Chapter 2: Meeting a Hero

After about a month in the Hospital, I was cycled back to the U.S. for rehab therapy and medically retired from the Marines.

Flying home again for the first time since my reserve unit was activated, I was glad to exchange my uniforms for civvies again. What a relief to be out of those desert camouflage uniforms at last.

I called my wife and told her when my plane would arrive and asked her about Eldarin. She said that he had been transferred to a V.A. hospital on the west coast and was fairly close.

We lived in the Seattle area, and that's where he had been placed.

When I asked how he had been placed in a Veterans hospital and Janice said "He's a veteran himself, and he was placed there since he actually lives on the coast here in Washington".

I said "Good, that makes it easier to get him out when he's ready and bring him here until he's able to take care of himself."

After my plane landed at Sea Tac Airport, I got off and went through baggage claim. My wife and the girls were waiting in the USO lounge as only passengers were allowed in the boarding area since the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

I met them there and got mobbed by 3 females as soon as I walked in.

"Oh God, I'm glad your home," Janice said.

"So am I love, so am I," I responded.

Sally was bouncing up and down like a hyperactive super ball yelling "My brothers' home, my brothers home" repeatedly. Erica just hugged me and said "welcome home big brother."

I said "It's almost worth leaving just for the way I get welcomed home again".

"That doesn't mean you're leaving again so don't start thinking about it," Janice stated.

As we headed to the walkway to the parking garage, I asked about Eldarin. My wife told me that we could go to the hospital and ask as it was on the way home anyway.

With that settled, we packed my luggage into the back of my old crew cab pickup and headed to the freeway for the short drive to the hospital where Eldarin was.

When we got there, we went to the information desk and asked for him. We were directed to the ward where he was staying, although Sally had to stay at the snack bar as you had to be 16 to visit patients' rooms.

Sally was unhappy about this, but she agreed and got a snack to eat while she waited.

The rest of us took the elevator up to the floor where the ward was that Eldarin was assigned to.

After checking in at the nurses' station, we went to his room and found him playing with the remote for his T.V.

When we walked in, he looked up at us and then said "I know you. Don't member from where, but I know you."

Then his eyes started wandering around the room and he started to mumble about the nurses not letting him have his coffee or go outside.

He sounded like a little kid that was upset about not getting to go outside and play.

While we listened to this, a nurse walked in behind us.

She said "He's been like that off and on for several days from a bad reaction to some pain medication."

"The doctors don't know exactly what the problem is, but he starts talking like a small child and doesn't seem to know where he is."

I asked "Can he go outside? My youngest sister-in-law wants to meet him but she can't come up here as she's under 16".

"What relation to him are you?" the nurse asked.

I said "I'm the reason he's here. I got shot in both legs in Bagdad and was under fire when he left cover and came and got me."

"He got hit twice pulling me to safety and if it wasn't for him I would have either bled to death or been shot again."

After taking a deep breath, I said "I owe him my life and I intend to repay that debt the best way I can. If he needs something I'll leave my home phone number and cell number for you to call."

The nurse said "Let me check his chart real quick and I'll let you know. He has no next of kin listed, and you're the first visitors he's had since he was brought here."

After checking his chart on his bed, she said "He can go anywhere on the hospital grounds as long as he's escorted by someone, but he has to be attended at all times because of his mental state."

She added, "We don't know the exact cause yet and we don't know how he'll act if he's left alone, and he's already tried to sneak out several times. I've taken him outside a few times on my lunch break and he loves to watch the jets flying over."

"When he's lucid, he's fun to talk to and seems very well educated, but there are no signs for when he will lapse into this state and no way to tell how long he'll be like this."

"How long do these episodes last?" I asked.

"Anywhere from 5 minutes to 2 hours or a bit longer."

"Can he walk at all?"

"Yes, but only for a short time before he gets tired. The injury to his left hip caused a lot of problems at first, but is slowly healing."

"It may be a few more months before he's able to walk more than a short distance, but with therapy, he should be able to walk with only a little bit of a limp."

"Ok" I said, "We want to sign him out for an hour or so and take him outside for awhile. My youngest sister-in-law really wants to meet him and wouldn't forgive me if we didn't give her a chance."

"I'll get him ready then. Just go to the desk where you checked in and tell the nurse there that you want to sign out a patient for visitation and come back."

"He'll be ready by then as he isn't hard even when he's like this."

"While you're down stairs, get him a cup of espresso and you'll see the biggest smile you ever saw. He loves his coffee and a cigarette now and then."

While Janice and Erica waited, I signed Eldarin out and went back and got him. He seemed to be more lucid now, and asked me where he knew me from. I told him that I was the one he dragged to safety when he got shot in Iraq.

"Sure, I remember that. You're the one who got it in the legs when the jeep got hit."

He looked at the nurse and said: "I remember. I told you I wasn't being bad when I got hurt. See? He was there too and I wasn't bad, I was being good."

The nurse said: "I knew you were being good. You're always good. I saw you with that little girl yesterday when she fell outside. You picked her up and held her while she was crying and just rocked her in your chair."

She looked at me and said "Yesterday, when I took him outside, a little girl was with her father. He had lost his legs in Iraq, and she fell while she was pushing him around in his wheelchair."

"Eldarin picked her up as she was crying about her knee, and just rocked her till she stopped. He didn't say anything, he just held her."

"Then when she stopped, he just smiled at her and said that a little fall like that couldn't stop a brave girl like her, and then he handed her to her father and went to sleep."

"He tends to go to sleep at odd times, so you have to keep him strapped into his chair or stay next to him if he gets up."

"The only other thing is that he'll want a cigarette when you get outside. I buy him a pack now and then, and he pays me back. The pack is in his bathrobe but he doesn't have a lighter as it's in patient storage right now."

I said "It shouldn't be too hard to get a light, as I saw a lot of patients out front smoking."

"I just hope my wife doesn't get mad as she hates cigarettes. Her uncle died from lung cancer last year and was a smoker. She blames cigarettes for that although the cancer was more likely to have come from asbestos."

After the talk with the nurse, I pushed the wheelchair to the waiting area and joined my wife and Erica. "Are you girls ready?" I asked.

They both said "Yes", so we went to the elevator and went down to the cafeteria where Sally was waiting.

When we got there, Sally jumped up and ran over and hugged Eldarin and said: "Thank you for rescuing my big brother."

Eldarin got a strange look on his face and said: "Who are you? Do I know you? I don't remember real good sometimes."

"You saved my big brother in Iraq", Sally said. "Because of you, he came home alive so I'll always be your friend."

Eldarin got that confused look on his face again, and said: "Can I have my coffee now? I've been good just like I said I would be."

Sally looked at me with a frown and asked: "What's the matter with him?"

I told Janice to get him a big espresso and Erica to take him to a table while I explained to Sally about his mental problem from the reaction to medication.

I took Sally to a corner table away from the others and told her quietly: "He had a bad reaction to some medication, and sometimes he lapses like that and talks like a little child.

"It isn't his fault, and the nurse said that he seems to be improving a bit, but we have to watch him closely because he might hurt himself. He also suddenly falls asleep for short periods."

Sally looked at me and said: "Well, I'll just have to watch real close then, won't I? After all, he saved my big brother so I owe him."

With that, I smiled and gave Sally a hug and took her back over to the others. I sat down and we talked for a bit while Eldarin drank his espresso.

"Shall we go outside now?" I asked after he had finished. The others agreed, and before I could get up, Sally jumped up and started to push Eldarin to the door.

"My job now", she said. I wasn't going to argue about it with her, because she would never give in on anything once she decided on something.

It's like trying to fight a tidal wave when she's like that.

Janice just watched and smiled at me. I knew then that I was beaten and that before I even knew there was a fight. Being outnumbered by women can be that way sometimes, I guess.

We went outside, and headed over to the smoking area where a few others had congregated. I took the pack of cigarettes out of Eldarins pocket, and handed him one. He asked for a light, and one of the others lit his cigarette for him.

When he had it lit, he said: "Hey Dar, is this some of your family?"

Eldarin looked at him with that confused expression of his and said "I know you don't I? I have a hard time remembering sometimes, but I know you I think."

The other man said, "Yes, you know me. I'm in the room next to yours, remember? We played cards the other night."

"Cards?" Eldarin said. "We played cards? I haven't played cards for a long time. I wish I could remember better."