The Lunch He Chose Over Me

The ER and the calls that went nowhere

Sue Dunbar was one of the deputies who came out. I had known Sue since our kids played ball together. She rode with me in the ambulance a little way and held my good hand and asked me who to call.

“Dale,” I said. “My husband.”

They called him. It went to voicemail. They called again from the truck. Voicemail. Sue said she would keep trying, and she had that careful voice deputies use when they are being kind to you about something they already suspect.

At the hospital, they cut my sleeve, they put my shoulder back where it went, which is a thing I hope you never feel. They cleaned the cuts along my scalp and checked my eyes and told me I had a concussion and a dislocated shoulder and I was, all things considered, a lucky woman. I was in my own hospital, on the other side of the counter for once. Two of the nurses were girls I had trained. They kept patting my hand and telling me they had called my husband and left messages.

When I could hold my phone again, I texted him myself. Left hand strapped down, thumbing it out with my right.

I was in a wreck. Im at the ER at Memorial. Shoulder is out and I have a concussion. Can you come get me.

The little dots came up right away. He was typing. For one stupid, hopeful second, something in my chest lifted. My husband was answering. My husband was coming.

Then his reply landed.

Cant leave right now. Im at lunch with Charlene, her ex is giving her grief again and shes a wreck. Just grab a ride with somebody. Sorry hon.

The young nurse, Bethany, was standing right there refilling my water cup. She saw my face change. She told me later it was not the change she expected. She said she braced for me to cry and instead she watched something in my face go still and level, like a pond after the wind quits.

“Is there somebody else we can call for you, Miss Ruth?” she asked, real soft.

I looked at his message one more time. Twenty-nine years. Two kids. A paid-off house on Sycamore Street and a shared plot at Rest Haven cemetery we bought together at forty because we thought that was the romantic sensible thing to do, plan where you would lie down next to each other forever.

Lunch with Charlene, her ex is giving her grief again.

“No,” I told Bethany. “But I need to make one call myself.”