Restoring Calm

Laura was far too tired to be driving and she knew it. Because of that she was trying to be more conscious of the road around her than usual. She did however encourage her boys to talk, if nothing else than their talking would help her stay awake.

It was clear by their tone that their stay with the Stanleys had been difficult for them but Laura felt certain that Emily hadn't done anything to intentionally hurt them. It was just that they were in unfamiliar surroundings and with all that was going on in their life right now that had been a little too much for their young minds to deal with.

As much as Laura listened though she didn't really understand a whole lot of what her boys were saying. Something about a broken potty house, Laura could only guess that was the shed in the Stanley's back yard. All the chatter about an, 'other potty,' was lost on her though.

Thankfully the drive to the hospital was short and Laura was soon unbuckling her boys and taking them by the hand while they each carried their own little bags. Laura deliberately entered through the emergency entrance because that was a place the boys had seen before. As they walked, Laura talked to the boys about a special place at Mommy's work were they could play with other kids and make pictures for Daddy to help him get better.

From the Emergency Department Laura walked her boys through the waiting area and into the corridor beyond that led to the Emergency Family Daycare.

When they reached the door the boys stopped and Laura allowed them to just stand in the doorway for a few minutes to look around. While they looked Laura pointed out the table with all the finger paints and markers and paper, she also brought their attention to the other kids in the room before pointing out at the little park outside a big window.

"Where potty house?" Gregory stretched his head trying to see.

"They don't have an outside potty house here just one inside, do you want to go see it?" Laura was sure that her boys didn't need to go potty again this soon after they had gone at home but clearly there was something about the bathroom facilities at the Stanley home that had troubled them.

Reluctantly the boys allowed themselves to be led into the bathroom as one of the care givers followed along. Laura was grateful the Day Care Staff person was letting her do all of the talking so far. As they entered the bathroom the boy's eyes opened wide. There were regular porcelain commodes but they were small to accommodate the children's size but most of all there were three of them.

"Nother potty," Mikey called out excitedly as he let go of his mother's hand and pointed to the second toilet in the room. "And other potty!" he exclaimed as he pointed to the third.

Suddenly Laura understood all the talk in the car. "Yes there are enough potties for both of you."

From the bathroom the boys were led to the nap room. Before they went in Laura placed her finger over her mouth and told the boys that they had to be very quiet in this room. The boys were shown the three different types of places they could rest. There were mats that could be unrolled on the floor, there were some of the newfangled bean bag chairs in a corner and there were also a large number of cots that were stacked along one wall. Two of the cots were in use at the moment by two other children and Laura noticed that they were resting but not sleeping.

After the boys had seen what was there they all stepped outside the room again and Laura talked to them quietly. "If you get tired and need to rest while you're here this room is where you'll go. But before it's time to go night-night Mommy will be back and take you home so that you can go night-night in your own beds. Okay?"

The boys seemed to feel a separation was coming so they took hold of their mother's arms and held on tight. Laura didn't pull away she just let them hold on and continued to talk to them Looking at the name tag of the staff member that had been following them Laura pointed her out. "Ginger here is going to watch over you while you're here. If you need anything you can ask Ginger and she'll help you find it. If you get frightened you can ask Ginger to call Mommy and Mommy will come right down and talk with you. It's going to be alright, Mommy is going to stay in the building, she'll just be in another room helping take care of Daddy.

The boys were still apprehensive as they were led to the main desk where name tags were made for them.

"Let me see, your name is Mike, right?" Ginger talked as she started to write the name on a sticky tag

"Mikey," the boy corrected.

"Alright, Mikey it is. See?" Ginger showed him his tag and then wrote two more. One was to be placed on the shirt in the middle of the boy's back, so he wouldn't peel it off as was the plan. A second one was placed on the front of the shirt for the boys to see, for as long as it managed to stay there. The third one was saved for a minute.

"And if I'm not mistaken you must be Greg," Ginger turned her attention to the next little boy. Ginger was an older woman perhaps in her late forties with silver blond hair and a slightly larger than healthy girth. She was gentle and patient in her mannerisms and willing to give the boys their space. Laura could see that she was wining the boys over and just let her do the talking for now.

"Gegoree," he corrected.

"Gregory," Ginger repeated as she made the three tags and then placed the first two just as she had with his brother.

Once the boys were tagged they were led to a section of shelves where bins were set and each boy was allowed to stick their tag on their own bin and place their bags in them. The tags were far from strait but that was okay, you could see from across the room which bin was theirs and that was all that mattered. The boys were then led to the craft table and encouraged to color a picture while Laura sat next to them and filled out a short stack of papers on the boys.

When the papers were filled out Laura gave each of her boys a kiss and a hug then hugged them together. "I'm going to go see Daddy now but if you need me you can tell Ginger here and she'll call me okay."

The boys looked at Ginger with uncertainty but they didn't refuse to stay.

"I'll be back to see you at lunch time and we can eat lunch together, okay?"

"Tay," the boys agreed to that and Laura slipped out of the room and out of sight but stayed for a moment where she could watch the boys using a mirror at the ceiling. Once she saw the boys going back to their pictures she made her way to the ICU and Mike's side.

Mike was looking much better and his heart rate showed that he was calm. Laura was told by the nurse on her arrival that she had just missed the doctors doing their rounds but that all was as well in fact better than was expected. The plan was to do a swallow study in a couple of hours where they would feed Mike small bites of food and then watch him swallow it through x-ray to make sure he could handle that well and if he did they would start him on a liquid diet to be upgraded as he was able.

Laura knew that if there was any indication that Mike would choke on his food they would be putting in a feeding tube this afternoon, she looked long and hard at the discoloration on his neck and felt there was a good chance that the damage was low enough that it wouldn't be a big problem. She felt assured that all would be well and began to relax a little as well.

Mike was just starting to stir again when Laura noticed Mom in the doorway. She gave her a tired smile and waved her in to her son's side.

"He's doing really well considering," Laura wrapped her arm around her mother-in-law and gave her a sideways squeeze. "He's starting to wake up now so your timing is great, although I'm sure you drove a little faster than the speed limit to get here." Laura smiled and gave another hug.

Mike's eyes opened at the sound of talking at his side, and he managed a smile for his mother.

"Michael, you are a sight. How are you feeling this morning?" Mom asked.

"He can't talk right now," Laura informed her with a slight point to the trach tube.

"Well I'm used to that." Mom took hold of Mike's hand and gave it a tight squeeze. "Mike here was the master pointer when he was growing up. I don't think he spoke a word until he was three and then his first word was 'Fire Truck'."

Mike smiled as his mother giggled. It wasn't long before Mike was looking tired so they let him go back to sleep knowing he would do better in his swallow study if he was rested.

When Laura walked back into the day care her children were excited do see her but even more excited to see Grandma coming in behind her.

"Nana!"

"Nana!" the boys ran right past their mother into their Grandmother's arms. After a greeting hug the boys started talking in rapid fire panic.

"Nana, Daddy braked just like your horsey," Gregory started.

"Can't touch him till hims goo dries and he hast'a stay at Mommy's work for a long, long time," Mikey added.

"He can't eben go home for night-night." Gregory added and Laura realized that the boys were more traumatized by Mike's hospital stay than she had realized. She had hoped because he spent the night at the fire station whenever he was on shift that the boys wouldn't have as hard of time with the situation for the first few days at least but it sounded like maybe they were a little upset about it.

Laura had ordered lunch for not only her boys and herself but also her mother-in-law so the four of them sat down together at a table that was a little low to the ground for Mommy and Grandma, but they didn't mind, and ate their lunch, comfort food for the boys of macaroni and cheese and hot dogs with cooked carrots and apple slices. Laura and Elaine Stoker each had a fish platter and though they didn't really taste anything it was filling. After lunch Laura showed her boys where to carry their trays to and then after washing up and a potty drill she coaxed them to lay down on one of the big bean bag chairs in the nap room with her.

Elaine sat with Ginger and watched as Laura fell asleep first but the boys soon followed, each one was holding tight to a piece of their mother's blouse.

Ginger and Elaine worked together to cover the three up with a light weight blanket and then Elaine left them in Ginger's capable watch while she returned to her son's side.

-0-

Mike passed his swallow studies with flying colors and his mother was thrilled to spoon feed him some jello and soup broth. Mike understood, as Elaine knew he would, that Laura had finally fallen asleep and they intended to let her stay that way as long as she would. Mike just mouthed the words 'Thank You' between bites of food.

The rest of the guys from the station came in just as Mike had finished his late lunch. They too were happy to see him doing so well and only slightly uncomfortable with his inability to speak. From there they all went to Chet's room where the department crisis counselor would join them for a group gab session. None of them had slept well the night before but after seeing Mike they were all feeling a little better and the thought of talking about their ordeal was a welcome event.

"I'm sure your crewmate will need to catch up with you men once he's able to speak," the counselor commented toward the close of the session.

"Nah, his wife will take care of him. She's one of the leading experts in the psyche of rescue workers," Chet spoke up. He was sure Laura had already started talking Mike through what he remembered by now.

"Yes, I've been informed that she's written a few books on the mental aspect of being a rescue worker," the counselor commented but it was clear by the tone of his voice that he probably hadn't read any of those books and he didn't seem to be as impressed with Laura Elmer Stoker as the rest of the men in the room were. "I'm sure she's never dealt with snakes before though."

"I don't know, I think she talked about killing a couple of cobras and an anaconda once." Johnny defended his friend's wife, someone who had helped him through more than a few bad runs.

When Laura would learn of this conversation several days later, she was real quick to tell them all, that she took an ax to one snake and a shovel to the other two but never once touched even a single scale of their bodies.

-0-

Laura felt the gentle shake of her shoulders as she heard her mother-in-law telling her it was time to wake up. Laura managed to roll over in the bean bag chair and shake the sleep from her head before she took in the sight of her two boys.

They had woken up long before she did and Ginger had gotten them involved with some finger painting. Now their faces, arms and shirts were covered in finger paint. To say they looked like they were wearing war paint wasn't even slightly accurate as the paint was just haphazardly all over them in every color that had been available to them.

"I'm sorry I didn't get them washed up," Ginger apologized. Although she had not washed them on purpose hoping their painted bodies would bring a much needed laugh to their mother. "I assure you it is washable paint."

Laura didn't laugh but she did smile a big genuine smile. "No don't wash them up; I'll bathe them when we get home."

"We haffa go, Mommy, they going to lock a doors," one of the boys commented slightly worried, Laura was still waking up and wasn't sure which one had said that but she was grateful for the sleep.

"That's okay; we can go home and sleep in our own beds tonight."

Laura borrowed the phone at the desk to make a quick call and then from the day care they all went up to the ICU.

-0-

"Mike," the nurse managed to wake him with just her voice. He turned to see what she wanted with a friendly smile. "You have some special visitors; your wife has your two sons on the other side of that window there to see you. Are you up to that?"

Mike smiled and nodded his head in a very affirmative manner.

"I'm just going to cover your trach tube with this towel so we don't frighten them. Is that alright?"

Mike again nodded then added a mouthed 'thank you' as the towel was placed over his tubing. He then operated his own bed controls to sit up a little more before the nurse took a hold of the foot of the bed and turned it so that Mike was more fully facing the window.

Another nurse pulled the drapers over the window and if Mike could have he'd have laughed out loud at what he saw.

Standing on something to make them tall enough to see through the window were two rainbow colored boys with great big smiles for their Daddy. Mike could hear them call out "Daddy," as they waved their arms and blew him kisses through the window. He was aware of his wife and mother quieting them down and pointing to the next rooms while saying something. Mike was sure the boys were being told to be quiet so they didn't wake up the other patients.

The nurse left the room and returned with two finger painted pictures. Mike had no idea what so ever they were supposed to be but he knew they were for him from his sons.

Mike managed to smile at his boys and raise his hand giving them a finger wave before blowing them a couple of kisses of his own. Before he was ready the drapes were drawn again and his bed was being pushed back into it proper position. Before he fell asleep again the nurse taped his paintings to the wall were he could easily see them and he fell asleep with a smile on his face.