Chapter 12

Back at camp, Michael was on the basketball court playing one-on-one with a camper named Rocky. The kid was more of a hockey fan, but Michael was trying to convert him into a basketball player, challenging him to games when there weren’t enough people around to form hockey teams.
“Nice!” he said as Rocky swished one in from the foul line.
Rocky shrugged. “It’s a sissy game anyway.” Michael tossed him the ball and Rocky bounced it a couple times, then saw some of his friends come in at the other end of the fenced-in court. “Looks like we’ve got enough for hockey!” he said excitedly, and bounced the ball back to Michael.
As the boys picked up hockey sticks and brought out a net, Michael shot a few hoops before they took over the whole area. He felt the firm rubberiness of the ball, relishing the sound of it as it hit the pavement and the way it fit so perfectly in his hands as he caught it again. He focussed on the net, jumped, and in one smooth motion sent the ball up in a graceful arc. He watched it hit the rim, circle once, and finally fall in. It was a beautiful moment. How could anyone prefer slapping away haphazardly at a little ball on the ground with big, cumbersome sticks? How could you play a game when you were always looking down? He couldn’t understand the attraction. He felt like an outsider looking in at a strange cult.
“Hey!” he greeted Will, who’d come in at the other end of the cage with a bunch of his boys. “What is it about hockey around here?” he asked, holding the ball at his side as Will approached. “Look at them,” he said, gesturing. “They don’t know any other sport exists. This court is nothing but a cement hockey rink to them.”
He knew before Will reached half-court that something was wrong. He tossed the ball in a corner and strode over to meet him. “What’s up?” he asked.
Will put his hand on Michaels’s shoulder, as if to support both of them. “It’s bad,” he said in a low voice, glancing around to make sure the campers weren’t near. “Some kitchen girls just came into the office from swimming at Moose Creek. We’re not sure what happened exactly, but they were saying Samantha and Jesse might have got hit by a train.”
He was stunned motionless for a second.
“Bob and a bunch of guys went to check it out already...” Will tried to hold him, but Michael shook him off and ran.
He reached the empty office and spent agonizing seconds fumbling for his keys. Slamming his desk drawer in frustration, he caught his finger in it. A curse came into his head and he almost uttered it out loud, kicked his chair across the carpet instead and hurt his toes. The second jolt of pain sobered him, and he stopped a minute to breathe, asking for strength and calmness. By the time he reached his car, he was thinking rationally enough to watch his speed on the road. No one needed another accident right now. As he drove, he concentrated on reaching the tracks; he didn’t think about what he’d find there.
Two cars were parked on the side of the road already. Four or five people were walking along the rails, searching the ground. A girl sat on the grass by the road in her bathing suit, knees pulled up to her chin. Michael started toward the others, but stopped by her side first.
“Missy?” he said. She looked up at him with scared, red eyes. “Hey,” he said gently, sitting beside her. She put her head down and rocked back and forth, shaking. “You cold?” he asked numbly. “You got a towel with you?”
“It’s in the car,” she cried into her knees.
Michael looked up and scanned the vehicles. “Which car?” he asked.
“No,” she said, “Sam’s car.”
“Where’s Sam’s car?” he asked, confused.
She looked up. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t - was it here?” When Missy didn’t answer, he pressed again. “Did Sam drive you girls here?”
Missy nodded.
“Did you see anyone move the car? Come on, tell me what happened! Please, Missy!”
Missy just cried harder. “It’s all my fault! I was right behind her, and I just left her there! I didn’t know she would get so scared like that. I told her there was a train coming, honest. I thought she came after me.”
“She didn’t get off the tracks?” Michael asked.
“No. She just ran. And Sam tried to pull her off, and they got hit. Both of them.”
“You saw them get hit? You’re sure?”
Missy nodded. “They were just, gone. It was so fast.”
“Did you take the car back to camp?” he asked.
“We ran,” she said, shaking her head.
“Did you see the car before you left?”
Missy bit her lip. “I don’t know,” she said finally. “I didn’t look.”
Michael stood up. Missy said they’d been hit, so did the other girls. So who took the car? He couldn’t let himself hope - but if they weren’t dead, Sam and Jesse would get to a hospital, wouldn’t they? No, they couldn’t, no one survived getting hit by a train. It wasn’t even worth considering. Thinking like this was crazy. And yet, he couldn’t help wondering, where was Sam’s car?
He drove back to camp first, armed with Missy’s description of a blue Honda Civic. A quick check of the half-dozen cars in the parking lot told him it wasn’t there. Then he headed for Hanger.

Jesse dreamed she was being chased by a wild buffalo. It ran her down, snarling and grunting most ferociously. When it caught up with her at last, it was all of a sudden behind a fence, and most docile-looking; but when she held her hand out to pet its nose it sneezed on her.
She woke up moaning, her nose still wrinkled in disgust until, upon opening her eyes, she looked upon and recognized her golden-boy. His face was creased with worry, but there was no mistaking him. Though she could still see in her mind the frightening wooly beast, she remembered now where she was and how she came to be there, and was much relieved to know she and Sam were no more alone. Although she was beginning to see a nicer side to Samantha, and no longer suspected her of hatred towards herself, Michael’s presence was soothing. It didn’t seem strange when he reached down and brushed her cheek lightly with his knuckles: she just smiled and sighed contentedly, and his pained look was replaced by a much more familiar grin.
“You’re here,” she said.
Michael nodded. “Yeah, I’m here. And you’re alive.”
“Is that such a surprise?”
“It will be to some people,” he said.
Jesse looked around the empty hospital room. “Where’s Sam?” she asked.
“Trying to phone camp,” he answered. “No one’s picking up.” He hesitated before volunteering the rest of the information. “She told me what happened to you two, but everyone at camp thinks you got hit by that train.” He watched for Jesse’s reaction to that news, but she didn’t seem too appalled. Maybe she was a little medicated. “I’d better go get her,” he said finally, “she made me promise to, when you woke up.”
Jesse just nodded and said “Ok”.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” he assured her as he backed away reluctantly. “You’re sure you’ll be alright?” he asked.
“I think so,” she answered.
“Don’t move,” he instructed as he reached the doorway. He turned around, checked right and left twice, finally decided on left, and ran down the hall.
Jesse chuckled. Inside that lanky 6" frame was an adorable little kid. When had she decided to refer to him as ‘golden-boy’, she wondered? It did suit him, with his ruddy skin and sandy curls, but she doubted he would appreciate the nickname if he found out about it. The thought that it would vex him, however, in no way weakened her fondness for the term; quite the opposite in fact. She would call him golden-boy forever now in her mind, and derive wicked pleasure from knowing it would annoy him to know it.
She expected Sam to arrive shortly, but it was her aunt Sandra who came in first, and shut the door behind her. She spoke long, and gave her some distressing information. Jesse bore up well under the news, not understanding everything, but enough to be both scared and amazed at her unlikely circumstances. When she was quite composed, Aunt Sandra, with permission, opened the door to the anxious persons who were of course waiting just outside. She then left to attend some other patient, as her niece wished to tell her friends, in her own words and privately, what the verdict was.
There was a slight complication the pregnancy. It had nothing to do with Samantha’s mode of rescuing her, and would not be fatal, but it was a good thing that it had been caught this early. Their coming to the hospital now was extremely fortunate.
“I’ll have to stay here overnight, though,” Jesse concluded.
Although she appeared little affected as she explained this, she was actually in something like shock. She did not know how to deal with the emotions stirring around inside of her, and of necessity was blocking them out. She had no intention of becoming a basket-case, and if she was one already she certainly was not going to let on about it. She squared her shoulders, held her head high, and with a smile begged them to try again to phone camp, as they must be very worried by now.
Ignoring this request, Samantha marched resolutely to her side and took her hand in her own two, and asked, would she mind if she prayed for her? Jesse didn’t mind, so in the stillness of that rose-coloured room she prayed simply but beautifully over Jesse and her unborn child. Presently, as Samantha was finishing, Jesse’s other hand was caught up, and the golden-boy added his own thanks for their God’s all-knowing goodness, which had guided them to the hospital, and asked for continued grace and safety under the doctors’ care. They did not expect her to feel up to adding to their prayers, and Jesse found herself summarily wrapped up in a tender hug from Samantha, which she readily returned. She could not help but be touched by their words, their obvious love and their faith, which had the effect of strengthening her own at that moment. She could see that God had protected herself and the baby, that he had used the train to bring her here. How could she be anything but amazed?
Both girls’ dry eyes did them credit in Michael’s view, for they were obviously affected emotionally, but each equally determined to grin and bear it for the sake of the other.
“Hey, you’ve got a phone in here,” he observed. “We allowed to use it?” Without an answer he picked up the receiver and dialled. “If no one answers this time, I might just drive back there to tell them.”
“So they really think we’re dead, eh?” Jesse said.
Samantha nodded. “That’s Michael’s story, anyway. Can you believe those silly girls?”
“It is kind of hard to believe they didn’t think to check the other side of the tracks,” Jesse admitted. “But then again, I didn’t think to jump on that side, either.”
“You weren’t thinking at all,” Sam said, and Jesse didn’t know whether she meant to excuse or berate her by this.
Michael hung up. “No answer.”
“You gonna drive out?” asked Samantha.
“Guess so.”
“You should go with him,” said Jesse, “you look tired. Go get some sleep,” she urged.
“No,” said Sam. “I’m not leaving you here alone.”
“Ah, I’ve got my Auntie Sandra. I’ll be fine. There’s nothing wrong with me, you know. I don’t even need to be lying down. We might just go out to the lake after her shift and take a swim...”
“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” asserted Michael.
“Well you are not my doctor,” Jesse said happily. “And my doctor recommends a swim and a sauna.”
“I doubt that,” Samantha said. “But I don’t think you need to worry about her, Michael. Her aunt will take care of her fine enough.”
Jesse smiled to encourage them on their way. When they’d left, she got out of her bed and stood by the window, watching the car pull away. It was a nice day. Another nice day she had to spend looking out at it. She fingered the yellow drapes. Though her window faced the parking lot, it was not a drab scene, for the lot was small and encircled by trees, and beyond them were hills. Her hand went down to her abdomen. She could feel the little round bulge, the tightness of her skin as it stretched to accommodate, though it was well-hidden under her loose blue hospital gown. She stretched out the fabric and looked down at herself. Unfortunately there was no mirror in the room. She felt the need to reassure herself that something was there.
She peered down the hall. No one was around but an old lady in a wheelchair, so she ventured out. As she passed the other patient, though, the woman reached out and touched the sleeve of Jesse’s gown.
“I need to go to the bathroom,” she croaked out.
Horror-struck, Jesse now looked back down the hall hoping so see someone. No one. She looked warily at the patient. She was very old, her skin loose and wrinkly, hanging off her miniature skeleton. Her lips looked like she licked them too much, her eyes were vacant.
“I need to go to the bathroom!” the old woman mumbled again.
“I don’t know where it is...” She tried to back away.
“Please bring me to the bathroom,” she begged, sounding urgent.
“Ok,” Jesse said quickly, not wanting to upset her. “That’s what I’m looking for anyway.” Besides, she would be old herself one day, and the thought of having to beg someone to bring her to the washroom made her sick to her stomach. She grabbed the handles of the metal chair and pushed it in front of her, peering into every open door they passed, as the woman informed her over and over that she wanted to go to the bathroom. Finally she found one: a small room with a girl’s sign on the door. There was hardly enough room to get the lady in, and no mirror suiting her own purposes. “Do you want me to close the door?” she asked, working hard to smile.
“Help me,” the woman said, trying to push herself up. “Help me out.”
Jesse was now stunned. She couldn’t help this woman go to the bathroom! What was she doing? Oh, where was a nurse? She backed away from the disturbing old person. “I’ll... go get someone.” she stammered.
“Nettie?” a voice behind her said.
Jesse turned in relief and embarrassment. “She said she had to go to the washroom,” she tried to explain, but the nurse walked right past her.
“Come on Nettie, let’s go back to your room.” She looked at Jesse as she wheeled her out. “She goes to the bathroom because she has nothing else to do. She’s just bored.”
“Oh,” Jesse said lamely. The nurse didn’t seem upset with her, but Jesse was mortified. Why had she meddled? Why couldn’t she just walk by, leave it alone? The patients here were none of her business, they weren’t her responsibility. She walked hurriedly back to her room and sat down on the chair by the window, her hands folded between her knees for a minute. Then she leaned forward and crossed her arms on the narrow window-sill, resting her chin on her wrist so that her nose was a centimetre from the window-pane. She sat there for a long, long time - until the light faded, and she could see the reflection of her eyes in the glass.
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There had been a new moon that night, and there were no street-lights by the cemetery. It was a quiet city and a weeknight, and she had met only a couple of younger highschool kids out walking, because she was far from the areas frequented by the university students. The church was a good 30 minutes off campus.
The graveyard started at the top of the hill and went all the way to the bottom, where it ended at another intersection and the streetlights started again. Jesse wasn’t afraid of graveyards. She and May used to pack peanut butter sandwiches and ride their bikes out to the old cemetery outside of town, when they lived in Manitoba. They would sit around the tall monument in the middle to eat their lunches, and then run around playing games, hopping over small gravestones and climbing up onto the bigger ones. They had no sense of respect for the dead at all. They knew where souls went when people died, and their parents had never thought it necessary to teach them to respect the body’s resting place.
On this night, at the top of the hill, someone sat on a bench a few feet back from the sidewalk, bent over with his elbows on his knees. It was odd enough, and dark enough, to make her nervous. She hurried her steps as she neared him, so as to pass by sooner, but he saw her too soon. Looking up, he greeted her pleasantly, and she was surprised that she recognized his voice.
“Jeremy!” she said, slowing. She knew him from highschool. They had been in the same music class and had mutual friends, but she knew little about him. She remembered him mostly by a couple of crude jokes he’d told in her presence, which stood out in her mind because afterward he seemed to regret offending her. Like many seniors, he’d worked at No Frills part-time last year, and usually said hi when he saw her. Overall, he had been friendlier to her than she could bring herself to act towards him.
It was such a chance meeting, she couldn’t pass him by now. They took a few minutes to catch up, and find out the reasons of each for being in the city. Jeremy rightly guessed that she was there attending the university. He said he was working. It was more, probably, than they’d ever said to each other all through highschool, and Jesse was about to smile, tell him how good it had been to see him again, and continue on her way.
Jeremy, though, seemed in the mood to chat. “Chilly out, isn’t it?” he said, and she felt compelled to stay.
“Oh, it’s alright,” she said, drawing her jean jacket closer around her. “What are you doing out here?”
“I’m just waiting for a friend,” he said. “You going somewhere?”
“Home,” she affirmed, standing awkwardly, aware of her inadequacy at small-talk. She didn’t want to be rude, though. “I was, uh, just at choir practice.”
“You’re in a choir, eh?” Jeremy asked, sounding impressed.
“Yeah, well, just for church.”
“Oh.”
“Mm-hmm. Well, I better get going.”
He seemed reluctant to let her go, but just nodded. “Yeah. See you around.”
She walked away, thinking he had sounded a little out of sorts. Nervous, perhaps lonely? What was he doing there, really? He’d been so polite, so soft-spoken; very different from the way he’d acted at school. He hadn’t been rich, popular, academic, athletic or artistic. He’d hung out with a crowd of the not-so-well-off, a step above the skids, smokers and bearded hippies. She had a few girlfriends in this circle, but the boys she generally disapproved of. She’d lumped Jeremy in with them.
Before she had taken many steps, her Christian conscience was berating her for what amounted to, she now realized, essentially turning up her nose at him. Wasn’t he a person? God loved him as much as he loved her, and she had never even attempted to show him that love. At times she’d regarded him with nothing other than contempt. She hardly knew him at all, but she began to believe she had done Jeremy Beale a great injustice, and that she would have to find a way to make it up.
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If only she hadn’t stopped that night. No, that wasn’t right. If only she had taken notice of Jeremy earlier, if she had seen the scars on his wrists. If she hadn’t turned her nose up at him because he wasn’t as smart as her, or because his manners or his language offended her. She looked at her eyes in the window-mirror of the hospital. What kind of eyes were these? Eyes that did not see, not really. They had not seen Jeremy Beale, the boy whose mother had run away when he was twelve, whose father beat him up whenever he had a bad day, who felt the world would be better off without him, and he without the world. Why had she not seen that? She hadn’t even bothered to look.
She sighed and decided to let it go. Even if she had seen, there was no guarantee... she might not have changed anything. This wasn’t her fault, she told her reflection in the window. It was thoroughly dark out now. If she stood up, she could see herself clearly in the window. Curiously, she did so. She pulled at the back of her hospital gown, so that it clung tight to her belly. She turned sideways, and stared. Yes, it was there alright. She relinquished her hold on the gown, so that it hung loose - or should have. There remained a discernible bump in the fabric. She thanked God next week was primary.
It was late. She walked across the room and switched the light off. The hallway was still lit - she shut her door. There was no lock. She climbed in between the icy hospital sheets with her socks still on, and pulled up the thin blanket that was folded at the foot of the bed. The pillow was too big and soft - she threw it on the floor. Lying back down, she sighed. It had been a few months since she’s spent a night in a hospital, but she hadn’t forgotten what it was like: she remembered the sounds, the hard mattress, the crack of light that slid under the door, the strange air that warmed her skin and chilled her insides. And she hadn’t forgotten the fear. Even with one or both of her parents beside her, she had always been afraid. Closed doors meant nothing. There was no safety in numbers. She could not sleep soundly, and had made little recovery until they brought her home.
This room was no better. It was worse, because she was alone. She had sent everyone away, she’d said she would be alright; and she would, she told herself. She wasn’t the scared wreck she’d been four months ago. She was stronger than that now. But even as the words ran through her head, the sound of footsteps in the hall made her bolt straight up, with her chest constricting painfully. She listened as they passed her room, her heart hardly daring to beat. She fumbled for the light switch above her head that turned a lamp on, not able to even breath until she found it. She did not lie down again. Every noise, every shadow, every movement of air, was a possible menace. She couldn’t argue herself out of being terrified, because she could not in all truthfulness tell herself she was safe. There was no lock on the door. There were lots of people inside the hospital already, and nothing to stop anyone else from entering it. She was vulnerable, so terribly, terribly vulnerable - and no one cared. No one was there to protect her, no one to stay awake while she slept. She was soon covered in perspiration, her hands clammy, her face wet with silent tears. But fearfulness was exhausting, and in time, merciful sleep claimed her, and carried her through till morning.