother's lashes. "Crane, no matter what you say or do I will never stop loving you. It's a given, our forged in stone relationship, ok?"
Crane nodded and Adam continued, "But what happened with you yesterday? What would you call that?"
"I don't know," Crane admitted softly.
"Sucker punched," Adam supplied. "Sucker punched because you never expected your actions would bring about the consequences that followed. You never saw it coming."
"Yes, sucker punched," Crane agreed. He spoke honestly, "I deserve a big punishment, Adam. I know that. You can spank me or ground me and I'm not going to get upset because I deserve whatever you decide."
"No Crane, no punishment from me," Adam contradicted. "You have punished yourself pretty roughly already. I don't think you'll ever forget these two days, right?"
"Yes," Crane agreed. "I mean no, I won't forget. I wish I could, though."
Adam continued, "You will have to decide how to avoid ever again feeling the way you have for these past hours. And while you're thinking about that, always remember in the back of your head that I will never stop loving you-ever."
Crane slid an arm over his brother's waist and burrowed against the familiar security of Adam's muscular body.
When the rest of the McFaddens returned half an hour later they met another nurse just slipping from the room. She grinned conspiratorially and placed a finger to her lips. "Quiet, please, your brothers are both peacefully asleep."