“Haven’t seen you much lately, though,” Webster’s father said.
Webster could only imagine how Sheila had looked in his father’s store. Bored? Sullen? Impatient?
“I have a job now,” Sheila said, maybe as embarrassed as Webster was to have had that initial portrait laid bare.
“Well, you have other things on your mind, don’t you, dear?” Webster’s mother said, deftly slaying the elephant. Webster was grateful. “Come right through,” she added. “We’re having drinks and some appetizers on the porch.”
Webster sat next to Sheila, who had her hands in her lap. When asked what she wanted, she said lemonade, a large pitcher of which stood next to a bottle of wine. Webster followed suit, which caused his mother to copy them as well. Only Webster’s father had the wine.
“I understand you’re from Boston,” his father boomed from his chair as if Sheila might be deaf. He had on a white shirt and tie and had groomed his hair with something that made it shine.
“Chelsea, actually,” Sheila said.
“And what’s that like?”
“It’s a small city near Boston. Most people only ever see it from the Mystic River Bridge.”
Webster’s mother was seemingly mesmerized by Sheila’s waistline, visible now that Sheila was seated.
Webster endured a long silence, unable to think of a single thing to say. Nervous, he ate all the nuts in the bowl.
“How did you end up in Vermont?” Webster’s father asked, even though he’d been told the answer.
Sheila looked at Webster. She didn’t know her lines and was desperate for a prompt.
“Car trouble,” Webster answered. “I already told you that.”
“And how did the two of you meet?”
“Dad, stop grilling her,” Webster said, willing to risk a confrontation. His father wasn’t buying Sheila as the sweet newcomer to Vermont. He knew better. He’d seen the woman in the parking lot.
Webster’s mother didn’t care how the two had met. She wanted to talk about the baby to come. “You’re taking care of yourself?” she asked Sheila. “I had such a hard time bringing that one”—she pointed at Webster—“into the world.”
“Mom.”
“Well, I didn’t mean to suggest that you would,” she said to Sheila. “Every birth, as I’m sure you know, is different.”
“I hope I’ll be a good mother,” Sheila said.
“Oh, you will, dear, you will,” Webster’s mother said, patting Sheila’s knee, the first time the two had touched.
Sheila blinked. Webster’s father stared at Sheila’s face. Webster’s mother stared at Sheila’s waist. Webster was horrified. They had just under two hours still to go.
At dinner, Webster and Sheila talked about the apartment they’d found over the ice-cream shop, causing Webster’s mother to reminisce about the years when “Petey” had always liked his chocolate cones with jimmies on them.
Webster shut his eyes.
Sheila complimented the meal, which seemed to be a soupy concoction of chicken, mushrooms, sour cream, and bread crumbs, with sprigs of parsley around the border of the casserole dish. Webster guessed that Sheila would have a hard time getting it down. When she did, he thought her heroic.
His father brought the bottle of red wine to the table, poured a glass, and offered it to Sheila, who hesitated and then took it, surprising Webster. He then felt compelled to mention that some doctors thought that an occasional glass of red wine was beneficial to the mother and not harmful to the baby. He also wanted to tell his father to fuck off, but that wasn’t anywhere in the script.
Webster checked his watch so often it became a tic. Sheila asked him if he had a shift that night, perhaps hoping that he would say he did.
She drank the glass of wine quickly and used the words shacking up to describe her move with Webster into the apartment above the ice-cream shop. Webster’s father seemed pleased and even went so far as to smile. Was his initial distrust waning, or was he merely proving himself right in his character assessment? By the time Webster’s mother served up a Boston cream pie, Sheila was on her second glass of wine, and his father was laughing. Sheila was flirting with the man, which made Webster as nervous as hell. Or was she merely opening up, being charming, trying to save the occasion?
Webster’s mother had a pleasant smile on her face and could be pulled from her happy daze only when spoken to. She roused herself to ask for coffee requests.
Webster knew the coffee would make Sheila feel sick. He didn’t ask for any, but his father did. Sheila devoured the pie and told Webster’s mother that she would love to learn how to make it.
“Surely, you’ve had it before, being from Boston.”
“I’ve had what passes for Boston cream pie,” Sheila said, “but nothing that compares to this one.”
When the coffee arrived, Sheila put the backs of her fingers to her nose and immediately went pale. She glanced at Webster across the table.
Webster pushed his chair back. “I think I’ll take Sheila for a little stroll around the house. She’s never seen the yard before.”
“I’d like to help with the dishes,” Sheila said in a weak voice.
“Nonsense,” Webster’s mother insisted. “You two go enjoy yourselves.”
Webster held Sheila’s hand as they walked into the backyard. Her heels dipped into the soft sod. Out of sight of the parents, she whispered, “You ate every last nut and piece of cheese!”
“I was so afraid you were going to give an answer other than car trouble. I just had to stop the questions.”
“I wish I’d worn a pillow for your mother.”
“She couldn’t take her eyes off your stomach.”
“What do you think they’re saying about us?” Sheila asked, glancing up at the kitchen window.
Webster didn’t want to know. His father would be saying that he didn’t trust the girl as far as he could throw her. His mother would be defending Sheila, saying, “Don’t be silly. She’s lovely.” His father would shake his head and use it as an excuse to leave his wife to do the dishes alone.
“You really want to know how to make Boston cream pie?” Webster asked.
“God, no,” Sheila said. “I’ve had enough Boston cream pie to sink the city of Chelsea.”
The next afternoon, Webster’s father arrived with a set of tools just as Webster was moving in his few possessions. He’d let Webster get the mattress from his old bedroom by himself, but he helped his son haul it up the back stairs to the new apartment. “Small,” he said to Webster when he saw the place.
Webster’s mother had found an old love seat in the basement that was in decent condition, even if the slipcovers were flowered print. She had curtains to match, which seemed a bit much to Webster, but which solved the problem of the open windows. His father fixed a leaky faucet, spackled and painted over large holes in the wall, and checked the electrical outlets, putting new covers over them. Webster’s mother had brought bedding, declaring that Webster’s old sheets and blanket weren’t fit to bring into a new home. She and Sheila made the bed together, and when Webster caught a glimpse of them in the bedroom, his brain filled with white noise.
Too fast, too fast.
He couldn’t imagine what Sheila was thinking. Would she feel that they’d been invaded? Would she be glad that she’d been welcomed?
Sheila and his mother opened cartons—mismatched dishes, glasses, a toaster, all unearthed from the Webster basement—while Webster and his father each had a beer. Webster thought his parents’ kindness a sign of acceptance. Maybe his mother had won the previous night’s argument after all.
When his parents left, Webster and Sheila stood at the counter, looking at the stack of Tupperware his mother had brought, all filled with parts of a meal and a coffee cake for breakfast. They shook their heads, bewildered. Two weeks ago, they’d had each other and nothing else. Their time together had been a secret. Webster was afraid that something precious was in jeopardy now. Their rela
tionship was public, subject to scrutiny. He longed to be back in that moment in the B and B, stroking Sheila’s arm before she woke up.
“What did you say when they left?” Webster asked.
“I said ‘thank you.’ What did you think I’d say?”
“I don’t know.”
“Your father glances at me when he thinks I’m not looking. As if I might be going to steal something.”
“He came to help.”
“Yes, he did.”
Webster put his arm around the woman he’d slept with, who was his girlfriend, who would be the mother of his child, who might, one day, be his wife.
“Can we crack these open?” Sheila asked, pointing to the food in the Tupperware. “I’m starved.”
Attention, Hartstone Rescue. We need a crew on Deertrack Road, number forty-five, suspected stroke, male, seventy-two, wife present at scene, blurred speech, apparent paralysis of left side.”
“Let’s go,” Burrows said.
In the rig, Burrows got on the radio. “Car sixty responding. Can you say when symptoms first occurred?”
“Approximately fifteen minutes prior to our call. Can I have your ETA?”
“Six minutes,” Burrows said and signed off. “It’ll be twenty minutes down when we get there. You know where you’re going?”
Webster was pretty sure he knew where Deertrack was. He’d once had a girlfriend who’d lived out that way. He nodded.
“You know the guy?” Burrows asked.
“No, do you?”
“Not really.”
At the destination, Webster made a U and backed expertly up the driveway of number 45. Each carrying their usual equipment, the EMT and the medic opened the front door and walked in. The house was old, built around the 1920s, with a lot of dark molding and small rooms stuffed with furniture.
They found the man still slumped in his recliner, the wife trying to hold him up.
“I know who you are,” she said, recognizing Burrows. “You’re that nice medic who helped my daughter’s son with his asthma.”
Burrows was a lot of things, but nice was a stretch.
Burrows checked the airway and applied the high-flow oxygen. Webster whipped out his pad and pen. “I’m going to have to ask you some questions,” he said to the woman.
While Webster took a history, Burrows dealt with the patient.
“Sir, can you tell me your name?” Burrows asked.
The patient answered, but his speech was garbled. Burrows asked the man to lift each leg. He could lift only the right one. Webster wrote that down along with the garbled speech. Burrows then asked the man to smile. The left side of the smile drooped.
Diagnosis confirmed. Injury to right side of the brain.
“I’m going for the stretcher,” Burrows said to Webster.
“Ma’am,” asked Webster, “can you help your husband sit upright? You can put your hand here on this left shoulder. I need to examine him.”
The man said something else in garbled speech.
“What’s he saying?” the wife asked, beginning to panic.
“I don’t know, ma’am, but it’s a good sign that he’s trying to talk.”
When Burrows returned, Webster reported: “BP two sixty-two over one twenty-eight. Pulse ninety-two. Respirations twenty-four. We need a line in. Sir, can you squeeze my fingers?” he asked the patient.
Webster felt something, but he wasn’t sure he was getting a good response. He needed to know the level of the man’s cognition. Had the stroke affected only motor skills or had the entirety of the right side of his brain been compromised?
Webster got in the man’s face. “If you can hear me, sir, please blink.”
He watched as the man blinked once.
OK, then.
“We were fine,” the wife said. “And then he just slumped over.”
“Ma’am, you can ride up front. There’s no time to change. Just put some shoes and a coat on.”
Webster and Burrows slid the man into the rig. They helped the wife, in her bathrobe and coat, up into a seat. Webster slammed the back door, got into the driver’s seat. The wife was already crying.
Webster drove as fast as he could. Minutes counted with stroke victims.
Burrows and the wife went with the patient into the ER, Burrows grabbing Webster’s written notes to take with him. While the medic was gone, Webster wrote down all the items that would have to be restocked in the rig. He cleaned up the back, stuffing the medical waste into the appropriate container. He stood by the passenger side, waiting for Burrows. The sun was up strong already. But it couldn’t do much against the late April chill.
A doctor Webster recognized waved as he passed by. Off duty? Going for coffee?
Webster could have used a cup.
Where the hell was Burrows?
Seventy-two and a stroke. Not uncommon. The couple had probably lived in that house for years, their routines established. Alone now since the kids had moved out. The wife had seemed caring. They had each other. Maybe they bickered; maybe they didn’t. He’d looked for pictures of grandchildren but hadn’t seen any.
Burrows finally climbed into the rig.
“Where were you?” Webster asked as he checked his watch. Nearly thirty-five minutes.
“The guy stroked out again. And then a third time with the wife watching.”
“How is he?”
“Bad shape. Real bad. Cognitively, he’s got nothing. I wanted to stay with him. I knew if you got a call, you’d come get me.”
“Poor bastard,” Webster said. “One minute he’s reading the Hartstone Herald and having his Nescafé, and the next he’s a veg.”
“Seen it plenty of times before,” Burrows said.
“You think it gets easier?”
Burrows sat back. “Yeah, I do. But every once in a while, it hits you. That could be me, I think. That could be Karen.”
“I think like that sometimes.”
“You?” Burrows hooted. “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”
“What are the odds the guy will make it?”
“Zero,” Burrows said.
Webster parked his cruiser in front of the ice-cream shop. He thought of bringing a treat up to Sheila but then decided to ask her first. These days, she was finicky about food. He stood and stretched his back. He’d stayed in service later into Saturday morning than he had imagined he would, Rescue having been shorthanded for four hours. He’d eaten peanut-butter cookies Burrows’s wife had made and had studied his course work for medic certification. Anatomy fascinated him. But all he wanted now was a bed with Sheila in it. His face and vision felt grainy. Sheila should be home. She almost always had weekends off.
With his uniform jacket on, Webster climbed the long outdoor stairs to the apartment. He opened the door and stood still. He felt a surge of adrenaline, as if he’d barked his shin on the edge of a coffee table. A cop sat at the table, Sheila across from him. Webster thought, DUI.
Webster shut the door behind him. Not a DUI. The cop was too casual, leaning back in his chair, his legs crossed, ankle on knee. It took Webster another two seconds to register the insignia on the uniform. Chelsea. Massachusetts.
“You didn’t tell me he was an empt,” the beefy man at the table said, grinning. “Quite a comedown, Squirrel. From a cop to an empt?”
Squirrel.
The cop had the same accent as Sheila did. He was built, 220, outsized shoulders. He did something else besides ride around in a cruiser all day. Football league? Weight lifting? “What’s going on?” Webster asked, hands moving into fists.
“This is the man I told you about,” Sheila mumbled, her face pale, her posture in the chair saying it all. She’d narrowed her shoulders together, as if she were trying to hide her breasts, her entire body. When Webster saw that she was trembling, rage flooded him.
But you couldn’t manhandle a cop who outweighed you by forty pounds, who had a gun in his holster.
“Hey, I got a name, Squirrel.”
“This is Brian Doyle,” Sheila said, not looking at Webster. Webster wanted to add, The guy who pissed the bed.
The cop didn’t get up, didn’t offer his hand.
Webster stared at the man, waiting for an explanation from somebody. The cop’s chin had so many acne scars, it looked chewed. The eyes were pale green, washed out.
“An empt,” the guy said again, as if he’d made a terrific joke. Nodding all the time. Establishing rank. He examined Webster head to toe. “Quite a surprise to find my sweet little Squirrel shacked up preggers with an empt in Vermont.”
Why didn’t Sheila say something?
“Get out,” Webster said.
“Whaaa? I drive all the way from Chelsea, and you want me to leave without a proper meal?”
“There’s a diner down the road,” Webster said.
Engaging him.
Mistake.
“Squirrel and me have things we need to talk about.”
“Not in this house,” Webster said.
“This a house? Fuck, you coulda fooled me.” The cop took a sip of coffee, as if he were Webster’s best friend.
“What things?” Webster asked.
Second mistake.
“Hey, man, the bitch ran out on me,” the cop said, as if appealing to a fraternal bond.
Sheila looked up at Webster. She put her hand on the table. “He says I owe him money,” she said.
“Do you?” Webster asked.
She shrugged.
“How much?”
“Eight hundred.”
“Eight hundred fifty,” the cop corrected. He slid his hand across the table and covered Sheila’s. She flinched.
“Take your fucking hand off her,” Webster said, quivering with fury.
The guy was thirty, maybe thirty-three. Maybe he weighed 225.
“Simmer down, probie.”
Was the gun in the holster the reason the guy had driven through three states in his uniform? It would have taken him four hours to get to Hartstone.
All Webster could hear was Burrows’s voice in his ear, warning him months ago: Never approach a guy with a gun. Even if he’s hurt. He’s hurt, too bad for him. Nine times out of ten, you approach, he’ll shoot you.