My Name Is River Blue

by Noah James Adams

  The EMTs and sheriff's deputies arrived quicker than I expected. I could see beams of light shining from below and to our right, raking across the area where I remained trapped in the car with Ant. The rescue crew had responded to our location in the past, and they knew that the old farm road by the Thomas place was the shortest way to reach us. As if it mattered at that moment, I oddly wondered if anyone had ever thought of building a safer bypass around Henry's Hill. What were they waiting for?

  The lights were coming closer. I heard voices. The crew was moving up the trail towards us, and I had the smallest flicker of hope. Just for a moment, I thought they might be in time.

  Then I heard a different sound from Ant. A throaty, struggling gasp.

  I told Ant that I was smiling, just the way he always wanted. I promised him that I would work harder, if he would only stay with me. Then I told him something that I had never said outright to him before that night. I knew that he already understood, but I hoped that in saying those words aloud that they would somehow have enough power for a miracle.

  He made another sound. A long rush of breath. There was nothing more.

  The woods around me grew bright from the lights of the rescue team, and their voices grew louder as they came closer. I was aware of the urgent activity and intense dialogue of the team as they began their work to help Ant and me. A strong beam hit me directly in my eyes, which I quickly closed, but before I did, I caught just a glimpse of Ant and the wreckage surrounding us inside the car. Everything I saw was mangled, colored red, and covered with sparkling pieces of glass. I wish that I had never seen what I did in that brief moment, and I know that no matter how hard I try to forget, the image of Ant will stay with me as long as I live.

  Someone aimed a light at my face.

  "Oh god!" The man's voice was loud. I knew him.

  "What? What is it?" Another voice asked from farther away.

  "It's River Blue," said the first voice, the one I knew.

  "Are you sure?"

  "Positive. My son and I played catch with him in the park just a week ago."

  With my eyes still closed, I heard the second man passing the word along to the rest of the crew. Sergeant Cox tried to wake me.

  "River, this is Sergeant Cox. Can you hear me?" His light was still in my face.

  "Yes," I said. "I'm not asleep. You're blinding me."

  "Sorry, River." The sergeant shifted his beam. "The team is setting up, and we'll have you out soon. We’ll carry you to a flat clearing about thirty yards from here where the Medevac chopper will set down and then fly you guys to the hospital. Who is that with you?"

  “Ant, my brother.”

  "Can you tell me where you're hurt?" Sergeant Cox seemed different. His face was fuzzy, and his voice distant. It was difficult to focus on his questions with my brain crawling.

  "My left arm's broken. I think my back and legs are messed up."

  "Okay, can you tell me Ant's condition?”

  "He's dead." Even to me, my voice sounded strangely unemotional. According to Sergeant Cox, it was the last thing I said before losing consciousness. To the best of my knowledge, the next time I spoke was three days later in the ICU of Bergeron County Hospital.

  I have never watched it, but a TV magazine show did a story called Friday Night Heroes, A Tragedy in the South. I refused to give an interview. So did Sergeant Cox.

  ***

  My nightmares don't come every night anymore, and they're not always the same, but the assault on my senses is always strong and real to me. In one dream, the car's violent somersaults are accompanied by the sounds of metallic scraping, bending, and crunching. After we smash into the tree, strong hands with scarred knuckles reach through the broken glass, grab me tightly by my throat, and pull me into a dark tunnel where I hear screams coming from the other end. I'm choking and struggling to breathe as the hands continue to drag me through the tunnel towards the voices. I finally come to a light so I can see who is dragging me, but I can never remember who or what I saw. I wake up gasping. I stink of sweat and fear.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Seven months later

  July 2005

  The summer following the accident was the hottest I could remember, and the day I packed my belongings in early July, the temperature reached ninety-six degrees with life-sucking humidity. The air conditioning in Tolley House never worked as well upstairs as it did downstairs, and most of us eight boys, who all shared bedrooms on the second floor, wore only our boxers or gym shorts in our rooms. Hal Mackey swore that the state had approved funds needed to upgrade the central air system and that the work would begin within two weeks. It was great news for the boys who would enjoy the new system, but after reaching the age of eighteen and graduating from high school, I had "aged out" and could no longer live there. The next day, I was moving to Deer Lake Farm.

  I had not seen my girlfriend for three days, our longest separation since the accident, and I missed her even more than I thought I would. Yeah, Carlee, my girlfriend. It's funny how things change. She wanted to help me with my move, but I insisted that she go on vacation with her family. We didn't give Big Bill another reason to hate me.

  We both knew that her folks, especially Big Bill, would go ballistic when they realized that Carlee's relationship with me was more serious than they thought. He had tolerated Carlee spending time with me during my recovery, but I knew that he was near the end of his patience. My guess was that he was avoiding a fight with Carlee because he thought that in late August, his problem would be solved when she left me behind to attend college out of state. Big Bill didn't know yet that his little girl's college plans included me.

  Cleaning out my half of the room was not difficult, but the combination of heat, physical activity, and pain caused me to perspire soon after I started. I packed clothes, toiletries, personal items, and mementos of sentimental value, mostly things that had belonged to Ant. I told my foster brothers that they could have anything I left in my room. As I continued to work, rivulets of sweat rolled from my pits down my sides, soaking my boxers until they were sagging from the weight.

  I had mentioned to Papa that I intended to toss all of my football trophies and awards, but he asked me if he could have them. I think he wanted to save them for me in case I changed my mind, so I had one of my foster brothers load them in his truck one day when Papa stopped by the house. Since Tolley House was full of wild boys, Hal and Jenny asked for my crutches, if I didn't want them. I wished that I could give them my cane, but I used it often, especially on bad pain days, and there were still more bad days than good ones.

  When I was almost done with packing, I had filled a large, green duffel bag, two gym bags, and two paper grocery sacks. I would pack the remaining toiletry items after I finished in the bathroom the next morning, and I would get my pills and written prescriptions from Jenny before I left. I was eighteen years old, but the state still required house parents to control and administer all medications in a group home.

  I took three different kinds of pain medicine, and I had other medications for muscle spasms, inflammation, and depression. I was on time-released morphine and a nerve pain blocker around the clock every day. In my pocket, I carried a pill fob, which contained oxycodone to dull breakthrough pain generated from my spine and left leg. As my pain management doctor suggested, I carried a photocopy of the current prescriptions in my wallet in case I ever had to explain the contents of my fob to authorities.

  I would have to come to Harper Springs for my pain management appointments every two months. Since state law prohibited refills on my narcotics, the appointments were primarily for my doctor to write new prescriptions for two months worth of my medications. The doctor had to write a separate prescription for each drug to be filled thirty days apart. It was inconvenient for patients who would be taking the drugs indefinitely, but the state, doctors, pharmacists, and insurance companies followed strict policies concerning narcotics prescriptions.

  ***

&nbs
p; During my first weeks in the hospital, my injuries confined me to bed, and I needed help with the most basic tasks. My left arm was in a cast, as was my left leg, the cast running from hip to foot. I had three broken fingers on my right hand, which was cut and badly bruised along with my right arm. When I was still in Ant's car, I didn't realize that I had so many lacerations, but a nurse told me that I needed more than two hundred twenty stitches, most of them in my arms and legs. My doctors declared it a miracle that my accident caused no life threatening internal harm.

  The damage to my spine was my most painful injury, and initially, if I attempted more than the slightest movement on my own, the ungodly pain would shoot like an electrical fire from my back through my buttocks and down my legs to my feet. My left side was the worst. I often thought the toes on my left foot might fly off in small balls of fire, and I routinely asked the nurses to make sure my morphine was not an expired batch. The pain taught me to do only what I was physically ready to do, and if my condition had not gradually improved, I believe I would have begged for a lethal dose of morphine.

  From the night of the accident, I spent just over two months in the hospital, followed by three months as an inpatient of the rehab center. I would have been discharged much sooner from the hospital, but I developed a nasty infection in my left leg. For a time, I was afraid that I might lose it. As I was healing from the infection, they found a blood clot in my leg that the doctor had to dissolve before it became life threatening.

  Between my neurosurgeon and orthopedic surgeon, they used rods, plates, screws, and cadaver discs to repair the damage to my arm, leg, and spine. When they had done all they could, they referred me to a pain management doctor to deal with my chronic pain. The surgeons were not confident enough to predict how much my current level of pain would decrease with time and continued therapy, but both assured me that the pain management doctor would help me achieve the "best quality of life possible."

  During my last appointment with Dr. Atchison, the neurosurgeon, he answered my questions until I was satisfied that I understood his opinion of how different my new life would be. He had informed me early on that I would never play sports again, and he, along with the orthopedic surgeon, were unsure if I would improve enough to ever hold down more than a part-time office job. If I progressed enough to work full-time, they believed that it would have to be light work with the freedom to change physical positions and take frequent rest periods. As hard as I tried, I couldn't picture a job that fit that description.

  On the positive side, Dr. Atchison assured me that because I was an athlete in top condition at the time of the accident, I had progressed faster than most patients would have, and I had a better chance of achieving good results with continued physical therapy. He warned me that negativity and depression were my enemies.

  According to Dr. Atchison, I had already been blessed with two miracles because I was lucky to be alive and equally fortunate that the accident did not leave me paralyzed. He suggested that I take positive energy from those gifts and apply it to my continued efforts towards a meaningful recovery. He insisted that my new life, although different from what I had planned, could be just as rewarding.

  I could hardly believe that the doctor fed me such a bullshit line with a straight face. I wanted to shove my cheap, wooden cane up his ass. I wanted to tell him that while different from what he had planned, if he swallowed enough pain meds and kept a positive attitude, it could be just as rewarding to walk bowlegged and shit splinters for a month. I seriously might have spent the night in jail had Carlee not been there to calm me with a squeeze of her hand and a pleading look in her eyes.

  Yeah, Carlee again. My relationship with her was another dramatic change in my life, and although I initially fought her kindness and selfless devotion to me, she was relentless in her efforts to help me and impervious to my nasty verbal assaults. My hateful behavior would have provoked most girls to call me an ungrateful asshole right before they granted my wish to suffer alone.

  There were times in the hospital that as tough as Papa was, and as much as he cared for me, even he would have to leave my room for a calming walk before my remarks made him lose his temper. Papa, Manny, Miss Martin, Max, Hal, and Jenny all took turns sitting with me, but I remember them taking frequent breaks from my room. I'm sure that they were all thankful for the many hours of relief Carlee gave them by staying with me longer than her fair share. Howie Spearman, who had a four-hour drive round trip, usually stayed with me a full day each week, and everyone was always anxious to know which day Howie was coming.

  Carlee saw me every day with few exceptions and stayed as long as she could. On some school days, she would bring her books, and if I nodded off to sleep, she would do homework. If I were awake, she took care of anything I needed and updated me on school happenings. She had a good sense of when to talk and when to be quiet, and the only times she aggravated me was when she was much nicer than I deserved, which, in the beginning, was every day.

  There was an afternoon, a few weeks into my hospital stay, when my mind was clear enough that I suddenly realized Carlee had changed into a young woman that anyone would admire. I had noticed good changes in her before the holiday break, but in the hospital, it was even more evident that she was a different person. I no longer saw her as possessive, self-absorbed, and spoiled. She was good company, and I missed her when she wasn't there.

  The more time I spent with her, I liked the new Carlee much better than I did the new River. I acted much like the cynical, angry kid I was when I first arrived at Tolley House. It was easy to hate everything, including me. I hated that I was stupid enough to believe that state kids like Ant and I could make our dreams come true by working hard and honestly for what we wanted. I hated that I allowed myself to care so much for Ant that his death was the worst pain I had ever known.

  I don't believe that I will ever completely understand how Carlee could faithfully stand by me no matter how nasty I was to her. She never lost her temper with me or cut a visit short because I was a jerk to her. With every instance where I did my best to crush her feelings and run her off, she responded with understanding and kindness. She made me crazy.

  The only time that I remember Carlee chewing on me was not for anything that I said to her, but for my rudeness to Max. He got on my nerves by repeatedly telling me how sorry he was about the accident. Carlee told me that Max was trying to be a good friend to me, but he often wondered if he should stop visiting because everything he said seemed to upset me. She reminded me that Ant was Max's friend too. I had never even considered how much Ant's death hurt Max, but after talking to Carlee, I made a point to be nicer to him.

  Before I was well enough to begin catching up with my school work, Carlee would often read to me at night before she left for home. One night, when Carlee sat next to my hospital bed and read Howie Spearman's sports column to me, I interrupted and very bluntly asked her why she was still spending hours with me after the many times I had been rude to her.

  "Why are you doing this, Carlee?"

  "Reading to you?"

  "You know what I mean. Why are you here so much? What's in it for you?"

  "I love you and I want to help. That's all."

  "There's not going to be any miracles. I'll never be a rich and famous football player. I'll be lucky to get a minimum wage part-time job. I'll be lucky if I can do anything."

  "River, I think I have been here enough to have a clear understanding of your medical condition, and it doesn't affect the way I feel. I love you and that's not going to change."

  "I told you long before the accident that we weren't going to be a couple."

  "I know, and you had every right to say what you did. I didn't deserve you. I was terrible to you and honestly, I wouldn't have wanted an immature, possessive, snobbish bitch, either."

  I laughed for the first time since the accident. I laughed so loudly that I surprised Carlee, who blushed and giggled over the self-description she had offered. "That's on
e hell of a string of adjectives, Carlee."

  "I know, but it's true." Carlee laughed with me until we both had tears running from our eyes.

  When we recovered, I still had serious questions. "So what are you expecting from me, Carlee? That I'll be grateful that any girl would want me the way I am now?"

  "I'm not expecting anything," she said, a stern edge to her voice. "It would be a lie to say that I don't want you to love me back like a guy loves his girlfriend, but I'm okay with simple friendship, if that's all I can have."

  I doubted that she was okay with friendship. Still, Carlee really had changed, and her personality was becoming as beautiful as the rest of her. "Carlee, I'm not the boy you fell in love with. He doesn't live here anymore. Being a good athlete was all I had going for me. I was a 'nobody' when we first met. Now I'm less than that."

  She stared intently, and I was sure she saw my eyes glisten. She stood, moved closer to my bed, and gently stroked her fingers through my hair.

  "I once heard that people are the sum total of their experiences,'" whispered Carlee. "So after what you've been through, you aren't the same boy, and I'm not the same girl, but people are always growing and changing in some way or another. It's not important to me that you won't be a super star football player anymore. Do you remember when I faked falling so that you would catch me?"

  "Yeah. Seventh grade." How could I forget a scene that my mind had replayed a thousand times?

  "Mr. Miller would tell me anything if I smiled the right way and leaned in close when I asked him. I knew you were a foster kid from Tolley House, and I knew about Stockwell. None of it mattered to me. You weren't even playing football then, and I had no idea that you would become the best high school football player in the country. I don't care that you're not as physically gifted as you were, or that you won't be rich from playing pro football. When you held me in your arms in that hall, I fell in love with you. I still love you, River, and I always will."