Chapter 12: Misunderstandings

Great job by rlfj on the translation into HTML...

Now, after the screwups I just did, I hope to get the last three chapters right...

Just as the sun began to come up Jack rolled over onto his back and yelled, "Jesus!"

"Ugh. What? What is it?" Zelda asked, not even half awake.

"It felt like a hot knife just went through my spine. I can't move and it hurts. Oh man but it hurts. Quick, roll me over on my belly, please." He moaned, and then grunted as she rolled him over face down on her bed.

Another small lump formed just above his tailbone. The festered area pushed up, almost breaking through the skin. "Wait here, don't move," she ordered tersely.

"Hell, I can't move," he grunted as she ran into his room and came out carrying the box of tissues, the alcohol and her tweezers.

"If you're going to give orders, give ones that make sense," he griped, when he heard her reenter the room.

"Shut up," she told him in a sharp voice.

"What do you mean telling me to ... oh no!" he grunted. There was the sensation of a long thread being pulled through the flesh on his back. He felt the cold of an alcohol soaked tissue wiping his skin. He felt her squeeze and felt an almost audible "pop."

"Gotcha," she muttered. She wiped his back clean and told him, try to sit up. She stepped back and waited.

Jack took a deep breath and hesitantly shoved himself into a seated position, his feet flat on the floor. "What did you do?" he asked in a wondering voice. "Holy smoke, I don't hurt. What did you do?"

She showed him a bloody mass of fine fibers of the thickness of baby hairs. There were almost colorless. "I think this is what has been causing most of your problems. What is that stuff?"

"If I'm right, it's some of the nastiest evil stuff in the world," he told her in a hard voice. "If that is what I think it is, it was experimented with in China and then abandoned as being too unstable. Those fibers were finely woven over a steel jacketed lead centered slug. They were impregnated with neurotoxins at time of manufacture. The slug goes on through and the fibers are left behind in the body. The idea is to turn every battleground casualty into a living corpse that either has to be killed or cared for. Either way it will demoralize the enemy in ways threats of dying never could. I heard the scuttlebutt about these things. But they were supposed to have been discontinued because they cost too much to manufacture and were too unstable to store anywhere outside the lab. It looks like I heard wrong."

"Let's take this sample to the VA hospital for analysis. That way we'll know if you're right. No matter what this turns out to be, you have just had a stroke of luck. Jack, my boy toy, this is your lucky day. You won't need so much help now."

Surprised at her flippant attitude, he asked, "What's the deal? I thought..." His voice trailed off for a moment. "I guess, I thought, you ... me ... us. Oh hell, forget about it. I don't know what I thought." Slowly he got to his feet. He stood in one place, unsteady long enough to get his balance. Finally, as he felt more certain of himself he began to slowly walk back toward his room.

Behind him Zelda watched his retreating back. Tears flowed down her cheeks as she turned away and slowly went into her own bathroom to shower and prepare for the coming day. "Oh, Jack," she whispered as she stepped under the spray of water.

Jack entered his shower and sat on the special bench built for him. The walk from Zelda's room had tired him. He started the shower and sat quiet and let the hot water soak some of his aches away. After a while he stood, soaped and rinsed quickly. He was careful as he stepped out of the shower and dried himself off. He was vaguely aware this was the first time since he was shot up he had been able to do such a simple task for himself. He smiled a grim smile, as he donned clean underwear.

Completely dressed, a towel around her head, Zelda entered Jack's room. "Do you need any help?" she asked stiffly.

"I made it by myself," was his gruff answer...

"Jack, about last night, I..."

"Thanks for the charity fuck," he snapped at her. "I realize no woman wants to be stuck..." He paused, searching for words.

"Jack! Is that what you thought that was, a charity fuck?" Red faced, she took a deep breath, "How dare you? What do you think I am? A charity fuck? Is that all you think of me?" She trembled with rage. "I just wanted to tell you that I understood about you saying ... you loved me ... when we were ... fucking. Forget it. What a silly fool you must think I am."

"You shut up, just shut up. I never told anybody in my life that I loved her since I said it to my mother when I was a little kid. I can't ever remember saying it to Melissa's mother. She got pregnant and I married her. But I never said I loved her. I don't say stuff like that unless I mean it. Forget it. I should have known better, who the hell wants a crip?" He bent over to pick up his shoes and kept going. His head hit the corner of his nightstand. Everything went black.

As if from far off he heard, "Oh, Jack, oh Jack, I'm sorry. Jack, I love you and don't want to lose you." Something brushed his lips. "Please wake up."

He opened his eyes slowly. "What happened?" he asked.

"You fell and bumped your head," she told him softly.

"Uh! Oh yeah, I remember. All at once I ran out of strength and just folded. Let me see if I can get up by myself." She rose up and stood waiting, ready to help him if necessary.

Jack struggled to his feet and stood quiet until the room stopped swaying. He stepped over to the bed and sat back down heavily. "About what I just said," he started.

"Jack, I wasn't making light of you," she said at the same time. They both paused and looked at each other. Quickly she said, "Go ahead with what you started to say."

"Oh hell, I didn't have any right to expect you to want to be saddled with me. I was way out of line. I'm sorry," he told her.

"Jack, inside where it counts you are more of a man than anyone I have ever known. Not that I've had all that much experience with men. Before you there was just Hugo and his buddies he loaned me to. After I was notified that Hugo died in prison, I felt happy. Yes, I felt happy that rotten monster was no longer in my life even a little. I went crazy for a while and swore I'd never have anything to do with another man as long as I lived. That's also why I began to study Jeet Kun Do and body building. After those years married to a drug dealer and used for a punching bag and a party favor, all I wanted was to wall myself off from the world. Then I went to nursing school. I met you after I graduated. O Jack," she sighed.

"I meant what I said about loving you, Zel. But I'll never bring it up again. Like I said, I was way out of line." He looked down at the floor.

"Jack, you macho assed idiot. I love you too and I was afraid you wouldn't want to be saddled with a fat in her middle thirties broad when there are so many cute, sweet little teeny things like Hugo used to bring home and do right in front of me. I never knew what it was to love someone until I started working for you. Jack, you treated me with respect!" she wailed. "Oh Jack."

"Well, where do we go from here?" he asked. "What comes next?"

She hurried into Jack's bathroom and came back out with a wet washcloth. "I believe next is to wipe the blood off your forehead. I don't want people to think I pick on you."

As she began to dab at the blood on his face Melissa came down from upstairs. "Dad, what happened to you?" she asked as she saw the bloody washcloth.

"She hit me," he told her with mock solemnity. "It hurts." Zelda scrubbed his nose with the wet cloth. "Hey! Ouch!" he exclaimed.

"You want hurt, I'll give you hurt," she told him and boxed his ears.

"Do you two always play this rough?" Melissa asked.

"Only when he's feeling frisky," Zelda answered. Your father just might have gotten the best news of his life." She stepped back and smiled down at Jack. "I would say he has gotten the best news ever. "He might be walking unaided soon, real soon."

"Wait a minute, I thought the doctors all said he had extensive nerve damage. I accessed his records and I saw what they diagnosed. They said he would be one hundred percent disabled for life."

"We won't know for certain until after we take him in for a checkup, but I believe there's a good chance he was misdiagnosed from the very first." Zelda smiled softly. She turned away to throw the washcloth in a hamper.

"No doctors," Jack said flatly. "This stays between us until we see how far I recover. This may be temporary and it might be permanent. Either way I am safer if no one knows about the junk you pulled out of my back. Turn on the television.

They sat through seeming endless commercials until finally the news reporter appeared. He was one of the three Jack had called when Creel died. It was a rerun of the original bulletin when the story broke. "I am standing in front of the home of the late Senator Josiah Creel. Acting on an anonymous tip the senator had committed suicide, I raced to this house and found the front door open, the lights were all on and the senator lay dead in a pool of his own blood. It was apparent suicide. The police still have not issued a statement except to verify the dead man was Senator Creel. All inquiries to the White House have gone unanswered."

The scene changed to the same newscaster standing by a desk in the studio. "That was the beginning of the story of the death of Josiah Creel. Acting on a tip I hurried to the home of the late senator and found him dead. I immediately called the police. We have received a tip there were two, and I quote, 'Arab looking persons' seen fleeing the scene from Senator Josiah Creel's home at about the time of his death." Switch to a commercial on how to live a healthier life by eating vitamin fortified Oat cereal for breakfast.

Jack looked troubled. "I don't know what the deal is. Creel's buddies want me dead. But they want me made into a villain first. Why?" He stood up and walked a little steadier than before toward the kitchen. Melissa gasped. Zelda smiled.

Jack sat at the kitchen table. "Why in hell are they going to all this trouble? I was a sergeant in the army, a nobody. No one ever noticed me except to tell me to go clean up a mess somewhere. Then I was shot in that damned ambush that Creel had something to do with. The cameraman sent me that disc and he was dead by the time the disc got to me."

"Jack, you showed those discs. You made them public. Those two idiots last night weren't a part of any political plot. They were after revenge." Zelda shook her head.

"Ricky Madera and those bikers are errand boys for James Lytle. He was Creel's errand boy and Creel was the president's fair-haired boy. You put James, Ricky and, at last count, two of the bikers in the hospital. Those two biker idiots were acting on their own, not under anyone's direction." Melissa thought a moment and continued, "I can't understand why those two fools even got involved. All they ever do is deal drugs and party every night.

"I think it would be interesting to find out who those two morons talked to before they came over here. You forgot about the two errand boys who came around looking for a mini disc. I thought they were blowing smoke, but what if they weren't?" Jack looked at both women and shook his head.

"I wonder if we haven't been inadvertently drawn into some bigger game than we are aware? I have a hunch Creel's photographer is the key to the whole thing."

Melissa watched Zelda put on a pot of coffee and start to prepare breakfast. "Does Zelda always wait on you hand and foot?" she asked her father.

"Of course I do," Zelda cut in. "That's what he pays me the big bucks for." She started a pan of hash browns cooking. Hot red chili pepper slices were mixed in. Zelda scrambled half dozen eggs. A half-pound of bacon was popped in the oven under the broiler. Four slices of rye bread were placed on top of the toaster.

Jack slowly got up to pour himself a cup of coffee. "Jack, you had better take it easy until we know just how improved you are. I'm worried you might have a relapse if you get too active."