by Hazel James
“Okay, what’s your plan?”
“What do you mean? I just told you. No one knows anything. At this point, I’m not even sure I can get an appointment with my primary care doctor.” I rub the furrow sprouting between my brows while silently cursing the VA for ruining my chance to look like a woman again.
“I asked what your plan is, not what the problems are.” Clay and his damn goals and plans.
I shrug. “Keep calling, I guess.”
“Nope. Not good enough.” His face turns resolute. “Tomorrow morning, you’re driving to the VA to talk to the patient advocate.”
Bless his heart, sometimes he can be so dense. “I have to work tomorrow.”
His lips, never far from a smile, turn up. “It’s a good thing you have a great supervisor. Don’t come to work until you’re done at the VA.”
I open my mouth to say it won’t do any good when he takes my chin with his thumb and index finger. “That’s a great idea, Clay,” he says, moving my mouth while he imitates me. “Thank you so much for giving me the morning off.” He drops his hand, lowers his voice, and continues. “You’re welcome, Leilani. I’m always glad to help.” Pleased with my forced agreement, he rises and heads for the door.
My disappointment over his departure is made marginally better by my view as I trail behind him. What’s that saying? I hate seeing him go, but I love watching him leave.
“One more thing.” With his hand on the knob, he turns, and I shift my gaze from his ass to his face a millisecond before I’m busted.
“Yes?”
“The pink shirt you wore Friday night? You should wear it more often.” His honey eyes hold mine for an extra beat, and then he’s gone. A small part of my brain registers the sound of his truck driving away, but the larger part is occupied with a single thought: Clay has touched me more times in thirty minutes than he has in thirty days, and I already want more.
Thirteen years of Sunday School taught me that hell is nothing but fire and brimstone. The last forty-seven minutes of my life confirmed hell is actually the parking lot at the VA hospital. Even at 9 a.m., the Oklahoma sun is trying its best to burn everything, and the dumpster on the back edge of the lot reeks of rotten eggs.
I’m so grateful to find a spot that I almost don’t mind parking next to it.
Almost.
The hospital directory seems straightforward—the patient advocate is in Zone F and I’m in Zone C. That means I need to take two lefts, three rights, and a final left to reach the office. Easy enough, until I factor in the motorized scooters, hospital beds, crash carts, and elderly patients walking at a snail’s pace.
Maneuvering through the hallways becomes a live version of Tetris with me pretzeling myself in empty spaces to avoid getting run over. I’m doing well until yellow tape and plastic sheeting force me to stop.
Come on.
“Closed for construction?” I groan, reading the paper hanging from the sheeting. The detour information posted on the wall is less than helpful, considering half of it has been ripped away. Defeated, I retreat to the previous hall and consider my options. Logic says I need to keep moving toward the back of the hospital, but the restricted access sign at the end of the corridor makes that impossible.
“Pardon me, miss.” I feel a tap on my shoulder and spin around. “Are you a damsel in distress?” The gentleman’s wide smile separates his handlebar moustache and chest-length beard. He smells of aftershave and pipe tobacco and has at least fifteen years on my dad.
“That depends. Are you a knight in shining armor?
He lifts his left pant leg and whacks his prosthetic with an American flag cane. “Titanium, actually.”
A chuckle slips past my lips. “Impressive.”
“But wait, there’s more,” he says in a dramatic voice. The man drops his pant leg, tosses his cane to his other hand and strikes his right side, just above his shoe. The fabric muffles the ping.
“Now you’re just showing off,” I tease.
“Guilty as charged. Where are you headed?”
I glance at the restricted access sign again. “I’m trying to find the patient advocate’s office.”
He nods. “They’ve had this half of the hospital blocked for months. Supposed to be a new radiology clinic, but I’ll probably be dead before it opens.” Not missing a beat, the man crosses in front of me and holds out his elbow. “Right this way.” I slide my hand through the crook of his arm and follow him out a side door. “What’s your name?”
“Leilani. Yours?”
“Tripod.” He guides me around a clump of small trees and down a grassy path.
“Are you a photographer?”
His deep baritone laugh reminds me of flannel shirts and fireplaces. “No, just a double bologna with a cane.”
I shoot a quizzical look to my left. “A double bologna?”
“My amputations. They’re both below the knee. Bologna. Add my cane and I make one hell of a tripod.” He steers me around the corner of another building while I dissolve into a fit of giggles. I can’t wait to tell Dad I was escorted by a man who could pass as Wilfred Brimley’s little brother.
“How long have you been coming here?” I ask.
He moves the fingers on his free hand while he silently counts. “Probably since you’ve been in diapers.”
“No wonder you know your way around.” He nudges me to a set of wooden steps leading to a row of single-wide trailers. “Am I keeping you from an appointment?”
“Nope. I just got done seeing my doctor. My Betty won’t be done with her physical therapy for another half hour.”
“Who’s Betty?”
“The sweetest lady this side of the Mississippi.” Tripod beams with pride. “She was my consolation prize from Vietnam. I lost my legs but I found the love of my life. Her friends were worried that it was the Florence Nightingale effect. They finally quit fussing about that twenty years ago.” He winks and stops in front of the second trailer. “Here you go. Door-to-door service.”
I smile and untangle my arm from his. “Thanks for the escort. It was nice meeting you.”
“The pleasure’s all mine.” Tripod salutes me with the tip of his cane and retraces his steps toward the main hospital while I take a moment to assess where I’m at. I may need to draw on my land navigation skills to find my Jeep, but that’s the least of my worries right now.
The aluminum door squeaks open, revealing a small waiting area littered with old magazines. Three chairs have already been claimed and judging by the expressions on the occupants’ faces, they’re just as unhappy about something as I am. I sign in and take a seat in the fourth chair.
The air conditioning unit in the window to my right rattles and hums just loud enough to make small talk impossible. Instead, I focus on the line of posters on the wall across from me, each bearing a word and an inspirational quote.
Change. “Embrace change. True success can be defined by your ability to adapt to changing circumstances.”—Connie Sky
Patience. “A jug fills drop by drop.”—Buddha
Perseverance. “Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after another.”—Walter Elliot
Achievement. “Without failure there is no achievement.”—John C. Maxwell
Integrity. “Honor your commitments with integrity.”—Les Brown
The irony is overwhelming. Some poor sap displayed these images as a literary pep talk for life’s challenges, when really, they all apply to VA health care—or the lack thereof—in one way or another.
The person in the first chair gets called back twenty minutes later, but they stay in the patient advocate’s office twice as long. By the time the third customer stands up, my ass is numb, my cell phone battery is at nine percent from playing games, and I’m in desperate need of anything with sugar as the first ingredient. If hell is the VA parking lot, then purgatory is this waiting room.
I lean my head against the wall and think of the flavors on the Sonic Blast menu. Bits
of candy bar in a sea of ice cream sounds heavenly right about now. I’m debating between Snickers and Butterfinger when I hear my name.
Finally.
“I’m sorry,” the woman says. “The office is closing for lunch.”
I shoot out of my chair. “What? But I’ve been here since nine thirty!”
“I know.” Her remorseful expression does nothing to lessen the blow. “You’re welcome to come back tomorrow, though.”
“Tomorrow? Why can’t I come back when you re-open?”
“We only take appointments in the afternoon.”
Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit. I take a calming breath. I need this woman’s help, which means I need to keep my temper reasonably contained. “Okay, can I make an appointment?” I politely seethe.
“Absolutely.” I follow her down the hall to a makeshift office. “Let’s see.” She logs into the computer and brings up her calendar. “It looks like my next available is… 2 p.m. on August seventeenth.”
My stomach drops. “That’s five weeks away.”
She nods. “We fill up quickly. Would you like me to put you down, or do you want to try again during our walk-in hours?”
I don’t expect Clay to give me another morning off, and even if he did, there’s still no guarantee I’d be seen. That means I have another month of no answers, and God knows how long after that to find out what’s going on. It looks like I’ll never have my surgery. Angry tears prick my eyes as I accept my reality.
“I’ll take it.”
Goals and Gratitude
“SPECIAL DELIVERY.” A TINY WOMAN walks into my office, and my face lights up when I see what she’s carrying.
“Rosa, you never cease to amaze me. I’m surprised you didn’t have a line of people following you down the hall.” I take the plate of tamales and bend down to kiss her cheek. “How’s Eduardo?”
The news that he’d collapsed last month while teaching a summer school algebra class at Lawson High was devastating.
“He’s feeling better. He has one more week of restricted activity and hates that I’m holding him to it. I told him if he went for his mid-day walk while I was gone, I would sell his gun collection on eBay.”
We chuckle. “I hope for his sake he follows directions.”
“He probably won’t. He’ll pretend he was watching TV the whole time and I’ll pretend I don’t see his shoes in the bedroom. I swear that man is going to turn the rest of my hair gray.”
“Do you need to take more time off?”
She pats my arm. “No, mijo. You’ve been very generous, but I’m looking forward to coming back to work. After a month at home, there’s nothing left in my house to clean.” We visit for a few more minutes before she turns to leave, saying Eduardo should have had enough time to lie down and look innocent.
As soon as she clears the door, I grab a fork out of my desk and tear into my tamales with little regard for the extra miles I’ll need to log tonight. I’ve inhaled three by the time Leilani stomps into my office, flings her purse into the filing cabinet behind my desk, and plops on the chair in the corner. I take full credit for the ball cap she’s wearing today, but given the murderous look on her face, that’s the last thing she wants me to bring up.
“Grocery store out of Fruity Pebbles? I hate when that happens,” I say, hiding my smile behind my napkin.
Leilani’s brows bump together in a scowl. “You’re so annoying.”
“You’ve mentioned that. How’d it go at the VA?”
“It didn’t.”
“What happened?”
She rolls her eyes. “I got lost. Someone escorted me to the patient advocate’s office. I signed in. I wasted two hours of my life. They closed for lunch. I stopped to get a milkshake but the stupid machine was broken. I came to work. Happy?”
Her logic when she’s hangry is laughable at best—I don’t know anyone else who would forego food because they couldn’t eat dessert first. I grab my plate, load my fork, and wheel my chair toward her. “Open your mouth.”
“No.” She sets her jaw.
“So help me God, open your damn mouth.”
“You can’t—”
Seeing an opportunity, I slip the fork past her lips. Her nostrils flare once before her taste buds turn her protest into a satisfied sigh. No one can resist Rosa’s cooking. “Now tell me why you’re not at the VA talking to the patient advocate.”
“They only take appointments in the afternoon.” She gazes longingly at my food, though I know she’d rather eat her foot than ask for another bite.
“Did you make one?”
“Yes, but it’s not for another five weeks.”
I nod. “On the bright side, at least you made some progress today.”
“Easy for you to say. Your boobs are bigger than mine.” She cocks a brow and steals my tamales.
“First,” I say, leaning forward in my chair, “I don’t have boobs. And second, you didn’t say please.” I snatch the plate back and take a victorious bite, enjoying the hell out of the daggers she’s shooting at me.
“You’re so mean!”
“Maybe.” I wave the dish in front of her face. “I’m also the one with the food. If you ask nicely, I’ll share.” She says nothing, as expected, so I grab her chin. “Clay, I’m too stubborn for my own good. Can I please have some lunch before my stomach shrivels up?” She keeps her narrowed eyes on me as I answer my own question. “No problem, Sonic. You know I’m always happy to help.”
“Sonic?”
“The Hedgehog.”
“Ass,” she mutters.
Not bothering to hide my smirk, I pass my plate and grab her employee folder from the filing cabinet. “Time for the next order of business.”
“Which is?” she asks around a mouthful of food.
“Going over your goals. We were supposed to do this last week, but I got sidetracked.” I remove the paper from her packet and scan the answers.
“Belize?” I chuckle. “I didn’t realize you had such an interest in Central America. Or chocolate soufflés. How are the cooking lessons going?” She pauses mid-chew. “What about Toy Story 3? Have you watched that recently?” Her head turns back and forth. “Well, we already know about the status of your surgery, so it looks like the only goal you met last month was not getting fired. You’re one for five.”
Leilani swallows and sets the plate on my desk. “Funny, aside from keeping my job, surgery was the one thing I thought I’d actually accomplish. Or at least have scheduled by now.”
“I can only imagine how frustrated you are, but you still have a lot to be grateful for.”
“Like what? Stellar health care? Half-off on manicures? Saving money on shampoo? How about a boyfriend who dumped me because I got cancer? I get that you’re Mr. Sunshine, but gratitude doesn’t fix anything.”
I comb through her questions, zeroing in on the last one. “Wait, your boyfriend dumped you because you were sick?”
She flashes a wry smile. “Nice of him, huh?”
I can’t imagine letting go of a woman like Leilani. In the short time we’ve known each other, she’s become one of my favorite people. Work is never boring when she’s around, and she’s already come up with a bunch of different advertising ideas for Battles 2. “That’s really shitty.”
“Yeah, well, I’m good at losing things.” She leans back, resting her hand on the top of her ball cap.
“I know it sounds hokey, but there’s truth to the power of positive thinking. I promise if you start looking for the good in situations, you’ll realize things aren’t quite as bad as they seem.”
“Clay, seeing the good isn’t going to make the VA do their job properly. I’m just sick of looking like a boy.”
Her honesty is as appreciated as it is alarming—getting the truth out of my clients can take months, but what Leilani sees as the truth is completely distorted. I maneuver my chair in front of hers, trapping her between my knees and the wall.
“Hey.” With a heavy sigh, she
drops her hand and drags her gaze to mine. “You could wear a three-piece business suit with a football helmet and a pair of construction boots and still look like a woman.”
She grins. “Or a very confused man.”
“Also that.” Her giggles fill the space between us. It’s a sound I’ve heard many times before, but never while I’ve had a front-row seat to her smile, and especially not while I’ve imagined what her lips would feel like pressed against mine. “Come to Hawaii with me.”
Two things happen the moment those words leave my mouth: Leilani’s eyes turn to saucers and my brain launches into damage control to craft an explanation for my semi-outlandish request—preferably one that doesn’t include my desire to see her in a bathing suit or put sunscreen on her back. I start by rolling my chair to my desk. I can’t not look like a creeper if our knees are still touching.
“Every summer, I do some sort of fundraiser to help a non-profit. Last year, I hosted a bachelor auction for VETSports, and this year I teamed up with a few people to participate in a summer camp sponsored by Helping Hawaii. But instead of just raising money, we’re lending our services, too. I’m leaving on Saturday with two doctors from Barton Memorial, an art teacher from Hawthorne Elementary, and an executive chef from the Rolling Thunder Casino.”
Leilani tilts her head. “What’s Helping Hawaii, and why do you want me to go?”
“It’s an organization that helps children affected by homelessness and poverty. Fifty kids between the ages of twelve and seventeen will be split into groups of ten, and they’ll rotate each day. Local companies have sponsored trips to the Honolulu Zoo and a day of water activities, and the Battles team will cover the remaining three days at the community center. The doctors will spend the week at the hospital—one in the pediatric clinic and the other in surgery.”
Remembering the stash in my filing cabinet, I retrieve two Boston cream pudding cups and plastic spoons. I’m not above bribery. “I want you to go because your story will resonate with these kids. They’ve had it hard their entire life. You’re a great example of how to overcome challenges. And on the flip side, you could benefit from the trip, too.” I peel off the lid to the pudding cup and plunk the spoon inside, then roll toward Leilani.
