Pamela never looked up from the man’s bleeding arms. “We have got to get you back to the house.”
At that moment, he felt the shaking begin. It always started in his knees and worked its way up. Soon, it would reach his hands and face and he would not be able to hide it from her this time. He eagerly scanned the brush surrounding him. There was nowhere to run and hide.
“Daniel!” Pamela’s voice registered in his brain. “Daniel, are you all right?”
He felt his body caving in. The panic was ripping through his muscles and tissue, taking over his will to fight and his desire to maintain control.
Pamela watched as Daniel sank to his knees. He reached up and placed his face in his trembling hands, and then he started to hyperventilate. His gasping breath rattled in his throat as his body seemed to be taken over by convulsions. Pamela knelt down in front of him and pushed his hands away from his face. She looked into his eyes and immediately saw that unmistakable expression.
“Goddamn it,” Daniel growled beneath his breath. “Not here. Not now.” His eyes burned into hers. “Not with you.” He wrapped his bleeding arms about his body and started to rock gently back and forth. “Go away, Pamela. Leave me alone,” he ordered in a shaky voice.
Pamela calmly placed her hands about his face. “Daniel, I’m not leaving you. I am right here.” She knew she had to get him out of there. “I have to get you back to the house,” she declared.
He covered his ears. “The gunfire! I can still hear the gunfire!” he mumbled.
Pamela ran back to the ATV and put the vehicle into gear. She pulled it right alongside of Daniel. She got off the four-wheeled vehicle and went back to him.
“I need you to focus, Daniel,” she directed as she placed her hand under his chin and tried to draw his eyes to hers. “I want you to listen to me and do as I say. I need you to get up and get on this four-wheeler.”
She watched as Daniel nodded his head and fought to gain control of his rapid breathing. She helped him to his feet and lifted his leg over the back of the vehicle. She then climbed on to the seat in front of him and rested her rifle across her lap.
She turned back to Daniel. “Put your arms around my waist and hold on as tight as you can.”
He did as she instructed. Pamela could feel his respirations beginning to calm, but his shaking body was now soaked through with perspiration. His sweat mixed with blood seeped through her own shirt and created a chill against her skin. She took a breath and slowly started to make her way out of the clearing, her body straining with tension as she maneuvered the ATV through the dense woods. Pamela did not feel her body relax until she saw the familiar blue and white cottage looming before her.
* * * *
“A bear?” Daniel said as his dark eyes stared transfixed at Pamela.
He was sitting on her green couch, naked from the waist up and wrapped in a blanket. He had bandages down both his forearms, along with a few minor scratches on his face, and was holding a half glass of cognac in his now steady hands.
Pamela was sitting next to him nursing her glass of orange juice. She had removed her bloodstained clothes and put on her favorite robe. “A mother bear. She came out of the brush and found me standing next to the feeder. She was probably bringing her babies to eat.”
Daniel shook his head in disbelief. “A bear in Louisiana?”
Pamela nodded. “Not something we see a lot of around here, but black bears have been spotted in this area before. Not many places for them to hibernate, but she seems to have managed.”
“She could have mauled you, or worse,” he calmly remarked, and then he took another sip of the amber liquid from his glass.
“I shot over her head and scared her off. I’m good enough with a rifle should she have decided to charge me.” She shrugged. “But I would have been raising those babies instead of her. And a couple of baby bears would simply wreak havoc on my rehab facility. They are very mischievous and also very destructive.”
He tilted his head slightly to the side as he studied her for a few moments. “You’re a lot tougher than you look, right?”
Pamela smiled. “Yes, I am.”
A few uncomfortable minutes of silence passed between them.
“Are you going to tell me what happened out there?” she finally asked in a soft voice.
Daniel sighed and placed his glass on the coffee table in front of him. “I had a panic attack, that’s all. It happens every now and then when I get stressed.”
She leaned in closer to him. “And is that what happened this morning with Lester, the owl?”
Daniel nodded. “If I get stressed out, or angry, they tend to come in clusters.” He gave her a reassuring smile. He hoped his casual demeanor would make her think that his episodes were no big deal.
Pamela tried to read his feelings at that moment. His features said one thing, but his eyes said another. If she had been less experienced with medical conditions, she might have actually believed his nonchalant reaction.
“Panic attacks, huh?” She reached over and patted his knee. “Nice try, Daniel. But I’m not some airhead blond trying to flirt with an attractive bartender.”
Daniel grinned at her. “Attractive?”
Pamela ignored him. “Panic attacks are usually a symptom of some underlying disorder. And back in the woods you mumbled something about gunfire. You said you could still hear the gunfire.” She sat back on the couch but never removed her eyes from his. “What gunfire?”
Daniel took in a deep breath and lowered his gaze to the glass on the table in front of him. His voice became very faint as he spoke. ”I did two tours of duty in Iraq.”
Pamela raised her eyebrows at him. “Really? When did you join the military?”
“After September 11th. I remember watching the towers go down on the television and thinking, I have to do something. So I dropped out of graduate school and enlisted.”
“Graduate school?” she questioned.
“I was at Harvard, completing my MBA. When my old man found out I quit grad school and enlisted, he blew a fuse.” He laughed, slightly.
“I’m sure your father was probably terrified for you. You were going off to a strange country to fight a war.”
“Not quite. He was grooming me to take over his business. He wanted me to finish my MBA and go to work with him.”
“The scars on your chest. You got those in Iraq, didn’t you?” she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and steady.
Daniel sat back and ran his hands over his face. He shook his head. “We were on foot in what we thought was a pretty secure section of Baghdad. We came around a corner and walked right into an ambush. I took the first one in the leg and then the next three…” He paused. “Well, you saw the scars.”
She sat back on the couch next to him, admiring his strong profile. “When did you get out?”
“Six years ago after I was shot.” He shrugged. “I traveled around the country a bit and then I went to bartending school for the fun of it. I don’t sleep well and I figured if I was going to be up all night I might as well get paid for it.”
Pamela shook her head. “What you are describing, Daniel, is more than just—”
“It’s called PTSD, post traumatic stress disorder,” he interrupted. “That’s what the army shrinks said it was.”
“So you have seen someone?”
Daniel snickered. “I’ve seen several someones. They all say the same thing. They try to give me pills, try to hypnotize me, desensitize me, detoxify me, and demoralize me.” He got up from the couch and walked over to the window next to Louis’s cage.
The squirrel watched as Daniel came up to him. The creature’s little eyes curiously took in the stranger without showing the least bit of fear. Louis then climbed out of his cage and slowly made his way over to the tall man.
Daniel warily watched as the squirrel came closer to him.
Pamela rose from the couch and went over to the cage. “It’s all right,” she assured him. “He doesn’t bite.
In fact he is quite a sweet little boy.”
She took his hand and guided it toward Louis. At first, Louis seemed a little nervous about the big hand approaching, but then he let Daniel touch his head. After a few seconds, Daniel was able to gently stroke the top of the squirrel’s head.
“Now reach around and stroke under his chin,” Pamela instructed.
Daniel did as he was told and was happily surprised when the little creature lifted his front paw for Daniel to rub his fuzzy white underbelly.
“Look at that. He likes it.” Daniel laughed.
“Actually, it is something all squirrels do when you rub under their chins. I call it the squirrel reflex.”
Then Louis decided that he had had enough attention for the time being and moved away from Daniel’s hand and back into his cage.
“I’ve never petted a squirrel before,” Daniel said, his face bright with enthusiasm.
“Not many people have,” Pamela admitted. “Do you want to feel something truly amazing?”
Daniel explored her cool gray eyes. He felt a pang of desire blaze through him as he took in every detail of her face. His excitement dwindled to disappointment when Pamela turned away from him and walked over to the other side of the living room.
She went to the containers housing her myriad of wildlife babies and opened one. She came back to Daniel holding a small gray and brown lump of fur in her hands.
“Hold out your hands,” she told him.
Daniel watched anxiously as Pamela placed a six-week-old squirrel in his hands.
The creature’s eyes and ears were open and the body was covered with a silky brown and gray fur. He could feel the little life squirming in his hands, as tiny teeth nipped at the calluses on his palms.
Daniel looked up at Pamela. “It’s so small, I feel like I might crush it.”
“Would you like to feed her?”
Daniel raised his dark eyebrows at Pamela. “Are you sure?”
She gave him an encouraging smile. “I think it might be just what you need right now.”
* * * *
Half an hour later, Pamela looked on as Daniel sat on the floor, carefully feeding formula to his fifth baby squirrel. The man seemed to revel in the way the eager little mouths sucked at the small syringe. He carefully rubbed each and every pink tummy after feeding to aid with digestion, just as Pamela had instructed. He was enthralled with the tiny creatures, studying their faces, and caressing their little feet. The joy he seemed to find made Pamela feel as if the disturbing events of the day had almost never happened. Almost.
“No wonder you like doing this.” Daniel glanced up from the squirrel in his hands. “They are so helpless and have such trust in you. They let you feed them and rub them without the slightest bit of reservation.”
Pamela walked over to his place on the floor. “Wait until they get older and can squirm and bite. Then feeding them with a syringe becomes a real challenge.”
“Why do you use a syringe? I’ve always seen those bottles sold in stores with the kitten and puppy formulas. I thought you would be using them to feed your babies.”
“Nursing bottles can cause aspiration—formula in the lungs—in a lot of infant wildlife. Rehabbers always use syringes to make sure the animal doesn’t aspirate.”
“When do they get off the formula?”
“At eight to ten weeks I start weaning them. I’ll get them into some small cages, out of these plastic containers, and start to offer solid food. Usually I give them a selection of apples, berries, beans, and corn, along with a little sweet potato, as well as wheat bread or crackers. Once they are completely off formula, I will transfer them to the bigger cages outside that you were cleaning the other day. And when they are able to crack a nut with their teeth, they are ready to be released.”
He gazed down at the little ball of fur in his hands. “That must be hard. You must get so attached.”
“To some, yes, I become very attached. Almost from the first moment you begin feeding them, you recognize traits of each baby’s individual personality, no matter how alike they may appear. Some are stubborn, shy, feisty, or some are like little bulldozers; they will plow through anything that gets in their way. Most people think they are just animals and wonder how they can have different personalities. But getting to know them is just like getting to know another person. At first you see only the outside, but with time you learn to memorize every idiosyncrasy, every inflection, every movement until one day…” She shrugged. “They become a part of you. And for the rest of your life, their memory will live on in your thoughts and in your dreams.”
“Do they ever not want to leave?” Daniel asked. “I mean they have it pretty good here and it is a big old scary world out there.”
“Some hang around for a long time, like Rodney. Usually the males stay longer than the females.” She gave him a teasing grin. “But many do come back to visit me. The mothers bring their babies to me and show me their families. That makes what I do worthwhile. I guess it is their way of saying thank you. They make me a part of the tribe, so to speak. They remember me, and you cannot ask for more than that from anyone.”
Daniel carefully placed the small baby back in its plastic container. He watched as the tiny creature crawled over to join the rest of the litter, which was hidden underneath a mound of cloth strips. He put the lid back on the square plastic box and placed the container with the others against the wall on his left. He looked past Pamela to the window located across the room, and felt a pang of disappointment run through him as he saw the fading light peeking through the light brown curtains.
“It’s getting late,” he stated as he stood up from the floor. “I should get back to your roof while there is still some daylight left.”
Pamela shook her head. “No, you’re not going back up there today.”
“I’m fine now.” He leaned his head slightly closer to her and gave her a cocky grin. “I’m a lot tougher than I look,” he added.
“I’m sure you think you are, but I’m not letting you get back up there with all that cognac in your system.”
Daniel’s deep laugh filled the cramped living room with a sudden rush of warmth Pamela had never felt before.
“My dear woman,” he began. “I have been known to put a hell of a lot more than that away on any given night behind the bar. Trust me, I’m stone cold sober.”
She frowned. “You drink at work?”
He took another step closer, letting his body ease right up next to hers. He stared down into her gray eyes. “I’m a bartender, drinking on the job is required.”
“You don’t seem like a bartender to me. You’re well educated, resourceful, and have a curious mind. I’d say there is more to you than just tending bar and getting in fights with customers.”
He stared up at the ceiling, appearing to mull over her observations. Then he gave her an amusing smile. “Sorry, that about covers it for me. Drinking and fighting are what I’m best at.”
“But you can replace shingles on a roof? There must be other things you’re good at?”
“There are other things I can do, but I’m not necessarily good at them. And most men know how to replace shingles on a roof. A compulsion for making minor household repairs is just one of the side effects of testosterone.”
Pamela immediately broke out into a fit of laughter.
A perplexed look came over Daniel’s face. “It wasn’t that funny,” he commented.
Pamela wiped a happy tear from the corner of her eye. “It’s just that my ex-husband always said manual labor was the result of not having enough intelligence to know how to avoid it.”
Daniel furrowed his brow at her. “Sounds like a great guy. How long were you married?”
“Eight years.”
“May I ask what happened?”
Pamela waved her hand casually in the air. “When I was diagnosed with lupus things started to fall apart. Bob tried to be the dutiful husband and help me through the bad patches, but after
a few years he couldn’t handle it any more. So he asked for a divorce.”
“What an asshole,” Daniel said as he frowned at Pamela. “Why on earth did you marry him?”
“We met right after I was in a pretty bad car accident. He became my attorney and handled my lawsuit against the drunk driver who hit me. We wound up spending a lot of time together. Lunch meetings became dinner meetings and then our meetings turned into dates. I thought he was charming, kind, and would always be there for me. I was wrong.” She wrapped her arms about her body. “You ever been married?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No. I’m not cut out for long-term relationships. Most women get sick of my shit and quickly move on. It’s better that way. What happened today is something I never let anyone see. At times it becomes really hard hiding my PTSD from the world, but so far I have been able to keep most of my symptoms under control.”
“And when you can’t keep it under control anymore?”
“Then it will be time for me to move on. I’ll find a new town, and new people, who don’t know anything about me.”
“Is that what you have been doing? Moving from one town to the next to try and hide your condition?”
He turned away from her and went back to the couch. He removed the blanket from around his shoulders and picked up his bloody T-shirt. “It’s worked pretty well for me so far.”
“But you can’t go on like that forever, Daniel.”
He pulled the T-shirt over his head. “You don’t get it, Pamela,” he said with a hint of frustration in his voice. “For someone like me there isn’t a forever. Right now is about all I can handle.”
She stood in silence as she watched him neatly fold up the blanket and place it on her couch. He then picked up the half full glass of cognac and downed the contents in one long swallow.
“If you aren’t going to let me back on your roof, then I better head back to the city,” he grumbled as he banged the glass down on the coffee table.
“Maybe you shouldn’t be driving right now. Why not wait a while longer before you get behind the wheel?”
“I’m fine,” he said, avoiding her eyes. He moved to the front door. “I’ll come back tomorrow after lunch and finish the roof.” He reached for the doorknob. “Thanks for today, Pamela. I know what you must think of me, but I promise I will be out of your life soon.” And with that he opened the door and stepped out into the fading afternoon light.
Broken Wings Page 5
