The Accidental Exorcist (7 page)

Except Dave, of all people. Pastor Dave of
City on a Hill, Jenn's church. He seemed nice enough, but I never
completely trusted him. This was due in no small part to my
absolute distaste for organized religion. Ironically, Jenn had
become born again soon after we got married and began attending not
only Sunday services at Dave's church, but their weekly small group
Bible study as well.

I sat on my sofa in a chilled stupor, a
blanket draped over my shoulders while paramedics worked feverishly
around both of my children upstairs. According to Dave, they had
arrived just as he came out to get me. I was so shell-shocked that
I didn't recall their arrival.

Another team had gone to the master
bedroom.

"Jenn?" I bolted up. "Jenn!" They carried her
down in a gurney, a white sheet over her face. The anguish within
couldn't crack through the frozen wall of shock around my
mind.

Next came my kids, but they were not covered.
The paramedics worked on them as they brought them down and wheeled
them to the ambulance. "Bethie! Aaron!" I shouted and tried to run
over. Dave held me back.

"Let them, Sam."

I was trembling, shaking my head, as they
raced off. Jenn couldn't be gone. It couldn't be my kids in that
ambulance. It was like watching a movie. Flashing lights,
sirens.

"Let's go." Dave grabbed my arm and rushed me
into his car. We chased the ambulances, leaving behind a pair of
squad cars, their red and blues groping out into the rain like a
lighthouse in a hurricane.

My home had become a crime scene.

___________________

As soon as we arrived at Children's Hospital's
Trauma Care Center, a medical team rushed Bethie into one room and
Aaron into another. Frozen, I stood, chest rising and falling, eyes
darting between the two rooms.

"Bethany's a lot worse," Dave said.

I nodded and went for the door to Trauma One.
He caught me and turned me around to the correct room. Dave went
into Aaron's room just as I entered Bethie's.

The next thirty minutes were torturous. About
a dozen doctors and nurses crowded around Bethie, two of them
squeezing a plastic bag to assist with her breathing. Instruments
rattled in the crash cart as the trauma surgeons surrounded her.
IVs webbed around her, into her arms.

Speaking in rapid succession, overlapping each
others' words, yet somehow maintaining some form of intelligible
communication, the team's dialogue all meshed together.

"Epi's in."

"She's bradying down."

"Atropine in."

"We're losing her!"

They began CPR. Then the whine and snap of
defibrillator shocks. Jolted me as well. One of the nurses
announced that they'd gotten a pulse back, but a very weak one.
Bethie just had to pull through.

Doctor Yang, one of the doctors not completely
engrossed in the code, came over, pulled down her face mask. "She's
lost a lot of blood. We're doing everything we can, but you should
prepare yourself."

"For what?"

"Is there anyone you'd like to
call?"

I wanted to scream that her mother had been
murdered, less than half an hour ago. I could not accept the fact
that my little girl was within moments of death…"Please, you have
to save her!"

Doctor Yang nodded and returned to the team.
Seconds later an alarm from the EKG blared again. Bethie's pulse
was gone.

The lead doctor called out something about
joules. "Clear!"

Again, with the defibrillator. Bethie's torso
arched up and fell. The EKG blipped, but the line remained flat,
the tone static. The lead doctor was now performing chest
compressions with both hands. Gently! I wanted to cry out. But I
knew they had to do this to help her. This went on for a while, but
it was clear that her pulse continued only because the doctor's
efforts.

"Bethie?" I managed to whisper. It was
starting to hit me. Not even an hour after Jenn's death, I was
about to lose my daughter.

"Mr. Hudson," Doctor Yang said as she
approached. "Do you want to be with her now?"

Tears stung my eyes like acid. Gradually, the
cacophony of voices died down. I could now discern something that I
had vaguely heard earlier through all the commotion—one of the
doctors in the background announcing each elapsed minute since
Bethie's heart had stopped.

"Thirty-seven minutes since arrest." The chest
compressions continued.

"Mister Hudson?" Doctor Yang
said, again, her tone
sympathetic, but a
bit more urgent. Less and less of the team were looking at Bethie
now. They kept eyeing the clock.

The lead doctor had been doing chest
compressions for some time now. He looked to his team. "Shall
we?"

"He just lost his wife," one of the nurses
replied. "Can we try a little longer?"

He nodded and continued the compressions.
After a while, they tried the defibrillator again. No response. A
solid green line slithered across the screen. The nurses looked up
at the other doctor. He stood still for a second, glanced at the
wall-clock and shook his head. "Time of death..."

"We did all we could, Mr. Hudson," Doctor Yang
said. "I'm so sorry."

"NO! Save her, dammit!" I rushed for the table
on which Bethie lay as still as silence. "Don't let her go!" I
reached for the defibrillator paddles. A large orderly grabbed and
pulled me away. I shouted at the top my lungs. He didn't release me
until I stopped thrashing. The nurses stepped back.

When I calmed myself, the lead doctor
approached me.

"We did everything possible, but her injuries
were too severe. I'm sorry."

I couldn't speak. First Jenn, now Bethie.
Anger ebbed, giving way to despair. I walked over to my little
girl.

"Sweetie..." I held her lifeless hand, brushed
the hair out of her face and kissed her forehead. "I'm sorry.
Daddy's so sorry." Before I knew it, I was curled up on the floor
and sobbing, still reaching up and holding her hand. The orderly
tried to help me to my feet but I couldn't do it. Eventually, they
managed to get me up and pour me into a chair.

"Sir, do you need a moment?"

I nodded.

They drew a curtain and left me alone with my
daughter. That's when I lost it. I don't think I'd ever cried so
hard, or pounded my fist so many times into a wall, or screamed so
loud in my entire life.

Aside from the wounds and blood, Bethie looked
like she could have been sleeping. How could she be gone? How could
Jenn? I felt disembodied.

The activity outside the trauma room
increased. Walkie-talkies, intercom pages, hurried footsteps,
gurneys rolling.

The doctor emerged from the
curtain.

"I'm sorry, but there's someone outside you
need to speak to." Outside the room, an officer from the Sherriff's
department tipped his hat.

"My condolences on your loss, sir. But I need
to ask you a few—"

"This isn't the best time."

Dave Pendelton arrived.

I gripped his sleeve. "Aaron?"

"He's still in surgery. Trauma
One."

Behind him was one of the TCC
doctors.

"Is he going to make it?" I asked.

"Too soon to say. He's suffered severe trauma
to the head and internal organs."

"Can I see him?"

"Not yet."

I spent the next hour answering the deputy's
incessant questions.

What was my name, date of birth, social
security number, place of employment, phone numbers? He asked for
identification.

"Do we really have to do this now!" I huffed,
fumbling with my wallet.

Dave helped take it from my shaking hands and
gave the deputy my driver's license and social security
card.

The officer asked for the same type of
information for Jenn, Bethany and Aaron—the victims. My mouth
became bitter. Dryness impeded my words. The deputy was sympathetic
and seemed genuinely sorry to put me through this. I couldn't
concentrate.

Dr. Salzedo, the trauma surgeon
arrived.

"How is he?" I asked.

"We've stabilized him. He's been moved to the
Pediatric ICU."

I exhaled in relief.

"PICU's on the third floor."

I got up immediately and turned to Deputy
Schaeffer. "If you'll excuse me." If there was anything to hold
onto amidst the devastation, it was the hope that Aaron had
survived.

I wasn't prepared for what I saw when I got to
his room.

___________________

For some delusional reason,
I had expected to find my son sitting up, with a few bandages and
other dressings, but smiling at me. He would call out, "Daddy!" and
we'd embrace, holding on to each other
as
the last surviving remnants of our family.
When I entered,
however, I
found
him unconscious. Tubes of all sorts
invaded his body. A ventilator assisted his breathing and all I
could hear was hissing, buzzing and beeping medical
equipment.

"The next twenty-four hours are crucial," Dr.
Salzedo said. "We'll know better with time."

Aaron was in a coma with injuries to his head,
spine, and internal organs. Internal hemorrhaging had been
controlled, for now. But things could get better or much worse,
unexpectedly. Everything was still iffy.

I stood by his bed and held his hand. Warm.
Thank god. He would have appeared peaceful and simply asleep, but
for all the equipment he was hooked up to. It seemed grotesquely
uncomfortable.

Dave stood over Aaron, laid his hand on his
bandaged head and mouthed a silent prayer. I didn't like him
imposing his religion, even if Aaron had attended his church with
Jenn and Bethie since his birth. But I was too exhausted and beyond
objecting.

"You're welcome to stay with Aaron as long as
you wish," said Dr. Salzedo. "But there's nothing to be done now
but wait and monitor his progress. You've been through hell and
really should get some rest. We'll call you if anything
changes."

"No, I'm staying."

"Sam," Dave said, his hand on my shoulder.
"Maybe you should—"

"I said, I'm staying."

He leaned over and said something to the
doctor, who nodded in turn.

"I'll stay too, then," Dave said. "We can take
shifts."

"Thanks, really. But..." I couldn't think of a
good enough excuse besides the fact that he was starting to creep
me out with all his kindness. "If you don't mind, I'd like to be
alone with my boy."

"I understand." He pulled a business card from
his pocket and handed it to me. "If you need a ride home, give me a
call."

I thanked him again and he left. The Sheriff's
office was good enough to post an officer outside the room. "You
hang tough, buddy," I whispered into Aaron's ear and kissed him.
"When you wake up, I'll take you to McDonald's for a happy meal."
My voice broke. I had to believe he would get better. It was the
only shred of

hope left.

Chapter Three

The yellow tape had been removed. A
squad car idled on the sidewalk in front of my house as the
neighborhood awoke to a new day. At the wheel sat Chris, the young
partner of Lieutenant Jim O’Brien. Chris glanced my way then turned
away. I couldn’t tell if it was intentional, his sunglasses
obscured any hint. O'Brien was talking to one of the investigators
at my door. Good to see a familiar face. When he saw me get out of
the taxi, he came over and removed his hat.

O’Brien and I first met under tense
circumstances—with his rifle pointed into my chest. It was during a
shooting and hostage crisis at Coyote Creek Middle School, where
Bethie attended. Along with all the other parents, I stood for
hours in the parking lot not knowing what was happening
inside.

I grew tired of waiting around not
getting any answers. So I marched right up to the police line. My
cell phone started buzzing and I reached for it. He thought I was
reaching for a weapon and he drew his rifle. Pissed and defiant, I
pressed my chest right into the barrel. He wasn’t going to shoot
me. The other parents might have, though. On that, the longest
afternoon of my life, two girls were killed. One of the stray
bullets grazed Bethie’s arm.

Afterwards, Jim and Chris came over to
question Bethie. Chris, who couldn’t have been more than
twenty-five years old, seemed not only to enjoy Bethie’s
starry-eyed attention, he almost encouraged it. I was never
completely comfortable around him since.

As I walked up the very lawn, on which
I'd slipped last night, Jim removed his hat. "My God, Sam. I’m so
sorry about Jenn. And Bethie? Dammit. You dodge a bullet, only to—"
he stopped himself and scowled. "How’s Aaron?"