Before the Fall(11)

Chapter 4




A walleyed fisherman drives them to the hospital. The three crowd together on the worn bench seat of his pickup, bouncing on battered shocks. Scott is pantless and shoeless, without money or ID. Both he and the boy are racked with bone-deep chills. They have been in sixty-degree water for almost eight hours. Hypothermia has made them slow-witted and mute.

The fisherman speaks to them eloquently in Spanish about Jesus Christ. The radio is on, mostly static. Beneath their feet wind whistles into the cabin through a rust hole in the floor. Scott pulls the boy to him and tries to warm him through friction, rubbing the child’s arms and back vigorously with his one good hand. On the beach, Scott told the fisherman in his limited Spanish that the boy was his son. It seemed easier than trying to explain the truth, that they are strangers drawn together by a freak accident.

Scott’s left arm is completely useless now. Pain knifes through his body with every pothole, leaving him dizzy and nauseous.

You’re okay, he tells himself, repeating the words over and over. You made it. But deep down he still can’t believe they survived.

“Gracias,” he stutters as the pickup pulls into the crescent driveway of the Montauk hospital emergency room. Scott bucks the door open with his good shoulder and climbs down, every muscle in his body numb with exhaustion. The morning fog is gone, and the warm sun on his back and legs feels almost religious. Scott helps the boy jump down. Together they limp into the emergency room.

The waiting area is mostly empty. In the corner, a middle-aged man holds an icepack to his head, water dripping off his wrist onto the linoleum floor. On the other side of the room an elderly couple holds hands, their heads close together. From time to time the woman coughs into a balled-up Kleenex she keeps clutched tightly in her left hand.

An intake nurse sits behind glass. Scott limps over to her, the boy holding on to his shirttails.

“Hi,” he says.

The nurse gives him a quick once-over. Her name tag reads MELANIE. Scott tries to imagine what he must look like. All he can think of is Wile E. Coyote after an ACME rocket has exploded in his face.

“We were in a plane crash,” he says.

The words out loud are astonishing. The intake nurse squints at him.

“I’m sorry.”

“A plane from Martha’s Vineyard. A private plane. We crashed into the sea. I think we’re hypothermic, and my—I can’t move my left arm. The collarbone may be broken.”

The nurse is still trying to work through it.

“You crashed in the sea.”

“We swam—I swam—I think it was ten miles. Maybe fifteen. We just came ashore maybe an hour ago. A fisherman drove us here.”

The words are making him dizzy, his lungs shutting down.

“Look,” he says, “do you think we could get some help? At least the boy. He’s only four.”

The nurse looks at the boy, damp, shivering.

“Is he your son?”

“If I say yes will you get us a doctor?”

The nurse sniffles.

“There’s no need to get surly.”

Scott feels his jaw clenching.

“There is actually every need. We were in a f*cking plane crash. Get the damn doctor.”

She stands, uncertain.

Scott glances over at the ceiling-mounted television. The sound is down, but onscreen are images of search-and-rescue boats on the ocean. A banner headline reads, PRIVATE PLANE FEARED LOST.

“There,” says Scott, pointing, “that’s us. Will you believe me now?”

The nurse looks at the TV, images of fractured wreckage bobbing in the sea. Her reaction is instantaneous, as if Scott has produced a passport at the border crossing after pantomiming a frantic search.

She pushes the intercom button.

“Code Orange,” she says. “I need all available doctors to intake immediately.”

The cramping in Scott’s leg is beyond critical. He is dehydrated, potassium-deficient, like a marathoner who has failed to give his body the nutrition it demands.

“Just,” he says, buckling to the floor, “one would do, probably.”

He lies on the cool linoleum looking up at the boy. The boy’s face is sober, worried. Scott tries to smile reassuringly, but even his lips are exhausted. In an instant they are surrounded by hospital personnel, voices shouting. Scott feels himself being lifted onto a gurney. The boy’s hand slips away.

“No!” the boy shouts. He is screaming, thrashing. A doctor is talking to him, trying to make the boy understand that they will take care of him, that nothing bad will happen. It doesn’t matter. Scott struggles to sit up.

“Kid,” he says, louder and louder until the boy looks at him. “It’s okay. I’m here.”

He climbs down off the gurney, his legs rubbery, barely able to stand.

“Sir,” a nurse says, “you have to lie down.”

“I’m fine,” Scott tells the doctors. “Help him.”

To the boy he says: “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”

The boy’s eyes, in daylight, are startlingly blue. After a moment he nods. Scott, feeling light-headed, turns to the doctor.

“We should do this fast,” he says, “if it’s not too much trouble.”

The doctor nods. He is young and smart. You can see it in his eyes.