She didn't scream; she didn't panic. "Ryan," she said, very clearly and out of some kind of unholy calm, "call 9-1-1. Tell them your brother's been hit by lightning. If our phone doesn't work, go next door and use theirs, and give them our address. If the phone does work, make the call, then go next door to Mrs. Nebles. Take Jill. Stay there."
"But Ma-" Ryan burbled, clearly terrified.
"Go now," she yelled, fiercely, and then all her concentration was on the child who needed her. She ran across the living room and fell to her knees beside Rod. She put him over on his back, carefully, in case there was a spinal injury, feeling under his chin for a pulse.
No pulse. No breathing.
She had never done CPR except on a dummy, but it all came back to her now. She tilted his head back, made sure his airway was clear, covered his mouth and nose with her mouth, and breathed.
Once. Twice. Then pump his chest. She didn't need to be too careful; he wasn't so small that she'd crack his ribs.
Breathe. Pump. Breathe. Pump. Don't forget to breathe for yourself, or you 'II pass out.
At some point, she heard sirens over the sound of the pouring rain and the thunder outside. She ignored them as she ignored everything else.
Breathe. Pump. Breathe-
Hands pulled her away; she fought them for a moment, until she saw it was the paramedics in their bright yellow slickers, then she let them take over, surrounding Rod with their machines and their expertise.
Other people came crowding in; firemen, Mrs. Nebles, the neighbor with Ryan and Jill. She couldn't see Rod for all the bodies around him, but she heard the pure tone of a flat-lined EKG, then heard someone say "Clear!", and then everyone pulled away.
She heard the snap of the fibrillator, heard someone curse. The flat tone continued.
She collapsed into the chest of whoever was holding her, sobbing as hysterically as her two remaining children. She would never forget that horrible, unwavering tone for as long as she lived.
They tried, over and over again, to get Rod's heart started. But the tame lightning of their machines could not restart what the wild lightning had stopped.
Finally, they pronounced Rod dead on the scene, covered him up with a rubber sheet, and took him away, into the rain, in an ambulance, but one with the lights and siren dead. She rode in the back, with the paramedic holding her hand, awkwardly.
She was no longer crying, no longer screaming with the pain of her loss. She was numb, now; after the ambulance ride, after the session at the hospital with the doctors and the paperwork--how could they bother with paperwork at a time like that?-after the call to Rod, missing him by minutes. They'd left a policeman at her home, the nurses told her, patting her hand. The policeman would tell him. He would come soon, to help her with all this.
But he never came, and she stumbled through it all alone. Thank God Mrs. Nebles had said she would take care of Ryan and Jill. Thank God the paramedics had reminded her to bring her purse. What she couldn't remember was in the papers she kept in her purse.
Insurance. Why? she had wanted to scream. People to notify. Recounting it all to the police.
Still Rod did not come.
Surely he would come and take her home.
But he didn't come, and finally the nurses took pity on her and called the neighbor who had Ryan and Jill, asked Mrs. Nebles to keep the kids overnight, then sent her home with another policeman rather than a taxi. They probably didn't trust her to remember what her own address was. . . .
Rod's car was in the driveway; she walked up to the silent, darkened house, still numb, not knowing what she was going to say to him. Suddenly, she was afraid for him-how could he be expected to bear up under this? Rod was his image, his golden child! He must be half insane; no wonder he hadn't come to the hospital!
She pulled open the door-and there he was, staring at her. She opened her mouth, the tears starting again.
But as it happened, he didn't give her a chance to say anything.
He simply dragged her inside, face full of-not the grief she had expected, but silent fury. He dragged her into the living room, to the spot in front of the TV, where Rod had died. He shoved her down on her knees on the spot where he had lain.
He screamed at her, as she knelt there, unable to move or think. Screamed at her that this was all her fault-she was a slut, a whore, an unfit mother-she had caused Rod's death, to make way for her own favored brats, who were probably bastards by some fancy gigolo, conceived while he was hard at work, trying to make a decent life for them all-
Then, when she didn't respond except for silent tears, he hit her.
He knocked her into the wall, and she put up her hands, ineffectually, to defend herself. That seemed to infuriate him even further and he pulled her to her feet, then balled up both his fists, punching her in the face and stomach alternately, while she wept and retched, and finally dropped into merciful unconsciousness.
She woke up again, lying where she had fallen, in the dark and silent house, and crawled as far as the bathroom, using the sink to haul herself to her feet. Somehow, she got herself cleaned up, studiously avoiding looking at herself in the mirror. But she could not bear to go to the bedroom. Not to lie beside the man who had done this to her, and blamed her for her own son's death.
Instead, clutching her sore stomach, she got as far as the little bed in Ryan's room before she collapsed again, face and body throbbing with pain, onto the neatly made cotton comforter.
Eventually, she slept.
When she woke the next morning, an aching mass of misery inside and but, Rod was already gone.
The doorbell rang just as she was putting the finishing touches on a makeup job that she hoped, vaguely, would disguise the bruises, the black eye, and the swollen lip and jaw. It rang again, and she moved carefully to answer it, assuming that it must be the neighbor, Mrs. Nebles, who had taken Ryan and Jill-poor things, they must be hysterical; Rod hadn't come to get them and only God knew what they'd been told last night- But when she opened the door, it wasn't the neighbor, it was Jennie Talldeer, her expression one of sympathy and haunted guilt, a guilt that Toni recognized, but could not imagine the meaning of. There was a handsome, long-haired young man standing politely behind her, and Toni gulped down a surge of nausea and revulsion. Right now, she did not want to see any men-he would think she was to blame; he would say that Rod had been right to beat her-
"Toni, we heard on the news this morning and-my god!" Jennie exclaimed, her expression transforming from sympathy to shock and outrage. "What the hell did Rod do to you?"
Not "what happened," but "what did Rod do to you."
Jennie knew. It was out in the open between them. And Toni was too tired to try to hide it anymore.
"He said-" she began, then burst into tears, momentarily forgetting the presence of the young man. "He said it was my fault!" she sobbed, as Jennie took her arms and gently led her inside to the kitchen. "He said it was all my fault, and he hit me and-"
"God-how badly are you hurt? Did he touch the kids?" the young man asked, quietly, but urgently. Toni cast a quick glance at him through her tears, and to her amazement, saw that his expression was identical to Jennie's. Shock, and outrage-and concern.
"N-n-no," she replied, with surprise. Was Jennie right? Toni had thought all men must be like Rod, but- "I d-d-don't think so, I th-think they're still next door. I'll be all right, I th-th-think-"
They traded a look, and Jennie nodded. "I'll call the Women's Shelter," he said. "You take care of her." Then he turned to Toni. "Mrs. Calligan," he said, very gently, touching her hand as if it was something fragile and precious, "you stay here with Jennie. We're going to get you some help, and we're going to get you out of this place. And we won't let anyone hurt you again."