-Rescue

Blanch stood chatting quietly with Evelyn, sitting at the small desk in the emergency reception area of the Hebron Hospital.  It had been pretty quiet that night.  Outside, it was cold, but the fog and clouds had lifted.  She was glad that there weren’t a lot of people out on the highway tonight.  It would have been a lot worse. 

The hospital was empty of most staff, except for them and a few others, as usual.  Not enough going on to warrant paying a doctor to hang around doing nothing.  Besides, Dr. Bunting was right down the street should the police scanner near the desk or a phone call report a bad accident or other emergency that might be headed their way.  Then they would call him and the on-call staff and have everything ready by the time the patients arrived.  That was how it was done.

            They had locked the big sliding doors overlooking the emergency driveway just after dark, once Dr. Pembry went home for the night.  It wasn't long ago that that wayward goat had gotten through the automatic doors and into the reception area.  In panic it had run amok and made quite a mess.  It took them almost an hour to get it out!  They had had other past visitors as well including cows, lots of snakes, and once even a deer, which had tripped the automatic door mechanism before it scampered away into the night.

            Besides, nights like this had a foreboding nature about them.  She had heard stories lately of armed drug addicts bursting through emergency room doors of small hospitals elsewhere, and terrorizing the night staff as they rampaged to find something to get them high.  It was just safer to keep the doors locked.  The second someone called, they'd call the emergency staff, and unlock the doors, just like always.  So far, the scanner and telephone were silent. 

From between David and Ricky, dad directed the car back up the road he had just walked down to get to the highway.  He had mentioned the woods, and Ricky seemed to know where it was.  As they approached the dike, dad recognized the spot where he had found the road. 

“There is a path along that dike,” Ricky said.  David swung the car off of the road and carefully directed it along the narrow abutment finding his way around the pond and the woods.  Suddenly they emerged onto the frozen field.  Dad pointed the way he had come and David maneuvered the car to rumble over the tilled up soil in that direction.  As he turned the car, the headlights splashed over the wreckage in the near distance, illuminating the forlorn hulk of our little airplane.

“Holy mother of friggin God!” Ricky exclaimed, totally stunned by what he now saw. 

The headlights fully illuminated the wreck and for the first time dad could see the extent of the damage clearly, and it shocked him, too.  The plane was totally destroyed.  For a moment, as the reality hit him, he was taken by the wondering of how they had survived at all. 

David pulled the car to within several yards of the plane keeping the headlights oriented on it and stopped.  He caught a momentary glimpse of a young boy’s face in the pilot window.  Dad and Ricky got out of the passenger door and headed over to the hole in the other side.  David threw the car in park and quickly followed them. 

A dirty little boy emerged from around the plane as they approached.  The sight of him shocked David and Ricky both.  Dad got to him first and could tell immediately by the look in his eye that Chris had seen her.

“Oh, son,” he said to him, bending down and grasping Chris’ good arm.  “Why didn’t you listen to me?”

Chris looked down and didn’t speak.  Dad hugged him, horrified.

“Go sit in the car,” he said.  “These men are going to take us to a hospital.”

In the meantime, Ricky and David began to pick their way through the barbed wire and debris to get to the plane.  Dad followed.  David gingerly climbed into the wreckage and looked around, immediately spotting the little kids nestled in there.  He was stunned.  He had never seen anything like this. 

All he knew was he had to get these kids out. 

David gently reached down to pick up the little girl, and then carefully turned to hand her to dad.  Dad stepped around Ricky to get her, but suddenly as he reached, his body was wracked with intense pain, causing him to double over in agony.  All night he had no real pain when he was digging me out and carrying us all around. 

Now he suddenly and much to his dismay found he could barely even stand upright straight.  There was no way he could lift anymore.  Ricky saw his pain and grabbed him to help supported him as the pain slowly subsided.

“Take it easy, man!”  Ricky exclaimed.  Dad leaned against him.

“I-I can’t lift…I…” he grabbed his side again.

“Let’s get you to the car,” Ricky said, pulling dad’s arm around his shoulder to carry him away from the wreck.  He was suddenly very worried that this guy was going to keel over and die right there.  He was in bad shape.  How he even made it to the road in that condition was beyond explanation.

“We’ll get these kids, don’t worry.”  Ricky said.  He helped dad over to the passenger seat and sat him down.

Ricky jogged back to the wreck.  Dad turned and thought about mom.  He couldn’t leave her like that.  The flash of pain had subsided a little.  If he didn’t have to lift anymore, he’d be alright.  He pulled himself to his feet, and patted the pocket on his flannel shirt where he had put the little pen light that had guided his way all night.  It was still there, and he pulled it out.  

When he depressed the button, the light dimmed.  He pointed it towards his face and watched the light fade out and finally die.  He looked at it for second a little baffled by the timing, then flung it away.  It had done its job.  He knew where to go anyway.  He called to Ricky and David:

“I’m going to see about my wife!” he shouted in a hoarse and raspy voice.  Ricky called out an acknowledgement and dad staggered across the dirt once more to where she lay.  When he reached her lifeless form, covered with the blanket he had placed there and frozen to the earth, he knelt down beside her and gently took her cold, stiff hand.

In his wildest imagination, he had never thought it would be like this.  He was trying not to think about what life was going to be with out her; how he’d raise the kids, how he’d take care of things the way she had. 

She believed in God, he knew.  Even though he had always had his doubts about all that, he needed to say something, hoping that if her soul was still out there somewhere, he could bring her comfort.  Sitting there in that field, there was no sign of God, but still he brought her hand to his lips, pressing them against her cold flesh.  He began to whisper, and a tear trickled from his eye, falling from his cheek to mingle with her frozen blood.

“Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name…”