Miracles in the ER (28 page)

“Mike, I don’t know what—”

“No point in denying it. That guy you picked up in the rain out on Highway 5 yesterday used to work with the rescue squad over in Union. He was at the station this afternoon when I went by to pick up some paperwork and told me what happened. He said to thank you again.”

“See.” Sharon turned around and dried her hands on her bright-orange apron, which was emblazoned with a bold Clemson Tiger paw. “That
was
the right thing to do. It was raining and he was in the middle of nowhere with his car broken down. He needed a ride. What was I supposed to do?”

“Call someone—anyone. Call 9-1-1 and let them deal with it. Just don’t stop and pick up a stranger. Again,
I
knew the guy, but
you
didn’t. It’s just not safe anymore—not these days.”

Sharon turned back to her chicken. “Okay, I hear you. I’ll try not to do that again.”

“Sharon…”

“Alright, I
won’t
do that again.”

Mike shook his head and headed to the den.

Sharon and Mike Brothers were paramedics and worked as a team on EMS 1. In his “off time,” Mike did heating-and-air work with his uncle.
Once a month their supplier, Charlie Stokes, would drive from Columbia in his pickup truck, carrying parts and equipment the two men had ordered.

Over the years, Charlie had almost become a member of the family. If Sharon was off duty and knew he was coming, he would find a plate of oatmeal cookies on the kitchen counter, still warm from the oven, and freshly made iced tea.

“Nobody makes tea like you do, Sharon.”

“I’m going to tell your wife you said that, Charlie,” she warned one afternoon.

“Go ahead. She knows. And by the way, tell me about that three-wheeler out in the shed.”

Mike had bought the recreational vehicle years ago when their son was young enough to be interested in it and not girls. He was in college now, and the unused three-wheeler was languishing under the lean-to of Mike’s shop behind the house, covered by a camo tarp.

“You interested?” she asked him. “I’m sure Mike would be glad to sell it—probably not for very much, if anything. He might just
give
it to you.”

“Does it still run?” The last cookie disappeared from the plate and Charlie wiped some renegade crumbs from his mouth.

“You know Mike. Of course it runs.”

On his next monthly visit, Charlie came prepared to load the oversized bike into his truck. Mike refused to accept any money for it and helped his friend lift it into the back of the pickup. They couldn’t get the tailgate closed and had to strap it securely to whatever hooks and handles they could find.

Satisfied, Mike stepped into the shed and came back with a roll of yellow tape imprinted with large black letters.

Crime Scene—Do Not Cross

“We keep a roll of this on the unit
just in case
.” Mike tore off several five-foot lengths of tape and tied them to the three-wheeler. “This should satisfy the Highway Patrol.”

“I’m gonna be going slow,” Charlie said, checking the straps one more time. “Only have one more delivery to make, out on Beckley Church Road. Then I’m headed home. My ten-year-old is gonna be excited when he sees this. Thanks, you two.”

Sharon and Mike stood in the driveway and watched Charlie Stokes
turn onto the highway. He waved one last time through his open window, and then was gone.

Two hours later, Mike’s radio flashed and beeped from the kitchen table. They weren’t on duty, but he usually kept it on in case they might be needed.

A dispatcher’s strained voice reported a gunshot wound off Highway 5, their part of the county.

Sharon looked at her husband. “Do you think we—”

“Police on the scene,” the dispatcher continued. “And the coroner is en route. EMS not required.”

Mike shook his head. “They won’t need us for this one.”

Later, they were getting ready for bed and Sharon switched the TV on to a Charlotte station. A reporter was standing with his microphone, silently mouthing his report.

Mike was the first to see the scrawl on the bottom of the picture and shouted, “Turn up the sound! Quick!”

“…on Beckley Church Road. Police officers say they have a suspect in custody but have released no other details about his identity. They won’t yet release the identity of the victim, who was found facedown in a ditch beside the road with two bullet wounds—one in the back and one in the head.”

The reporter was not at the scene of the shooting but was standing in front of police headquarters, downtown. The cameraman slowly scanned away from the reporter, pointing his lens toward a cordoned-off area of the parking lot.

“We are told that the suspect was stopped while driving this vehicle and was subdued after a brief struggle.”

The camera zoomed in on a blue pickup truck. The view shifted as the cameraman walked behind the vehicle. Shadows played over the back of the truck and the camera shook until he finally came to a stop. The truck’s tailgate was down. Yellow ribbons of tape fluttered limply in the night breeze, tied to the back of a three-wheeler.

Mike and Sharon stared at each other.

The reporter’s voice cut into the heartbroken silence of their bedroom. “It appears the driver of this truck may have stopped, picked up the suspect to give him a ride, and was then shot and killed.”

Mike flipped off the TV.

After Charlie Stokes had been killed by a hitchhiker, Mike didn’t have to say anything more to Sharon. She watched her husband grieve the death of his friend and knew what was in his heart and in his thoughts. She didn’t want to add to his sadness.

Months passed, and it was the dead of winter. Mike and his uncle were out on a call to a failing heat pump and freezing family, and Sharon was returning home from the grocery store.

“Well, I’ll be.”

It had been cold and overcast, but no one had called for snow. She switched on the windshield wipers, clearing some stubborn flakes clinging to the tempered glass. The inside of the SUV was warm and toasty, but she cranked up the heater a notch—just for good measure.

The snow was coming down harder, and Sharon squinted to see the road ahead, driving in the middle of the highway and not the right lane.

“What in the world…”

There was something up ahead, something on the side of the road.

She slowed, sped up the windshield wipers, and stared into the late-afternoon gloaming.

Just ahead, walking on the right shoulder of the road, was the figure of a man. He was hunched over, hands thrust deep in the pockets of his pants, with a short-sleeved shirt on.

“What in the world…”

Sharon was barely crawling as she drew alongside. The man looked at her, chin tucked to his chest, and forged forward into the blowing snow. His face—the man was probably in his late twenties—was pink and chapped.

She hesitated, but only for an instant. The SUV accelerated and she headed home, only moments away.

Sharon jumped from the running vehicle, ran inside without her groceries, and stood staring in front of the coatrack in the laundry room.

“Which one…”

She grabbed an old hunting jacket of Mike’s—its sleeves worn and tattered—hurried back to the car, and tossed it onto the passenger seat. Over the faded camo on the back was taped a large, orange “X”—one arm of which was missing.

“This should work.” Sharon patted the jacket, shifted into reverse, and headed back to Highway 5.

What if he’s gone? What if someone picked him up? What if something worse has…

She cleared a curve in the road and there he was, huddled against the snow and wind, persistently plodding forward.

Sharon slowed as she approached the man and kept the SUV in the middle of the road. She came to a stop beside him and he once again looked up at her. This time he didn’t continue walking, but stopped and turned to face her. His lips were blue and ice was dangling from his scruffy beard.

That poor man is freezing. I’ve just got to give him a ride.

She looked to her right and reached for the hunting jacket.

Her cell phone started to hum and vibrate on the console. She picked it up and glanced at the caller ID. It was Mike. She stared at the phone, and with each vibration she heard another of Mike’s warnings. It vibrated one last time, and she saw the face of Charlie Stokes.

Sharon dropped the cell phone to her lap, grabbed the coat, and twisted around in her seat. The hiker stood shivering just outside her window, his hands still buried in his pockets. She hit the button for the window and lowered it just enough to be able to push the jacket into the arms of the surprised young man.

“Here, I hope this helps. I’ll call someone to get you a ride.”

She raised the window, sprinted a hundred yards down the road, whipped around in a deftly executed U-turn, and headed back to her home.

The man was clumsily getting into the jacket as she passed.

“Why didn’t you answer my call?” Mike had just walked into the kitchen and dropped his hat and gloves on the table.

“I couldn’t get to it in time,” Sharon answered, mostly in truth. “Was it something important? I figured if it was, you’d call back.”

“Nope. Just checking on you.”

Mike turned on the small TV set on the counter and sat down.

“Boy, it’s cold out there,” he said. “Freezing.”

They both heard “Highway 5 in York County” and jerked around together, staring at the television.

Mike turned up the volume and they moved closer to the screen.

“This comes after the monthlong investigation of multiple home
invasions in western York County. Twenty-nine-year-old PJ Bartlett was arrested this evening while walking down Highway 5 in an unexpected snowstorm. He has been charged with multiple counts of forceful breaking and entering, grand larceny, and malicious vandalism. He is in York at the County Detention Center with no possibility of bail. When arrested, he had two knives and a small-caliber handgun in his possession.”

Mike shook his head. “I saw some police lights on my way home, but I had no idea.”

He tensed and leaned closer to the television, his forehead almost touching the screen.

Walking between two stout officers, his back to the camera, was the suspect. He was wearing a faded camo hunting jacket with a large, orange “X” on the back. One arm of the X was missing.

“Hey, isn’t that my jacket?”

Sharon stepped back from the television, pale and trembling. She put her hand on the table to steady herself and it came to rest on something.

She looked down, picked it up, and clutched it to her chest.

Her cell phone.

T
HE
Miracle
OF A
C
HANGED
H
EART

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. and I will put my Spirit in you…

E
ZEKIEL
36:26-27

A Demon

“You know that guy?”

I looked up at the police officer standing at my side at the nurses’ station. He nodded down the hallway behind me.

“Him. That guy going into minor trauma.”

I turned just in time to see the profile of a slender, hunched-over man disappearing through the doorway. It was enough.

“Yes, I’ve seen him here in the ER before. Why?”

I looked down at the chart on the countertop and resumed making a few notes. For a moment I struggled for the man’s name, but gave up. I knew he had emphysema, smoked like a freight train, but I couldn’t remember his name. Probably a sad commentary—remembering people by their diseases and not by their names.

“That’s Jasper Reynolds.”

The name sounded a little familiar, but I had work to do. “Hmm.”

I didn’t look up.

“He was one bad actor.”

“Was?” I looked over at the officer, now curious about Mr. Reynolds—who seemed to be very much in the present.