Accidental exposure, p.31
Accidental Exposure, page 31
“Hi baby,” Annette says softly as Brian’s eyes focus properly and meet her stare. She’s close, pressing herself to the side of the bed. She looks uncomfortable, but Brian knows nothing could move her from that spot. When Annette speaks, he can hear the relief and hope in her voice, muffled slightly by mucus and other physical bi-products of despair. She must have been crying for a long time.
“Hi,” Brian replies, but even that single syllable is difficult to annunciate.
“How are you feeling?” Annette asks. Brian takes a deep breath, thinks about the question and decides not to answer.
“What’s going on?” he responds. Brian reaches for a glass of water on the bedside table to his right but his arm doesn’t work the way it should and his hand falters, falling weakly back to Brian’s hip. Annette raises the cup to his mouth and holds a straw for him, pressing the plastic to his lips.
Brian expels a mild cough and Annette begins to speak .
“We had an accident,” she says and Brian begins to nod slowly. “The car rolled. I was knocked out straight away but one of the nurses said someone told her you weren’t. She said you were awake when the ambulance got there.”
“They were fast. How long have I been out for? What’s happening now?” Brian whispers through recently moistened lips smacking together without a great deal of control.
“The accident was yesterday morning. It’s two AM now, so I guess it’s almost been a full day. I woke up a while ago.” Annette speaks slowly and Brian assumes she’s rehearsed this conversation.
“Your left shoulder was hurt and-”
“No, forget that, where’s Andy?”
Annette’s whimpering thickens and she drops her head.
“Stop crying and tell me where my son is.”
She tries to pull herself together, moves even closer to Brian, tries to speak. Fails.
“Annette!” he barks. “Where is he? Is he OK? Yes or no? Yes or no?”
“He’s in surgery. The doctors just said they needed to operate. They said they’ll let us know what’s going on when they can. The nurses can’t help either. I’ve just been waiting here, for you or them or anyone or anything to help us. No one can help us.” The loneliness in Annette’s voice is causing fresh tears to pool in Brian’s eyes. He can’t feel the pain of his injuries, but somehow sorrow fills every part of him.
“When was the last time you heard anything?” he asks.
“Almost two hours. I keep going back to find help. To ask, but no one can… No one knows.” Annette forgets her thought and the couple sobs together.
They cry like infants for a few minutes before Brian starts to curse angrily under his breath.
Why couldn’t he protect his son?
Brian wishes he could feel the pain of his injuries so that at least he felt some punishment.
“Are you OK?” Brian asks Annette and she blurts out, “Yeah baby, I’m fine,” in between controlled gasps. “I hit my head on the steering wheel, but there are only a few stitches. No serious damage,” she continues as she calms herself. Brian stares up at the small, sutured cut on her forehead. He summons enough strength to stroke her hair once before dropping his hand onto her knee.
Brian shuffles his hips a little and directs his attention to the rest of the room. He’s lying in a bed at an elevated angle. The top half is raised, so his legs lie horizontal while his torso is propped up at ninety-five degrees. It’s a standard private hospital room with a small television in the corner and a wall dividing the originally square space into two smaller rectangles. One with a bed, the other most likely a toilet. Brian attempts to arch his back and stretch, but his muscles disagree and he can feel some foreign device holding him still. He lifts his right hand from Annette’s lap and trusts his fingers to move over the rest of his body to find the injuries. Annette watches as the first move Brian makes is to inspect his left arm.
Brian struggles with limited feeling, but he can tell there is a solid cast wrapping his bicep and continuing down to his wrist. The brace extends above and beyond Brian’s shoulder as well, as far as his opposite arm can reach.
“Your arm is-” Annette attempts to list Brian’s injuries again, but he cuts her off for a second time.
“Who cares about my God damn arm? Our son is under the knife.”
Silence in the room, somewhere outside Brian can hear sneakers squeaking on the floor.
“I’m sorry. What’s broken?” he asks.
“The left arm with the shoulder. Your right knee might need to be reconstructed as well; the patella is damaged. That’s the knee-cap.” Annette drops her gaze to the floor and Brian moves to see what she’s looking at. There are so many tears on the floor that the droplets of salt water have swollen into a perfectly round pool.
“You also have some whiplash; the doctors are worried about your neck. That’s why you have the brace on your back.”
“OK.”
Another minute without sound or speech.
“Does anything hurt?” Annette asks .
“No, I can’t feel much at all,” Brian says as he looks to the drip plugged into the back of his wrist. His eyes follow the connecting tube to a small clear bag suspended by a pole above him, attached to his bed. An almost overwhelming groggy feeling confirms Brian’s suspicions that the surgeons have him on some heavy-duty painkillers.
“Do you need anything?” Annette asks.
“No. Just don’t leave me.”
“Never.”
“How long ago was the accident? Why is Andy still in surgery?” Brian asks and he’s forced to use all of his willpower to try and hold back his emotions. He wants answers and he knows that any sadness or anger will slow down the process.
Annette’s crying thickens again.
“They wouldn’t let me see him,” she sobs without looking at Brian. “They kept him in intensive care. They said there was too much swelling to operate immediately.”
“What the hell does that mean!” Brian yells without thinking. As soon as the syllables have passed his lips, he knows he’s done wrong. Annette’s breakdown consumes her and she begins howling so loudly that a nurse has to stick her head in to make sure no one is injured.
“He hit his head,” Annette says.
“It’s going to be all right. He’ll be OK.”
Brian doesn’t know what else to say, so he tilts his head the tiny bit that the brace allows to touch Annette’s gently. For hours they cry together without speaking, slipping in and out of dreams and nightmares.
Perhaps Brian wouldn’t care so much about the stitches and the breaks and the bruises if he knew that this is only the beginning.
This accident is only the birth of Brian Crown’s turmoil.
Chapter 5: Just Let it In
This time, Brian thinks of Andy as he sleeps.
***
The courtroom was silent as everyone listened to Brian’s address. A chamber full of blank, round faces in small clumps like nervous groups of barnyard animals stared at Brian and the yellow light of the ceiling bulbs gave every pale surface a strange golden hue. The smell of the place differed depending on what concentration of cologne and perfume and body lotions the occupants in any section was wearing; something floral with a male musk here, something sweet with dry spice there.
Brian’s phone began to vibrate, but he let the call from Annette’s brother, Jason, go to voicemail as he presented a new piece of evidence against one of society’s most wanted. The sound of a mobile phone, on silent, vibrating in Brian’s jacket pocket was still audible in the hushed courtroom. The bzzzzzzbzzzzzzz was interrupting his argument, so he quickly stuffed the phone into his briefcase on the prosecution’s desk to be forgotten.
He marched back and forth in front of the judge, firing off questions in the direction of the defendant on the stand. The jury was suckling on the responses, drinking down the horrible truth of the criminal’s twisted personality as Brian drew it out like a doctor commanding puss out of a boil.
“Mr Crown,” somebody whispered. Brian ignored the interruption.
“Mr Crown,” he heard the voice again, this time a little louder. Brian shot a frustrated look over to his associates and he saw one of the junior solicitors was waving his phone in the air as if he was using the light from it guide an aircraft in for landing. The younger man was standing and nervously biting his lip as he drew the attention of everyone present. The entire congregation was watching and Brian could tell they were ignoring his argument.
“Whatever it is can wait,” he barked before returning to his work .
“It’s your wife, sir. She’s in hospital.”
Brian ran over to the phone and read a text that Jason had sent. All it said was, ‘Annette is on the way to hospital. Now.’
“Magnificent!” Brian screamed to the horror of everyone listening.
With that, Brian sprinted out of the courthouse, leaving his lip-biting junior solicitor in charge, and he made his way as quickly as humanly possible to the delivery room. Annette had been pregnant for almost exactly nine months.
Andy was born early in the morning on February fourteenth. Valentine’s day. Brian thought this was good luck, Annette thought it bad, but superstition aside, the fact is that Andy promptly grew into an independent and curious child.
Lying there, dreaming those drugged up hospital dreams, Brian remembered how newborn-Andy seemed to listen intently whenever an adult was speaking around him. It was as if the child understood that he must learn the language and had decided to start immediately. The little blonde boy couldn’t be contained. Andy managed to unhook the latch of two different cribs, but only ever crawled to the nearest person. Brian and Annette knew their little explorer was never running away, only searching for company.
As soon as he could walk, Andy was running. Brian and Annette watched with confusion and concern as their crazed son sprinted around the house making aeroplane or racing car noises. He didn’t seem like he had an urgent agenda, the child just loved to move. Every now and again his fat little feet would falter and the boy wiped out in spectacular fashion, often destroying small pieces of furniture and ornaments. However, after a moment, Brian and Annette could hear the sound of tiny heels rapidly thudding over the ground once more and the single toddler marathon was back on.
Before long, the sight of a lonely boy running around in circles for hours on end became concerning for Brian, so the decision was made to find him a friend and Annette suggested they get a dog. Not just any dog, the biggest creature they could locate with a tolerant temper so that no matter how rough the wild child played, the pup would survive in good spirits. Brian purchased a young, but large, mongrel boxer from a friend one afternoon. The pup was strong but placid and had a slightly lazy eye, which the salesperson dismissed as common in boxers. The congenital disability allowed Brian to bargain down the price and he doubted Andy would ever notice.
As Brian pulled the car into the driveway, Annette stepped out onto the front porch. She looked nervous and she was calling Andy from his room on the other side of the house.
“Andy sweetie, we’ve got a surprise for you. You want to see? Come to mummy.” Annette called to the child as Brian got out of the car. The dog was standing on the back seat, panting and ducking down to look out the windows.
Annette shouted to Brian, “He’s been watching those cartoons since you’ve been gone,” and Brian knew Andy must have been fixated on the TV for the last hour. He loved watching old western cartoons like ‘Yosemite Sam’ and muttering “yeeha” to himself whenever he felt it appropriate.
“You ready?” Brian shouted as he pulled the dog out of the car by its thin black collar. The mutt tried to loosen his grip by leaping around and spinning in circles, excited by her new location. Brian held the pup firmly and moved toward the house.
The grass of the front yard was wet and Brian could feel his feet slipping as the bulky dog pulled him along.
“Yeah just let it in, Andy seems peaceful enough,” Annette called out as she watched Brian struggling. Brian released the pup into his home and the animal flicked forward for the first metre. The dog seemed as though she would tear away, destroying everything in her path on a maniacal rampage, but something about the child in front of her calmed the beast. She slowed her panting, shut her gob and walked gingerly towards Andy.
The moment the young boy met the dog was like the moment humankind perfected the submarine, everyone thought it was a great idea, but no one knew what to expect. Andy and the dog were staring at each other from a few metres away, cautious but keen. At this point in the child’s development, he could convey basic messages like hungry, tired and need to poop, but his linguistic skills were very limited. So, after a few seconds of neither beast approaching the other, Andy simply grunted loud enough to display his boredom and the canine slowly strolled forwards until they were standing eye to eye.
Andy puffed out his chest and stood on his tippy-toes as the big wet snout of the dog sniffed thoroughly around his face. Once the pooch was satisfied with the scent, she sat down with a smile and waited for Andy’s reaction. He grabbed the floppy left ear of the pup and lifted it, staring deeply into the dog’s head as if he wanted to see what was inside. She didn’t seem to mind too much, the dog just sniffled a fair bit and waited for Andy to finish his inspection.
After releasing the ear, Andy went straight for the curiously imperfect eye. He poked it as hard as he possibly could with two fingers, then laughed as his new toy leapt back in pain and aggravation. The dog shook her head furiously but didn’t make a sound. After a few seconds, she pointed her chest directly at Andy and leapt forward just enough to knock him on his arse. Neither Brian nor Annette bothered to intervene since Andy and the new arrival seemed to be having fun and they weren’t doing any real damage. They were simply testing each other like two siblings play fighting.
Andy rose to his feet with a completely blank look on his face. There was no laughter or tears, but it was obvious that the child had something on his mind. Brian was about to ask if the boy was all right when Andy took a couple of steps forward so that he was eye to eye with the pup again. The dog drew her head back slightly and cocked it to the side in confusion. Andy leant forward a little more, paused, filled his lungs with oxygen and screamed “YeeeeeHa!” before turning and running away.
The dog went from terrified to ecstatic in half a second, throwing herself onto her feet to chase Andy. The newest member of the family slapped the giant hallway vase with her arse, causing it to fall and shatter, then knocked over two chairs while running under the kitchen bench and only just missed the glass of the coffee table as she pounced over it to catch Andy.
Brian and Annette chased them through the house yelling, “Stop, stop!” a trail of family members weaving around furniture and down hallways. Brian caught the pair in Andy’s room as the child dropped to the ground, giggling, and the dog slapped at his face with a long, slobbery tongue. They were getting along so well that Brian turned to Annette and simply said, “I suppose we should name her ‘Yeeha’ then.”
***
When the doctors finally come to speak to Brian after the accident, they bring mixed news. Andy is alive and will live to recover from all of his injuries. All but one.
Chapter 6: Why Are You Crying
The medical staff explains that Andy was probably thrown from the vehicle upon the initial impact. This means that he wasn’t subjected to the same extended period of bouncing, rolling and scrapping that Brian and Annette had endured since they were trapped in the vehicle. Andy’s limbs are basically fine, but he hit his head quite violently upon impact with the ground.
“That doesn’t sound ‘fine’. How is he?” Annette asks the doctor.
“It appears Andrew is suffering a fairly major side effect of brain trauma,” the doctor continues without immediate elaboration, but Brian knows something else is coming. As if the couple can read each other’s thoughts, Annette reaches down and grasps Brian’s hand.
“There has been a great deal of swelling that has pinched the optic nerve, which is responsible for relaying sensory information from the eye to the brain. In time, this swelling will subside and Andrew may no longer suffer from his current condition, but there is no way to tell for sure at this stage.”
The doctor pauses again.
“What’s wrong with my son?” Brian asks.
“I’m very sorry. Andrew is completely blind.”
Brian can hear Annette screaming, but it’s as if she’s in another room, or down the street. Her wailing tone and the pain in Brian’s hand from Annette squeezing his fingers are all distant points of stimulation to a singular, baffling idea in his head: Brian is thinking about being a father, a protector of a child, and he’s allowed that child, his son, to be blinded.
Brian remains still, perfectly still, as he absorbs this information, and then his lip begins to quiver.
In the days, weeks and months that follow, the Crown family is forced to alter every aspect of their lives. The tiny glimpse of hope the doctor gave Brian and Annette when he said that it ‘might not be permanent’ was false .
The swelling subsided and Andy will be blind for the rest of his life.
Brian has no choice but to take an extended leave of absence from his job until he recovers from all his injuries. He can’t walk; he can’t move his arms properly. Some parts of his body are in agony all day and all night; some parts of his body have no feeling at all. The leave of absence becomes a blessing in disguise since Andy clearly benefits from full-time parental support and supervision.
Andy is now afraid of everything. He can’t even stand to be around the people he already knows as the shame and embarrassment thickens with every mistake he makes.
How can you put a child who has lost a part of himself back into a room with other children enjoying what he can never have again?
Will his young friends understand or care?
What will he do when the teacher writes the class instructions on the board?
