For the most part, I've confined myself to posting chapters of my book, Men of the Skull, from Part II, which concerns Penn State. Part I was about my time at Drexel leading up to my transferring universities. To that point (2004 when I wrote that chapter, and until 2014) transferring schools was the most radical thing I'd ever done in my life. I couldn't believe I had the guts to actually take initiative and do something that seemed so drastic.
Like climbing into wrecked school buses was ordinary, but I digress.
This chapter was the second to last of Part I, and, upon editing, will probably conclude Part I. It's one of the best written chapters of Part I, and that's because I had some help. A few years back, I posted an old story I'd written called "Disorganized Light." I mentioned that a dear friend of mine liked it, and threatened to re-write it. Well, he never did, but he DID re-write this chapter. He read it as one of my reviewers once I finished the book in 2007. Out of nowhere I received this chapter, re-written to the form you see now.
Chris is an amazing writer, especially detective stories. He introduced the 'dummy family' motif to the piece which I'd use while rewriting Part II. In any case, his rewrite was far superior to the original (which I'd titled "It's Over") so I kept it this way. Yes, I'll give him credit for that bit.
However, none of that has to do with why I'm posting it now. The piece concerns my final breakup with my first girlfriend, whom I call Julianne. After this, I'd see her a few times before PSU took me in other directions. I saw her once after college, and once at the bookstore pre-transition (She didn't recognize me.) Well, I saw her again this past weekend. I was visiting Wife and Daughter, and was in a grocery store, and there she was. She'd aged, obviously, but still had her classic beauty and tiny nose. She didn't recognize me (go figure) and I didn't say anything to her. Even if nothing else has, that old wound has healed.
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Chapter 1.27 Sucking Chest Wounds
“The doors are blocked. We won’t get them open until the towing equipment arrives, and we’re losing time!” Don shouted from in front of the crippled school bus.
“Let’s
cut in from the roof,” suggested Allen.
“OK. You and Lance do it.”
Don,
our captain, had sent me with Allen to the roof of the bus, because we were the
thinnest, so the initial hole could be smaller.
It was an advantage of speed that we needed, but a disadvantage when it
came to handling the massive hydraulic K-saw.
I steadied Allen as he pulled the big buzz saw across the yellow
roof.
Modern K-12 Saw
(https://www.thefirestore.com/Partner-K-12FD-Fire-Rescue-Saw)
“What the hell is taking you so
long?” Don called up. He had a couple of other guys using the Jaws
of Life on a wrecked car nearby.
“We’ve
encountered some roof struts and a second layer of metal. Five more minutes, I’m guessing” answered
Allen.
“People
inside may be bleeding to death. Cut
between the struts and have Lance climb through without his gear. He’s scrawny enough!”
“You
just wish you were still so thin!” I
yelled back at him as I stripped off my jacket and tossed it down to Mike, who
was tending the saw’s hydraulic line.
Three minutes later, I kicked open
a flap into the school bus.
“Watch
it! That cut metal will be sharp and
hot!” Don warned from the ground.
I put my gloves back on, but could
still feel the metal’s heat through them as I lowered myself through the narrow
hole and jumped down into the bus. A bit
of the metal cut my arm.
“Ouch! Sonafabitch!”
I yelled.
“Watch
your language with those kids!” Allen
called down, smiling.
I
quickly triaged the injuries of the four people in the bus—one with a broken
arm, two with head injuries, one of those unconscious, and one… shit.
Allen
dropped a first aid kit down to me, then lowered himself through hole. As we worked on the unconscious head trauma,
our priority, Don and some of the other guys were finally making headway on
removing the emergency exit in the back of the bus.
“Julianne comes home from the shore
today” I mentioned to Allen as I held the victim’s head while he put on a
cervical collar.
“How
long has she been gone?”
“A
week.”
Allen finished with the collar, and
we started strapping the victim to a short back board to immobilize the
spine. “Are you going to keep dating
when you go up to PSU?” he asked.
“I
don’t know. I guess it wouldn’t make
sense really.”
“Especially when it’s been in and
out of the toilet so much with you being close,” Allen added.
“Straps are tight.”
“OK. Let’s move her from the seat” Allen said.
The door in the back popped open
with a large bang as the
‘We
need another short board, two long boards and two more people in here!” Allen
called to the back.
“Take
care of that person, there, next” I said, pointing at the other head injury.
Mike
and another guy jumped in and started caring for the victim I’d indicated. Don brought in the two long boards and a
short board. Allen and I strapped our
patient to a long board and carried her out the back.
“Why
did you direct Mike to Victim One?” Don
asked us after we put Annie on the ground.
“Victim
Three was dead, so I thought number One took priority after this one.”
“What
do you mean Victim Three was dead?!
Victim Three wasn’t dead, but she probably is now!”
“There
was no card, so I did a quick exam and checked for a pulse… there wasn’t one,
so I figured she was dead or uninjured.
Either way, it put her at the bottom of the list.”
“No
pulse, huh? You think that’s funny? Well, just so you know, you’re still
wrong—you’re not a doctor, so you can’t pronounce people dead. If that person’s family sued…”
“The dummy has a family? I didn’t know… I’m really sorry.”
“That’s
why we practice” Don smiled. “Are you
sure there wasn’t a card that said ‘sucking chest wound’ on her?”
“Not
that I saw. Besides, wouldn’t I hear a
sucking chest wound?”
“Sucking chest wounds might make a wheezing
sound that you can hear, but accident sites tend to make a lot of noise of
their own. If you come across someone
with a sucking chest wound that‘s louder than a siren, you can pronounce that
person dead. Now, get back in there!”
Allen
and I went back in the bus to take care of the driver. We still couldn’t find a card detailing what
her injuries were supposed to be, but this time I did notice a gear shift lever
sticking out of the side of her coveralls.
“Still no pulse,” Allen called out to Don, “Is she dead, now?”
“No,
damn it, she has sucking chest wound, but she’ll be awfully damn lucky to be
alive after you two guys are done with her!”
“He
can sure say that again,” Allen said quietly as we began to minister to another
Resuci-Annie dummy.
We
spent the rest of the morning training in the junk yard. We saved a lot of dummies that day; I felt
even better about it than I had in the past, now that I knew they all had
dummy-families waiting for them at home.
After
a shower, I sat around watching MTV while I waited for Julianne to call
back. Lenny was having a party tonight
and I was hoping she would come along.
Julianne had never met Lenny—nor anyone else that I worked with for that
matter, except Chrissy, who she knew from the Springsteen show.
Chrissy’d be there tonight. She
and Lenny were a couple now.
I
hadn’t spoken to Julianne in over a week.
Part of me wondered why she hadn’t bothered to call while she was down
the shore. Another part already knew the
answer. All of me didn’t want to hear
it. The phone rang as Phil Collins was
singing to his drumstick “She reaches in,
and grabs right hold of your heart.”
“What’s
up?” she asked as if we’d just spoken to each other this morning.
“Lenny—the
guy I work with—is having a party tonight.
Want to go?”
“Sure. What time?”
“Seven?”
“OK. I’ll see you then.”
“OK.”
“OK,
bye.”
She
sounded happy enough.
It
was a few minutes after seven when I got to her house. She must have been waiting. She came right out of the house and jumped in
the car. The trip to Lenny’s house was
filled with hearing about how great Sea Isle City was and how much fun she had,
but she seemed a bit cautious again, like she was editing and measuring her
words. Eventually, we pulled into
Lenny’s front yard; his driveway was packed with cars.
We
followed the music into the open garage where we found Lenny pulling a beer
from a nicely iced keg. “Hey! You made it!” he said, turning toward us.
“Told
you we would. Lenny, this is Julianne.”
“Pleased
to meet you Julianne! I’ve heard a lot
about you. Want a beer?”
“No,
thanks. My parents would kill me if I
came home with beer breath.”
“Well,
dating this guy has to make them suspicious, doesn’t it?” he said, nudging
me.
I got myself a beer and followed
him into the living room. It was wood
paneled and had a gold colored shag rug.
Several bookshelves full of knick knacks and a few books lined one
wall. Chrissy played with a high-speed
stereo, which had a CD player and four huge speakers. The cutting edge electronics clashed with the
70’s décor… but then what doesn’t?
“Hi
Lance!” Chrissy cheered as she came over
to hug me.
“Chrissy! You remember Julianne?”
“Yeah. Hi!” she said smiling.
The
stereo began to blast the new Peter Gabriel record.
“This
CD is awesome!” Lenny shouted above the music.
“So’s
the tape.” I replied.
“Huh?”
Lenny asked unable to hear me.
“SO
IS THE TAPE.” I tried again louder.
Yeah,
‘So’. This is it.” He replied pointing to the stereo.
I
gave up. The name of the new Peter
Gabriel album we were listening to was ‘So’.
He must have thought I was asking about it. Maybe he forgot that I worked in the record
store with him where we played it to death every day. In any case, my window for making a joke out
of the fact that most people didn’t have a CD player was long gone, so I just
smiled and nodded.
We
stayed for a couple of hours, but there wasn’t a lot of conversation. When the party is at the guy-who-works-in-the-record-store-with-the-really-big-stereo’s
house, music tends to dominate the evening.
Julianne followed me around and I introduced her to everyone, but she
didn’t seem to be too interested in really getting to know these guys. We said our goodbyes relatively early and
started back to her house.
As the Rabbit sputtered down the
road, Julianne stared out the window.
Finally, she spoke. “Lance,
we, um, need to talk.”
Uh oh. Contrary to practical medical advice, I
pushed my finger into my ear and wiggled it around in an attempt to reopen my
auditory canal, so I could better hear that which I knew I didn’t want to.
“I met some guys down the
beach. And it made me feel so… so
wanted. They made me feel sexy.”
“And I don’t?”
“You do, but this was
different. It was fun.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“That’s not what I meant. It was fun playing the whole ‘chase’ thing
with them. It was fun flirting. You know?
What I mean is…”
“Well, we’ve been seeing other
people for a while. How is this
different?”
“It just is. I don’t want to hurt you, but staying
together would just hurt us both more.
And it wouldn’t be fair to me. Or
you.”
“So, this is it?”
“I think it is. I’m 17, Lance - I think we both know this
isn’t “it.” I still love you, but I’m
not ready to settle down right now. I
want to be fair to us both.”
“Ok.”
“I still want to be friends.”
Oh shit – the “friends” line. There wasn’t anything else to say. No words can more quickly end a conversation
between a man and a woman, leaving him dumfounded, than, “Let’s just be friends.” I guess I should have been glad that she
didn’t use them verbatim, but the familiar stabbing pain was back, stronger
than ever. I felt empty, and relieved,
yet full of rage at the same time. I
knew I was just telling Allen this morning that it made no sense for us to keep
dating when I went to
The rest of the short ride was
silent. At some point, I thought I heard
a faint wheezing sound. I looked over at
Julianne. She looked fine… Too
fine. Oh, my God, it was coming from me! Reflexively, I felt around my torso for a
sucking chest wound. She reaches in, and
grabs right hold of your heart.
As I pulled up in front of her
house, she half-whispered, “Please don’t hate me.”
Another cliché.
She got out of the car and walked
up her driveway.
I drove home to my dummy-family.
