"Well String, I guess you didn't expect to be back here quite so soon?" Dominic Santini quipped as he stopped the jeep in the parking lot of Northridge Medical Centre.
It had been a scant two weeks since Hawke had been discharged, after his little mishap and both men had believed that they had seen the last of this place.
At least, for a little while.
Stringfellow Hawke nodded in response to Santini's question.
"Look, String, do you really think they'll let you see her?"
"No."
"So what will you do?"
"Lie."
"Oh …."
"And if that doesn't work, I'll call Archangel and get him to pull some strings for me. Now that I know where she is, Dom, I can't just walk away and let it go."
"Of course not. You're Stringfellow Hawke," Santini sighed deeply.
"Even if it doesn't work out, she still needs a friend, Dom, someone in her corner, batting for her. I can do that much for her. Like you do, for me, whenever I'm in trouble. She's all alone in the world. If she needs someone to be an advocate for her, then I can do that. I got to know her pretty well in the dream," Hawke explained. "Besides, the doctor in the dream once told me, that he thought that people in comas could still hear. That someone talking to them could somehow reach them. They don't always remember it, when they wake up, but, if, there is a chance that she might hear me …."
"Yeah, well, I guess you're right. Want some company?"
"Thanks, but," Hawke's voice trailed away and he threw the older man an apologetic look.
"I know. Some things ya just gotta do alone," Santini reached out and squeezed Hawke's shoulder reassuringly.
"Thanks, Dom."
Hawke slipped out of the passenger seat and Santini watched him walk toward the hospital entrance, his heart in his mouth as he wondered what awaited his young friend inside.
He sincerely hoped that it wasn't yet more heartbreak and disappointment.
"What do you mean she's not here?" Hawke demanded of the woman manning the reception desk in the main lobby of Northridge Hospital. She was in her early twenties with a cute smile, as she eyed him with obvious interest, but, this was lost on Stringfellow Hawke.
"All I can tell you is that Miss Maynard is no longer a patient at this facility, Sir," the young woman with deep brown eyes and flame red hair told him politely.
"Then where is she?" Hawke demanded again.
"Are you a relative?"
This time the woman regarded him with an arched eyebrow, and he suspected that she already knew that Helen Maynard had no next of kin listed on her personal details, which were probably being displayed on a computer screen on the desk, where he could not see them.
"Not exactly," Hawke sighed deeply, tempted to lie and say that he was her husband or her brother or even her long lost cousin Fred from Wisconsin, but his conscience wouldn't let him.
"Then I am sorry, Sir, but I cannot give you any information. All patient records are confidential."
"Can't you at least tell me when she was discharged?"
"No, Sir. Sorry."
"Please? I've come a long way to find her."
"I am sorry, Sir."
"Dammit, this is crazy! Can you at least tell me if she's alive or dead!"
"Sir, if you don't calm down, I will have no choice but to call security, and have you removed from the premises."
"Ok, ok, I'm going," Hawke sighed deeply. "Just tell me one thing, will you, please?"
"I cannot give out a patient's personal details," she told him once again. "Hospital policy."
"I know that, but there's no hospital policy that says you can't tell me just how many facilities in California specifically cater for the needs of comatose patients, and where they are located, is there?"
"Oh, well, no. I can do that for you, Sir, certainly. Wait just a moment."
The young woman disappeared into a separate back office and returned a few minutes later with a piece of paper, a computer print out, which she handed to Hawke with a flourish and a wide smile.
"Thank you," he took it with an audible sigh of relief.
Hawke glanced down at the printed page, but he thought that he already knew what he would see there.
The list was short.
Two private hospitals up in Northern California, on the outskirts of San Francisco, one specialist clinic down South, near San Diego and one further in land, near to Mount Whitney.
Not too far from Lone Pine.
In a little town, in the foothills, called ….
Elkington.
Hawke drew in a deep breath and expelled it slowly, the young woman behind the desk watching him with interest.
"Are you all right, Sir?"
"Yes. Thank you. Thanks for this."
"You're welcome, Sir."
Hawke turned around then and walked slowly back out to the parking lot.
"Well?" Santini asked, noting the somewhat shocked expression on his young friend's face as he climbed into the jeep. "You ok?" there was real concern in his voice now.
"Yeah," Hawke replied absently, distracted.
"So?"
"She's no longer a patient there."
"What?" Santini frowned, then, his expression grew shocked, as a terrible thought took hold in his mind. "Oh String …. No, she's not?" He could not bring himself to speak the word.
"She was discharged."
Thank God …. Santini thought to himself silently.
"Discharged? To where?" He asked then. "Does that mean she's better?"
"They wouldn't tell me," Santini turned slightly in his seat then and gave Hawke a look that clearly said 'I told you so'. "It doesn't matter, Dom. I know where she is."
"Huh?"
"She told me."
"String, did you fall and hit your head again?"
"No, Dom. And I didn't suddenly develop powers of clairvoyance. Helen told me, in the dream. She's in Elkington, California. I'd forgotten that Archangel checked it out, and told me that the place really existed, and that it does have a hospital that takes care of coma patients. After he left the cabin, I checked the maps. It's a pretty little place, not far from Lone Pine and Mount Whitney."
"You're sure?"
"Of course I'm sure, you were the one who taught me to read a map."
"Not about Elkington, dope," Santini sighed deeply, quickly losing his patience with Hawke. "I mean, are you sure she's there?" he clarified.
"I'm sure," Hawke confirmed with a fierce look of determination on his face now, and Santini knew that there was no point arguing with him.
It didn't matter how Hawke knew.
He just did.
It was an undeniable certainty.
Those weird ' insights' of his had always proved reliable and Dominic Santini had long ago given up questioning them.
"And I guess wild horses wouldn't keep you from going up there?"
"No Dom, not wild horses, nor hurricanes nor volcanic eruptions. I have to go. I have to know."
"Yeah, I guess ya do. Good luck son. I figure you're gonna need it, but, if ya don't mind, I think I'll sit this one out."