Chapter 37

Mrs. Crowly lived a couple of blocks over from us. She drove a red and white 1953 Chevy Belair in mint condition. Fins in the back and chrome in the front. Most of the kids I knew would give their eye teeth for a car like that. The only time I ever saw her driving was when she went to church with her sister. Both of them must have been in their 80's.

It seemed strange to hear her voice. She was saying "I didn't see him. He just came out in front of me." I wanted to tell her it was alright but I couldn't see or feel anything. She kept repeating it to each person there. They were all asking if I was OK but I couldn't answer them, either. Somebody should answer Mrs. Crowly.

They were talking about him. He has a broken back. His legs are pretty bad. I don't think he'll walk again. He may never wake up.

Quiet. I just want to relax. Running too hard the last few days. Somebody check my mower. I think that car hit it.

The next few days will tell us a lot. I don't want you to get your hopes up. Even if he wakes up there's a good chance he won't be able to walk. He's just lucky his sister loves him.

Poor guy. I feel sorry for him. My sister loves me, too.

You can stay as long as you like. Don't expect any miracles. Normally we don't let children under 16 visit but as long as you're here his girlfriend can visit during visiting hours.

Wes, can you hear me? I'm here for you baby. So are Les and Sam. Oh Wes. Don't leave us. Not now that we've found each other.

I'm here. Sleepy. Just let me sleep in and I'll do my lawns tomorrow.

Mom's Story

Sam and I were in the kitchen, doing the dishes. At my son's request, I was talking to her about birth control. She told me that she'd been thinking about it and finally had the nerve to talk to her mother about it and was planning to do so that afternoon after practice. I agreed to step in and help if it became necessary.

I'd just picked up a glass to wash when I heard Les scream and then a sickening thump. I knew in my soul that Wes had been hurt and that he had been hurt badly. I let go of the glass, looked at Sam and said "Come on."

We didn't stop to dry our hands or anything, just ran out the kitchen door and down the driveway.

Wes was laying on the ground. The car had run over him. He was at an angle, his head between the two front tires. There was a lot of blood. The lawn mower was crumpled in the middle of the street.

Les was standing on the lawn, her hands up to her face, a look of terror on her face. She looked petrified.

"Sam. Run into the house and call the operator. We need an ambulance." Sam looked at me, then Wes, then Les.

"SAM! NOW!" I pushed her, hard. She almost stumbled, then seemed to shake herself. She ran up the driveway and into my kitchen.

I ran over to Wes. His chest was moving slightly. He was unconscious. Good. Probably the best thing for him. His body looked mangled and crooked and I knew he'd be in a lot of pain if he was awake.

Mrs. Crowly was in the car, obviously shaken up. She had some trouble but was able to open the car door and get out. She came up to me and told me she hadn't seen him, he just came out in front of her. I didn't pay her any attention.

I knew the worst thing I could do was to move him. "Leslie." No reaction. Come on, work with me here. "LESLIE!" She turned and looked at me, a blank look on her face. "Leslie. Wes is hurt. You've got to help me."

She looked ready to cry. She turned and looked at the house, then turned back to me. "Come on, Les. It's your brother. We need to help him."

She moved toward us. "Leslie. Go in the living room and get one of the pillows and the quilt off the couch. Bring them out. Hurry."

She turned and ran toward the front door. Sam was running back down the driveway. Mrs. Crowly went over to her and tried to hold her still while telling her she hadn't seen him till he walked into the street.

Les was running across the lawn with the quilt and the pillow. I lifted Wes's head and told her to put the pillow underneath. She did, then looked at the quilt and said "The blood."

I put my hand on her leg. "It's Wes, Leslie. Give it to me."

She pushed the quilt into my hands, then turned around. She held on to the car just above the headlight, leaned over and was sick in the gutter.

Come on. Come on. Where's the ambulance. Was it coming from the main police station? From one of the local hospitals? Oh, God, hurry up. My baby. My baby. My baby.

I felt arms around my neck, pulling me away from Wes. I backed up a bit and stood up. Les immediately wrapped her arms around me, hugging me as if not to let me go. Sam came up to our side and held both of us. We stood there and cried. Les finally asked the question on all our minds. "Is he going to be alright?"

"He's got to be, Les. If you've ever prayed for anything in your life, pray for your brother. I don't know how any of us could go on if he wasn't here with us."

We all moved back a bit and listened. Finally. There was a siren just coming into hearing distance, getting louder by the second. A big white and red ambulance with flashing red lights pulled up in the street in front of Mrs. Crowly's car. An attendant opened the passenger door, took one look at Wes and went to the back door. Both attendants opened up the back doors and pulled out a gurney. One of them climbed in and got a brace.

The driver was trying to put the brace on Wes but there wasn't enough room under the car. They couldn't back it straight up without running over his legs. The curb was too close to the rear wheels to turn it.

The other attendant was talking into a microphone on a curly cord coming from his radio under the dashboard. He was using codes but it was obvious he was calling for help to get him out of there.

Sam let go of me and mumbled "We don't have time for this shit." She ran to Mrs. Crowly's car and yanked open the drivers door. Les and I yelled out "Sam!" as both attendants chorused "Hey!"

Before we'd finished yelling, Sam had the car started up and was cranking the wheels. I looked at Wes and saw that she had them turned far enough to miss him, looked at her and nodded. She moved the gearshift into reverse and gunned the car.

You hear stories of people lifting cars off a loved one in an accident. Sam had never driven a car in her life. It was shear love for Wesley that gave her enough control to get the car off from on top of him. Unfortunately, that was all the control she had right then. Mrs. Crowly's car ended up with the back wheels in the grass next to the sidewalk, the front wheels in the street.

Sam got out of the car. The attendant with the brace looked at her and smiled. "Thanks. Remind me to give you the standard lecture on safety once this is over. But you may have saved this boys life just now." A short burst of laughter, then Sam broke into tears. I held out my arms and she came over.

They had the brace on Weslie. They carefully worked a board underneath him and then lifted him on the the gurney. They didn't bother to raise the gurney on it's wheels, they just lifted it and pushed it into the back of the ambulance.

One of the attendants looked at us. "I can take one of you with me."

Both girls said, "You go, Mom."

"I can't. I don't trust Sam to drive my car and you don't have a license." That got a short laugh from both of them. Les gave Sam a little shove. Sam leaned back and hugged Les. "Thank you. I'll wait for you in the waiting room."

The attendant ran to the front of the ambulance and grabbed a clipboard. He brought it over to me with a pen. "Just in case he needs surgery. It's a consent form." I blindly scribbled my name where he pointed.

He and Sam got in back with Wes. He hadn't reacted throughout this whole thing. No sound, no movement other than breathing, no reaction at all. He looked so fragile tied to that gurney with that white brace around his torso and neck. They closed the door and were gone, siren blazing and lights flashing.

We turned back to the house. Mrs. Crowly was standing on our front lawn. She looked lost.

I went over to her and gave her a hug. "I'm sorry, Mrs. Crowly. I had to take care of my son. It wasn't your fault. He's had a lot on his mind lately and it's just like him to walk right out in the street without thinking."

It seemed to cheer her up a bit. A least someone was paying her a little attention. "Is he going to be alright? He's such a nice boy."

"We hope so. We have to go the the hospital and find out. You're not in any shape to drive right now. Why don't you come in the house with us."

She came in and I sat her at the kitchen table. "Leslie. Put some water on and make us a pot of tea."

"Mah-hah-um. We need to go to the hospital."

"Leslie, put the water on. We all need to relax a bit before I get behind the wheel of a car. I'm sure Mrs. Crowly would like a nice cup of tea. I need to go up to my room and get money for the pay phone and your father's insurance card and whatever else I need for the hospital, so there's plenty of time for you to make tea."

I snuck out the front door and got Mrs. Crowly's car next to the curb, where it belonged, then went upstairs and got a few things, including a few changes of clothes. I wasn't planning on coming home anytime soon.

I went downstairs and the tea was just ready. I could see Mrs. Crowly really needed it. I got a cup and went over to the phone.

After I'd made arrangements for Jaz to spend the night with his best friend, I called my husbands secretary at home. She tried to keep up the charade that he was out of town on business. "Well, Honey, just tell him that his oldest son got run over and it doesn't look good. We'll be at Grossmont Hospital if he can get away."

There was silence, then a quiet "I'll tell him." I hung up the phone.

"Everybody ready?" Les nodded and Mrs. Crowly stood up.

"I'll just drive myself home."

"I don't want you driving right now. You've had quite a shock. I parked your car on the street and it's all locked up. Here are your keys and your purse. We'll drive you home on the way to the hospital. Tomorrow we'll find a way to get your car back to you."

"Les, grab a sweater for you and Sam." She gave me that look. "Come on, you don't know how long we'll be there and it chills down at night. They may not even let kids in the hospital and you'll have to wait in the parking lot."

"They wouldn't."

"They might. You're not leaving without them whether they do or not."

She ran up to her room, grabbed a couple of GHS sweatshirts and ran back down the stairs.

We locked up and got Mrs. Crowly into my car. When we got to her house, Les got out without being asked. Both of us held an arm and helped her up the walk and the steps to her house. She was definitely weak and in no shape to drive. We explained to her sister that my son had walked in front of her and there was nothing she could do. We got away without visiting because we had to get to the hospital. I had to promise to call them when I knew what was going on.

We got back in the car and Les scooted over to me, holding my arm. "Hold on a minute, Baby. I need both hands to drive. She grabbed the leg closest to her and leaned her head against it.

There wasn't anything to say. We both saw the condition he was in when they picked up his mangled body and hauled it away. The term "Meat wagon" came to mind and I couldn't shake it.

I pulled into the hospital parking lot and parked. Les got up, her face wet with tears. "Oh, Mom."

"I know, Baby. We just have to pray for him and hang in there."

We went in the door marked Emergency. Sam was sitting on a bench just inside the door and stood up as we walked in. There were about 8 examination rooms, some with curtains pulled, others empty. The standard room with an examination table, a steel cart with tools on it, a counter with some drawers and jars with cotton, bandages, long Q-Tips and other emergency supplies and a sink.

At the end of the hallway was another hall going right and left. There was a room with swinging steel doors with big square windows across the hall. It looked like they opened into a room for the staff to wash and dress up and there was an operating room past that. Sam pointed to the swinging doors and said "They took him in there."

The three of us talked. Actually, I asked questions, then Les and I listened. It seems they were waiting for Wes to arrive and as soon as the gurney was out of the ambulance they raised it up and a couple of doctors took a quick look at him just inside the door. A nurse was holding the curtains open for one of the examination rooms and one of the doctors said we need to get into surgery right away. Thank God I'd signed the consent form when they picked him up.

I had to settle Sam down. I guess she was holding on to Wes while they were checking him over and the nurse wasn't very tactful when she pried her off him. Nobody had told her anything and it was almost a half hour since they took him in. I got her settled down then we had to wait.

The swinging doors opened towards us and a doctor came out. He pulled his mask down, then peeled off his gloves. He looked fairly young, probably 26 or 27.

He walked up to me. "You're Wesley's Mother?"

"Yes, Doctor. How is he."

"Who are these girls?"

"His sister and his girlfriend."

"What I have to say isn't going to be easy to hear. As the parent you have the final decision about the girls." They both grabbed onto me.

"We all need to hear it, Doctor."

"OK. Follow me."

He led us into one of the vacant exam rooms and pulled the curtain shut. There was no place to sit so we all stood in a next to each other as he talked. Each of them had two arms wrapped around one of mine. He introduced himself as Dr. Bradley and we all gave our names.

"Your son is lucky to be alive. He has two severely broken legs and a broken back. He is also in a coma. He could snap out of the coma in a day or two or he could stay in it until he dies, days or years from now. If he recovers from the coma, there's no way to tell if he'll ever walk again."

All three of us had tears flowing down our faces. I looked closer at the doctor. "There's more, isn't there?"

He took a few seconds before he looked me in the eyes. "Your son has some internal damage. He must have been hit in the back by the bumper as the car was running him over. Both of his kidneys were destroyed."

"What does that mean?"

"Well, the kidneys clean the poisons out of the body and expel them with other waste. If left unattended, your son's body will build up poisons and he'll die a very painful death within a couple of weeks. There is a procedure called dialysis that uses a machine to clean the blood a couple of times a week. It is very expensive and most insurance companies don't cover it. The other option is to find someone willing to donate a healthy kidney. There are donors available, but the average wait time is 3 - 7 years, depending on the patient's blood type and other body characteristics. We would have to check the donor and make sure we have a match or else we run serious risk of the body rejecting the kidney."