Chapter 2: Just Another Day

“Y’all open?”

I finished taking the lug off the wheel and looked over at the salvage yard gate where a tall, awkwardly lanky man stood. He tugged his old frayed Army field jacket a little straighter. It was faded to the point of almost turning grey. “Yeah. What can I do for you?”

He rubbed the grey-shot stubble along his jaw. “I’m wonderin’ if you could let me pick and pull some parts. A guy I know restores cars, and he’ll pay me to hunt some stuff down for him. I pay ya for the parts; he pays me for parts and time.”

“Not a lot of money in that.”

“It’s enough. I got my VA disability, and this just gets me a little extra beer money under the table.” He pulled a couple of tattered pieces of loose-leaf paper covered with scrawled lists of parts from a jacket pocket.

“Come on in. I have to get you a waiver to sign. We don’t really do pick and pull, but what the hell.”

He limped through the gate, his left leg dragging oddly. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

“When were you in?”

“Been out almost fifteen years. I was an Eighty-Eight Mike in the Army. A truck driver.” He gestured at his left leg. “Hit a wash out and rolled it. That was all she wrote.” He grinned ruefully. “Shit happens.”

“Yeah, it does. I was a medic.”

“Really? Thought ‘bout doin’ that, but my test scores weren’t high enough.”

We went up into the trailer office, and I managed to find a pick and pull waiver for him to sign. Tara had dropped by a couple months ago, seen my piles of paperwork, given me a scowl that could have been fatal to small animals, and promptly made a project of organizing them to death. She’d also printed off stacks of legal forms for everything from hazardous waste to environmental impact statements to safety waivers for visitors. Delaney had found the whole process hilarious right up until Tara had shifted over to her homeschool desk and done the same thing.

We’d spent the better part of the last month scrambling to figure out where Tara had put everything. Which, embarrassingly, nearly always turned out to be a file folder clearly marked with whatever we were looking for.

He scrawled his name and handed it back to me. I glanced at it. “William Aleshire?”

“That’s me; I just go by Billy though, Doc.” I half-smiled at the familiar military nickname for a medic.

Delaney walked up cautiously, a tire iron balanced on one skinny shoulder. “What’s up?”

Billy snorted. Then laughed out loud with one of those snorting laughs you can’t help comparing to a donkey.

“What’s so fucking funny?” Delaney scowled at him.

“Sorry, you said, ‘What’s up’ to Doc here. You know, ‘What’s up, Doc?’ Like Bugs Bunny always says.”

Delaney looked at me. “A concussion. You’re looking for a medical form because he gave himself a concussion, aren’t you?”

Billy shook his head. “Damn, she’s funny.”

Rolling her eyes, Delaney shifted her attention to me. “I got the set of wheels off that ‘61 Catalina, but it only had three caps. They’re stacked and ready to go.”

“You got any ‘91 Accords out there?” Billy looked right at Delaney.

She nodded. “Why?”

“I’m fixin’ to pull some parts for a guy.”

“Seriously? Jesus, a full fucking tank of gas doubles the value of those things.” Delaney’s face twisted in distaste.

Bill looked over at me, and I shrugged. “She’s got a point. They’re not bad cars, but they aren’t worth much. One of the most common cars ever made.”

“Well, ol’ boy wants some parts for them, so they’re worth something to me. Money’s money, ya know? I think he’s building street racers, some kinda nostalgia thing.”

“Fair enough.” I pointed back to the stacks. “Try the third row, should be a couple on level ground about halfway down.”

“There’s four there, right in a row. One is blue; you can’t miss it.” Delaney pulled a candy bar out of one of her coverall pockets and took a bite. “You bring tools?”

Billy gave a goofy gap-tooth grin. “Got a whole trunk full of them.”

“Good. I don’t loan my tools.” She popped open the toolbox on the back of the rollback.

“Spoken like a real mechanic.” Billy nodded sagely.

I looked at the time. “We close at five sharp today. So be done by 4:30.”

“No problem, Doc. That’s a good hour. I’m just scoutin’ today. Don’t want to mess up family time.”

Delaney grunted as she pulled out a breaker bar. “Weird family time. We help out at the free clinic.”

“Still doing the Doc thing, huh?”

I nodded. “Just helping out a little.”

Honestly, Sheree convincing me to help the clinic had turned out to be more than a little cathartic, and Delaney was always ready to hop into her black skull-and-crossbones-covered scrubs to help. Tiffany had found a way to make Delaney a formally listed volunteer in the hospital network. She was surprised when Delaney promptly handed over her CPR card and First Aid certification. Kurt and Katie had arranged for a rather interesting array of training at the “Summer Camp” in Texas; the girls seemed to have certifications in everything from junior marksmanship to weather spotting.

Billy looked over at Delaney. “You don’t like it?”

“I didn’t say that. It’s kinda cool.” She suddenly grinned. “Last week, this homeless guy had a massive infection in his arm, and we opened it up. It went off like a volcano. Spewed shit everywhere. It was nasty.”

“You get to help do that?”

I shrugged. “I think she’s supposed to just help with admin stuff and some minor cleaning, but we’re always shorthanded, and she sucks at typing.”

Delaney stuck her tongue out at me.

“We just have to ask the patients if it’s okay if she helps. Never been a problem.”

He gave that same goofy grin. “Well, yer keepin’ yer hand in and havin’ some excitement, anyway.”

I shrugged. “Mostly sore throats, a sprained ankle or two and maybe on a really exciting night, a broken finger.”

Four Hours Later

“We’re out!”

I didn’t bother to argue that. Pamela, the LPN at the clinic, accounted for every cotton swab, alcohol wipe and paper towel. If there had been another dose of naloxone in the clinic, she’d have known, which left us short by ... I watched a guy drag another strung-out girl through the door, then glanced at the bodies draped over every flat surface ... short by way too many.

Pamela held her phone up. “9-1-1 lines are still down, and all the sheriff and fire department desk phones are busy.”

One of the first things you learn in the Army is that nothing ever goes wrong alone. There is nearly always a string of failures lined up to make things worse. No police, no ambulances, out of naloxone, and running out of time, with overdoses still pouring through the door. “Delaney!”

She looked up from where she’d just finished dragging another overdose case, a guy with stringy hair and a face tattoo, and rolling him on to his side; several months of hauling tires let her make it look easy.

“We need more Narcan. Everything we can get. Sheriff’s office has a locker full; they ordered them through us. Take Sally. Get them to send police and EMS here. We need all the help we can get.”

I’d barely finished the sentence before she snagged my keys to my bright yellow ‘79 Mustang Cobra, aka “Sally,” off the desk and was hopping over the bodies strewn on the floor, then sliding sideways through the door to avoid yet another incoming overdose case being carried in.

Keeping patients alive for the next twenty minutes took all the attention and focus I had, but I was certain Delaney would get what we needed if it was at all possible.