For Tuyet, Katrina, KaSandra, and Luc
"GABRIEL'S PROMISE"
Long Beach,
California, November 24, 2002
François scrubbed the copper bottom
of the small saucepan vigorously, erasing the black carbon residue left behind
after countless uses and months of neglect. Pitiful, he thought as he scoured
away the last of the tarnished debris, his callused hands immune to the
scalding hot water streaming from the kitchen faucet. Forty plus years wrenching the humongous marine engines
of warships, freighters, and whatnot left him with skin the texture of a
crocodile's backside. He retrieved a squeaky-clean saucepan from the hot soapy
water and rinsed away the thick white suds, pausing briefly to examine the
quality of his handiwork. From what he could see with the critical eye of a
perfectionist the pan couldn't possibly get any cleaner? The copper bottom
shined so brightly now that you could read by its glow in a dark room!
“One down, five to go,” he muttered, humming
the theme from Gabriel’s favorite cartoon television show.
“I love you, you love me, we are one big fam-i-ly…blah blah blah!” sang François, mocking the silly tune with his sarcasm.
“Qui etes-vous (who are you) Barney?” he wondered reaching into the sudsy water to retrieve
the next dirty dish.
He didn't mind doing busy work; he preferred it to sitting
by the phone waiting for the damn thing to ring. Ho-hum chores kept his mind
occupied and that was better than fretting over things he couldn't change. He
frowned at the clock on the microwave noting it had been better than two hours
since Michelle had rushed Gabriel to the emergency room; and still no word from
her. My father knew I'd be home soon, within the hour actually, and didn’t want
to be standing around with nothing more to offer than an “I don’t know” when I asked what and where everybody was. He took
one more look at the clock on the wall; it read 3:15pm. Maybe he should call a
cab he thought; Michelle might need his help or something? Then again maybe not,
so he decided to stay put and wait for me instead. Better if I hear everything first
hand rather than read a hastily written note because he knew that two seconds
after reading that note like I'd be flying down the 110 Freeway like a UFO. Why
take a risk like that? One Bouchard in the emergency room was one too many he
reckoned.
San Pedro, California, November 24, 2002
“Come on man, shake a leg will ya, I'd like to get home before sunset!” I shouted
at Sandy
Slamming the tailgate shut I turned to
see if he was on his way, and of course he wasn't. I knew my buddy well, he was
the obsessive-compulsive type, someone that couldn't leave his desk or home,
pretty much anywhere unless EVERYTHING was in its proper place, and I mean in
EXACTLY the right place! I pictured him sitting at his desk adjusting each
picture frame to precisely the right angle so that whoever sat across from him
had a clear view of his wife and kids, as well as the trophy marlin that he
caught in Baja back in 1989!
I climbed into the cab, shutting
the door a little harder than I had intended, making me even more conscious of
my anxious state of mind. I was still vexing over whatever was ailing Gabriel,
and couldn't shake this feeling of foreboding. I couldn’t put my finger on it
exactly, but something was nagging at me, a tiny voice whispering static white
noise instead of words. Maybe I should have taken the day off and followed my
instincts for a change, but I didn't. As usual I allowed everyone and everything
else to take priority. Earning a living, providing for the family consumed the
lion's share of my every day. A country singer named Ray Stevens wrote a song
about a father misunderstanding priorities in his life by “placing value on the worthless and disregarding precious wealth.” The
wealth being his family and the worthless being everything else.
Lately thoughts like
these were weighing on me. There were changes coming, I felt the nearness of
them, and I feared them instinctively. I feared them because I knew I couldn't
stop them. And in typical Patrick Bouchard style I internalized it, keeping all
of that dread to myself and becoming more and more agitated, frustrated and
withdrawn. I always thought Michelle and I had a great relationship, a terrific
marriage. She was my best friend and my lover. She was the only person I would
open up to, she knew the weak side of me as well as the strong and she loved me
anyway. But, after Gabriel’s little episode last night I realized how frail human
beings are. I also realized that I had never been totally honest with my best
friend, my lover, my wife. There were
secrets that I kept from her; that I kept from everyone.
I used to think that was
normal, that it was something everyone did, even her. At least I did until that
nagging voice in my head, the one whispering foreboding thoughts of our son
also hinted I was wrong. All I wanted to
do now was go home and make things right. The truck shook sharply as Sandy
“What are you waiting for, let’s
roll!” Sandy
“Did you leave everything nice and
tidy Miss Molly Maid?” I replied with equal sarcasm as I started the
engine and headed for the exit.
“Cleanliness
is next to Godliness, isn’t that what they tell you in church every
Sunday?” scoffed Sandy
“You’ve never set foot
in a church!”
“I have this fear of turning into a
pillar of salt, but that doesn’t keep me from reading!”
I
was impressed that Sandy
“Are you implying you've actually read
the Bible Mr. Lucci?”
“Like General Patton said, every
goddamn day!" Sandy answered, laughing heartily and slapping at
the dashboard like it was his personal drum kit.
Grinning
I drove on, amused by the demon child riding beside me. I glanced down at the
radio; the digital clock read 4:17pm. By the time I dropped Sandy
“Pat…Pat…PAT!” Sandy
“WHAT!” I growled pushing Sandy
“JESUS CHRIST! You want me to get in a wreck fool?” I hollered.
“You don’t need me to help you with
that,” Sandy
“SHIT!” I shrieked, standing on the
brake pedal until the Tacoma
“WHAT THE FUCK MAN!” the wide-eyed guard
shouted as he sprinted up to the driver’s side of the truck, swatting my arm
with the clipboard he was carrying.
“Sorry Eddie, sorry dude, I don’t know, stupid over here was
badgering the crap outta me and I…”
“Spare me Pat, I don’t care what you
and your girlfriend were fighting about slick. It’s none of my business you
know, live and let live, right?”
“If you girls want to pull each
other’s hair, then whip over to the curb, or get a room!”
“DO NOT let your domestic spat put MY
SWEET ASS in harms way! You get my drift Mary?” said Security Guard Eddie lecturing
me excitedly.
I
smiled timidly and nodded as I capitulated, accepting Eddie’s good-natured
ribbing. I was just glad that Sandy had been watching the road well enough to
keep us from squishing poor Eddie Chambers to death.
“What's the rush fellas?” Eddie
asked, as he leaned on my arm and gave Sandy Sandy
“Oh
yeah, you got kids? Damn, I thought you two were like a couple or
something.” Eddie said sarcastically.
“I mean you two are always together,
always fussin and fightin, laughin and such. Me and my old lady don’t spend that much time together and we
got six kids!” Eddie teased. He was probably just bored to tears and happy to
have someone to talk to at this lonely post.
“We ain’t gay Eddie, and I really do
need to get home and check on my boy, so if ya don’t mind,” I said finally,
nodding toward the closed gate. Eddie pushed away from the door and looked over
at the closed gate.
“Alright, I gettcha, I’m pickin up
what you’re layin down man!” he replied with a toothy grin.
“Don’t get all red in your pasty
white face, I’ll let ya’ll out,” Eddie answered as he strolled back to the
guard shack to buzz the gate open for us. He waived as we passed by the tiny
structure and Sandy
“YOU WISH LUCCI!” Eddie shouted as we
sped away.
“That was cold blooded man,” I chuckled.
“Ahhh, he wouldn’t respect us if we
didn’t fuck with him a little,” Sandy
“You know if you feel like talking
and get whatever’s been eating at you off your chest I’ll pretend I'm listening
dude,” Sandy said through a yawn.
“Nah, I’ll be all right,” I replied,
accelerating to merge with the rest of the commuters heading north toward Los Angeles
I
took the usual route, the 110 to the 405 and exit on Palo Verde to drop Sandy
“The goddamn things compel you to drop whatever you're doing to
acknowledge them, hold me, answer me, love me!” he'd say.
County
Trauma Center, November 24, 2002…5:00pm
Linda Bradley rubbed at her temples
as she sat at her desk, exhausted from her long, grueling day. She held her
reading glasses in one hand and her ballpoint pen in the other as she vigorously
massaged her aching head. She was amazed that she hadn’t poked out an eye in
the process. She sat up straight and returned her glasses to their perch on the
bridge of her slender Roman nose. Linda was a youngish, forty something professional,
slender and fit, who still caught the eye of most of the male staff around the
hospital. Truth be told that applied to a few ladies as well. Not that she
noticed mind you or at least if she did you could tell as she was too cool to
be that obvious. A graduate of the Harvard School of Business, she had come to Los Angeles
Linda had become quite
well known in the hospital administrative circles, embarrassingly referred to
as the golden girl. There wasn’t a
ledger she couldn’t balance or a budget that she could not keep. In the heart
of beantown she'd taken on a fleet of the worst financial performers in the
country and turned them all around quickly, each and every one of them! Her
secret you ask? Well, it was really quite simple as she would say, in fact, it
was so simple she almost had to laugh; “I
just put them all on a strict fiscal diet, and taught them all how to say NO!”
she'd say.
What she meant was that
she essentially embraced the HMO craze sweeping the country. She let ALL of her
highly paid staff know that she called the shots on EVERY
dime spent. These multi million dollar facilities and all of their care giving
and life saving services were businesses and not charities. She believed in
that concept thoroughly. And she had argued that point successfully at both
City and State levels whenever bleeding heart legal eagles challenged her over
a decision she made in the performance of her duties. “Leave the charity work
to the free clinics, or let the State cough up the necessary funds to serve the
masses,” she argued.
Linda Bradley was no fan
of the current administration on either the National or the State level. In
fact, she was so fiscally conservative you might think she was moonlighting for
the GOP. However, quite to the contrary, she'd been a staunch Democrat from the
cradle, born and raised a Catholic WASP in the heart of Chicago Illinois
As she became more aware,
more exposed to the facts and the truths found between the lines in the history
books she grew up with, as well as the tales told around the supper table, her
compassionate nature became seasoned with bitter spices of reality. First in
her mind, and then in her heart, she fashioned a new personal philosophy. The great leaders were no longer the people
who spoke inspirationally or passionately, they were skilled at telling you
what you wanted to hear. Now, the great
leaders were the people who had the courage to make a really hard decision,
to tell the truth. They valued truth over conjecture and popular spins. They
were the people that would tell us what we needed to hear, whether we wanted to
hear it or not.
Linda felt going into
this job that if she needed to adopt this philosophy, this ethic, this mantra
of a great leader. She'd likely be branded a heartless bureaucrat as a result,
a woman without compassion, a slayer of hope. But to her mind she felt as if
there was more compassion in facing reality straight on, and dealing with the
difficult choices together, than brightly coloring a hollow egg and looking
surprised when the enviable occurred. True to her fears, her professional
successes had been laced with a great deal personal strife, as she encountered the
disappointed faces of the people affected by her difficult decisions. She
wasn't cold, not without feelings; and she wasn’t immune to the suffering of
others. But she resolved to stick by her guns, do the right thing, consider the
greater good, and serve the needs of the many versus the wishes of the few. She
believed in that wholeheartedly in the light of day within the safety of her
office. But at night, alone, as there wasn't room for anyone else in the life
she'd chosen, she wrestled with her conscience, and she hated that!
Linda read the report once more, not because
she was contemplating changing her mind. Changing her mind was something that
she rarely did. No, she just wanted to be sure that she memorized all of the
facts before she met with the board in the morning. She read Dr. Wallace’s
diagnosis again and slowly shook her head. Turning the page she reviewed the
family’s financial situation and insurance coverage. Major Medical and a small
Blue Cross plan with insufficient coverage to support the kind of care this
little boy was going to need over the next couple years, if in fact he could actually
survive the aggressive treatment. This was one of the worst kinds of cancers to
contract as a child, the survival rates were alarmingly low, and the
chemotherapy and radiation regiments were brutal. To subject someone so young
to that sort of, well, torture just
seemed unconscionable. Of course it was the parent’s decision, and she was
sensitive to the fact that when pushed into a corner most people tend to fight.
It would be her instinct as well she reckoned, although she could only presume
as she had never married or had a child of her own. Still, however painful or
whatever hope such treatment might offer, it was still a very expensive
undertaking. And given the bleak prognosis that Dr. Wallace was predicting, it
hardly seemed in the best interest of the boy, his family, or the hospital.
Still, her policy was to present the case to the board, to let them hear from
Dr. Wallace first hand, and then debate amongst themselves, a collection of
both medical and business professionals before rendering a recommendation to
the Chairman. In the end it would be her decision, hers alone.
Linda closed the manila
file and leaned back in her leather chair. She sighed as she removed her
reading glasses for the umpteenth time. She had sat through hundreds of these
kinds of discussions, they were all unique and yet they were all the same. She
knew how it would end though; there was really only one choice. She silently
scolded herself for being so mundane about such a serious matter. At least at
this facility they did not include a photo of the patient as a practice, she
was grateful of that.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself Linda
girl,” she muttered, as she buzzed her secretary in the next room.
“Lisa, would you bring me a cup of
coffee please,” she said tiredly into the squawk box.
“Yes ma’am. You want me to doctor it
up this time?” Lisa asked cheerfully.
“No, just black dear, thank you,” she
answered politely, taking her finger off the button.
“I’ll do my own doctoring,” she whispered to
herself as she checked her desk drawer for the bottle of bourbon she kept
hidden for quiet moments of decompression, like
this one.
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