Chapter 3

Cindy's turn:

Idyllic life, I was thinking. I was sitting in a corner of the R&D lab with my laptop, cogitating over some power boosting issues when my cellphone came alive. That means something in this venue. As a group, we do NOT randomly call one another. The community calendar is always there and always updated, who's in class, who's on the road, who's cooking, all our information including, yes, those black spots that mean 'Don't disturb us.'

So when my phone goes off and everybody can tell that I'm in the lab today, it's got to be some significant event. I look at the display. Mom.

"Hey, Mom," I say. You have no idea what manner of magic that is. In the days before Dan, there were NEVER moments where I really looked forward to talking with Mom. She was seriously off-track when I hit puberty.

The voice on the other end of the line was NOT happy. "Cindy. Bill's in a hospital in Georgia. Heart attack. I'm on the way there. You need to call Dan."

Before words could form, my phone buzzed in my hand. "Mom, that's Dan now. I'll call you in a minute." I swapped calls, tears forming in my eyes as I did it. "Dannnnn..."

"Baby, Bill's in a hospital in Georgia. They came in an ambulance and took him off the project. I'm trying to get more information. I'm on the way to get you."

"I'll be at the street, waiting."

"Okay. That's all I know right now. Post it for us."

"Okay," I said. I shut down my laptop and stuffed it into my backpack and headed to Dr. Embert's office. She looked up.

"Cindy, what's wrong?"

"Medical emergency. My adopted grand-dad had a heart attack on the project in Georgia. I'm going..."

Dr. Embert had met Mister Bill at one of our socials, so she had a picture of him, big, greying bear, teller of stories, protector of innocent teenagers, grandpa. "You do what you need to do, Cindy. Keep us posted."

"Yes ma'am," I said. "If anybody asks, tell 'em what I told you."

I walked out into the sun, sat at the base of a tree by the road and tapped furiously on my iPhone, updating the calendar with an informational sticky note. I heard the guttural note of Dan's pickup truck wending through the university streets. As soon as he slowed to a walking speed, I was in the door and buckling myself in.

"We're driving," he said. "By the time we flew there and got a rental car, we can beat the time just driving."

"What do you know?" I asked.

"One of the techs said Bill was there talking with the civil contractor and he started having pains and getting dizzy. They made him sit in his truck and they called EMS. The guy followed them to the hospital. They took Bill in and got serious with him." He sighed. "That's all I know."

"Mom's on the road..."

"Ahead of us," he said.

"This could be bad," I said.

"Or not. Medicine does some miraculous things these days. People used to just lay there and die. Doctors can work miracles."

At least he SOUNDED confident.

I punched on the truck's sound system.

"Don't play a requiem, baby," he said.

"Friends are important," I uttered. Yeah, this has my thinking all disjointed. "Mister Bill didn't have to care at all..."

"But he did. Said you were the granddaughter he wished he would've had."

"He fit real well with us," I concurred. "A person that I was always happy to see." I sighed heavily. "Let me call Mom."

I did. Mom's fried. I mean REALLY disturbed. She didn't want to talk much. I just told her to be careful and repeated Dan's words about modern doctors.

"It's ... He's in a freakin' hillbilly hospital in freakin' GEORGIA! If it's not a chainsaw wound, they won't know SHIT!"

That was the old Mom. The new Mom's language was much more controlled and genteel. So Mom's stressed.

It was hard for me to work up to a happy conversation on the trip. Hours. Finally pulled into the parking lot of what was actually a good-sized, modern-looking hospital. Lots of pickup trucks in the parking lot, but that was it. While we searched for a slot, I saw Mom's car. Empty.

Dan's hand on my shoulder, reassuring me as we hurried inside, gave Bill's name, got directions. Found Mom in the waiting room of the intensive care unit.

Okay. Mom and I NEVER cried together. I mean, she cried in my arms when she came back home to Alabama, but this ... We BOTH cried. Poor Dan. I guess he felt totally helpless with two crying females in front of him.

Finally, he asked, "Donna, do you know anything?"

She nodded, wiping her eyes. "He's gonna survive. Be okay. Blockage. Stent. That sort of thing. He's sedated. Being monitored. Tomorrow he goes to a regular room."

I breathed a sigh of relief.

She pointed to the clock on the wall. "In a couple of hours they'll let us go in again." She sat in a chair, motioning for me to sit beside her. Gazed into my eyes.

"Cindy," she said, "That's a GOOD man in there."

"I know, Mom," I said.

"No, you DON'T know. That's a GOOD man." She heaved a breath. "When I got here, they wouldn't tell me anything. I'm not related, you know. I told 'em I was damned sure related, I was his fiancée."

I gasped. Glanced at Dan. Didn't need TWO heart attacks.

"I'm not, Cindy. I lied, just a little. But it makes me think." Her eyes moistened. "All those losers, Cindy. All those losers. That's a GOOD man..."

Dan and I let the conversation along that line trail off. Talked about other things. Changed the subject to Terri and Rachel and Bot-bot.

"Acts like a dog," Mom said. "Those two ... Watching them ... It's unreal."

"That's what that patent attorney said," Dan said. "Alan called one to come look. Terri and Rachel played catch with Bot-bot while the attorney watched. Terri did that thing where she left Bot-bot outside the door and let him whine. Alan said the attorney started salivating."

"It's a wonder they're not graduating with you next week," Mom said.

Yes, next week is the graduation ceremony for the university. Nikki and I don't get to walk. We get to sit upon the dais. Not valedictorians. No, the university president talked with Doctor Embert and Doctor Stebbins and Doctor Ramathani and we are being conferred Master of Science in Engineering, Bachelor of Science in Engineering, Bachelor of Science in Physics, and Bachelor of Science in Mathematics.

They still try to make it seem like Nikki and I don't know each other. I got called to Doctor Stebbins' office. I was ushered in. I recognized Doctor Stebbins and Mizz Aneeta and Doctor Embert.

"Oh, look, George," Mizz Aneeta said. "We actually have surprised Cindy."

Doctor Stebbins stood when I entered, along with the other two GENTLEMEN.

"I think we have, Aneeta," Doctor Stebbins said. "Cindy, this gentleman is the chancellor, Doctor Paul Hoskins. Paul, this is one of them."

"Doctor Hoskins," I said, shaking his hand. "I'm Cindy Richards."

"Ah, yes," Doctor Hoskins said. "I've seen your name on some surprising correspondence. I was told..." he eyed Doctor Stebbins, " ... that I should meet you in person so that I do not faint on the dais at graduation."

I smiled demurely. "I hope it's not that bad."

"No, it is not. I was warned. I was told that you jumped over, around and through every obstacle we have in place to get where you seem to be. Since these people have been terrorizing young scholars for years, the fact that you filtered through their impediments makes you special. Let's talk about your degrees..."

Nikki was waiting in the reception room when I walked out. My feet were like six inches above the floor.

That event provided some of the lift I need right now to get over the fact that an important person in my life is up the hall with hoses attached to his body and is monitored by enough technology to hunt Russian submarines.

Finally an ICU nurse showed up, looked at us, and said, "He can have visitors. No more than two at a time."

"Hon," Mom said to me, "let me have a few minutes with him and then y'all can come in."

Inside my head I went 'Huh?!?' but I said "Okay, Mom."

She stood up, pulled herself into some semblance of order. I noticed as she walked away that this is indeed the new mom. Slacks, not skin-tight. Blouse, subdued color, not showing cleavage. Shoes, not what Dan informs me are called 'fuck-me heels'. She disappeared into the hallway, doors closing behind her.

"Mom's shook up, baby," I told Dan.

"Yeah, I see that. They've sort of become really good friends. Bill says he really enjoys having her in his life."

"He told you that?"

"Yeah. Guys don't generally sit around talking about feelings and stuff, but we were talking about YOU and your mom, so that makes it legitimate."

"Tell me another one," I laughed. "You flunked the Neanderthal test that day you turned Mom down at the pool."

"Yeah. I know. And that's NOT the same person who's here crying about Bill."

So I'm mulling here. Nagging thought. I mean, I DO have some penchant for approaching a stack of ideas and deriving answers. This one was a doozy. If I had something of this magnitude in the lab, I'd be calling Doctor Embert over to show her a fusion reactor cell that operated on wheat chaff and chicken manure.

The doors to the hall pushed open. Mom. "Y'all go see him. He's doin' good. Looks good. Really."

I'm parsing the expression on Mom's face as Dan and I make our way up the hall.

Mister Bill's in a scene right out of a medical drama: Cannula at his nose. IV. Catheter bag. One of those horrid gowns. And trying to smile through this.

"Hi, punkin. How are you? Hi, Dan."

"You scared me, Mister Bill," I said.

"Ditto," Dan said.

"I'm gonna be fine, y'all," Mister Bill said. "I could've driven myself to the hospital."

"Randy took the best route, calling EMS," Dan said. "You never know if it's gonna get worse when it starts."

"Yeah, I owe the little turd a steak dinner, now," Bill smiled. "Maybe a LITTLE steak, but a steak nonetheless."

"Look, old man, you get your butt healthy and I'll make sure that Randy gets his steak," Dan said.

"That'll work," Bill said. He turned his grey eyes to me. "Cindy, I need to ask you a serious question."

Uh-oh. Here it comes. Let's see if Cindy has read the signs correctly. "Anything, Mister Bill."

"Cindy, I want your permission to marry your mom."

Okay, there's this thing, you know, where you pretty much expect something to happen, but you don't expect it to happen like THAT. This is one of those. "Mister Bill, Mom's old enough not to need MY permission."

"Cindy-Cindy," he smiled, using a pet name he gave me, "you're entirely too smart to think that I don't know that." He smiled at Dan. "Donna is all worried about how this all looks. I mean, she's thirty-six and I'm sixty..."

I watched Dan swallow hard on that one. I was fourteen and he was forty-one when we got married. All he could manage was a sheepish look in my direction.

"Mister Bill, you know all about Mom."

"I do. The whole history. Every bit of it. Every failure. Every regret. Every bad choice. And how she came to realize that she needed to change. That's what brings us here, baby."

"Mister Bill, you, and Mister Charley are my adopted grand-dads. I will never look on you as less than that. I'm still getting used to the new mom..."