-Hospital

Ricky and David had gotten us placed in the car as dad re-emerged from the darkness.  Somehow they packed all of us, including Chris, into the back seat, leaving room for dad up front.  Dad took one last look at the plane, feeling a tinge of gratitude for it.  It had saved them, in its death.  It was a strange thing to feel for an inanimate object, but still he did. 

David slid in next to dad and Ricky put the car in drive, slowly guiding it bumpily away from the plane and out of the field.  Dad glanced once more in the direction of mom, and slumped back in the seat, closing his swollen eyes.  He was exhausted and suddenly in intense pain but grateful the ordeal was almost finally over.  Ricky pulled the car onto the dirt road and sped down it, trying to avoid the jolts of the potholes the best that he could. 

Eventually he reached the highway intersection, gave a quick glance in either direction and screeched onto it, heading south back toward Hebron.  He punched the accelerator to rush us to the Hebron Hospital, which was the nearest one for many miles.  A few minutes streaking down the highway and the turn off to it approached.  Ricky screeched the tires as he thundered around the corner.

From the opposite direction, the lights of a small helicopter appeared over the horizon, bearing down on the beacon that silently pulsed from the shell of our airplane, the only sign of life left there.

Blanche was startled by the screeching of the tires coming roaring off of the street and into the emergency drive, and turned her head to face it.  The car whipped around through the driveway, its lights flashing briefly into the room through the glass, and ground to an abrupt halt just outside the locked doors.  The passenger door of the car burst open, and a figure leapt out.  It came rushing to the door and pulled on it. 

When the person found it was locked they began to hit the glass repeatedly with an open hand, slapping loudly and rattling the whole thing in it’s frame.  From a voice muffled beyond the glass she could hear the cries of the man to let him in.  She could see his eyes widen when he saw her and Evelyn inside, a desperate look in them.  He looked dirty and she could make out his long hair.

            Both she and Evelyn stood and faced the door, trying to make sense out of the commotion.  This smelled like trouble

            "That’s Ricky Arnold," Evelyn said, suddenly recognizing the young man from town.  "What in God’s name is he doing?" 

Behind him, a car door slammed and another figure approached the glass.  David appeared beside Ricky and also banged his hand on the glass and waved them to come over to the door.  Blanch approached carefully, trying to make out their muffled and excited speech.  She wasn't sure what to make of this.  She thought about the Davis boys just a few months ago who did this same exact thing, getting them to rush to the door before they ran off in a prank!  That had scared Blanch half out of her skin, and neither of them were about to fall for those shenanigans again.

            "Ricky, David, what's going on?"  She asked from a few feet away, trying to sound stern.  "What do you boys want?"

            Both of them began chattering so loud she could hardly hear either of them.  But she distinctly heard the words 'plane crash.'

            "Plane crash??!" Blanched asked bewildered.  She turned around to look at Evelyn standing by the desk.  They both glanced at the scanner which still sat surrounded by eerie quiet.  Evelyn shrugged befuddled.  Blanche looked back at Ricky and David angrily.

            "I don't know what this is about, but we didn't hear about no plane crash, or any other kind of crash," she insisted.  "Is this some sort of joke?" 

She was truly annoyed by now and a little frightened.

            "Please, let us in!!"  David pleaded.  "There's a whole family here, and they need help!  Lady, please!!"

            Blanched stared a cool glare at him.  "Well I am going to call the Sheriff!  We'll just see about this!"  She tuned and hurriedly walked toward the phone, but was stopped in her tracks by Evelyn’s startled cry.

            "Blanch! My god!"  Evelyn gasped. 

A sudden enraged smash against the glass of the door prompted Blanche to wheel around.  She gasped and grabbed her chest in shocked horror.  The hand that had pounded the door slowly slid down, leaving a streak of blurred crimson where the fingers touched the glass.  Beyond the blur, she could make out the shambling figure beyond.  She suddenly was too frightened to move.  Evelyn was motionless.  Then he spoke to her in a loud and angry croaking voice.

            "Listen to me! I have crashed an airplane and my family is in this car and needs emergency care!"  He barked.  "Open this door, please!"

            Blanch slowly approached the door again.  His face was covered in glistening blood.  He had a ragged cut across his forehead.  His clothes were tattered and covered in mud and blood.  His one eye that she could see, obscured through swollen lids, was dark red and crazy looking.

            "I…I…" she tried to say, but he slammed his hand into the door again, spattering more blood across the glass, making her leap.  Her heart began to pound in her throat.

            "OPEN THE GOD DAMN DOOR!"  He shrieked.

            "Call Dr. Bunting!!" she turned and screamed at Evelyn, snapping her from her trance, and causing her to scramble at the telephone receiver.  Blanche turned back to the man.  She was now very scared. 

"You have to wait for the doctor to come for us to admit you!"  She said, hoping he got there quickly.  The man pressed his face up to the glass glaring at her.

            "A doctor is here!"  He glowered.  "NOW YOU OPEN THIS GOD DAMN DOOR RIGHT NOW!!!"

He emphasized each of the last several words with a further pound on the glass by his bloody hand, causing her to gasp again.  Suddenly the reality of the moment collided with her, and she realized what it really was that she was looking at.  This was no joke!  Something horrible had happened, and they hadn't heard!

            "Oh my god! I'm sorry!" she hollered pleadingly, and turned to run to the desk and grab the keys to the door.  She could see Evelyn was shaken to tears as she dialed Dr. Bunting’s number with fingers trembling so bad she could hardly get them to work at all.

            Blanche raced back to the door and quickly unlocked it.  It flew open, nearly knocking her over as the man burst through.  He had pulled a bloody little girl from the car.  He was wild and agitated.  He looked around the emergency room with a quick glance, then turned to glare at her.  She stood immobile, and this seemed to enrage him further.

            "Gurney!?" he barked.  She jumped startled and immediately pointed to the hallway beyond the door where the ER gurneys were.  He rushed in that direction.  She went out the doors to the car, and was again horrified.  Three more young children, all boys, remained in the car.  She reached in and slowly lifted the one closest to her.  David and Ricky hurried to the other side and began to extract the others.  Carefully she entered the emergency room and made her way to another gurney near the door.  The man had begun rummaging through the drawers of the ER, pulling out bandages and other items. 

She slowly lowered the boy down on a nearby table, but his head was slick with blood and slipped from her grasp.  It lolled backwards before thumping onto the smooth stainless surface.  She was shocked by the man’s enraged bellow, and shrank in terror as he steamed into her.

            "What are you doing!!?" he screamed.  "Be careful!!!" 

He roughly shoved her backwards from the gurney.  She could feel the tense strength that pulsed through him as she staggered back.  Instinctually, she stepped toward the boy again, but he snapped at her.  Even in his broken state, he exhibited enormous strength, which did not seem tempered by his rage.  She was truly frightened of him.

            "Ger away from us!" he screamed at her, bloody spittle splattering her face and shirt.  

She burst into tears and ran toward the reception area where Evelyn had gotten Dr. Bunting on the phone.  Meanwhile dad had found a pen light in one of the drawers and was pointing it into the Rick’s eyes for a few moments.  Then he tenderly stroked his head before going to the other children one by one, laying in gurneys now strewn about the hallway. 

He ignored Blanch completely after that.  Ricky and David stood in the waiting room and watched the scene unfolding in tired disbelief, having no idea what they were suppose to do.  This was not what they had expected.  For the moment, they just stood in silence, the blood of my family stained on their clothes.

-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…”

-Hebron

It was right around 10 AM and the rain clouds that had come around that morning had began to clear up.  Kim and I chatted excitedly as we drove west on I-80 out of Lincoln, toward the highway that led to Hebron.  

We had been anticipating this part of the trip the entire time and now the excitement of it was overflowing from us.  At the small town of York, we turned south on Highway 81 and the conversation tapered off.  We sat in silence and spent our time looking off into the distance of the road, towards the clumps of trees that dotted the landscape, wondering if they were the place.  Neither of us had any idea as to where the crash had actually happened.  Only that we ended up in Hebron.

Eventually a big red billboard appeared announcing to all that Hebron was just ahead.  We stopped to look at it for a few seconds, perhaps to consider what we being there meant.  I stood and looked at the sign.  I was nervous.  Afraid of what I was about to find.  I shook it off and got back behind the wheel of the Pontiac, and we continued eventually turning off of the highway and into town. 

The main street was brick, like it had been there forever.  We drove slowly over it through the little town, taking the place in while we followed the blue signs emblazoned with a big white H that guided us toward the hospital. 

The town was neat and clean.  All of the houses had neatly trimmed lawns and freshly painted fences.  American flags fluttered proudly in the spring breeze everywhere we looked.  The place wasn’t at all what I had pictured it would be; rather it defied every image I had kept of it.  It was beautiful and peaceful.

We rounded a corner and saw the hospital up ahead on the left.  I wondered if this was the same road we had come up on that night, and if dad saw the same things then that we saw now.  It was a strange sensation, like de-ja-vu. 

We pulled into the parking lot of the Thayer County Medical Center right on time for our appointment and found a place to park.  The hospital was small, but modern looking and clean.  I felt suddenly dizzy as I strode towards it - not like falling down dizzy, but like dream dizzy.  Surreal dizzy.  It all hardly seemed real all of a sudden.  There was no way I could know this place, but yet I knew that I did.

We went through the sliding glass of the entrance doors, and immediately saw an older and pretty lady standing there, beaming at us widely as we came in.  She immediately reminded me of my grandmother, and I felt an instant bond to her. 

I knew it was Helen.  With barely a word I went to her and gave her a long warm hug, and she hugged me back, like we’d known each other for our whole lives, which I guess we had.

When I pulled away, there were tears in her eyes.  Surprisingly to me, there were tears in mine too.

“I have thought about you so often all of these years,” she told me.  “I am so glad to see you now.”

She took us around the corner and into an office where we were greeted by Joyce, who hugged us both and offered us a seat.

We told Joyce and Helen what we knew, which at that point wasn’t much.  They both shook their heads in disbelief the entire time.

“That poor, poor man,” Joyce had said repeatedly as I told her the story of dad’s ordeal that night.  I had never thought of it that way.  I never saw my dad as the victim that he was until Joyce said that.  Hell yes, he was a victim.  He’d survived a plane crash!

I turned to Helen.  It was strange to finally meet her.  She had cared for me so long ago, and I never even knew who she was, now here she sat, next to me.  I felt very privileged.

Presently, she took us into a small conference room.  Around the table sat Dr. Bunting, and Blanch and Evelyn, and Dick and Gary.  They had all been there that night, and now were all here.  It was truly amazing to me.  I could see that Kim felt the same way.  It was almost like a dream.

I looked at Dr. Bunting.  He was 82 years old now, but still held a sparkle in his eye.  He had long retired and he and his wife had moved into a retirement home directly across from the hospital.  I felt warmth and sincerity coming from him.  I liked him immediately, and now hoped I could get him to talk about me and my family.

“What happened that night, sir?”  I asked him.

He looked at me for a moment, sizing me up.  Then he asked:

“Do you want the watered down pleasant version, or do you want to know what I saw?”  He said.  I was taken with his honesty. 

“I just want to know what happened,” I said.

“Well, I’ll tell you,” he said.  “Throughout my entire medical career, I had never had a more frustrating night than that…”

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. 

Chapter 8

 Jim Nitz pulled the CAP truck to a stop on the shoulder of a dirt road running by the south side of Kramer and got out.  The other CAP search vehicles rolled up behind him.  He looked up and down the dark road.  They had completely circled the town but there had been no sign of the beacon on the ground.  He was never hopeful that it would be an easy search from the lack of specific location info from Looking Glass, but was beginning to feel like he was looking for a needle in a haystack. 

He unfolded a map and put it on the warm hood of the truck.  They had drawn a red line of the planned flight path of the missing plane and were standing right on it, but the transceiver was completely silent.  It was frustrating.  They just weren’t here. 

Larry thudded by in his chopper just above he trees, shining his spotlight through their leafless forms as he passed slowly overhead.  Larry had flown an orbit around the entire area and had come up with nothing on his locator.  Jim picked up his Radio.

“Sheriff-1, be advised were going to get our bearings a second,” he said.  “No sign of them yet.”

Jim gazed up and back down the road, figuring out their next move.  The next town along the lost planes flight path was Hebron, about 35 miles due south west.  He decided to move that way and see if they could pick up anything.  Above them, the CAP plane circled.  It had been monitoring the beacon, but it was still very weak, meaning it could still be a ways off.  He called Larry.

“Sheriff-1, CAP-1.” He said “We’re going to move toward Hebron.  Can you move in that direction and see if you can get anything?”

“Roger, CAP-1.”  Larry replied.  “Give me a minute to get a vector.”

Larry adjusted the pitch of the rotor blades and gunned the engine of the chopper.  He and Bruce quickly shot up to 4,500 feet above sea level.  As he gained altitude the siren-like squeal of the ELT signal began to creep into his headset.  It had been blocked by the terrain as he flew low, but now he had it.  It was just a matter of finding the right direction and if he did, it would get louder as he approached.  He adjusted his radio and raised Minneapolis tower.

            “Minneapolis, this is Lancaster County Sheriff Helicopter-1.  I am at 4,500 feet above Crete, Nebraska conducting a search, I am squawking 1200 and will ident…now,” he said pushing the identifier button on his transponder, tuned to 1200.  “Do you see me?”

            A few seconds passed then a voice came back.

            “Roger, Sheriff-1,” came the reply from Minneapolis as he appeared as a blip on their radar.  “We have you.”

“Roger, Minneapolis, can you give me a vector to Hebron?”  Larry asked.  “We’re trying to locate an ELT out there somewhere.”

“Roger Sheriff-1,” the voice said.  “Stand by.”

A few moments passed, then the reply:

“Sherrif-1, fly to magnetic bearing two-three-five.  Squawk 4342”  Minneapolis replied.  “That’ll put you right there.”

“Thank you much, Minneapolis,” Larry said back, adjusting his transponder to the code he received so the radar would identify his blip as him.  He pulled the stick and moved the helicopter toward the bearing until his compass read 235 degrees.  Then he called the CAP search plane.

“CAP Search, Sheriff-1, I am flying on heading Two-three-five, do you have a signal?”

“Roger that, Sheriff-1,” came the reply from the CAP plane that orbited above him somewhere in the dark.  The little Cessna was still picking up the weak signal, but still couldn’t tell where it was coming from either, although the pilot was beginning to suspect it was in the direction of Hebron, too.  “Go ahead and travel in that direction and I’ll see if I can get a fix on you.  I am at five-thousand, right above Kramer.”

Larry began to fly to the bearing he had gotten from Minneapolis.  In the CAP plane the pilot leveled his wings and brought the plane to a straight and level flight.  He was listening intently to the beacon coming weakly from his headset, as he watched the lights of the small helicopter began to head away from him to the southwest.  The downed plane was out there somewhere.  If he could get to a place that put the helicopter between him and the crash, the signal would be blocked, and he could extrapolate a bearing right to it.

Suddenly the signal went dead, just for a moment, and then popped up again.  Larry had flown through the beam!

Larry looked at his gauges.  He was becoming more and more aware of his slowly sinking fuel indicator.  This would have to wrap up soon, or he’d have to cut off to refuel.  He flew and waited for a signal from CAP.  He was getting ready to make sure they were still there when the radio crackled.

            “Sheriff-1, hold your position right there!!” came the cry from the CAP pilot.  Larry eased back the yolk and brought the chopper to a dead hover.  The CAP plane banked sharply to come around and fly the opposite direction.  As he passed the path of the helicopter, the signal died again.  The CAP pilot quickly turned 90 degrees, flying away from Larry.  The signal stayed silent.  The CAP pilot did a quick back azimuth calculation.  A moment later the radio crackled again.

            “Sheriff-1, you are blocking my signal to the beacon.  That puts you directly between me and them.  Continue on heading two-three-five.  I’ll continue to circle behind you and let you know if you get off course.”

            “Roger that!” Larry responded, excitedly. 

Now he had them!  He turned the chopper to the right heading again and pulled the throttle to full open slinging the chopper full tilt toward the signal, gradually descending as he went.  In his head set, the whoop of the ELT signal continued to grow louder and louder.    

            Jim listened intently to the radio transmissions from the two aircraft.  They were indeed in the wrong place.  He began to plot a route to move further southwest, toward Thayer County.  He and Jon ran their fingers along the black lines on the map, finding the roads to take them there.  He radioed to Larry.

            “CAP Search this is Cap 1,” he said.  “See if you can lock down that signal and we will start our move that way.  Do you read, Larry?”

            “Roger,” Larry replied.  “Let me see if I can get you an escort.” 

Larry flipped frequencies to the State Police band and was greeted by a patrol officer cruising a nearby highway.  Larry quickly explained the situation and the officer promised to meet the CAP team at a nearby intersection to escort them full speed to Hebron.  

            The CAP teams jumped back in their vehicles and roared south toward the officer.  They’d find them now.

            Dad hunched on the side of the highway impatiently waiting for the next vehicle which was now coming over the hill.  He wasn’t as excited now, and was, in fact, getting pretty fed up with being run off of the road.  He considered picking up a big rock to throw at them if they tried to go past too, or making some other means to make them stop, but thought better of it.  He was in no condition to get in a fight. 

As the lights crested the hill, he could see this one wasn’t a large truck but a passenger car.  It approached down the road speeding towards him as he began to wave and shout again.  He thought with building anxiety that it appeared it was going to go by, too, but then to his surprise it swerved to the side of the road and slowed, grinding to a stop on the rocky shoulder 20 or so feet away from him.  He stood for a moment squinting into the bright headlights washing over him, temporarily blinding his one eye that could blurrily see, and then began to lurch toward the driver side.

            Ricky Arnold and David McLaughlin sat stunned in the car.  They had barely caught a glimpse of the man on the side of the road when they both knew something was very wrong.  It caused Ricky to slam on the brakes and pull off before him without a second thought.  They could immediately see that the man wasn’t dressed for the cold at all.  His face appeared to be disfigured and twisted, like he was wearing some kind of mask.

            “What the hell?” David muttered as he pulled up to the shambling figure.  The man stood there for a few uncomfortable seconds, washed bright in the beams of the headlights, then began to stumble toward them.  For a moment, they were both a little nervous about this.

            Dad reached the drivers door and looked inside.  Slowly the window rolled down and dad saw David looking up at him.

            “Man…” David said. “Are you alright?”

            Dad hunched down, and leaned on the door, trying to catch his breath, then lifted his head to look at David and Ricky inside the car.  They could see that it was no mask on his face.  He really looked like that, and that was messed up.  He was covered in blood.  Dad took a few deep breaths, trying to find some words.  He felt awkward all of a sudden and out of place before these two.  Finally he spoke.

            “I crashed and airplane…” he said.  “Can you give me a hand?”

-The Road

The road rolled up and down before dad, and seemed to go on forever.  He had to stop often to catch his breath and get his bearings.  He didn’t feel overly tired at that point, but he didn’t want to push it.  If he could get to the main road, someone would see him sooner or later, even if he dropped dead when he got there.  Hopefully they would be able to tell from the condition of his corpse that something dreadful had happened nearby and at least go looking for that.  With any luck they would find the wreckage and the kids before they all froze. 

He only had to make it to the road.

He paused again in a trough between two small rises for a moment, and then began to climb once more.  As he reached the crest of the hill, he abruptly stopped again.  He was stunned to clearly see the octagonal glare of a stop sign glinting in the moonlight just at the bottom of the rise. 

The asphalt of the State Highway 81 appeared black before him as he stumbled down the small hill the 30 or so yards to get to it, like a man finding water in the desert.  When he reached it, he slowly wandered slightly dazed into the middle of it, looking up and down the long black and empty moonlit ribbon of road.  He stood in silence for a few second to consider it. 

To the south he could make out the lights of what appeared to be a small town in the far distance.  He had no way to know what town it was as he still wasn’t sure where the hell he was.  To the north, west and south, there were no obvious signs of life or activity.  If no one came along, he decided to make toward the town to the south.

Just then, as if on cue, he was spun around to look south again.  He heard again the familiar whooshing that suddenly emanated from that direction.  Over a far off rise in the road, a halo of light faded up brighter and brighter simultaneously with the rising pitch and intensity of the whoosh, until it’s source suddenly burst into view with a flash as the high beams of a big truck crested it, rushing straight toward him!

For the first time in the last fifteen hours, his cracked and puffy lips slowly curved upward into a smile.  Finally, they would be saved!  He lifted leaden arms and waved up and down at the still distant truck excitedly, stumbling desperately toward it.

“HEY!” he yelled as loud as he could, even though it hurt his side.  He was to overcome with joy.  If he could have he would have jumped up and down.  “HEEEEEY!”

The truck raced toward him, and he moved to stand in middle of the southbound lane where he was sure it would see him.  He could quickly tell it was a big 18 wheeler.  He continued to wave and the truck continued to come. 

Fast. 

Suddenly, the reality that it wasn’t stopping gripped dad.  Could the driver not see him?  He waved his arms over his head frantically and with all his might and screamed at it as loud as he could, but it wasn’t stopping.  He waited till the last possible second then dove off of the road as the massive truck careened by with a long blast of it’s horn, kicking frozen dust and rocks at him as it rumbled by without so much as a pause. 

Dad landed on his good side in the deep ditch beside the road, smacking the frozen trickle of water that was gathered at the bottom of it.  It quickly soaked his clothes. 

His head swam in a swirl of throbbing pain and angry amazement as he struggled to catch his breath.  He closed his eyes, and waited for something to happen. 

Slowly it did.  Focus began to return and the pain of the dive began to dissipate.  He forced himself to sit up disbelieving, and tried to catch his breath and make sense of what had just occurred, but was cut short. 

The whoosh of another big vehicle was approaching from the same place as the last, heading north.  Again its lights broke the crest of the hill and bore down on his spot.  He struggled to his feet and hauled himself out of the ditch and onto the asphalt, again waving and hollering with all of his might.

Again he was forced to dive into the icy bottom of the ditch a few moments later to writhe in pain on his back as the second truck rumbled by as if he were invisible.

What the hell? Dad thought, blinking at the starry sky above him utterly baffled.

Chris lay next to mom without making a sound or moving for a long time.

It wasn’t really a voice that shook him away from the edge of peace and caused him to open his eyes again.  It was more like an impulse.  Like a feeling. 

Don’t go to sleep, it softly nudged him. 

He lifted his head, and listened, only capturing the sound of the icy breeze.  He laid his head on frozen ground again, and again he felt it. 

Don’t go to sleep, my sweet boy… 

He could make it out clearly.  It rang through his mind, although its origins were as foreign to him as this field.  It spoke to him from somewhere deep within him, a place he couldn’t quite finger.

Go back, he felt.  It will be okay.  The kids need you.  Go back…

He looked at his mom again, and thought he understood.  She was still, but suddenly he felt like he could sense her around him.  Suddenly he realized that even in her death he knew what it was she would have wanted him to do.  It wasn’t to die out there next to her, either.  She would have never had that. 

It was to live.  It was as if she were in him and speaking to him, even in death.  He knew what he had to do.  He had to live – for her. 

He slowly worked his way to his feet, and looked down at her again.  He was taken that she looked as if she was at peace, too.  That was enough for him right then.  The thought that it would be that last time he would ever see her didn’t ever cross his mind.  If it had, he may not have left after all.

He turned and walked through the cold and dark toward the plane.  He never looked back, and he never saw her again.

-Alone

Chris stared at the empty space where he had caught his last glimpse of dad.  He was aware of the whisper moan of the icy breeze that washed across the plane in irregular intervals.  Behind him, we were all still.  He sat cold and alone.  He wasn’t scared.  He had never really been all that scared.  There was simply no point.  If he was supposed to be dead, he knew he would be.  We all would be.  But he wasn’t now.  Not yet.

To the side of the plane through the dirty plexiglass, he could now clearly see mom.

Dad reached the tree line.  The forest was surrounded by the dense brush of a plum tree thicket.  He had come across a long strand of barbed wire which he followed to the forest, presumably from the fence we took out on impact.  Dad couldn’t penetrate through thick brush of the plumb thicket, so he followed it around to the right.  It ended abruptly and he suddenly found himself standing on an earthen dike that circled gently away from him to the north and around what appeared to be a pond before bending toward the west and in the direction of his objective.  As he stumbled along the dike, he could make out the ruts of past trucks and tractors that had traveled over it, and was heartened.

After a few steps, he could see that the dike abutted what was indeed a large pond just off to the left as he walked over it.  He felt fortunate we had hit where we did, or we might have ended up in there.  We would have sunk without a trace.  No one would have ever found us. 

He continued to make his way when he stopped abruptly and squinted into the dark.  50 or so feet before him he could make out a light swath of ground running toward the east and west as far as the moonlight would allow him to see.  He immediately recognized it to be a dirt road.  As he reached it, he was excited, so much so that he stumbled and was compelled to focus again on his broken rib, which jabbed him rudely. 

He bent forward, grabbing his side tightly, and the stab faded slowly back into the steady throb he was use to.  He was reminded that if he wasn’t careful, he was good as dead.  The thought was punctuated by a fresh curtain of breezy cold, which numbed him further. 

Dead as dead can be.

But not yet.  He composed himself and gathered his strength, then stepped gingerly over dirt curb of the road, turned west, and began to stumble slowly toward his hope for salvation and deliverance from this hell.

Chris turned around to survey us laid out in the middle of the plane.  No one had moved, even Ricky.  Chris felt very restless since dad had left.  He didn’t want to just sit there anymore. 

He needed to stretch. 

He worked his way out of the plane again and slowly stood on the cold earth, shivering against the freezing breeze.  He adjusted the sling around his neck and looked at the make-shift bandage on his hand.  It was darkly stained in the moonlight from being soaked with his blood.  He surveyed the blue tinted landscape around him until his eyes locked again on the body of his mother, so clear now in the icy moonlight.

Up to that point, he had held the impulse at bay, but seeing her and separated by only distance it was overpowering.  Suddenly he didn’t hear dad’s warning.  He wasn’t worried about us, either.  He just knew he had to go there.

He slowly made his way through the debris and barbed wire and walked past the buckled nose of the plane and across the moonlit void between him and mom.  He felt like he wasn’t walking to her as much as being drawn, and was now merely submitting to the force of it.

When he reached where she lay, he stood motionless for a while taking her in.  He wasn’t sure what he was suppose to do.  He was completely spellbound by the sight. 

The blanket covered her head and upper body and most of her torso.  Her lower body and legs protruded from it still.  Her feet were bare; she had lost her shoes.  The pants of her light blue suit that she wore were colored monotone in the moonlight and stained with dark patches.  He couldn’t tell the difference between which were mud and which were blood.  He didn’t really care. 

The tips of the fingers of her left hand extended from the edge of the blanket.  Her diamond wedding ring sparkled subtly in the moonlight.  Chris stared at it.  She was a prominent person in Lincoln society.  My family was considered fairly well off by the day’s standards.  She could have had a big huge diamond to show off, but she didn’t.  She had this small modest one.  It was lovely and the epitome of her.

Chris lowered himself to the ground to sit beside her, and then reached out to touch her hand.  It was like ice, and frozen stiff by the cold and rigor mortis.  He withdrew in shocked horror. 

It wasn’t what he had expected.  It was the first time he had ever touched a dead body.  He sat for a moment and considered her.  He shook off the horror, then gently took her hand again.  It wasn’t so bad this time.  Wrapping his fingers around hers he slowly leaned over, lowering himself to his side until he was laying next to her on the frozen stiff ground of the field, his head next to hers.  He looked at the shape of her profile under the dark stained blanket but he didn’t lift it.  He didn’t need to.

The decision to go to sleep came to him like a logical conclusion.  He was suddenly very tired.  He didn’t mind anymore if he had to die.  He preferred that it would be here, with her.  If he wasn’t suppose to, he wouldn’t have come out here.  He didn’t feel cold or scared or in pain.  The sanctity of the darkness behind his closed eyes brought with it the promise of delivery from this place, one way or another.  He didn’t know if dad would make it back or not, and suddenly he just didn’t care. 

Darkness began to wash over him.  Then he felt peace. 

Chapter 7

The Jamaican sun had caressed her skin as she napped under it, next to the bay of a little resort near Kingston.  Dad and mom went there the year before, and it was wonderful.  They had looked so forward to it, and shot frisky looks across the dinner table at each other in the days leading up to it when we kids weren’t looking.  They had not had a vacation of just their own in a while.  They had danced and listened to calypso music and steel drums and snuggled while they watched the sun set.

Another chilled draft shook dad and washed away the memory, returning to him in it’s wake an empty and numb feeling.

This was sure as hell not Jamaica. 

Dad rubbed his shoulders and scanned the sky.  The black tapestry above our airplane was filled with bright stars.  The sky was dotted with them, sparkling clearly.  But he had not seen an aircraft since the distant blinking light he had pointed out to Chris with such enthusiasm what seemed like hours ago.

On any other night Chris would have noticed the beauty of the stars, but he could care less now.  Now they were just stupid stars.  He didn’t feel the same about the moon. 

The moon began as dull yellow lump behind the clouds but peeked out once or twice as the last remnants of the front broke up and floated around it. 

Then all at once it seemed, it suddenly burst into the open sky.  It was two days after the full moon, so it came out big and white and radiated a bright light that splashed across the landscape around them, bringing for the first time that night figures and substance from the dark.  For the first time in what seemed forever, he could actually see a little. 

To the front of the plane, Chris could now clearly make out the tree line that we crashed through.  Beyond that, still a long way off, was the road he had heard earlier, still out of sight.  There wasn’t a lot of traffic on it at this time of night, but what there was he could hear.  A handful of vehicles had gone across his front with the familiar whooshing sound during the hours that they had waited.  They were so close, but none of them had any way to know we were out there, just out of their sight.

           Dad saw the moon too, although it was blurry and dim through his swollen eyelids.  His vision had gotten progressively worse to the point that he could hardly see at all, his face was so swollen.  The blood had slowed it’s flowing into his left eye, but still impeded it. 

He had considered more and more about the possibility of going for help.  When he had seen the airplane fly above them, he had thought that there would be a rescue soon if not immediately.  He hadn’t wanted to try and make the journey for help if he didn’t have to. 

For one thing, it was so dark that he was sure he’d get lost, particularly with no guidance, even from the stars.  For another, he was feeling very lucky that he hadn’t ruptured his spleen yet with the broken rib that floated in his side.  Whatever path led to that road from this field was sure to be rough, and he was worried that a single stumble or trip would finish the job.  He had enough experience with this exact type of injury in the ER numerous times, and knew that if his spleen went, he most likely wouldn’t even make it back to the plane before he died in agony somewhere in the dark and frozen night.

            So there was that.  Not to mention he could hardly see.  At any rate he was getting pretty sure that if help wasn’t on the way now, if it wasn’t here yet, it might not be coming at all.  The though was infuriating and made absolutely no sense to him. 

1976, and no one even knows when a plane crashes? 

He didn’t buy it.  They would have noticed immediately that we were overdue, he would have thought.  All they had to do was come this way.  Why were they not here?  Why were they not looking for us?  

The though suddenly made him feel very alone.

         Dad snorted it off.  He didn’t even know who ‘they’ were.  He certainly had no knowledge of the intense search being conducted only 40 or so miles east of us.  He only knew it was beginning to look like he was on his own.

          Kim and I were still asleep and hadn’t moved since he had placed us in our patchwork nest of clothes behind him, but Rick was becoming a problem.  He was going through bouts of excitement and trashing about.  Dad was worried he would hurt himself or one of us during a violent fit.  Moreover he was worried about Rick’s brain, which he knew was continuing to swell in his head even as he lay there, and that it could kill him at any time. 

It had gotten very cold, too.  Beyond just uncomfortable.  The tingling in his fingers and toes told him it had gone toward dangerous, even deadly if they didn’t get out of it soon.  He had no way to tell the exact temperature, but had been out in it enough in his time in Colorado and Nebraska winters to know it was near freezing.  This was emphasized by an occasional shudder from Chris beside him. 

He began to really worry that none of us would make it till morning, and even if we did, this was Nebraska in the winter time.  Plenty of people had died in cold like that in the middle of a crystal clear and sunny day.  Here, he knew sun would not necessarily equate to warmth.  And God forbid if the clouds returned bringing a storm with them in the next hour or two, which was also not unheard of.

The old joke was that if you didn’t like the weather in Nebraska, wait a little.  Dad knew the joke was based on very real weather phenomena that occurred over the plains all the time.  Violent storms could grow from seemingly nowhere, in the middle of a clear blue sky.  Dad had seen it many times.  Any Nebraskan had.  It wasn’t a joke to dad.  It scared him.

          All of this weighed on him now as he tried to work out what he had to do.  He had been eying a distant point of yellow light glowing from a darkened rise in the land to the northeast for some time now.  He knew it was a farm building.  And a farm building is usually located next to a house...but not always.  It could just be a light on a pole at the corner of a field.  He had no way to know.  He didn’t trust his eyes. 

Then there was that road.  He had heard the cars on it the several times Chris pointed them out, and he thought the road might be closer than the building, or whatever it was.

But he couldn’t tell for sure; his blurry vision made judging distance to either point impossible.  Not to mention that wandering out into the prairie with no light to guide him would be roughly the same as walking into the desert.  People can get disoriented and lost and freeze to death in the fields on nights like this, the distances between aid being so great and the cold so bitter. 

          The moon changed that.  He knew the road was his best bet for eventual help if another car came, but an occupied farm house would mean immediate help.  The darkness of the night had made either option too treacherous, but he could now make out the contours of the ground around us, and knew with the light of the moon, he had at least a chance.  

Either way, he also knew he had to make up his mind quickly.  The last thing he wanted was for the clouds to come back when he was a long distance from the plane, storm or not.  They would obscure any landmarks he could see and very possibly cause him to loose his way and not be able to find his way back.  He would most likely not survive that. 

So now was the time either way, he decided.  He turned to Chris.

          “Son,” he said, “How far away is that light way out there?” he pointed to the speck on the horizon over his shoulder that he thought might be near a farm.  Chris turned to look at it and stared for a long time.

            “I don’t know,” he said.  “It seems to be a long way.”

            Dad faced forward toward the road.

          “How far to the road?” he asked.  Chris thought hard.  Judging by the sound, it wasn’t far, but without seeing it, he just couldn’t tell.  He knew what dad was thinking.  Dad had muttered about going for help a few times in the hours they had been waiting.  He didn’t want to make a mistake now, but it was up to him.  He clenched his jaw and made his decision.

            “I…I think the road is much closer,” Chris replied, trying to sound confident.

            In an instant all doubt was gone.  Dad had the answer he needed and knew what he had to do.  He formulated a quick plan in his head.  He turned to look at Chris.

            “Listen, son,” he said.  “I don’t think we can wait any longer.  I don’t think anyone is coming just yet and we have to get the kids help now.  I am going to try and get to that road and hopefully flag someone down.”

            Chris had locked on to him with his stare, but said nothing.  He only nodded.  The thought of really being left alone was terrifying. 

But dad continued.  He hadn’t really thought about what he should say if this point came, but there was no time for stoicism.

            “I think we can get help there.”  He paused to gather his thoughts.  This was getting difficult, but Chris had to know everything, in case something happened to him out there.          

“If I don’t come back, you need to wait here with the kids, okay?” Dad said.  Chris nodded, wide-eyed.

            “Someone will come sooner or later.” Dad tried to sound reassuring.  “You just need to stay strong.  But don’t come looking for me, no matter what happens.  If I don’t come back, you need to stay here?  Do you understand that?”

            Chris nodded.  He didn’t know what to say.  His impulse was to beg dad not to leave him, but he knew dad was right.  Chris had to trust him. 

Dad went on, and began to pull himself together to get out of the plane.

            “Keep and eye on Ricky,” dad said as he got up, glancing toward us in the middle of the plane.  “Try to keep him calm, but try not to move anyone.” 

Chris watched as Dad worked his way up and out of the plane, using the ripped up fuselage to balance himself.  The breeze hit dad as he stood.  It was really cold. 

He surveyed the ground around him.  It seemed so bright now, bathed in the moonlight.  He could see the tree line we had crashed through, silhouetted against the horizon, which to his injured eyes appeared as a dark blur against a slightly lighter one.  To the right of the trees, he could make out a slight rise in the contour of the ground that he thought looked like it could have also been a path.  Near that, there was probably a road.  Probably a small road, but a road all the same, and that would lead somewhere, hopefully to the bigger road.  He decided to start out that way.

            He scanned the remainder of the area around him for a second and his eyes rested on a moonlit spot of lightness against the dark earth on the other side of the plane.  He stared at it for an instant before realizing with a tinge that it was the blanket that covered mom.  He gazed at it for a moment more, then stooped down to look at Chris.

            “Look, son, your mom is right over there,” he said and pointed to the approximate direction of her broken and dead body.  “You can’t go over there, understand?”

            Chris shifted his eyes away and looked down.  Chris knew where she was.  He knew she was dead.  But dad was horrified at the thought that Chris might look for her and see what he had seen.  He was adamant.

            “Son,” he said trying to be gentle but stern. “You have to listen to me.  There is nothing we can do for her, okay?  You have to believe me.  She is…gone.”

            He waited for a response, but Chris just looked away from him and stared at the busted instrument panel.  Dad tried a slightly different approach.

            “The kids need your help,” he said.  “I am depending on you to watch out for them and take care of them, Okay?  Chris??”

            Chris looked at him again and nodded once.  He knew.  Dad reached in and patted his head. 

          “It’s going to be all right.  We’ll get out of here soon,” dad said, then stood again and began to move. 

Chris watched him as he stepped carefully off of the shattered wing, and toward the front of the plane.  He paused to gain his bearings for a moment, and then took a deep breath of the frozen air.  Resolved, he set off, walking in a straight line across the rough ground of the field toward the right hand edge of the silhouette of trees.  The moon played off of his form as he went, bobbing and weaving his way into the moonlit darkness of the frozen night. Gradually his form dimmed until it blended with the dark backdrop and faded completely out of view. 

Then he was gone.