Alive on Opening Day (6 page)

“
There
has to be something you can do!” Clara exclaimed. “Or
something
we
can do,” she added, looking to David. He squeezed his wife’s
shoulder.

Parks moved closer to the
couple and touched their hands with his. “He’s in the right place,
Clara,” Parks assured her. “Nothing is going to happen to your son,
but this is one of those situations we can’t force. The human body
is resilient, especially when it’s a young, healthy body. Dan just
needs time, and I’m confident he’ll come back to you.”

“
But what if he doesn’t?”
David asked. “Could he be like this forever?”

Parks shook his head. “No,
David, we won’t let that happen. If nothing has changed in a couple
of weeks, we’ll reconsider our options. For now, though, let’s give
Dan a chance to figure this out on his own, OK?”

David and Clara nodded,
but neither one looked confident.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Swaddled

“
So I
was
hibernating
?” Dan asked as he scraped the last bit of egg onto a piece
of toast with his fork. “Like a
bear
?”

Clara nodded. “I know it
sounds unbelievable, honey, and, trust me, I didn’t want to accept
it, either. But there was simply no other explanation.”

“
Whoa!” Dan said, looking
to his mother with wide-eyed marvel. “So what happened
next?”

He might well have been
asking Clara for a recap of the latest blockbuster movie rather
than nine months in his own life. “I mean, how did I get from a
hospital in Indianapolis in June to my bedroom by the following
March? Seems like I’m still missing quite a bit of information
here, Mom.”

Clara poured another
serving of orange juice into Dan’s empty glass.

“
You’re right, Dan.
There’s more,” she said. She sighed and then launched into the rest
of the story.

Two more weeks had passed,
and Dan’s condition had not changed one whit, but Dr. Parks had
still been reluctant to intervene. He believed as long as Dan was
stable, they should continue to give his body the chance to heal
itself. Clara and David pushed hard, though, and eventually sought
a second opinion. When the second doctor was more aggressive in his
treatment ideas, Dr. Parks consented to try some sort of hormonal
therapy if the Hodges would call off their hired gun. David trusted
Parks and wanted him to care for Dan, so the Hodges agreed, but
with the understanding that they wanted to take any and every
action necessary to bring their son back to
consciousness.

After several weeks of
hormonal therapy, augmented by periodic adrenaline shots and other
revival attempts, Dan was still unresponsive. While these measures
did boost his heart and breathing rate temporarily, they never
brought him close to consciousness, according to EEG readings, and
he soon slid back to his slow baseline pulse and breathing rates.
It appeared no matter what doctors tried, Dan
wanted
to remain asleep.

These results bolstered
Parks’ resolve to let Dan work through his condition naturally, and
he resisted further suggestions from the Hodges that they try new
techniques. The second-opinion doctor agreed nothing seemed to be
helping and so he flopped his recommendation to match Parks’. When
a third and fourth, this latter brought in from Chicago, also
concurred further treatment may do more harm than good, Clara and
David finally had relented and accepted the fact Dan would not be
forced into consciousness. They eventually settled into a routine
of visiting their son as much as possible, with Clara spending most
days at the hospitals and David coming on weekends and most
nights.

By late summer, Dan had
turned 19, and the insurance company at HBM began to make noises
about discontinuing coverage for the boy’s care. Their argument was
that he was out of high school, well past legal age, and should
therefore be responsible for his own care, while David and Clara
contended Dan was a dependent child who should continue to be
covered under David’s policy. As cool fall breezes blew across the
brilliant Indiana landscape in October, the issue reached a tipping
point, and the Hodges were forced to hire a lawyer in order to stay
their coverage while the legal wrangling played out.

Two weeks before
Christmas, the two sets of legal counsel worked out an agreement,
though David and Clara had little input into the decision. Under
the new arrangement, the insurance company would cover expenses for
Dan to receive three in-home visits per week from a nursing center,
and he would be covered for any medical emergencies which arose. No
longer would he be able to stay in the hospital, though, with
constant monitoring. The agreement was to take effect on January 1,
1974, but Clara decided she would have her son home for the
holidays.

So, on Christmas Eve,
Clara and David drove to Methodist together, checked their son out
of the hospital, and brought him back to Pickens County for
Christmas.

The rest of the winter had
passed just like the previous six months, with no discernible
change in Dan’s condition. In addition to the three weekly nurse
visits, Dr. Parks made regular stops at the Hodges house to check
on his patient and to run a few rudimentary tests. There had been
no medical crises in the three months since Christmas, and blood
tests showed the same markers of hibernation that had been in play
since April. Parks had told the Hodges early on they would see a
small uptick in Dan’s hormone levels not long before he woke up,
but his numbers had not budged at all by the New Year.

His hair would start
growing again, too, Parks told them. Clara had insisted on sprucing
up Dan’s appearance during his first week in the hospital, which
entailed giving him a close-crop haircut and a clean shave. Neither
his hair nor his beard had grown
at
all
from that day until they brought him
home for the holidays.

In her heart, Clara never
lost hope her son would someday wake up, but she was discouraged
and felt like she might have lost him for good. She and David had
settled into as normal a routine as they could and were at least
somewhat resigned to the idea Dan might be with them, asleep, for
the rest of their lives.

—

As his mother finished her
story, tears building in her eyes, Dan was stunned but sympathetic
to his mother’s plight. He wasn’t surprised she felt guilty about
his accident and hibernation, but he wanted to relieve her angst as
much as he could.

“
It’s OK, Mom,” Dan
assured Clara. “Look” — he graced her with his cheesiest smile —
“I’m fine. See? You did everything you could to bring me back, and,
well, here I am! Besides, you should have known I’d wake up soon.
The baseball season starts next week, and I always come alive on
Opening Day.”

“
Thank you, Dan, for
trying to make me feel better,” Clara said, “but it’s so hard for a
mother to stand by helplessly while her child
struggles.”

“
I know, Mom.”

She walked behind his
chair, slipping an arm around his chest while he continued to
eat.

“
Oh, Dan, I can’t tell you
how happy and relieved I am to have you back,” she said and “It
feels almost like the day you were born!”

She kissed the top of his
head, and he reached an arm back to pat her shoulder.

“
But, honey,” Clara
continued. “We don’t really know what this means yet, so I want you
to take things slow and easy, OK?”

“
OK, Mom,” he
agreed.

“
And we’re going to have
to go see Dr. Parks just as soon as we can. This afternoon if he’s
available,” she said.

“
OK, Mom, that’s fine,”
Dan said.

She held him tight for a
few seconds more, stalling, just enjoying the quiet moments they
had together. Finally, she said, “And Dan?”

“
Yeah, Mom, what is it?”
he could sense there was something she wanted to say.

“
I have something else to
tell you, son,” Clara said.

Dan’s heart picked up and,
for the first time, he realized David wasn’t there. He stood and
whirled toward his mother, grabbing both her arms in his hands. “Is
it Dad?” Dan asked, panicked. “Did something happen to
Dad?”

Clara was startled by
Dan’s sudden movement, and she shook her head to clear her
thoughts. “What? Oh … no! No, your father is fine, Dan,” she told
him. “He’s just at work. I called and left a message with the
receptionist, but I don’t know when she’ll deliver it to your
dad.”

Dan’s body relaxed and he
let out a huge sigh. “Oh, thank goodness,” he said. “But what was
it you wanted to tell me, Mom?”

Clara was about to respond
when a car door clanged shut in front of the house.

“
Who’s that?” Dan asked,
but he didn’t wait for the answer, hurrying to the front
door.

On the street in front of
the Hodges house stood a dingy green Oldsmobile sedan, with four
doors and plenty of rust around the wheel welds.

“
Who
is
that?” Dan repeated as Clara joined him in the entry
way.

At that moment, the
driver’s side front door swung open, and a brown penny loafer
clomped on the pavement, attached to a dainty ankle. As the driver
exited the car, Dan followed the leg up a curvy young body and
nearly exploded out the door when his gaze landed on a plump but
beautiful face.

“
Gabbie!” he called, but
then realized she couldn’t hear him through the door. He opened the
latch and ran out into the yard, with Clara following close
behind.

“
Hold on, son,” Clara
called to him, but he didn’t hesitate. “Dan, STOP!”

Dan was just a few feet
from Gabbie, who was fussing with something in the passenger’s seat
and had not yet seen him. He spun to face his mother with his arms
outstretched and said in an exasperated voice, “What,
Mother?”

“
Dan,”
she started again, “I know you’re anxious to see Gabbie, but you
need to look at me and listen to what I’m saying …
right now
.”

He raised his eyebrows to
indicate he was listening and wanted his mother to hurry up, but
then someone gasped behind him.

“
Dan, I didn’t realize you
were already out here!” It was Gabbie’s voice.

Dan spun around to face
his girl, and Clara reached for his shoulder to stop his turn. She
was too late.

Dan’s jaw dropped open and
his vision went white at the edges when he saw Gabbie standing
there, just a foot way from him in front of the old jalopy …
holding a baby.

CHAPTER NINE

Starting Over

Dan looked back and forth
from Gabbie to the bundle in her arms, unable to fully comprehend
what he was seeing. There was his high school girlfriend, whom he
remembered as the slender young lady behind third base cheering him
on just the night before. Now here she was, maybe 15 pounds heavier
and much curvier, holding a baby who couldn’t have been any more
than a few weeks old.

“
Gabbie …” was all he
could say.

Clara laid a hand on her
son’s shoulder and said quietly in his ear, “This is what I was
trying to tell you, honey.” Dan brushed his mother’s lips away like
he was swatting a fly and squinted at Gabbie.

She was wearing an orange
polyester skirt with a light jacket to match, covering a flowered
blouse. Her blond hair was pulled back into a pony tail, and her
blue eyes glimmered in the spring sunshine.

She smiled softly and
said, “Dan, I can’t believe you’re awake!” She brought a hand to
her mouth, shooting a surprised glance to Clara.

Clara nodded at the girl.
“It’s OK, Gabbie,” she said. “I’ve told him most of the story. Dan
knows he has been hibernating for the last nine months.”

Dan watched the two women
speak as if he were at a tennis match, head bobbing back and forth.
His mother’s words seemed to turn on a light bulb, and he gasped
out, “Nine months!”.

Gabbie smiled and bowed
her head, casting a knowing but demure gaze his way. Dan placed a
gentle left hand on Gabbie’s shoulder as if she were a fragile
porcelain doll and stuttered, “Is … is … is th-that a
b-b-baby?”.

He was craning his neck
forward gawking at the babe in Gabbie’s crooked left arm. He pulled
back and looked into Gabbie’s eyes.