Dating : He Was Already Dead When She Got to the Hospital

Marie raced to the hospital as fast as she dared — which was the limit of what her old-lady sedan could manage. She blazed through red lights, fishtailed around corners fat and wide without signaling, all the while looking in the rear view mirror.

Where the hell were the police when you wanted them?

A police escort would assure public safety. Marie was driving like a maniac to get to her husband before he croaked. With no cherry tops in sight, she would have to handle things herself.

It’s not like she wasn’t used to taking care of herself. Forty years with Sal might have convinced her to let her guard down, but Marie was too smart for that. She knew what to do and she knew how to do it. Either you give her help or you get out of the way like that truck driver just did.

The twenty-five minute drive took fifteen minutes. In her prime, it would have taken her ten minutes, if that. Of course, then she had the Corvette and there was no beating her at the track or anywhere else. But her dream car was long gone to the junkyard and she’d be in her own junkyard soon enough.

As she knocked into a crone shuffling with a walker, Marie prayed for the first time this year:

Please, God, if you’re there and you’re listening, let Sal be alive. I need to talk to him. I’ll do whatever you want. Fifty-four novenas? Consider them done — and they will be as soon as I know what they are. I was a Catholic school drop-out, but of course, You know that. And since You know that, You know how important it is that I say goodbye to my beloved. Or at least ask him my question. Please? I can do nonstop rosaries on my knees while doing one of those pilgrim things in Spain or France or Portugal. Only no place that’s too expensive. You know how tight money is, with the business and the grandchildren and the leaking roof….Well, You know. Please let me talk to Sal.

The crabby nurse at the emergency room desk pointed Marie toward the room at the end of the hall. The nurse rubbed her neck with an angry hand, rearranged her hair into a neat ponytail.

“Mrs. Jones, I must tell you that your husband was the most uncooperative, nasty, profane individual I have ever met. And let me tell you, in thirty-one years at this armpit of hell, I have seen some champs. You’re either a saint or a lunatic to be mixed up with someone like him.”

“Yeah, well, that’s the story of my life,” Marie called over her back as she sped down the hall.

Mike walked slowly out of the room, shaggy gray head down, not looking where he was going. Leo staggered into him, wiping his face with a huge meaty hand.

Marie shoved past them into the room, ignoring their yammering and tugging at her coat. Sal’s friends were idiots. He didn’t care that she hated them and wouldn’t have them over for dinner unless Sal forced her into it. They are great guys, he’d claim. Never a dull moment with these pranksters.

Still breathless from the drive over, Marie stopped short in the too-quiet room.

A young nurse pulled a sheet over the person in the bed. She turned, blew out a long breath, and jumped when she saw Marie.

“Oh, my God, you scared me! I didn’t know anyone was still here.” The girl’s eyes brimmed when she gestured at the bed.

“Was he your….”

“I don’t know. Is he Salvatore Jones?” Marie gripped her purse.

“I’m so sorry,” said the nurse. “We did everything we could to save him. He loved you so much, Mrs. Jones. All he kept saying was give you this, that you’ll know what it means.”

Marie held out her arms for Sal’s last gift to her.

The nurse dropped a lapel pin into her outstretched palm. “I’ll get the doctor for you. Can I get you a drink of water, a cold drink, a…”

Marie stared at the lapel pin. “No, thank you, sweetheart, I’m good. Give me a minute? I just want to say my goodbye in private if that’s okay?”

Dark eyes full of sympathy, the nurse eased around the door.

As soon as the door clicked shut, Marie whipped the sheet off the bed.

Arturo?

What the hell happened to Sal’s cousin? Blood soaked through the bandages covering his chest, arms, and neck. She flipped the sheet over the dead man.

Her phone blared “Staying Alive.”

It was Sal.

Marie knew it was him. A wife of forty years feels it when her husband dies. And she hadn’t felt it, not really. Actually, she wasn’t exactly sure what it would feel like, but she sure wasn’t feeling it now.

“Sweetheart!” Sal was jubilant.

“You son of a bitch! Your cousin? What were you thinking?” Marie caught her breath. She’d take care of things the right way, in her own time.

She crooned low and sexy, the way Sal liked it. “Sweetheart, I’m so glad that you’re not dead. It’s crazy, but when I thought the body in the bed was you, the first thing I thought about was what to wear to the funeral. I was thinking my black lace dress, except it’s a little merry widow with the cleavage and the tight fit….”

She hung up, after agreeing she’d model the dress for him later.

After too much paperwork and everyone trying to console her when they could see she was perfectly fine, Marie finally made it outside. She heaved in a breath of fresh air and headed for her car.

The lapel pin stabbed her when she turned the key in the lock. She dropped the pin and sucked at the drop of blood.