Chapter 15

Sheila had been sleeping for nearly 18 hours, when she heard the phone ring. She turned in bed, to look at the alarm clock. The red numbers were blurry at first and she rubbed her eyes until she saw 11:45 AM appear. She reached a hand out to search for the phone, but as she lifted the receiver to her ear the caller had hung up.

It had been two months since she had signed off on the divorce papers between herself and Charlie. Chad had brought over the papers two weeks after that, so she could return her driver’s license, bills, and bank accounts to her original name, Sheila Polk. They were still unsigned and sitting where she had left them that day, on the dining room table. Still embarrassed by her sexual harassment of Chad, she had told him to take a month’s vacation. He was reluctant to go.

“I’m really worried about you, Sheila. I don’t think I should let you be alone for a week, let alone one month,” he had told her.

“Oh, please don’t be worried. I’ll be fine. I’ve been through bigger problems than this before in my life.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t want to talk about it now, ok? Just, believe me. I can get through this on my own. I need to do this, alone.”

She didn’t believe her own story then, and she was proving her doubts, and Chad’s, right.

She couldn’t sleep without taking a pill, and she couldn’t stay awake without taking another pill. The doctor was concerned about issuing her a prescription, since she hadn’t had sleeping problems before. He didn’t know about the divorce, but could tell that she was not in a good frame of mind.

“Are you getting any exercise, Miss Polk?” He had been instructed over the phone by Chad earlier that day to use her maiden name. “Perhaps some light activity would allow you to relax?”

“I’m walking everyday, doctor. I don’t think it’s exercise. I have just been working so damn hard, you know?” She had started to cry. It was so easy to produce tears normally, and in her exhaustion the tears were even easier to come by. “I just need something to help me stay asleep. Please, Dr. Miller?”

He wrote her the prescription for some Dalmane, but only gave her 10 pills and no refills. After those pills ran out, she went to see her gynecologist, and got another prescription for Ambien. The  pills were starting to run low, however. She was thinking about seeing Dr. Miller again soon, trying to craft another story in order to get more pills.

She tossed her feet out of bed, and stood up. Feeling wobbly she placed her hand on the wall and walked to the bathroom, and ran a bath. As the water filled the tub, she flipped on the light switch, and was immediately blinded by the bright lamp above the bathroom sink. She tried to take a look at her reflection in the mirror, but couldn't bear to open her eyes wide under the light.

Leaving the bathroom, she walked into the kitchen with her eyes half-closed, still holding on to the wall for balance. The coffee pot was still filled with yesterday morning’s coffee, so she poured herself a mug and heated it up in the microwave. She ran some cold water from the kitchen faucet and wiped her eyes with it. When the microwave was done, she took out the mug, filled it to the brim with  milk and sugar, and took it back into the bathroom.

She tried to test the water with her toe, while holding the mug of coffee with both hands. Her head started to spin and she spilled the coffee on to her arms. This shocked her so much so that she slipped into the bathtub. Her hips hit the edge of the tub, and sent her face into the tile wall behind the tub. She immediately tasted blood in her mouth, and this sent her into a panic.

Her heart racing, she crawled into her bedroom. The bath was still running and the coffee  spilled on the white tile floor, but she didn’t have time to deal with this. She feared that she had broken her jaw. She dialed 911.

The operator had a hard time hearing her, as she couldn’t open her mouth up. She started to gag on her blood, and the operator – hearing this – told her to calm down, that the paramedics were on their way. Sheila blacked out.

“Looks good to me. Nurse, will you please let them know that she’s ready for Dr. Geary to take a look at her?”

Sheila heard the voice, but couldn’t see who it belonged to. “What – what’s happening?” There was silence, darkness. “Where am I?” She started to panic again.

“It’s ok,” the voice said again. A sheet was lifted from the side of her face, which had been covering her eyes. “You had a fall and you needed some stitches in your mouth and on your cheek.” Sheila turned her head to look at the person, but immediately felt sore.

“Ow,” she grabbed her neck.

“Yes, you’re going to be sore for a while.” She felt hands turning her head, very gently. “I’m Dr. Phillips, Mrs. Polk.”

Sheila tried to sit up, but felt Dr. Phillips’ hands pressed on her shoulders. “No, don’t try to sit up just yet. You’ve badly bruised your hip. It looks like you were pretty close to breaking it, so you need to take it easy. Just lie back.”

He was handsome, olive skinned with big, black eye brows and dark brown eyes. His hair was covered up by a blue paper hat, and he was wearing blue paper scrubs.

“What happened to me?”

He picked up a manila folder sitting at her feet, and said “Patient found at right side of bed, in prone position. Looks like you passed out while talking to 911. There’s also some notes here about a conversation you had with the paramedics.”

“Oh?”
            “You said that you were trying to take a bath and you slipped and fell into the tub.” He looked up from the folder and looked at her. He smiled at her and said, “How do those stitches feel?”

“I can’t feel anything, really.”

“That’s good.” Putting back the folder, he said “Why do you think you slipped?”

She was quiet, thinking to herself if she should mention the pills, or start with the divorce that left her unable to cope with even the idea of sleeping.

“The pills? I guess, the pills I was taking to make me sleep made me dizzy.”

“Ambien? They found the bottle in the bathroom. And a bottle of Dalmane. Why did you need sleeping pills, Mrs. Polk?”

The question sounded accusatory to Sheila. “It’s Miss Polk, Dr. Phillips.” She closed her eyes and tried to turn as much as she could away from his glare.

“Miss Polk, sorry. Are you upset about something?”

“Are you a psychiatrist or a physician?”

He leaned over the bed, putting his arms right beside her body. “Miss Polk, I am a physician who cares about you. I could send in a psychiatrist, if you’re telling me that you want one, or maybe that you need to talk to one?”

The tone in his voice melted away the armor she had so quickly put up. She expected to start crying, but she couldn’t feel the tears in her eyes. “I’m just so tired. I’m tired of everything. But I can’t stay asleep.”

“Is that what you want – to just stay asleep?”

“Not forever, no. Just to sleep through the night, not waking up at any little sound or because of something I thought I felt, you know?”

“Ok. Well, I think you need to try and get some rest now. Dr. Geary is going to come in and look at your stitches and the bandage on your hip, but you can close your eyes. Do you want me to close the blinds and turn off the lights?”

“No, that’s ok.”

He patted her shoulder, and left the room. With the door closed, Sheila could hear the humming of the fluorescent lights, and started to feel the sting of her hip. She rubbed her tongue on the inside of her jaw and felt the stitches along her gums. “Oh my god,” she thought, “What the hell do I look like?”

Dr. Geary entered, not expecting Sheila to be lucid. He picked up the file folder and looked over the notes. Sheila moved her feet in the bed to make him aware of her presence, and he looked over to her. “Hi there. I’m Dr. Geary. Looks like Dr. Phillips did a great job with the stitches,” he leaned in to her face to get a closer look. “Very nice.” He smelled like pine needles and cedar.

“Does it look bad?” she asked him.

“Well, take a look for yourself,” he turned around to find a small mirror and handed it to her. “You had a bad spill, and you’re going to see that bruise on your cheek grow about three times that size. It could have been much worse, though.”

 She looked at her reflection and saw the red and blue spot just below the stitches on her cheek-bone. “Oh my god,” she said, out loud this time. “I look like someone beat me up.”

Dr. Geary took the mirror from her, “All done? I told you, it could have been worse. You could have damaged your eye socket, or lost some teeth.”

“So my teeth are ok?”

“You did get cut on the gums, but no tooth damage that we could see. You are going to have to call your dentist, however. He’ll want to make sure of that for himself.”

“Chad.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Ask Chad to call my dentist, he’ll have the number.”

“Who is Chad, Miss Polk?”

Sheila was confused for a second. Surely Chad had followed the ambulance to the hospital, and would be getting reports back from the doctors and nurses. “Isn’t Chad here?” she asked him.

“I’m sorry. Is he a relative that we should contact? Your boyfriend?”

“He’s my assistant.” She recalled that he was away, and wouldn’t be back until the next day. “I forgot, he went to Jamaica for a month.”

“Do you have his phone number, where we could reach him?”

“He’s gone until tomorrow, but maybe someone could leave him a message on his cell phone?”

“I’ll have the nurse get the number from you.” He made some notes on a pad of paper that he got from his breast pocket. “I’m going to have her call Chad and tell him that you are in the hospital.”

“He’ll freak out,” she mumbled.

“What’s that? Oh. Well, we won’t tell him any more than we have to. Your hip is very bruised and will be considerably painful for at least two weeks now, Miss Polk. Try to not roll over on to your left side, ok?”

Sheila nodded at him. “When can I go home?”

“We’ll see what we can do about getting a hold of Chad.”

Knowing that she couldn’t wait for him to return and then come retrieve her from the hospital, she called out to the doctor, who was making his way out the door. “Wait! Call my hus… my ex-husband. I know the number.”

Charlie was in the studio, working on the sound editing of the song he and Terry wrote several weeks ago. It was called Enough, and Frank, Jean Marie, Lana, and anyone else who heard the rough version of the song thought it was magnificent. Terry was still dealing with his cancer, and made several trips a week to the studio to help Charlie with the songs they had written. However, Charlie couldn’t stop fussing over Enough, wanting it to be perfect. He imagined listening to this song after Terry had passed away, and was racing against an invisible clock to finish it, perfect it, so that he could present it to Terry and the rest of the world, in all its glory.

Jean Marie was lying on the floor of the bedroom, practicing some yoga stretches she learned from a videotape her sister sent her. Her pregnancy, now five months and one week along, wasn’t causing her significant discomfort, but with her physical therapy background and her desire to stay moving, she was eager to try as much as possible with her ever-changing body. As she lifted her right leg straight into the air, the phone rang.

“Oh, great timing,” she said. She brought her leg down and rolled on to her side, propping herself up from the carpet, waiting to see if it was a wrong number. After the third ring, she got up and rushed to pick up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“Is this the Charlie Clark residence?”

“Who is calling, please?”

“This is Meridian Hospital, Nurse Lee calling. Is Charlie Clark there?”

“This is his wife, can I help?”

“I am calling on behalf of a patient here, Miss Sheila Polk. She requested that we notify Mr. Clark. Is he available?”

Jean Marie was searching her memory, trying to think of who this Sheila Polk could be. Finally it clicked. “Oh! Sheila Clark? I mean, Polk? Um, can I call you back? I need to find Mr. Clark, Charlie.” The nurse gave Jean Marie a number to call, and hung up immediately.

She took the number with her down the stairs and out to the studio. She knocked on the doors, as had become customary during the recording sessions so that they wouldn’t be disturbed. She didn’t wait for a reply, though, instead entering immediately.

“Charlie? I just got a really strange phone call for you.”

He looked up from the sound mixer. “Huh? A phone call? Who was it?”

“Well, it was the hospital. Meridian Hospital. They said that Sheila Polk wanted you to be notified that she was there.”

Charlie’s face was smacked with surprise. “Sheila? What happened?”

Jean Marie handed him the phone number, and said “I don’t know, you’ll have to find out. What do you think happened?”

“Well, knowing Sheila,” he waved the paper in the air, “something tragic, dramatic, tragically dramatic, or none of the above. Let’s find out.”

Charlie went to the phone in the kitchen, dialed the number on the paper and waited. A nurse answered and told Charlie about the situation. She asked him if he wanted to talk to Sheila.

“Yes, please. Thank you.”

“One moment, please.” There was a horrible song for the hold music, and he pulled the phone away from his ear while it was playing.

“Hello?”

The voice was muffled. Charlie pulled the phone back to him, “Hi, Sheila?”

“Yes, who’s this? Charlie?”

“Yeah. What happened?”

“Oh, thank God you got the message.”

“Are you ok? Is it something serious?”

“No, luckily it isn’t. I just had a really bad fall. I hit my face and my hip, and I got stitches.”

Jean Marie tapped Charlie’s shoulder, looking for any information about what Sheila was saying. Charlie looked up at her and nodded with a serious look on her face, and she grimaced.

“Is anything broken?”

“Well, I almost broke my hip, and they said my teeth could have been damaged. But it just seems like I’m going to have some really painful bruises and bumps for a while.”

“Ok.” Charlie paused, waiting for any additional information, but there was none. He finally said, “So, why did you need me to call you?”

“Oh yes. Well Chad is in Jamaica on a vacation – great time for me to give him a vacation, huh? They said I couldn’t leave the hospital unless I had someone give me a ride home, and I don’t want to leave in a taxi like some orphaned woman. So I was hoping you would help me. Please.” She said it more as a matter of politeness, rather than pleading with him.

“Let me talk to Jean Marie and I’ll see what I can do. Where are you?”

“I’m not sure, but it’s the Meridian Hospital. There’s a number on the phone – it’s 9H.”

“Ok, She. I’ll see you in a bit.” He hung up, without waiting for her to say goodbye. He looked back at Jean Marie whose arms were crossed at her chest, and she still had the grimace on her face.

“Is this where I have to be the understanding wife and let my husband go off to save his ex?”

“You don’t have to be understanding at all, honey. I’m just giving her a ride home, that’s it.”

“I trust you Charlie. I don’t trust her, though.” Charlie rolled his eyes at this. “Don’t look at me like that! I’ve heard all the horror stories – stories you yourself told me, about how domineering she can be and how she made you the villain of the band. Maybe I should go with you?”

“If you want to come along, that’s fine with me.”

“Do you think she’ll flip out?”

“Probably.”

They both looked at each other for a bit, thinking about the possibilities. “I’ll come, it’ll be a little adventure.” Charlie stood up from the barstool and gave her a hug.

“You are an understanding wife. And I will get you a present for this, when we’re all done.”

“Just as long as it isn’t something from the hospital gift shop, though.”