TIME-TO-SEE-25
We left Jilder with Jake back at the townhouse, and Nick and I rode along together to his dad's house, but Nick wasn't saying very much. I tried to have a conversation, but Nicky was completely preoccupied, just looking out the window, watching the billboards and the parked cars as we passed by.
I wasn't very familiar with this part of town. In fact, I'd never been here even once in the 12 years I'd lived near San Diego. There were many older, simple neighborhoods, in San Diego, just like this one, but all of them were neat and clean and cheerful in this wonderful climate.
We drove slowly down one of the neighborhood streets, and as we got closer, Nicky began to grow excited, and he began to talk. He was eager to go home.
"There! Over there. There it is," Nicky said excitedly, pointing with his finger pressing against the front windshield glass.
"Okay. Just let me ease over here. Looks alike there's plenty of parking around," I said.
I had no sooner cut the engine than Nicky was out the car door.
"Wait for me, Nicky," I called out.
"Oh, Okay," he answered, stopping in his tracks and turning back to watch me catch up with him.
"That one," Nicky said pointing to a beige sandstone building with no shrubbery around it.
"We're on the bottom floor, and Mrs. Munoz lives upstairs," Nicky told me as we approached.
Nicky knocked loudly on the front door and could hardly contain his eagerness for it to open.
We waited a very long time. Finally I said, "Do you think we could go around to another door, or even a window. Your dad could be sick and not able to get to the door, you think?" I suggested.
"Yea... maybe... let's go around back. I can climb in a window and let us in," Nicky said.
"Be careful not to hurt yourself, Nicky!" I called out. In a short while Nicky was jumping onto the floor inside of a room at the back of the house.
"Go back around to the front door, and let me in," I said loudly, and then I jogged back around to the front.
In an instant, Nicky flung open the front door and called to me from inside, "Kevin, come here quick. My dad has fallen on the floor, and he's not movin. He must have passed out, or maybe he's sick! Hurry, Kevin!" Nicky screamed in panic! "Kevin, Come quick!"
I ran in and saw a form crumpled up on the floor: Nick's dad, a man somewhere in his late thirties maybe. He must have been walking toward the back of the house, and just collapsed on his way.
I pulled out my cell phone and dialed 911 immediately. Nicky ran to the sofa and brought back a small throw pillow that he placed gently under his father's head.
The ambulance summoned, I put my ear down on Mr. Lundgren's chest, where I could hear only a very faint heart beat. It didn't look good to me, but I was hoping that if we could get him to the hospital fast enough that his chances of survival would soar...
Time seemed to stop, while we waited for the ambulance.
Nicky was down on his knees on the floor talking to his dad and rubbing his forehead. "Don't worry dad. I'm here now. I can take care of you, and we're gonna take you to the hospital.... Don't worry, you hear...."
Amazing! A siren sounded in less than a minute, literally, and two young men ran up to the door with EMT equipment. One of them carried a stretcher. I don't think I've ever seen an emergency unit respond so quickly.
The other of them went to work immediately listening for Mr. Lundgren's vital signs. I could tell he was alarmed. He quickly scrambled for a vial and syringe in his medical box. He injected Mr. Lundgren in the chest, and immediately both men moved him to the stretcher.
"What hospital are you going to?" I asked.
"City Municipal..." they said tersely on their way out of the door, hardly noticing me or Nicky."
"I'll meet you there," I said.
Nicky was running along beside his dad on the stretcher, talking to him. "Don't worry dad. You'll be at the hospital soon, and they can help you there... It won't be but a minute. Hold on, Dad!" Nicky implored his father.
When the ambulance doors were closed, I took Nicky by the shoulder, held him tightly and pulled him gently in the direction of our parked vehicle.
The ambulance was in motion with red lights flashing and siren screaming in mere seconds.
Nicky got in the car. Still outside, I clicked open my cell phone again and phoned Hugo's Supervisor in the Orderly Section. I explained to Alberto what was happening, and asked whether he would please write this information down for Hugo.
"Also, please tell Hugo that I'm on the way to his hospital with Nicky's dad. Nicky'll need all the support he can get. I'll come to find you right after we get there, as soon as I can."
"Oh, yeah, and, Alberto, would you include one more thing in this long message too: Jilder is safe at the townhouse with Jake, my old nurse, who had the day off and volunteered to keep him while I took Nicky to see his dad."
NO ONE had any idea that this was happening. I had been trying to protect Nicky's privacy, and didn't give anyone any details.
"I'm so very sorry to impose on you, Alberto. But I have to get this message to Hugo," I said. "I'll make it up to you, I promise. Thank you very much for your help.... but I gotta run. I'm on my way to your hospital right now... We're maybe a half-hour away."
Nicky was silent on our trip to the hospital. He wouldn't let me in: I tried again to talk to him, but he just went silent and remote. I was left only to imagine how he must be feeling; it had to be awful.
We parked and went into the Emergency Room, not too different from the Emergency Room that Nicky had been in himself just two weeks ago. Mr. Lundgren was taken into emergency treatment immediately. The Emergency Medicine physician was trying to drag Mr.Lundgren back from the edge of death, but no one knew what was happening exactly or understood what the doctor was facing or why the delay.
Nicky sat in the waiting area stone silent, just looking down at the floor. Not crying. Like a catatonic stupor! I put my arm around him. Just looking at Nicky scared the shit out of me.
I don't know where the afternoon went. It was dark before I knew it, yet Mr. Lundgren was STILL in Emergency... It was bazaar!
"What in hell could be going on in there," I thought.
Nicky had collapsed from stress, his own stamina was limited, not being anywhere near healed from his operation. I lay him down on a sofa in the waiting room and just let him sleep, hoping he'd be able to rest for quite a while longer, because this waiting was hell.
Being in a holding pattern as we were, I realized then that I was feeling the day myself. I grabbed another sofa in the empty waiting room, and before I realized it, I had dozed off.
Tick..... tock..... Tick..... tock.... the sounds came very slowly.
"Kevin." Someone was calling my name. Softly.
"Kevin." I heard it... again.
"Yes?" I answered.
"Kevin, it's Papa."
"Oh! Papa I've missed you. Thank you for coming to be with me."
I spoke again: "I've got a terrible situation on my hands with Nicky. His dad is in the Emergency Room, and I don't know what's going on, and I don't know what to do to protect Nicky."
Papa answered me, "Well, of course, Kevin, it's not about Nicky. It's about Lloyd Lundgren, Nicky's father. His body is not doing well. I've talked to him, and he is saying that he won't go back!"
"Noooo?! Papa! That will destroy Nicky. Can't we stop that from happening? Can't we change that?"
"Well, son, there's actually a lot that we could do, but the main thing that we cannot do is make Lloyd want to go back."
"Doesn't WANT to go back!!! Doesn't he know how much Nicky loves him? Doesn't he know? Doesn't he care? He can't be so blind," I said exasperated to distraction.
"The fact is, Kev, Lloyd loves Nicky very much, but, well, you talk to him, Kev; you'll understand..."
I had a sense that my position was changing, and then I felt I was with someone else. Papa hadn't gone away, but someone else was with us.
"Mr.Lundgren, we're so worried about you. Nicky's worried about you." I said "What are you doing here when Nicky is waiting for you back in the Emergency Room?"
In a voice barely descernable amid its sobbing, "I can't care for Nicky... (Sob)... not as good as you and Hugo do. I can't stop drinking... (And the tears flowed again...)... I did try! I tried and tried and tried to stop... I'm just a hopeless alcoholic. Don't you see?"
"But you can change, Lloyd; you don't HAVE TO do that any more."
I was frantic to show Lloyd that this is only HIM-- through his ego delusions-- first, condemning himself and convicting himself as GUILTY and then sentencing himself to DEATH..." Lloyd was doing it to himself!
I couldn't stop speaking, "Besides, we CAN'T care for Nicky as well as HIS OWN FATHER can! You know that; Hugo and I only jumped in to take care of Nicky because you weren't able. WE are the substitutes, Lloyd, the second-string. We DO love him and will forever, Lloyd, but Nicky needs YOU, his real dad." I answered.
"We'll help you," I spoke again, trying to implore him to see. It's TIME TO SEE!!! "Lloyd!!!..."
"No. It won't work," Lloyd snapped. "I've tried and tried before, and all I do is fail." Lloyd said.
"I don't want to give Nicky more pain... I love him. I was so worried when the paramedics came and took him to the hospital, but I was too drunk to help..." and Lloyd dissolved again into inconsolable grief.
And the sobbing broke again: "I knew Nicky couldn't breath, and I didn't have no money to pay for an operation. I was always too drunk to go out and get a job for the money, like a REAL father would a done. WHAT KIND OF FATHER WAS I?" Lloyd screamed. "A SHIT! A SHIT! I WAS SHIT!!"
"Nicky deserves so much better. He's a good boy," Lloyd mumbled out in tears.
I said, "Why don't you go talk to Nicky? You'll see that he doesn't blame you or criticize you for drinking a lot. He understands, and he loves you. He had me take him to your house today; so that he could tell you himself not to worry about him, that he was breathing just fine. Lloyd, Nicky can stay with us for as long as he wants, and he can return to your house, when you return yourself and are there for him."
Mr. Lundgren was irreconcilable. "No, No, I've made such a mess of everything. Nicky needs a better father and a real family, one like you and Hugo can give him."
"Mr. Lundgren! PLEASE!!! I can't tell Nicky you want to die! He'll think it's his fault that you don't want to live. He'll think that he is so bad that you didn't want to try to stop drinking. I know how kids are, Mr. Lundgren, they believe that they are the cause of everything bad that happens around them... Please, Mr. Lundgren, don't let Nicky lose you... please?" I pleaded.
Yet Mr. Lundgren howled the more. I've never seen a man so desolate or lost. His spirit was blind. He couldn't see the love that everyone was offering, or realize the immense sense of loss we would all experience-- especially Nicky-- if he decides to leave us all right now.
"OH, GOD!" I implored. "Help us! Help Lloyd! Help Nicky!"
Then I was blinded by an immense light that was more intense than anything I'd ever experienced.
***** AND A VOICE SPOKE:
"My son Lloyd. My son Kevin. Both of you believe that you can annihilate yourselves and remove yourself from Existence, that you can make yourself into something that I did not make you. That is Impossible. But you try.
"You are whole and perfect as I made you; and even when you delude yourselves, amid much self-contrived pain, into believing that you are bad, you are not. You are just as I made you: totally good.
"This drama you create only serves to confuse you. It is not true. The only truth is the Love that connects all of you together. Whether you can believe that or not, that is all there is!"
"You can pretend that you are destroying yourself and each other. You can act out the illusion for one another, you can make it seem to happen, but you cannot make it true. Each of you must come to trust that I AM, and you will EVER be as I made you- perfect."
"Please cause yourself pain no longer."
And although the light faded, the warmth remained. I looked around for Lloyd, but he was not there. "Papa," I called out.
"Yes, son," he answered.
"Where did Lloyd go?" I asked
"He believes he is hopeless. He has gone into the Grand Illusion where he will remain, unharmed, until he is able to understand that he is not bad and not unworthy and not Lost," Papa explained.
"Does that mean that he won't be going back to the Emergency Room, Papa?" I said.
"I'm afraid so, Kev... I'm afraid so..."
There was scurrying around in the waiting area of the Emergency Room. Soft chimes sounded and woke me.
I looked around and saw a young man walking in my direction. He couldn't have been any older than I was. He was dressed in physicians' scrubbs and looked like he'd been through a war.
"Mr. Kramer?" he addressed me.
"Yessir?" I responded.
"Are you here for Mr. Lundgren?"
"Yes, I am. I brought his son, Nicky, that boy asleep on the sofa over there. There isn't any other family." I said.
"I'm so sorry, Mr. Kramer. I thought for a long time that we had him, but something just happened, and he was gone. I tried everything: direct heart massage, stimulant injection, shock... But his heart refused to beat again. After three minutes, everyone in the emergency room was crushed. We'd lost!... I'm so sorry for the boy..." and the physican put his head into his hands and cried quietly.
"I understand."
I just stood with the doctor for a moment, then I said, "I'm sure you did all that was humanly possible. I wonder whether you'd mind if we woke Nicky and told him together?" I asked.
The young physician gathered himself together in a moment and said, "Of course..."
I went over to the other sofa and reaching over the back of it, gently picked up one of Nicky's hands. Then speaking softly I said, "Nicky..... Nicky......, can you wake up?"
Nicky slept on his back, of course. His eyes flew open, but he didn't move a muscle. He was wide awake instantly. Without moving he said, "What?" Then he spoke again, "Where's dad?"
The doctor had come over to the sofa and knelt down on the floor very close to Nicky, their faces only a foot or so apart, and he looked Nicky in the eye. His own eyes visibly moist, the doctor began, "Nicky, we worked on your dad for a very long time, and we did everything we could possibly do-- everything-- but his heart just wasn't strong enough to keep going any longer, and we lost him. Nicky, your dad won't be able to go home again. I'm so sorry, Nicky." His voice cracked as he fought to conceal his own emotions.
Nicky squeezed my hand and said, making no attempt to speak quietly or be polite, "I KNEW IT! I KNEW IT!" he shouted out angrily. "I TRIED to help him! I TRIED to help him, but I couldn't.... I just couldn't do it!!! I tried and tried and tried," and with that the tears gushed out amid the anguish contorting his young face.
Nicky grabbed the doctor-- he needed anyone who was willing to be with him in his pain. And he grabbed the doctor around the arms and cried with great heaves into the doctor's chest. This was the loss of his lifetime, his one last natural family member passed away. His grief was palpable...
I was devastated too. I had tried along with Nicky and the doctor, and I had also failed. Papa and I had spoken directly with Lloyd trying to get him to see that he was good, but he BELIEVED that he was NOT. And nothing trumps one's own belief about himself.
That which you believe is true about yourself becomes true about yourself.
I could NOT allow this kind of ignorant belief to take root with Nicky or with Jilder.... or with Hugo either, for that matter. Lloyd didn't understand what he was doing. He simply made a colossal error.
Hugo arrived in the Emergency Room waiting area and walked right over to Nicky, who was clinging to the doctor and crying his eyes out.
When Nicky realized that Hugo was there, he lunged for Hugo and began to experience his grief all over again, and Hugo held him in his strong arms rocking him back and forth, kissing him over and over on the head, as he cried.
Hugo had lost his father too, thus he understood the devastation Nicky felt. It's true that Hugo's loss had been slow and subtle, but the effect and desolation were identical: two children left alone in the world not knowing what to do. And the one person in their lives who was supposed to help them was gone.
Finally we got Nicky to leave the hospital, but not before he went into the treatment room and spoke to his dad, one last time.
Nicky ran to the table on which his father was laying. He put his head next to his dad's and cried softly and profoundly saying, "Daddy, I love you... I love you, daddy... I'm so sorry you had to leave me... I didn't want you to go... I want you to come back..." and the crying errupted once again.
Hugo and I had walked in right behind Nicky and were standing right behind him as he spoke to his dad, each of us keeping a hand on his shoulders, not allowing him a chance to feel like he was falling into the abyss of the unloved or abandoned.
"Daddy," Nicky said, "I'm not mad with you. I'm not mad 'cause you drank too much. I know you couldn't help it. And I tried to help you stop, but I wasn't good enough to keep it from hurting you." and the tears flowed once again.
"No, Nicky." I intruded: "You were plenty good, Nicky," I said softly. "Your dad was just very, very, very sick, and even the doctor who has studied for 10 years how to help people wasn't able to help; so NO, Nicky, you couldn't help, but it was NOT because you weren't good enough. You were so very, very good, that everyone was willing to do anything and everything to help your dad. It just turned out that he couldn't benefit from all the love and help people offered." Nicky turned to Hugo and me with pleading in his eyes, "BUT I LOVE HIM."
"I know," I said.
"And Hugo and I love YOU," I continued after a moment. "I hope that you will let us help you?"
Nicky turned back to his dad's body, and gave him one last embrace and a kiss on the forehead... with that, Nicky, said "Good-by, Daddy..."
And we three left the Emergency Room, Nicky clinging to us both.
That was the last time Nicky ever spoke with his father, Lloyd.