Chapter 11: Caution Ahead - Traffic Pattern Modified

I didn’t know it, but circumstance was about to destroy any chance of my walking out of the hospital without a confrontation happening. First the matron wanted to speak to me because she wanted to ask me to keep notes on any problems or any benefits of any kind that I happened to notice with either of the new casts. Of course Carissa seemed to be glued to my arm about then and since Corinna stayed with her twin, Will was along as well. All of our parents had left before the matron seemed satisfied that I knew what she wanted and she finally decided that we were free to leave.

That meant all of us were heading for the door as a group. Carissa and I were holding hands and we were being followed by Corinna and Wil. Then I felt Carissa tense and her hand clasp mine even tighter than it had been. That’s when I noticed Sandy McAdam coming through the outer door toward us. I think if looks could have killed, Carissa and I might both have died about then.

I will never understand people in some instances. This was the young woman that less than twenty-four hours ago had insisted I was some kind of freak, but now she was reacting as if I and Carissa had insulted her in some way. I fully admit that I was confused, but her reaction floored me. At first I thought the look on her face was all we were going to have to deal with, but then she stepped into our path and stood there with her hands on her hips as if she was confronting someone who had done something terrible. I held my tongue and thankfully, so did Will and the twins. Sandy seemed to be trying to get her breath for a moment and she simply stood there, taking one deep breath after the other.

Then she simply crumpled. I never moved and neither did Wil, but Carissa and Corinna both did. I still don’t know how it was possible, but they had caught her before she hit the floor and eased her into a chair. Then Carissa was up and running to get the matron while Corinna held Sandy’s hand and supported her to stop her from sliding out of her seat. I didn’t know what to do and I doubt if Wil did either, but the decision was out of our hands. Corinna simply ordered us to go outside, telling us that she and Carissa would catch up with us in a few minutes.

The idea of getting out of the hospital wasn’t something I was going to argue about right then. I was out that door as fast as I could hobble on my new cast and Wil was on my heels. Once I was outside, I took a deep breath of the late spring air and without speaking to Wil, I headed for my car. That’s when I found out the world wasn’t done throwing shit at me for the day.

Under my windshield wiper, I found a ticket for speeding and another for parking in the emergency zone of the hospital. I was completely speechless.

Will wasn’t speechless though. He howled with rage, in fact I’ve never seen him so angry. I think if the cop had been there Wil would have eaten him alive. I was just too wiped out to even comment. I’d been through too much and my emotions were simply unable to keep up to the roller coaster they’d been on. I simply opened the driver’s door of the car, got behind the wheel, put the key in the ignition and drove the twenty or thirty feet to a parking spot. Then I shut off the car, put my head on my hands as they rested on the steering wheel and broke into silent tears.

I’d had it. I was an emotional wreck and felt that life was unfair. I was only sixteen years old, but in the last few weeks I’d dealt with more problems and more triumphs than at any previous time in my life. In fact, in the last week or so, my life had gone from one extreme to another and I simply didn’t feel capable of coping with all the changes that had happened to me and to those around me. Emotionally, I was totally overloaded and needed some sort of relief.

I’m not sure how long I sat there, quietly crying, but it couldn’t have been that long; however, that brief interlude was what I needed. When I lifted my head and dashed the tears from my face, I found that I was still alone, still sitting in my car, but I’d gained a feeling of resolve that I’d never felt before. Previously I’d simply reacted to everything around me and while everyone had thought I was planning my life and my actions, I realized that instead I had only been reacting, letting what others did govern how I behaved.

In those few moments, I’d made up my mind to act on things happening around me instead of simply reacting to them and taking the consequences as they came. Perhaps I grew in some way, I don’t know, but I did know that from that moment things were darn well going to change as far as I was concerned.

The first thing I did was to go back inside the hospital. Wil was standing off to one side talking to Corinna while Carissa and the matron were talking to Sandy, who was still sitting in the same chair and quietly staring at them. Then Sandy looked over at me and her eyes dropped to the floor, that’s when I cleared my throat and everyone else seemed to realise I was standing there.

“Excuse me, but I need to talk to Sandy for a few moments and I’d like to be alone, if everyone doesn’t mind,” I said insistently.

Carissa must have seen something in my face because she stood and moved toward Corinna and Wil, then they went outside. The matron was another matter. She looked like she was about to argue with me.

“I’m sorry, Ma’am, but this is a problem that needs to remain between Sandy and me. I’d like to talk to her and I really think it should be just between the two of us. If you want to be nearby, that’s fine, but I do want to speak to her privately.”

The matron looked at me as if she was still willing to argue, but she didn’t say anything. After a few seconds though, she turned and looked at Sandy who nodded her head as if in agreement with me.

When we were alone, I really wasn’t feeling as positive as I had a moment before, but I knew I had to say something and all I could really say was to explain what I felt and what I had noticed about Sandy and her family. In order to stall for time and prepare what I wanted to say, I took the time to pull over a chair and sit down at Sandy’s side. Then I began by explaining my feelings about the way I viewed women and the world.

In order to do that I found myself explaining about my childhood, my experiences in school, my experiences at home and simply about my life in general, then I found I was asking her about her life and about her family.

Our lives were quite similar in a lot of ways, but very different in others. While we were both from two parent families, our parents were much different. My Mom and Dad discussed and decided issues, but in her family her father tried to overrule every decision. We were both from three child families, but while I was the middle child with an older brother and a younger sister, she was the oldest child with two younger sisters. The similarities and differences went on and on, but the biggest difference was the fact that in my family we discussed and decided things as a family, while in her family, she’d always been taught that men ruled and women served their wishes.

I did manage to convince her to talk to someone about the way she’d been raised and about her feelings, then I paused to talk to the matron before I left. All I did with her was to explain that Sandy and I had a difference in our outlook on life and on relationships, leaving it at that.

I’m not sure why, but when I walked back out to the car I felt like I’d left a huge load of rubbish behind me. Wil and the girls were sitting in the car, talking quietly when I came out. Of course they were curious about what had happened, but I felt that I’d already said enough to them about the situation. I just shrugged my shoulders and said that I didn’t think there would be any more problems. Needless to say none of them seemed happy with my decision to remain silent, but I remained adamant in spite of their entreaties to get me to speak.

I picked up the traffic ticket from the seat and tossed it on the dash, then started for home. I hadn’t driven more than a couple of blocks before I noticed that I was being followed by the RCMP car again. I made certain that I stayed within all the traffic laws, but drove as quickly as I could to the local RCMP detachment, grabbed the ticket in my hand, got out of the car and went to the door. Since it was Sunday afternoon, I had to wait for someone to open the door to my ring. I was just entering the door as the cop who’d been following me pulled into the parking lot and parked beside my car. I ignored him, entering the door and closing it behind me.

“Could I speak to whoever is in charge?” I asked.

“That would be me,” the constable who’d opened the door said quietly.

“Fine,” I smiled and held up the ticket I’d gotten earlier. “I found this ticket on the window of my car not long ago and although there are extenuating circumstances behind my actions, what is written here is true. I will be fighting this in court, but that isn’t the reason I’m here. You see after being in the hospital for nearly two hours, I find that rather strangely the moment I pulled out of the hospital parking lot, I was followed by the same car and the same RCMP officer who had given me ticket.”

Almost as if it was scripted, the door opened again, this time it had been unlocked from the outside.

“Ah, here he is now,” I turned and smiled.

The look on the young officer’s face was worth the time I’d taken to set him up.

“I should explain that I’m normally a very law abiding driver. I happen to own a dirt track stock car and I like the idea of winning races, but I like my races to be at the stock car track where I can feel safe.”

“You were driving down a public street, exceeding the speed limit, then you abandoned your car parked in an emergency zone,” the young officer snapped almost as if he was responding with a memorized speech.

“I had found a man who had suffered a heart attack and he was in an area where emergency services were unavailable, so I transported him in my car,” I spoke slowly and quietly. “I admit that I was doing forty miles an hour in a thirty mile an hour zone, but at that time I was flashing my lights and sounding my horn to warn pedestrians and oncoming drivers. At that time I was driving with a cast on my left foot, which I happened to destroy by hitting my dimmer switch in order to flash my lights. When I arrived at the hospital, I was not allowed to leave the hospital to move my car until I had a new cast in place.”

There was a brief silence.

“Ummph umm,” The constable who had opened the door for me cleared his throat. “Constable Samuels, I wish to speak to you in my office. Mr. Crawford, I will be speaking to the authorities at the hospital, if I find the circumstances are as you explained them, you’ll find that when you go to court a plea of innocence due to extenuating circumstances will not be opposed.”

I suppose I should have explained what I was doing before bolting out of the car and hurrying inside the RCMP station, but I hadn’t taken the time to do that, so when I went back outside I found Wil arguing with the girls. He wanted to see what I was up to. I explained as I started to drive home and I think I surprised everyone. Just the idea that I might go out of my way to say something like I had seemed to be outrageous to all of them, in fact they expected that I’d be targeted by the young cop in the future.

I shrugged my shoulders, then laughingly said that my family let me drive like a nut on our own property, so I didn’t feel that I had to drive like a nut on public roads. At least Carissa thought it was funny, but the other two seemed more subdued. When I asked about it, Wil explained that he felt he was going to be tarred by the same brush in the future, in other words he was worried that he’d be targeted by that cop just because he was my brother.

I suppose I wasn’t very sympathetic, whatever the reason, most of the drive home passed with almost no conversation.

When we drove in the yard Dad and Mr. Coulter were sitting on the front porch and as I pulled to a stop, Dad got to his feet.

“We were about to send a search party out for you,” he said as I slid out of the car.

“Sorry about that,” I answered him, then quickly explained about Sandy and about the cop.

Both Dad and Mr. Coulter just shook their heads as I talked about the cop as if they agreed with Wil and Corinna. Of course the discussion carried over to the dinner table. To my surprise I found both Mom and Mrs. Coulter agreed with Carissa and me, but I watched and listened to the conversation, Dad slowly changed his mind as well. Before too long I had the feeling that even Wil knew that any argument he came up with was going to be shot down by someone.

Of course that wasn’t the reason for this meal or meeting or whatever it was.

What surprised me was that nothing was being said about the twins having grown to be involved with the Wil and me, yet there was no way that I could think of to bring it out without causing a ruckus of some sort. Carissa finally opened the can of worms.

“Well Dad, since Beth isn’t here to take her share of our thanks, I suppose Corinna and I only have you to thank for setting us up with our two guys do we?” she spoke softly.

The old saying that ‘You could have heard a pin drop.’ described the silence that followed. I waited a moment, then winked at her.

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” I drawled. “I remember the looks on Mom and Dad’s faces when I first brought you two here. Don’t you think they deserve some thanks as well?”

“But they weren’t counting on all the things that could change,” Corinna grinned at me. “Like you getting hurt or the idea that we might feel responsible for that and try so hard to take your place and please everyone.”

“I don’t think they counted on my coming home early either,” Wil added.

“Now just a darn minute...” Dad started to say, but he looked at Mom and saw that she had a silly grin on her face, whatever he’d started to say seemed to die right there.

In fact the whole table grew silent for a moment, then to my surprise Mr. Coulter was the first one to laugh.

“Okay you smart alecks, so we’re hoisted on our own petards; that doesn’t mean we want to see any of you making silly decisions that could end up hurting your futures,” Then he looked directly at me. “By the way, I thought you told me that you were extremely shy?”

“I was, but your daughters beat that out of me in a hurry,” I winked at him.

“Chris!” Carissa squawked like she’d been poked with something, then she turned toward her dad. “Daddy, Chris was never really shy, he’s just reserved until he gets to know you, but he won’t agree with that. He believes that he’s shy.”

“Actually I think Chris has changed a fair amount in the last few weeks,” Mom said quietly. “But then, Carissa, I think you’ve changed a fair amount in the last few days as well.”

I simply smiled at that, because I agreed with Mom. I wasn’t going to say that though, in fact I managed to sit back and let the conversation flow around me for a while. I was actually marvelling at the way Mom kept managing to turn the conversation whenever it seemed about to drift toward an extremely controversial or more or less taboo subject.

Of course before too long the conversation drifted to Grampa Bender and what we were going to do about his place up in the hills. I’d been thinking about that myself and I had some ideas I wanted to promote, but I waited for just the right opportunity to bring them up.

I’d always had the dream in the back of my mind that I’d like to live up there on the edge of the foothills and raise horses, however I didn’t know if I was really cut out for that kind of life. What I wanted to suggest was that if Grampa Bender had to remain in the hospital for long, I wanted to stay at his place and look after it until he was well enough to live there on his own again.

That evening though, I knew I was in for an argument before I even started to speak.

I suppose the fright everyone had received about Grampa Bender’s heart attack had put everything into a different perspective and also calmed everyone down a lot, at least in respect to Corinna and Wil’s actions. All of us were feeling our mortality and I think Mr. and Mrs. Coulter had been impressed by the prompt action that Carissa and I had taken when we’d found Grampa Bender in such bad shape. In some way Corinna and Wil may well have gained some ‘reflected’ respect from our actions as well, at least no one was bearing down on them as hard as I had expected.

Actually I think it helped that Mom and Dad took the time to discuss all the happenings of the last few days, then to answer any questions that Mr. and Mrs. Coulter had about anything that had happened. In fact I felt they laid it on just a bit thick, but at one point all of Mom and Dad’s work almost went down the drain.

“I was very impressed with how Carissa and Corinna pitched in to help around the farm, particularly after Chris was injured,” Mom smiled at Mrs. Coulter. “Actually we owe your two girls a huge thank you for all the work they’ve done while they’ve been here.”

“Well, we sort of felt responsible for Chris getting hurt, so we were trying to make up for it,” Corinna shrugged.

“Yeah, if we hadn’t been so eager to ride the horses, he wouldn’t have been hurt at all,” Carissa added.

“You certainly don’t owe us anything, in fact we owe you,” Corinna smiled at Mom, then turned her head toward Wil.

I felt Carissa’s leg move at my side and suspected that she’d kicked Corinna’s leg under the table. At least Corinna jumped slightly, but also shifted her gaze to Carissa almost instantly.

“We certainly do,” Carissa said. “I’ve learned a tremendous amount about farming and raising animals. For instance, I never, ever want to be involved with raising chickens!”

“Oh my, that reminds me, you should see those pictures your uncle took of the two of you,” Mr. Coulter chuckled. “I think they’re priceless.”

“Oh, Daddy! You would!” Corinna grumbled. “Why would anyone want a picture of us with no makeup, grungy clothes, messed up hair and both of us dripping wet from sweat because we’d been working so hard.”

“That’s the whole point,” Carissa said and I could feel her relax, as if the dangerous subject had been bypassed for a moment. “Daddy likes the pictures because they’re proof that we’re not the totally spoiled little bitches that some people seem to think we are.”

“Oh, I see,” Corinna actually smiled at her twin. “Then I think we owe the whole Crawford family a gigantic thank you for taking a chance on us, don’t we?”

“I think everyone should call it even,” I chuckled. “It was another of those deals that Dad calls a fair trade. Everyone got some benefit out of the process.”

“Well seeing that you’re the only one who seems to have been injured in any way, I suppose your opinion should be our guide,” Mr. Coulter said quietly. “I must admit that when I heard you were in the hospital I was worried. Since the rumour I heard made it sound as if the twins had been involved in some way with your injury, I felt somewhat responsible myself.”