Disclaimer…I do not own anything
Author's Note…Boys will be boys. Hopefully, the conversation they will ensue in this chapter is balanced out by the deep stuff surrounding it. And I mean no offense to baseball fans. I myself love the Mets--especially this season! ;) Oh, and the name 'James' in the tale of Augusta's Bridge bears no relation to James Wilson. OR DOES IT! Errrm, no. It' doesn't.
"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
by any other
name would smell as sweet"
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, (II, ii, 1-2)
Shawn
When I first told my friends that I was moving to a town called Augusta's Bridge with Hilary and Megan, they had laughed in my face. "Augusta's Bridge," they mocked. "Who's the mayor? Some hardworking single mom who's man done her wrong?" One buddy even captioned it as "Augusta's Bridge: As featured on Lifetime: Television for Women." They were convinced that, after having a child for all of fifty-two days, I had converted into a softie. Another friend, who had just graduated with the rest of us, but with honors as the newspaper editor, even said that he should have dedicated his last installment to the "basketball star turned 'good, obliging, husband.'"
Although I would never admit it to the gang that always referred to me as Tommy and Hilary as Gina, it was I who insisted on moving to that small, Washington, town. The residents seemed genuinely nice, and the school system had a good record, but frankly; Hilary was more concerned with that type of thing.
The truth is; once I heard the tale that accompanied the town, I couldn't not live here.
Legend has it that the first settlers of the town was a pioneer named Alexander, his son, Paul, his daughter, Margaret, and his wife, Augusta. Now, at the time, this place was in the middle of nowhere and the four of them lived alone for about a month (they may or may not have been the lone survivors of a wagon train group gone awry) until one day, an admittedly ominous man visited the family. He went by the name James, and, although nobody recognized him, he swore he had a deep connection with them. "But we don't even know you," Alexander had insisted staunchly.
"No," James had agreed, "but you will."
Alexander had taken the prediction as a threat and ordered James to leave, but to no avail. James held his ground and, like a cancer, infiltrated himself into familial routine. And that was the way things were for a while; the family lived in fear with the stagnant threat.
Nowadays, the only river here is a slender creek that meanders through the town like talk but supposedly, when Alexander settled here, there was a thick river with a bridge stretching from one side to the other. To this day, nobody knows how it got there. Alexander and Paul had searched the town for skulls and skeletons, but found nothing. But it was a sign that life had once existed here, and it was the reason why the pioneers decided to stop wandering and settle.
This river was where Augusta and Margaret were doing the wash one day. Margaret was absorbed with the task at hand, but Augusta kept noticing things that were just…off. She begged her daughter to help her keep watch, but, in the grand tradition of teenagers rebelling just for the sake of it, Margaret chose to ignore her and tried to tell Augusta that there was nothing to worry about. But there was no convincing the woman and that was why, when James suddenly sprung out of a bush with a sharpened dagger in hand and made a move towards Margaret, Augusta was prepared.
The story gets blurry at this point. Some say Augusta killed James with her bare hands; others believe that when James saw Margaret was not alone, he fled, never to return; and still others insist that Augusta managed to summon a swarm of Green Darner Dragonflies, the Washington State Insect, which pushed James into the river and drowned him. Me, I like to think that James was a demon who didn't hold a candle to Augusta's love for her daughter. There are other versions, but the citizens can only agree on one point: Somehow, Augusta managed to protect her family and saved the young town from evil, and for this, we owe her a name.
I loved the story because somehow, even before cancer was a wink in the pediatrician's eye, I was positive that Hilary was going to save us all.
Nowadays, when I see the way Hilary looks at our daughter, I'm not so sure.
XXXxxxXXX
Maybe it's a belated teenage rebellion, or maybe it's an early mid-life crisis, or maybe it's a bizarre combination of the two, but a small part of me is absolutely certain that it is not the Earth that revolves around the Sun, but the Sun that revolves around us. Sorry Copernicus, but this part of myself resides in the same came as ancient Anaximander; For some reason, it's comforting to believe that the Earth is really a giant pillar in the center of everything, and the Moon and the Sun and the stars are really just holes through which we can see a fraction of the fire that surrounds us all. Maybe it's because I can identify with that theory; perhaps that's the part of me that knows the most acutely what it's like to be looking from the inside out.
But the rest of me accepts what the rest of the world does: us nine planets revolve around the sun, which is part of the Milky Way, which is part of the universe which, believe it or not, has an end. Turns out even infinity has its limits.
My cousin Matt wasn't an astronomer exactly, but he works for NASA now, and, when Hilary and I lived with him, and I faced insomnia while pregnancy-induced exhaustion put Hilary in bed by 9:30, he taught me everything he knew. I remember on one warm August evening, he explained the wonders of gravity. It exists everywhere, even in space, apparently. It's what keeps us in orbit with the sun, what keeps us from wandering off into supernovas and black holes. It's what keeps us together.
I suppose this is why when Johanna showed up out of nowhere not more than a few hours ago, I wasn't completely surprised.
Now that I have finally snuck her away from Hilary and Megan so I can get some food in this girl, we can really talk.
"So," I say, taking a huge bite out of my half of the peanut-butter and jelly sandwich I swiped from a nurse that doesn't work on the floor either of my daughters will be on, "been a while."
Johanna nods and nibbles at the crust of her half.
"Of course," I say, the memory dawning on me. "The only kid in America that doesn't like peanut-butter."
She nods again. "Can I eat the chips instead?" Johanna asks, motioning towards the bag of Lays that's probably only half-full.
I push it towards her. "How've you been?" Probably starving, judging by the speed in which she consumes the chips.
"Fine."
I raise my eyebrows at her. "Remember my rule about one-word answers?"
She frowns. "No…"
"That's because I never had to make one. You always said exactly what was on your mind."
She shrugs her own personality change off and sticks her finger in the bag for crumbs. I sigh; if she doesn't give me answers on her own, I'm going to have to ask her the hard questions.
"How are you feeling?" It's a start.
"Well," she says, plucking at her sweatshirt, "It's like I got all this extra bone marrow inside and I really just want to just get rid of it already."
Whenever I heard someone say that they forgot how much they missed a person, I always rolled my eyes. How can you forget how much of something you do if you're still doing it? The statement always reminded me of an equal ratio of stupid and impossible, but I find myself thinking it. "We're all pretty anxious to get Megan better," I agree.
She crumples the bag into a ball, and shoots it into a trash can about five feet away, but falls short just a few inches.
"Hey, you could have landed that shot easy a few years ago. You forget our lessons?" I tease.
But a distant look clouds up Johanna's eyes. "I didn't forget anything," she says without looking at me. This is how I know that it's time to have the conversation I've been prepping myself for but have been delaying second after second, minute after minute.
"So you want to hear something funny," I say slowly, giving Johanna plenty of opportunities to interrupt, none of which she takes. "The man you came with says he's your biological father, giving him legal guardianship over you, and allowing him to say it's ok to do the transplant…but you haven't called him Dad. Not once."
Johanna doesn't just look at me, she stares me down, the closeness of our old relationship spilling onto both of us in a sudden rush. "He doesn't care what I call him."
That's good; Johanna should be able to call him the most obscene of names and he should still love her without the thought of wavering even occur to him.
But, like a shallow boost to my humble ego, I'm somewhat pleased that Johanna has known no other 'Dad' besides me.
"Johanna," I say softly, wading through emotions that are frankly much too deep for me, "you can call him whatever you want, but if he's not your father, and he doesn't have the rights…then this is illegal."
She bites her lip as she wades through matters that an eighty-year-old shouldn't have to go through, much less an eight-year-old. "Then he's my father. Alright? I'll even call him 'Daddy' if it means that much."
And with that, she turns away and runs out of the cafeteria. "Wait!" I call it out right before the doors swing open and she turns around to shoot me an angry glance.
At least she tries to. Because when the doors swing shut again, they hit her right on the head, rendering her completely unconscious.
Gravity, you know, is stronger than anyone can ever reallyimagine. It's like a thread of thought you want to put in your hand just so you can exert some control over it. It can pull in everything. Even comets, those beautiful balls of dust and ice that travel in the oddest and most unexpected directions, will always come back to you.
This is what I'm thinking as the man Johanna came with and I race towards her simultaneously, each desperately trying to apply enough gravity to bring this poor girl home.
XXXxxxXXX
Wilson
5:56
Tick.
5:56
Tick.
Longest damn minute of my life.
Tick.
5:56
Tick.
5:57
I was stupid to think the passing of a minute would bring relief.
Tick.
5:57
Tick.
The door opens suddenly and youthful doctor emerges, X-Ray in hand. "She'll be fine," she says before Shawn and I can even ask. "Just a minor concussion."
Shawn and I both breathe sighs of relief. "Can we go see her?" I hear Shawn ask.
The doctor, who I feel forever indebted to, holds the door out for us. "You guys were so cute out there. You two looked like expectant fathers, just pacing away."
Oh, the hilarity. I ignore the doctor I liked so much just a few seconds ago and rush right in, but Shawn is more hesitant. It occurs to me that Shawn has about as much experience with hospitals as I do, in my field even, but he is on the other side of the glass.
"Don't trip over your lab-coat on the way out," Shawn mutters under his breath to the doctor, apparently also embittered by the doctor's flippant treatment of Johanna. I chuckle under my breath appreciatively and hope that I have never treated a patient like that. Suddenly, I gain a new respect for House's "I-Don't-See-Patients" policy.
I don't exactly know when a bond was forged between Shawn and me, but it is there, as strong and tangible as blood. We each take a seat on either side of Johanna's bed, and I flick on the small television. A baseball game is on, and we watch it silently.
"I hate baseball," Shawn says after a few comfortable minutes.
"Why?"
"Because you can't explain it."
I frown. "Of course you can. There's a diamond and in the middle of it there's a small hill, and that's where the pitcher stands-"
"What's a pitcher," Shawn interrupts, playing the devil's advocate.
"Well, he's the one who throws the ball," I say, joining the game with much less reluctance than I would have guessed.
"To who?"
"The batter."
"What's he do?"
"He hits it."
"Where? What if he misses?" He grins at my startled expression. "Told you."
I keep my eyes trained to the television. "Baseball's the slutty sport anyway."
Out of the corner of my eye, Shawn smirks. "Why's that?"
"It puts out every day…and it's basically all the same plays, no new tactics or strategies. Essentially, the same thing happens over and over again. There's no mystery, and the only shock you get is when someone does something wrong. Don't get me started on Buckner. But football on the other hand; you look forward to it every week. And you know those coaches are working their asses off just to make sure the other team never knows what's coming. So they never know what hit them." I pause. "Pun intended."
"And yet, football is the sport with all the sexy cheerleaders." But then the highly amused expression leaves Shawn's face as he glances at Johanna's sleeping body. "I really hope she can't hear any of this."
"Yeah," I agree. "Her mother'll kill me."
"Nah, Johanna would never tell Hilary something like this. Megan, maybe, but not Johanna."
"No, her mother's name is--" Then, as abruptly as a knock to the head, I realize what he meant. My breathing suddenly becomes shallow, and my heart twisted, erratically trying to pump blood to my brain. What it does not understand is that there is no room for anything other than this sickening knowledge.
"I didn't mean-" Shawn says immediately, sincerely trying to apologize, but I cannot hear him over the sound of my own shock.
"I'm going to call her mother," I tell Shawn distantly, getting up to leave. "And I mean her real mother. The one that's…" Not here.
"The one that's at home. Her real mother," I finish and wait a beat. "Her name is Allie." Her name is Allie.
But mothers don't let their children roam the dangerous world, without caring so much as to even call. Her name is Allie. Johanna's mother didn't do that to her. Her name is Allie. That's the kind of thing my own mother does, to innocent people like Bryan. Her name is Allie. The woman I love doesn't do stuff like that. She…couldn't.
Her name is Allie. Her name is Allie. Her name is Allie.
But as many times as I repeat it to myself as I walk vacantly down the hall, I cannot bring myself to believe it.
