Post by minianne on Oct 12, 2009 13:53:55 GMT -5
“A Long Way Up”
Chapter 3
Jim slowly made his way toward the bed and lay down. He was spent emotionally and physically.
He started to drape his arm across his forehead, but the pain radiating from his left temple made him wince. His fingers gently explored the site of his injury. It was bleeding, he realized, encountering a warm stickiness. Shit, he must have broken open some sutures smacking his head on that desk drawer.
Rolling over, he reached toward the nightstand to get a Kleenex. The drawer was still open. He pulled out the pack of tissues, closed the drawer, then dabbed at his head.
Funny how physical pain was easier to take than the mental stuff.
Rick was right. He had to pull himself together. But how? It would be so much easier to just give up and die. But so many people loved him. Christie…his mom, his brothers…what would it do to them if he were to kill himself? If was his life, but what did he owe his wife and family?
It wasn’t that he wanted his life to end, but he couldn’t imagine how to begin to deal with this blind thing. Maybe some people could…but what kind of life could he have? Jesus. How could he cross the street? He had to feel his way along the walls to get out in the other room.
He thought about Christie. She was so beautiful. But it wasn’t only physical beauty, he loved the way she challenged him. Nothing was ever easy with Chris. High-maintenance didn’t even begin to describe her. But, she had been beside him from the moment he entered the hospital to the time he left. She’d slept next to him in that hospital room every night. He’d heard her crying for hours on end. She’d sat next to him, read to him, reassured him… How did he reward her? When she’d tried to hug him when they got home, he’d blown her off.
That was her main gripe with him. She always said that he shut her out. That was true. She had wanted to connect with him, knowing damn well that coming home was going to be difficult, but he hadn’t allowed her “in”. Jim sighed. But couldn’t she understand that letting her in might make him appear less of a man in her eyes?
Even more so than that…if he did decide to go on, how would he earn a living? Jesus. He was a cop. Shit. How could he go back to work? There were no blind cops. In his entire life it had never occurred to him that he couldn’t be a cop. Now it was being a cop that had got him in this mess. But what was he…who was he if he couldn’t be a cop?
Besides that…what would his handicap mean to their marriage? Shit, handicapped. That was a hateful word. But it was true. His optic nerves were destroyed, never to be reconnected. He was blind and that meant handicapped. Jim grimaced at the thought and cracked his knuckles nervously. Handicapped…now that was a bitter pill to swallow. Handicapped people needed to be taken care of…he had spent his whole life taking care of other people. This just didn’t figure into his equation of life.
What he’d said to Rick was the honest truth. He was never going to see anything ever again for as long as he lived. Just imagining it made his heart race. It was so final. What did that mean? He had trouble wrapping his mind around the concept. It was like trying to grasp the meaning of infinity.
He “looked” around the room…slowly and deliberately moving his eyes toward where he knew the window to be, the door, the dresser. He held his hands up and tried to look at them. Nothing. Jim bit his lower lip. He strained to see through the void. Nothing. The effort made the ache behind his eyes intensify. Fuck. This is what it was going to be like until the day he died. There weren’t going to be any miracles.
What would it be like to live like this day in and day out? Is this something he could adjust to? Could he ever get to the point where he could breathe freely again, not feeling like the void was pressing against his chest, squeezing the air out of him?
Suddenly Jim longed for his mother to be there. He wished that he were a child again. When he was sick his mom would make a little bed for him on the couch in the living room and she’d make him special treats like soft boiled eggs with toast and let him watch cartoons all day long. There was nothing from an upset stomach to a broken arm that she couldn’t soothe… He could feel her cool fingers gently brushing against his fevered brow…
Damn it, Dunbar! he thought, trying to push that image out of his mind as tears began to burn his eyes. But why was it so surprising that he wanted his mother? Just before his buddy Frazier died from his shrapnel wounds, his last words had been “Oh mommy“. Yeah, now Jim knew why he had said that.
This was so f*cked up! Jim sat up and carefully made his way toward the bathroom. After peeing, he turned on the sink and washed his hands, turning off the hot spigot and splashing his face with cold water. He turned it off and grabbed a towel, burying his face in it. He put the towel on the counter, then leaned in toward the mirror. Tentatively, he reached out and touched the smooth surface.
He wondered what was reflected back. Was he swollen? Black and blue? What did his eyes look like? Were they still the same color? All his life people had always told him how attractive his blue eyes were. Especially women. He couldn’t count how many times some woman had told him what gorgeous blue eyes he had. Well, those days were gone.
f*ck…what woman would want him now? But his eyes…did they “wander” all over the place like that guy who runs the newstand in City Hall? Jesus. It hadn’t even occurred to him before now that that might be the case. God, he hoped not. He was going to have to ask somebody. But who? Christie. He’d ask Christie. He just had to figure out how.
Maybe, he thought…maybe I should wear sunglasses. Isn’t that what blind people do? That way people wouldn’t have to look at his eyes. He headed toward the dresser. Opening the top drawer, he felt around a bit. There was a plastic bag in the front and he realized it was his wallet, watch and the things he’d had in his pockets when he was shot.
He opened it, put the wallet in his back pocket, took out the watch and started to put it on his wrist. Suddenly, he stopped.
A whole hell of a lot of good it’s gonna do me now, he thought, realizing he needed his eyes to read the God-damned thing. He absently ran his fingers over it. There were several rough spots on the band.
Probably from when I hit the ground. The thought made him shudder. He felt around a bit, found the box the watch came in and put it in there.
Out of sight, out of mind…
Jim explored the rest of the drawer until he found a couple of eyeglass cases. Opening one, his fingers touched metal frames. A wry smile crossed his face. He’d almost forgotten about his glasses. He’d only had that Goddamned Lasik procedure done a few months ago.
Would he have gone ahead with it if he’d have known? Shit. That was a kick in the head. Well, that was the least of his worries… He opened the second case. His sunglasses…no, not these…these were the prescription ones…but really, what the hell difference would that make? He didn’t have any vision left to correct. At one time all it took was slipping these on and everything would snap into focus.
He carefully put them on. For some reason, that made him feel safe, protected. But against what?