"She put him out, like the burning end of a midnight cigarette…"

Whiskey Lullaby

Elmer stood in the elevator waiting. Waiting for the elevator to reach the basement. Waiting for the doors to open. Waiting to see Lona. In his hand he held a perfect red rose. He had wanted a white rose, but after 30 minutes of looking through the white roses, he realized there wasn't a 'perfect' white rose and he had to switch to the red roses.

It took over an hour to find a perfect rose, but for Lona, it had to be perfect. For Lona he would have spent all afternoon looking for a perfect rose. Anything less than perfect would not have been good enough. Especially after the incident with his last gift. Best not to think about that.

"Finally," Elmer said to himself as the elevator doors opened. He started walking down the corridor toward the sleep lab. Hopefully Lona would be in and he could give her the rose and tell her he had an idea for a new experiment and since it was so late they should talk about it over dinner.

Hopefully that wouldn't sound stupid or desperate. It seemed no matter what he said, it always sounded stupid, or desperate, or worse. Maybe this time he could pull it off and she'd say she'd love to go to dinner with him; but she'd probably say no.

He reached the sleep lab and carefully grasped the handle, slowly opening the door so as not to make any noise in case there was an experiment going on. That would be the last thing he needed. She'd never go out with him if he woke up a subject and ruined one of her experiments.

Elmer didn't see anyone, so he entered the lab and looked around. All the equipment was turned off; though he did see light from Lona's office in the back, and he heard some sounds from inside. He decided to take a peek around the corner in case she was with a subject, that way he wouldn't be intruding; which Lona hated.

He peeked into the office, then quickly pulled back in shock. This couldn't be happening; she couldn't do that to him. He thought about looking again, then he thought about bursting in and confronting Lona; but he just turned away and left. Behind him, on the floor, lay a perfect red rose.

"I'll have another," Elmer said banging the glass down on the bar and shaking his head. Why did they always bang the glass down on the bar in the movies? That was really getting loud. Elmer started to sway a little as the bartender picked up the bottle from the shelf.

"Do you really think you should have another," he asked looking at Elmer.

"Yeah, one more, then I'm going back to the hospital and giving her a piece of my mind," Elmer said leaning a little too heavily on the bar for support.

"I don't think you should be driving like this," the bartender said.

"I'm not going to drive," Elmer said wagging his finger at the bartender. "I'm going to walk back to the hospital. It'll give me a little time to think of what I'm going to say."

The bartender shrugged and poured Elmer another drink. "Your funeral," he said.

Lona put on a lab coat and walked out of her office to make sure she didn't leave any equipment running. Not seeing anything still on she turned back to the office, then stopped. She thought she saw something on the floor.

Lona walked over and picked it up. It was a rose. "Who would leave a rose on the floor," Lona said to herself walking back to the office. As she got into the light she twirled the rose in her fingers admiring its beauty. "Who would leave a magnificent…"

Lona stopped. She looked toward the office and then the rose. "Elmer," she whispered. "Oh, no, Elmer."

As Elmer was walking back to the hospital, he wiped a tear away from his eye. He couldn't get Lona out of his head; he couldn't get that awful, stupid image out of his head. He thought if he drank enough he could forget, but it didn't work.

"Boy is she going to get it," Elmer said to himself. "When I get back to the hospital, she's going to get a piece of my mind." He continued on, stumbling through another intersection and almost walking into the Kingdom Hospital ambulance.

"Danny is that who I think it is," Ollie asked.

"Isn't that Elmer," Danny said watching Elmer stumble through the intersection. "Boy does he look wasted. I don't think I've ever seen him drunk before."

"That's because his old man wouldn't let him drink."

Elmer turned to the right, more by accident than by intent, and started across the intersection, ignoring the 'Don't Walk' sign.

"He's crossing against the light," Danny said. "We should stop him before…"

That's when Danny and Ollie saw the tractor trailer.

Hook was standing in ER looking around for Chris. He thought he saw her heading for the ER. "I must have been mistaken," he thought to himself.

"Hook to ER, shtadt," Otto's voice boomed over the speaker. "Hook to ER, shtadt," Otto repeated.

Hooked turned and looked through the glass window into the security room, where Otto was sitting. "Otto, I'm already in ER," he said to himself, putting his hands on his hips. Hook watched Otto get up and walk out of the security room, apparently looking for him.

"Otto," Hook called out, "over here."

"There you are," Otto said walking over to Hook. "I got a message from the ambulance. They have an accident victim. He was hit by a truck. They should be here soon. They said I should get you to the ER, but they didn't say why."

"Probably just another head trauma case Otto," Hook said. "Why else would they call for me to be in the ER. There's the ambulance now."

Mary stood in the ER aside of Antubis, both unnoticed by everyone.

"Is there anything you can do to help him, Antubis," she asked.

"No," Antubis replied simply.

"Why not?"

Antubis turned and walked away.

"Antubis," Mary said watching Antubis walk away.

The hospital doors opened and Danny and Ollie pushed the stretcher with their patient into the ER. "You're not going to believe this one Hook," Danny said.

Hook pulled out his pen light and checked for pupil responsiveness, then realized who he was looking at. "Otto," Hook said turning to him, "page Louis to the ER right now."

Otto stood there in shock for a moment, then ran to the security office.

"Hook," Elmer said weakly.

"What is it Elmer," Hook asked turning back to Elmer.

"Tell Lona… I… I…."

(to be continued)