Broken Song (7 page)

Back at her place we parked at the curb.  A homeless woman was leaning against a light pole on the corner, looking through a plastic shopping bag.  Sandra waved happily at her.  “Hi, Tina.  Can you watch the car for me?  We gotta get the little troublemakers.”

The woman waved and nodded.  “Sure thing, Dandelion.”  Then we made our way inside and up to her apartment.

She put the bags beside the couch with a cloud of puppies around her feet.  Then she said, “OK kids, line up, time for work!”

The four cavaliers instantly calmed and sat at her feet.  But Daisy jumped up on the couch and curled up on a pillow, apparently for a nap.

I watched in amusement as the dogs patiently allowed her to clean them up with what looked like baby wipes and snap new collars on them that had tiny bright little bibs on them that had “service dog” printed on them.  Then she clipped the leashes on them and handed the leashes to me.

They were suddenly their hyper selves again as she moved to the rabbit cages.  She picked up a hello kitty purse looking thing that had a mesh door on it then grabbed a way too fluffy-looking rabbit, cleaned it and slipped a “service animal” bib on it and stuffed it into the purse.  “Get in there, Tinkerbell.”  I grinned as I realized it was a pet carrier.

She grabbed a large shoulder bag and some envelopes off the desk and turned to me.  “Ready to see my children?”  That was cryptic like everything she said.  I just nodded.

She giggled. “Good.”  Then she looked at Daisy who lifted her head. “Watch the fuzzballs, I think they're planning something.”  Daisy yipped then ran and jumped into the desk chair then up on top of the cages and looked down into the cages as she laid down.  “We're just doin' a half shift Daisy.  We'll be back early.”  I swear the dog knew what she was saying.

Then she turned to me with a smile. “Shall we be about it?”

As confused and fascinated as I was watching this obviously routine preparation dance, I found myself seriously curious as to what was coming next.  “Lead on, my lady.”

She almost skipped to the door and the dogs tried pulling me to catch up. 
Nice try little fuzz buckets.
  I walked out after her.  After waving at Tina and loading up in the car, we were off again.  All of the dogs fighting for a place on my lap and eagerly looking out the windows.  I caught myself absently stroking them.  It was relaxing.  I wonder why Victor never allowed me to get a dog for our daughters.

When we got to the hospital she stopped the car and stared straight ahead thinking.  She took a deep breath then turned to me with the most serious look I have seen on her face.  “OK, Penny.  No matter what you see or hear in there,
DO NOT REACT
.  Keep smiling, and most importantly, treat the children like any other child.  This is really important.  Most adults can't even look at them, it is so hard, but make sure to make eye contact so they know that you see them for who they are.”

She stared at me for a few more seconds and I nodded.  Then she let out a breath and smiled almost sadly this time.  “Let's get to work then.”  Then we were out and moving through the hospital to the children's wing.  The dogs were surprisingly well behaved, she stopped for a moment to clean their paws again with those wipes.

I paused as we approached some automatic doors that had “Cancer Ward” etched on the glass.  I started breathing faster but her eyes held mine and urged me forward.  The nurses at the station outside the doors waved as we approached.  A pleasantly plump nurse with graying hair said, “Hi Sandra, we were hoping you'd show up today.  The children have been asking about Monster.”

San grinned. “Well he is a heck of a guy.  Tracy, this is my friend Penny.  She'll be helping me out today.  Penny, this is Tracy, and the big lug there is Hector.”  They both smiled and nodded as we exchanged pleasantries, then Tracy waved us in.

The large room was partitioned with curtains on rails and I could make out the humming of machines and beeping of monitors.  We stopped there and my playful blonde said quietly, “Tulip, announce.”  She unclipped all the leashes, but the dogs stood where they were.  Then little Tulip sat down and howled like a wolf.  An itty bitty tiny, silly sounding wolf.

We were greeted with giggles from behind the curtains and one little girl voice squeaking as she said, “Monster is here!”  A couple curtains pulled to the side and a little sickly looking girl hooked to a rolling IV tree, accompanied by a man and woman who could only be her parents, came out.

The girl looked to have virtually no meat on her bones and she had no hair whatsoever, not even eyebrows.  Her parent's had shaved heads and looked totally healthy.  They must have done it in a display of unity for their child.  The little one couldn't have been more than six years old.  I caught myself remembering when my girls were that age.  I would have died if something like this had happened to them.  Then I started thinking about my cancer and started breathing faster.  A soft hand in mine squeezed gently reminding me not to react.  I changed my most likely panicked look, into a smile for the little girl.

I glanced over and Sandra was beaming at the girl.  An older boy, maybe ten or eleven came slowly shuffling out of the other opened curtain with a nurse or doctor with him, helping him along.  He had a huge smile on his face.  His appearance was similar to the little girl's but he had sparse patches of hair on top of his head and was bloated a little, probably from a steroid treatment.

Sandra wiggled her eyebrows at the kids and looked down at the dogs and uttered, “Shell game!”  The four dogs ran around each other bouncing and yipping then they all sat down.  Then she looked at the little girl expectantly.  The girl was looking eagerly at each of the dogs then giggled as she pointed. “That's Monster!”

Sandra giggled. “He can never fool you Ranee.  Go get her Monster!”  The little dog obediently ran up to her and she picked his excitedly wiggling form up into a big hug and wandered back into her curtained off area.

The girl's parents looked at us and smiled.  The woman said, “She's been looking forward to Monster's visit the past couple days.  Thanks for this Sandra.”

The woman almost broke down but Sandra was there almost instantly, hugging her.  “Thank Monster.  He insisted on coming today.”

The man was now holding the woman as she almost chuckled, then took a deep breath and raised her head and put on a strong smile then they followed behind their daughter.

Then Sandra was on a knee looking at the timid boy being supported by the medical professional.  I still don't know if the woman was a doctor or not.  Sandra said with a  bird-like chirp, “Your turn for a dog today Michael.  Who would you like to play with?”  He looked at me and hid behind the woman.

Sandra looked over at me.  “That's just my friend Penny, Michael.  She's helping me with these furry troublemakers today.  Aren't you Penny?”

I grinned at the boy.  “Yes, these little ones are a handful.  Can you help us out for a while and take one off of our hands for a bit?”

He nodded and pointed slowly. “Petunia.  She's not a troublemaker,” he said defiantly.

I grinned again and nodded as Sandra said, “Go get him Petunia!”  The boy was all smiles as he tried to pick up the wiggling ball of happiness that ran over to him.  He couldn't lift her so the woman grabbed Petunia with a wink to us and led Michael back into his area.

Sandra looked at me and whispered.  “I wish I had more dogs, that's where my foundation would help with more people and more animals.  As it is, each child gets to play with one every other visit.”

I turned as the doors behind us opened.  Tracy came walking in saying, “So, who's turn is it today. That's umm Fang and Monster?”

The giggling blonde rolled her eyes. “That's Fang but the other one is too pretty to be Monster.  It's Tulip.”  She grinned and wiggled her eyebrows at the nurse who just slapped her arm playfully.

Then San said, “Ranee has Monster and of course Michael chose Petunia.  So, the other two lucky children are Ted and Shandra here,” she said as she opened the curtain beside her to an empty bed.  She looked quickly at Tracy with pleading eyes.

The nurse shook her head once with a face full of regret and Sandra swayed on her feet and shuddered in a silent sob with a look of utter pain and loss.  A tear rolled down her cheek.  I wanted to hold her, I almost reached out but she wiped the tear on her sleeve and sniffed and stood tall and strong with a look of defiance on her face.  “When?”

Tracy squeezed her arm and whispered, “Early this morning.  She was a fighter.  She clung to every moment of life.”  I almost broke down myself, for the child and for the almost physical toll it seemed to take on Sandra.

Sandra shook her head and said, “Then Ted and Emily.”  She forced a smile on her face and went past Micheal’s curtain to the next.  God, she's stronger than me.

I stood in the opening and watched the grey-eyed angel as she walked up to a bed where a girl who looked to be thirteen or fourteen was laying on a hospital bed hooked up to IVs and monitors.  Though she was bloated too, she had a hollow look about her and had a stocking cap on.  She looked over to us and her mouth slowly transformed into a smile.

A small voice for a teenager said, “Hi Sandra.  Next round of chemo.”  She nudged her head toward the IV.  “Mom says they'll let me rest a little more until the next one.

Tracy walked over and started looking at the readings on the machines and checked the IV as Sandra shot Emily a stunning smile.  “Well a little bird tells me that it is your turn to take care of one of my little minions today.”

The girl gave another slow smile and turned her head.  “Oh!  Nobody got Fang?”

Sandra shrugged. “He's been holding out for you.  I think he has a crush.”  Then she looked down. “Fang, announce.”  And the little dog sat and howled to more giggles from the curtains.

Then she picked him up and set him on Emily's chest.  “Fang, cuddle.”  And he did, it was frigging cute, he snuggled into Emily and just laid there as the girl slowly stroked his furry head.  The girl grinned at us. “Great, my first boyfriend and he's an animal.”

We all shared a chuckle and Sandra kissed Emily on the forehead.  “We'll be back to see how your date turns out later.  We have to get Tulip to Ted, stat!”  She grinned at her use of hospital terms.

Emily giggled and rolled her eyes at San's antics.  “OK, I'm just gonna sit here with my beau then.” She looked at me then back to the blonde dynamo. “Who's your friend?”

Sandra smiled. “That's Penny, she's helping me out to...”

The girl's eyes went wide. “Wait!  You're Penny Franklin!”

I stepped up and grinned at her then stroked her cheek lightly. “Yes, but let's keep that little secret to ourselves, shall we?”  She nodded more vigorously than I thought she could in her condition.  I kissed the top of her knitted cap.  Tracy's eyes were so wide at the revelation that I thought they'd pop out of her head as Sandra and I made our way along with Tulip.  We went down the row of curtained off areas to the end and she pulled back the last curtain.

There was a boy, maybe five years old.  He was asleep.  Though I was scared to death it was more than sleep the way his breathing seemed so shallow.  Sandra walked up to him with pain in her eyes as she stroked his cheek then kissed it and lifted Tulip up beside him and she put his arm on top of her. “Tulip, snuggle,” she said and the dog obeyed.  I swear I saw Ted's fingers lightly sinking into Tulip's fur a little.

She smiled at the boy and we exited his curtain.  Then with a silly voice Sandra said loudly, “Oh my, I seem to have an extra animal today.  Oh what am I to do with Tinkerbell?”

There were some cute “Me, me, mes,” coming from the curtains.

Sandra turned to one partition. “Was that Yvette chiming out first?”  There was a strong giggle from behind the curtain and we stepped through to a sixteen or seventeen year old girl.  She had the bed adjusted so she was sitting up as she sketched in a book.  There was something sticking in her neck that looked like a valve.  I tried not to look at it and just smiled at the girl.  She was gaunt but there was such sparkling life twinkling in her eyes.  An undeniable strength.  Even bald this girl was a beauty.  She reminded me so much of my daughters.

Sandra made a show of unzipping the door on the carrier then plopped the carrier onto Yvette's lap. She started to speak, “My partner in crime over there is...”

“
Penny Franklin.” Yvette finished for her softly.  “Gawd I love your music.”  Then she held her finger to lips before anyone could respond and whispered, “But you're just Penny here right?”

I winked at her.  “Right.  What you working on there?”

She handed me her sketchbook and retrieved Tinkerbell from the carrier and proceeded to nuzzle and cuddle her.  I flipped through the pages with Sandra leaning on my back to look.  Her heat was leaching into my back and I found myself pleasantly distracted until I looked at the artwork.  I was floored, this was museum quality work.  The things portrayed were fantastical and amazing.  A unicorn standing tall and proud in a meadow with the wind whipping its mane.  It looked so real you could almost reach out and touch it.

I stopped on one page, it was unmistakeable.  Sandra floating on a cloud of cavaliers with that smile I can't seem to get enough of.  I felt a lurch that felt like the blonde in question, who was still leaning on my back, was stopping a sob.  I quickly went to the next picture.  I was on the verge of tears of my own and I had absolutely no idea why.  “These are beautiful Yvette.”