Chapter 61

HOSPITAL IN FLORIDA — THE WEE HOURS OF FRIDAY MORNING

A little goodwill can sometimes be a marvelous thing. Word had gotten around the hospital about the food Fred and his women had provided for the ICU nurses. Room 331 was one of the hospital's new rooms — a little bigger and the furniture wasn't quite as cheap. There was a couch in the room that folded into a fairly nice bed, and one recliner that also folded flat. They had no sooner gotten into the room yesterday than another recliner and two more straight chairs were brought in. Obviously, there had been communication between the ICU and floor nurses other than just that concerning the patient's condition.

As the nurse walked in for her 3:00 A.M. vitals, she stopped to look at the scene. Two of the women were asleep on the bed; another was sitting in a recliner just watching. The man was sitting in a straight chair with it facing the bed. He had let the patient's bed down as far as it would go, and sat in the chair, slumped forward, his upper body resting on the hospital bed while he held hands with the patient's even as he slept.

Hating to disturb them, the nurse, nevertheless, had to take the patient's vital signs. She gently tried to disengage Fred's hand, but he flinched and glared at her.

"Sorry, Sir," she quietly said. "I need to take her blood pressure."

As Fred moved his hand, she pressed the button on the blood pressure monitor and the cuff inflated to squeeze the patient's arm. The body on the bed jerked a little when the cuff squeezed.

"It's all right, Sweetie," the nurse automatically said. "I'm just taking your blood pressure. The cuff will relax in just a minute." Meanwhile, she took Pamela/Brenda's temperature and continued with patient assessments, turning to enter them into the wall-mounted computer nearby.

As soon as the blood pressure reading popped up on the screen, Fred took Brenda's hand again. Before he could speak, he could hear Brenda, "What was that? I felt something. Fred, are you there? Fred, answer me!"

"I'm here, Baby. Everything is fine," he said aloud before he remembered that Brenda could hear him if he thought instead of verbalizing as long as there was body contact.

The nurse smiled at them, turned the lights back to the low setting and walked out, thinking, If a loving family will help this woman, she has it made.

DAYBREAK ON MATTHEWS' MOUNTAIN

As breakfast was drawing to a close, the General looked over at Jeff, "I've taken your advice. We've decided to ride around the area some, if we can borrow one of your vehicles, Colonel."

Without a word, Arlene came by and put a set of keys on the table in front of him almost before he finished his statement. As he turned to stare at her as she walked away, Jeff chuckled. "Get used to it, Sir. They frequently have the answer before I have the question."

"Thank you, Ma'am," Whitworth said as a grinning Arlene began gathering up dishes.

"It's the black one sitting on this end of the inside garage. It's all gassed up and ready to go, but there's a credit card in the glove compartment if you need more gas," she said.

Whitworth turned to Jeff. "So you have tanks up here?"

"Well, I don't per se. Frank already had them installed when we moved in," he said, nodding to Wainwright, who smiled back. "My younger wives have taken over the job of making sure all our vehicles are ready at any time, and that includes checking the fluids and letting me know when it's time to change the oil."

"And they're teaching us," Nicki proudly said.

"So you've never gassed a vehicle before?" Whitworth asked, mostly joking.

Nicki, taking his comment seriously said, "Not until day before yesterday. We didn't even know what a motor looked like until Arlene raised the hood and showed us."

"We've ridden busses when the school took us on field trips," Nat injected.

"And we rode in a van when the orphanage took us to that awful foster home," Whitney added. "Then we got to ride in an Escalade when Arlene and Kayla took us shopping in Winter Park. They bought us so many nice things. We haven't even gotten to wear them all yet. Thank you again for sending us here."

That produced a rush to hug and kiss the General on the cheek. He blustered, but hugged them all back as Jeff winked at him.

Barbara and Ellen got up to help with cleanup. "You don't have to do that," Diana scolded. "Why don't you guys go ahead and hit the road? We put a map in your SUV and a list of things that we've found interesting that we thought you might want to see. You can just program the GPS to take you to them, or use the map and just drive around if you had rather do that. We've programmed the retreat into all our GPS units, so if you get lost, you can just hit Home and it will bring you back here."

"That's so thoughtful of you and we'll certainly do that. Right now though, we're going to at least help with cleanup. We're both feeling guilty about not getting to the kitchen in time to assist in preparing the meal," Ellen said.

As the women continued talking, Jeff stood and motioned to the General to follow him. Ann, smiling, was just finishing putting a carafe of coffee, cups and a platter of hot cinnamon rolls on a serving cart.

"Thank you, Wife," Jeff said as he turned to her, knowing she liked to be called that.

Ann put both arms around his neck and stretched up to kiss her husband. The kiss only lasted ten seconds or so, but it was time enough to produce two very noticeable bumps in her blouse. The General quickly averted his eyes and pretended he hadn't noticed.

Ann put her mouth close to Jeff's ear and whispered, "I'm so proud to be your wife, and I'm sooo glad I saved my armor-plated hymen for you." With a soft giggle, she prissed away.

Very aware of Ann's intellect, Jeff knew that even though she had whispered, she had intentionally let Whitworth hear, since he was only a step away. Chuckling to try and cover his embarrassment, Jeff pushed the cart toward the kitchen door. "Come on. Let's get out of the way before the women start griping about useless men in the kitchen."

In the living room, Jeff turned the thermostat down and pushed the cart near a couple nice chairs, then knelt to start the fire.

The General poured their coffee and commented, "Looks like one of your wives has already laid the fire for you."

With the fire started, Jeff stood up and looked over at Whitworth. "One of my wives, or Dave, or one of his wives, or Frank, or ... Heck, no telling who it was. I walked in to clean out the ashes last week and Frank Wainwright was just finishing up. A multi-billionaire and he cleaned out the fireplace."

Whitworth cut each of them a piece of roll. Jeff took his plate as the General slid a large piece of cinnamon roll on, picked up a fork and grabbed his coffee. Both men sat.

Whitworth put his coffee on a nearby table, then took a bite of the cinnamon roll. After chewing for a second, he froze, then chewed again and swallowed. "That is the best fucking cinnamon roll I've ever tasted. Who..."

"It's Diana's recipe. Hmmm, come to think of it, I think it originally came from Susan. Anyway, the new girls, at Susan's direction, made these first thing this morning. They were in the kitchen by four o'clock."

Whitworth took another bite of roll, then, "Your mother-in-law seems to be doing a lot for the girls," then quickly added, "Teenagers, up at four o'clock. You've got to be kidding me."

"Remember what I told you about your body changing. Little One has made our bodies far more efficient. We don't need as much sleep and we have a whole lot more energy. Plus ... my Queen expects her sister-wives to get along and be ... self-starters."

"And since she wants those girls to be future wives for you, she is instilling that in them as well."

Jeff took a bite of cinnamon roll, then a sip of coffee before replying. "I really don't know how it works, maybe Little One has something to do with it. Hell, everyone here at the retreat is a self-starter. You heard me talking to Dave about plowing out the driveway at four in the morning. Evie, Linda and Kim are just like him. Something needs to be done around here, someone does it. They don't gripe, bitch, or say something isn't their job. They just do it. We're all family. The only thing the men are — well — forbidden to do is anything to do with food, uh, other than carrying it in for the women when they go shopping. And ... eating it, of course," he joked.

"I imagine shopping takes up a lot of time with your wives cooking for so many people."

Jeff got up to pour some more coffee for both of them. "Not really. Oh, they go shopping every week, but generally just for unusual things. We have a service that brings up an order twice a week. The women run all that, unless I want something special."

Whitworth thanked Jeff with a nod. "Those shopping trips need to be protected, too."

"Well, I never let them go out without me, other than Caitlin and Joyce, of course."

"They're vulnerable also," Whitworth said.

"I know. Shit, I know. But it's like talking to the wall. Joyce says she's not quitting right after she was shot. It would make women look bad. And Caitlin is still hanging in there about being a nurse. Of course, this new job of hers is turning out to be a lot different, so I'm hoping..."

"We'll put someone on their security when we get things going."

"Since Caitlin is a nurse, I guess we could set something up for her okay, but Joyce is a county deputy, for goodness sake. I've racked my brain, but I can't figure out how to do anything. And she's adamant that no one is going to hold her hand."

"Maybe they'll be more receptive when we have the blocks in and we can tell them more."

"Yeah," Jeff mumbled, and as a friend of mine is so fond of saying, 'and if frogs had wings... '"

HOSPITAL IN FLORIDA, A LITTLE AFTER 9:00 A.M.

Everyone groggy this morning from fitful sleep, or in Fred's case trying to nap while sitting up, they had just finished a late breakfast. The family had been given the option of receiving hospital meals when those of the other patients' were brought up, at extra charge of course, but Carla had nixed that idea, knowing there would not be enough food for Fred on a hospital tray. Audrey and Jessica had volunteered to get take-out orders from the cafeteria, so after the morning rush, they brought everyone breakfast.

Carla had sat looking at Pamela/Brenda on the bed. After a moment, Carla stood, "I'll be back in just a minute." Shortly, she returned with a small container in her hand.

Audrey was gathering up their breakfast trash and Jessica was folding the blanket from the couch/bed. "What's that, Mom?"

"Applesauce."

"Applesauce? Ugh, it looks like baby food."

"Exactly," Carla said as she finished peeling the top back on the plastic container. Sliding a straight chair over, "Raise the back of the bed up some, please," she told her mate. "We need her in a sitting position."

Fred started to respond negatively, remembering that the doctor said they would put a tube down Pamela/Brenda's throat today and start force-feeding, but at the last second, he looked at Carla. Shrugging mentally, he pressed the button to bring the young woman into a near sitting position.

Carla sat, put a tiny bit of the applesauce on the tip of a spoon and pushed it between Brenda's lips.

They waited.

Fred finally let out a sigh. "You tried."

Carla reached back with the spoon and gently wiped the tip under Brenda's upper lip as you would a baby to get the baby to taste or swallow. A few seconds later, the woman swallowed.

Smiling, Carla put a little more on the tip of the spoon and did it again. The swallow was quick to follow this time.

"Are you there?" Fred said aloud so the women could hear that he was talking to Brenda.

"Yeah, I'm here. Where else would I be?" Her mental voice seemed a little louder, and her tone was almost joking. Then after a moment, "Baby, I ... taste ... applesauce. I guess that's kinda crazy, huh?"

"No, Baby," Fred choked out. "It's not crazy at all. Carla is feeding it to you."

Jessica, now with her arms around Fred, kissed away a lone tear that slid down his face.

Carla was almost to the bottom of the small container of applesauce when Doctor Harris walked in. If the others in the room noticed him, they gave no indication. He stood watching Carla slowly feed his patient. It seems like every time I walk in here, something new happens. This woman was brain dead. Now the tests show almost furious activity in parts of her brain. It can't happen. Yet, I've seen things happen before that I can't explain. Could his wife really have come back? Crap, I wish Wilson would talk to me about it. He keeps holding back, claiming that I would think he's nuts. Hell, maybe I would, but even that might be some sort of explanation. Oh, crap, that doesn't make sense, even to me. What is going on?

"She's eating, Doctor. Not much, but she is eating," Audrey said, finally one of the women acknowledging his presence.

"Who thought of the ... applesauce, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it's applesauce," Carla said. "I've spent a lot of time around a hospital. One of the nurses suggested I use applesauce to help my first husband take his pills after he became so weak from the cancer. She said they frequently used it when old people had problems swallowing medicine. It's about the consistency of baby food, so I thought..."