Nick of Time

by Julianne Q Johnson

  "Aww, you mad, bro?" Todd is not at all chagrined by his behavior. He's been telling me I need a girlfriend for months. I'm not certain having Todd's supposed "help" on this front is particularly helpful. Outing me as a dateless wonder is not exactly flattering.

  "Shut up, Todd," I repeat as I walk into the kitchen to get forks and paper plates for the food.

  "Get me a pop," Todd yells after me.

  "Get it yourself," I shout back.

  It doesn't matter if we have an extra mouth to feed because Todd has brought a mountain of Chinese. He always overbuys because he likes leftovers. I put the movie he's bought into the Xbox and we dish out plates of shrimp fried rice, twice cooked pork, and fill pancakes with mu shu. There's also a plethora of deep-fried appetizers, and I grab several crab Rangoon before Todd can eat them all. He pulls a second order out of the big bag and dumps the entire thing on his plate, which makes Daphne giggle again. Soon, we are all happily chomping away while we watch Tom Conti and Teri Garr on the television.

  It's a comedy called Miracles which was filmed in the eighties. In the movie, amazing things happen through a series of unbelievable coincidences. It's good, but it hits a little too close to home for me. It is sort of the story of my life, only I am missing the part where everything works out and I get a happy ending.

  After Todd leaves, I make up the couch for myself and put clean sheets on the bed for Daphne. She offers to take the sofa, but I don't mind. It's comfy as hell, and I've fallen asleep in front of the TV many times.

  "I have to warn you," I say as we stop by her apartment so she can get something to sleep in and brush her teeth, "I have to go to a birthday party in Monticello tomorrow. It's a huge family thing, at a house on the banks of the reservoir. You're welcome to come if you want. No one will mind."

  "Sounds like fun. Besides, it might be nice to get out of town for a day, just in case Adam shows up."

  "Good point."

  We say goodnight soon afterward. I'm tired, but sleep eludes me for some time. It's strange to have Daphne so close, yet it feels like she is still too far away.

  I'm in trouble for sure. If she spends any amount of time with me, there's no way she won't notice the fact I'm cursed. I have yet to meet a woman who can deal with the mess that is my day-to-day life. With this troubled thought, I slip into an uneasy slumber.

  Six

  Early the next morning, we rise and try to shine before heading out for the big birthday celebration. I wait in Daphne's living room while she showers and changes clothes. There's been no sign yet of the douche, Adam. He hasn't been picked up yet, Daphne checked with the police right after she woke up. Even so, maybe no news is good news. The jerk might have come to his senses and realized breaking his parole to shout at a woman who wanted nothing to do with him wasn't the smartest thing he's ever done. Not that the dude seems especially bright, mind you.

  I can't help thinking we'll run into Douche sooner or later. Of course, I'm a pessimist, so what do I know?

  On the way out of town, we stop near the Eagle Creek area and pick up my granddad Dylan and grandmother Fiona. Fiona Malley was born here in the States, but her father, my great-granddad Ronan Brennon, was born and raised in Ireland. He journeyed to America on a steamship when he was eighteen years old, and never went back to the old country, not even for a visit. Gran says he always spoke fondly of Ireland, but he thought America was the future, and he didn't want to get stuck in the past. He was quite a character, from what Gran has told me.

  My parents went up to the lake house last night to help with the setup, so it's up to me to get the grandparents to the party. I don't mind a bit except both of them end up as melodramatically shocked I have a woman with me as Todd had been the night before. Daphne seems to find this charming, and chats easily with my grandparents on the drive up to Monticello.

  My youngest sister, Sonya, is turning thirty-two. She and her husband Mark moved up to Monticello a couple of years ago. Mark works as an English professor at Purdue University and Sonya manages a bookstore there. They lived in Lafayette for a while, and then they found the house in Monticello and decided it was worth the commute time. They are complete boat nuts. Skiing, fishing, tubing, they love all of it. I doubt they'll ever live anywhere else.

  Monticello itself is a fairly small town of around five thousand people. It has the typical small-town Indiana town square, complete with historic old storefronts and a town hall. They decorate it with what seems like a million lights at Christmastime, and it looks like something out of a Norman Rockwell painting. It's a pretty place, and I like driving through town when I visit my sister. They've got some beautiful old Victorian homes on the main drag. In the summer time, they have a drive-in movie theater. A real, honest to God, drive-in movie theater, with a snack bar, two screens, and everything. I try to get a bunch of the nieces and cousins together at least a couple times each summer to go to the movies there.

  The town isn't what draws people to the area, though. People visit and live here because of the lakes. Back in the 1920's, they dammed the Tippecanoe River to create two lakes. My sister's house is on Lake Freeman, south of the city. North of Monticello is Lake Shafer, home to a giant country club and an amusement park called Indiana Beach. There's not much of a beach, mind you, and the amusement park is more like a carnival than the fancy park we went to in southern Indiana, but it's fun.

  The drive is pleasant if a bit boring. Southern Indiana is all hills and tree-filled beauty. North of Indy it gets as flat as a pancake. It has its charms in a green fields around a bright red and white barn with black and white dairy cows frolicking around kind of way. Northern Indiana simply doesn't have the flashy pizzazz of the southern part of the state. Daphne's cheerful chatter brightens things up. Grandma Fiona tells Daphne stories of my great-granddad growing up on a farm in rural Ireland. I've heard the tales a thousand times, but I never get tired of listening. By all accounts, Fiona's father had been a precocious youngster who was always getting into trouble one way or the other. He told these tales to his daughter, and she tells them to us. They are the family histories we all have which are passed on by word of mouth from one generation to the next.

  When I was young, I always wanted to visit Ireland and see the places where these tall tales happened. I have distant cousins who live there, and it would be interesting to meet the Irish side of the family. Then my eighteenth birthday hit, and my life became so chaotic transatlantic travel seemed far too troublesome to embark on. With my luck, I'd be on a plane over the middle of the ocean when catastrophe hit. What if I was too slow or two stupid then? Would I doom an entire plane full of people to a watery grave?

  Best not to consider it. Not on a day as warm and breezy with a bright blue sky full of fluffy white clouds as today. It is the best of summertime and we are going to play at the lake. Now is not the time for morbid thoughts.

  As my grandma is telling the tale of Ronan and the Bull, we pull into my sister's driveway. I wait a moment in the car for Grandma to finish, and Daphne is practically sitting on the edge of her seat waiting to hear what happened. This story scared me as a child. Not only because the tale is a bit frightening, but because I always had the sneaking suspicion grandma had left something out of the story. It's grim enough as it is. I can't imagine what she might not be telling us.

  We exit the car and help carry a mountain of food my grandparents have made for the party. There is already a bevy of cousins and nieces strewn across the property. There are girls playing on the lawn, swimming by the dock, and I see Tulia's brood out for a ride in the four-seat pedal boat you power with your own effort like an aquatic bicycle. The breeze has kicked up a little bit, and they seem to be making a herculean effort to get back to the dock.

  After we drop the food inside, and I introduce Daphne to some of the adults, we head out to the back lawn to look at the lake.

  "Where are the boys?" Daphne is looking at the herds of young women and girls with an expression of puzzlement.

/>   I forget sometimes outsiders are not used to my female-infested family.

  "You are looking at him," I say, and then chuckle. "I'm the first male born into the family in recent memory. Any other dudes you meet here today are related by marriage."

  "Wow. Were you ever lonely? I mean, it must be hard to be the only male child in such a big family."

  "Not really. When I was young, I didn't realize there was anything strange about it. When I got older I had male friends at school. Don't get me wrong, my sisters and I fought about all the usual things. What TV show to watch. Who got more mashed potatoes at dinner. You know, the usual crap siblings get up to. But that's normal sibling stuff. I always got plenty of attention, so I never felt I was missing anything."

  An uproar of anguish coming from the shore of the lake interrupts our conversation.

  "What's going on?" I can't tell what's happened, but some of the girls who are swimming seem to be upset.

  "Look, out there in the water." Daphne points me to the correct direction when I have trouble figuring it out. "I think they lost their ball."

  Sure enough, off to the left, there is a brightly colored beach ball which has been caught by the breeze. It is kiting across the water as if it was made to sail the seven seas and in a hurry to get started. Back at shore, I see Tulia's children preparing to mount an expedition to retrieve it by way of the pedal boat, but they'll never catch the ball in such a slow vehicle.

  "Feel like a boat ride?" I ask my companion.

  "I would love it."

  Daphne is smiling again. Her eyes twinkle with amusement as if a boat trip to retrieve a wayward ball is a great adventure. Her enthusiasm for the task makes me see the fun in it as well. The truth is, I need someone like Daphne in my life. She reminds me--despite the troubles I face on a daily basis--that the world remains full of simple delights if one would only look for them. Being with her makes me feel more positive about everything and helps me forget how jaded the events of my life have made me.

  "Then let's go rescue a beach ball." I stand up and offer her my hand. "To the boat!"

  Daphne giggles like a schoolgirl and lets me tug her down to the dock by the hand. My sister and her husband's boat, a red and white speedboat made for pulling skiers, is tied to the dock and waiting for adventure. I know on a day such as today the keys will already be in the ignition, and I've driven this boat a hundred times. They bought the boat before they bought the house. I think the biggest reason they moved to the area was so they could stop dragging it around on a trailer behind their pickup truck.

  Tulia's girls have not made much progress in the pedal boat and, as they see me help Daphne into the speedboat, they cheer and gleefully turn around to return to the dock. It's good they do. The beach ball is long gone. As I untie the boat, my sister Taylor's twin girls and a couple of random cousins jump in to join us for a boat ride. I sit down in the driver's seat and the twins push us away from the dock. With Daphne in the seat beside me and the twins in the bow on the lookout for the wayward beach ball, we're off.

  The smell of the water and the feel of the wind in my hair remind me I don't blame my sister for becoming a boat enthusiast. The people who live at the lake have a closely knit community. They have fireworks on the Fourth and a giant pitch-in picnic with a live band in the spring. At the holidays, nearly every house is decorated in twinkling lights. There's a grocery store, gas station, and a couple restaurants which have docks so you can get there by boat. As we drive around, looking for a speck of blue, orange, and pink, other people in boats wave at us, and we wave back. It's a different way of life, and I'm both pleased for my sister and a tad envious of her.

  A shout of pure excitement from the bow carries back to me on the wind. The twins have spotted our quarry and point off to the left. I swing the boat into a sharp turn which makes all the girls squeal in delight as the motor kicks up spray infused with a myriad of rainbows from the bright sun. All four of the girls are pointing now, and I follow their direction until I too can see the bit of bobbing color.

  The ball has fetched up near a neighbor's dock and seems to be caught amongst the pylons. Good. On a breezy day like today, we'd have some trouble catching it on the open water, even in the speed boat.

  I throttle down the motor and I bring us towards the dock at a slow crawl. Best to be cautious when approaching someone else's dock. We're almost there when the back door of the house slams open. An elderly man runs out and I'm half afraid he'll shake his fist at us and warn us to stay off his lawn.

  Instead, he waves to us frantically, an expression of panic on his face. I don't even think about it, I know something is wrong. Gunning the engine for a second, I aim to come alongside the dock and turn the motor off. By the time the boat sidles up to the dock, I'm out of my seat and threading a rope through a nearby gunwale.

  "Help! Help, please! She's choking! Help her, please!" The old man's voice is filled with fear.

  I hand Daphne the end of the rope. "Just hold this, hold the boat here. Girls, stay in the boat."

  I jump out of the boat onto the planks, staggering slightly as the dock sways with the impact, and then I'm sprinting to the house. The old man turns as I pass him and hurries after me.

  "Thank God. Thank God. I called 911, but they aren't here yet and she can't breathe. Then I saw you through the window. My wife, she's in the kitchen. You have to help her."

  We are through the back door and the old guy gestures towards an archway which must lead to the kitchen.

  "I'm certified in CPR and first aid," I say as I dash through the archway. "I'll do what I can."

  The old girl is lying on the linoleum. She is still conscious, but there's a bluish tint to her lips I do not like the look of. I think about starting CPR immediately, as it can be effective in dislodging objects from the throat, but I decide to try it the old-fashioned way first. CPR will almost certainly break one of the elderly lady's ribs, and at her age, such an injury would be pretty serious. I'll do it if I have to, better a broken rib or two than a dead woman, but I can try the Heimlich first.

  "I'm going to sit you up," I explain as I drop to my knees behind her and lift her shoulders off the ground. "Try to relax...try not to be afraid...I'm going to help you."

  She nods in response, but it's a feeble motion. She's seconds away from passing out, I think. I wrap my arms around her, grab my left fist with my right with my thumb knuckle pointing inward, and squeeze. Two hard and sharp motions later, and a piece of something whitish flies from her mouth and skitters away across the pink-and-black checkered floor. The lady in my arms drags in a harsh, rattling breath, and then another.

  In the distance, I hear a siren approaching. It should arrive shortly, but it's a good thing I was here. The old girl might not have made it. I sit down on my butt, but let the woman continue to lean against my chest. It will be easier for her to breathe if she isn't lying flat.

  "Thank God! Thank God! She's going to be alright, isn't she?" The old fellow has tears streaming down his face. He looks at me with such an expression of hope it gives me a good idea of just how much this old guy loves his wife.

  "I think she's going to be fine. The ambulance is coming, and they should check her out. They might want her to go to the hospital, just to be on the safe side. Choking can injure your throat."

  "We'll do whatever they say." The tears are drying up, though he continues to look frightened. "She's still here because of you, Mr...?"

  "I'm Nick." I hold out my hand and we shake a little awkwardly due to me sitting on the floor while he stands over his wife and me. "I'm visiting Sonya and Mark, it's my sister's birthday today."

  "Sonya and Mark, you say? Oh, they're such a nice young couple. They brought us some zucchini bread over the other day. Well, I don't know how to thank you, Nick. I'm Jay, and my wife is Conny, and I'm pretty sure she wouldn't be with us anymore if it wasn't for you."

  "I was happy to help."

  "We've been doing pretty well here on our own, bu
t I don't know, maybe it's time for us to think about a retirement home. I know what to do when someone is choking, and I tried, but I just wasn't strong enough."

  "I don't want to leave our house." Conny's voice is a bit ragged, but she's rallying quickly.

  "You might want to think about it when things are back to normal." I barely know them, but it makes me sad to think of them having to give up their home. They both seem spry and self-sufficient. I think not being able to help his wife has really shaken Jay up.

  "You were scared, Jay, we both were." Her voice is getting stronger already. "No reason for us to set up shop in an old folks' home just yet."

  "Accidents can happen anywhere." Don't I know it. "Moving away won't fix it. All you can do is try to be careful."

  "No more chicken breast for you." Jay waggles his index finger at his wife. "Not with those fake teeth of yours."

  "There's nothing wrong with my teeth," Conny grumbles. "The chicken was too dry. You left it in the oven too long."

  The paramedics arrive while the old couple is bickering good-naturedly, and they decide to take Conny into the hospital as a precaution. I see them off and then return to the boat.

  "Everything okay, Nick?" one of my cousins, I think it's Joyce, asks me.

  "Everything's fine." I stoop to pick up the errant beach ball and hand it to Joyce to hold on the return trip.

  "What was wrong?" Daphne asked. "We saw an ambulance, but the girls told me not to worry."

  "Yeah," my niece Jessica says. "No need to worry if Uncle Nick is around."

  "Whatever it is, he'll take care of it." Jessica's twin sister Cathy adds. "Uncle Nicky always fixes it."

  "But what happened?" Daphne is nothing if not persistent.