I woke up spitting grass out of my mouth. I was face down on my lawn, naked from the waist up. Night had fallen and I was cold, shivering.
Sunstroke. I'd been swilling energy drinks, skipping meals, and working in the heat.
I hadn't been taking care of myself, and I'd gotten heat stroke.
I was goddamn lucky to be alive.
I sat up with a groan, my arms shaking, barely able to hold my weight till I sat up. My head was ringing and my vision blurry. I could see the hose coiled on the holder on the side of the house and started crawling toward it. My stomach kept cramping and I had to stop and rest twice, my head pounding like it was going to crack open.
I could remember being completely confused, thinking Pru was still alive. I remembered looking for, thinking we'd gone to visit some acquaintance.
I found out I still had enough water for tears.
I fumbled the hose down, reaching up with one weak hand to turn the handle. The water sprayed into my face and I greedily began gulping it down.
I threw it back up.
I drank more, then turned off the water, feeling my stomach cramp.
I laid in the wet cold grass, shivering, waiting for the stomach cramps to ease up.
I could remember buying a riding lawn mower with a bag attachment and riding around the property, throwing away debris when I found it, emptying the clippings into the dumpster. I'd built another shed so the smaller shed could be where the riding lawn mower lived and the other one could act as a workshed. I'd had the garbage hauled off three times, then called in a dump truck full of gravel to gravel the road and a parking area. I'd replaced the firewood and loaded the woodshed by sawing down two dead trees and chopping them up.
I'd gotten heat stroke after laying down the flagstones for the front walk.
Stupid stupid stupid.
I'd only thrown up water. God only knew the last time I'd actually eaten.
I remembered feeling like Pru was chasing me. Any time I wasn't working she was behind me, staring at me, blaming me for letting her die.
I curled up in a ball and cried, my chest hurting so bad I honestly thought I was having a heart attack.
Light washed over me and I managed to sit up before flopping back in the grass, my muscles refusing to work. A beat up dented pickup truck came to a stop in the gravel. I tried to sit up and fell backwards again.
"You all right, Texas?" Old Pete called out, walking around the front of his truck.
"Over here," I managed to say.
Of course, I chose that moment to throw up again.
"Yer sunburnt all over pretty bad, Texas," the old man said. He squatted down near me. "You get drunk and pass out?"
I shook my head, heaving up more water.
"You haven't been in town a couple days. You missed coming by the diner for your lunch," he said. "Madison and her pa asked me to come on up and check on you. Said you hadn't missed a lunch in over a week."
"What's today?" I managed to gasp out, then started dry heaving.
"Second of July, Texas," The old man said. "I'm gonna call Doc Rutheford," He told me, pulling a cell phone out of his pocket.
I just heaved up another gout of water.
"Hey, Doc. Pete here," the old man said. "Yeah, I'm up at Mary-Beth's ol' shitty trailer. Got a boy here with sunstroke. Can you come out?" He put his hand on my back. "Yeah, he's still burning up like he's got a fever. Yeah? OK. How about if I spray him with water? All right."
I heaved again as the old man unspooled the hose and turned it on. He started misting me with the water.
"Doc's on the way," he told me.
I tried to grab the hose, desperate for a drink, but he held it out of my reach and went back to spraying me down. I started coughing, deep wracking coughs that made my chest hurt.
I suddenly wanted Pru.
When I remembered she was dead I started crying again.
The water moved off of my and I felt the old man's rough callused hand on the back of my neck. He started misting me with water again.
"Still burning up, boy," He told me.
I coughed, curling over, and when I was done he grabbed my arm, pulling me into a sitting position, and kept taking the hose off of me for a minute or two and then spraying me.
"Seems like a Texas boy would know how to avoid heatstroke," he mused.
I tried to answer, but ended up coughing.
"Course, a man who lost his wife, he might not care if he got heat stroke and died on his front lawn," he said to nobody in particular.
After a little bit lights washed over us and I heard a car door slam.
"He ain't Aquaman, Pete, you can ease up off the water," A rough phlegmy voice groused. "When did Mary-Beth fix this shit pile up?"
"She didn't. Texas here did," Pete said.
The doctor knelt down, putting his fingers on my wrist and checking his watch. "Heart's racing like a hammer, son." He was older, sixties or seventies, with a goatee and his iron colored hair in a mullet. "You're burning up. Let's get you inside."
My muscles were rubber as the two men helped me inside. It smelled of paint, new carpet, and was spotless.
"Where's your bedroom?" The doctor asked.
"Been sleeping in the back of my truck," I told him.
"Which room has a bed in it?" He asked me.
I coughed and he waited for me to finish.
"I don't like the sound of that cough," He told me. "Pete, give us some light. We'll put the boy on the couch."
I remembered the couch. I'd gone to a couple thrift stores in nearby Irving and went shopping, buying furniture for the house. I remembered the workers bringing it in and setting it where I said while the guys from the gravel company leveled and steamrolled the road.
When the light came on the doctor jerked back, staring at my chest.
"Good God Almighty, son, what happened to you?" He asked.
"Huh?" I looked down, expecting to see a bleeding wound or a piece of metal sticking out of me. "What?"
He picked up the dogtags, looking at them.
"What did you say your name was again, son?" Doc Rutheford asked me.
"Sam. Sam English," I told him. My head was still swimming.
"Huh," he said, dropping the dogtags. "What's your blood type, Sam?"
"O-Negative," I said.
"Last four?" He snapped.
I answered out of reflex. "Three one two two," the last was said in a mumble, my head hanging down.
"Huh," was all the doctor said. He looked at Old Pete. "I got this now, Pete. Why don't you go on home to your wife," he looked at me. "Breathe deep, son."
Pete looked doubtful but nodded.
"Night, Texas. You take care of yourself, ya hear?" He told me. He stopped at the door. "I'll bring you up lunch tomorrow. Me or one of my girls."
"Thanks," I said, gasping as the doctor put his stethoscope on my chest.
"So, any particular reason you're wearing the dogtags of another man?" He asked me, putting his stethoscope on the other side. Before I could answer he put his stethoscope on the other side of my chest. "That's odd."
"I'm missing part of my lung," I told him.
Doc Rutheford leaned back, looking at me. He got up, got a chair two dining room chairs, and bought them in next to the couch.
"That so," he said. He pulled an IV line and a banana bag out of his satchel.
"Missing two ribs on that side too," I told him, flushing.
He glanced down, putting the hydration IV together. "Yup. Obvious now that you mention it."
I blushed, which immediately made me dizzy.
"As your doctor, is there anything else I need to know?" He asked me.
"Missing my spleen," I told him. "Appendix too. I've got surgical pins in my right forearm and right hand, right femur, and I've had my right leg rebuilt."
"That's a lot of missing parts, son," he said gently. I flinched slightly at the pinch of the IV line going into my wrist.
He leaned back, looking at me. "Your name is John Bomber, isn't it?"
I nodded, still feeling dizzy.
"You're the one that's been on TV, that rich Texan the FBI and the Texas Rangers are looking for," he said.
"You gonna tell them?" I asked him.
He sighed, rubbing his hands on his pantlegs. "No. You're my patient, and that gives you doctor patient confidentiality."
"Thanks," I said, and I found I meant it.
"Can I ask what's going on?" He asked me. "Might as well make talk, I need to run at least two bags into you."
I nodded. "My wife died. I couldn't stand it any more."
"That's a hell of thing to happen to man," He said gently. He put a device against my ear, clicked it, and got a beep. "Hundred and two. You're lucky you're made of Texas rawhide."
"Wasn't thinking. I went a little crazy, I think," I told him.
He looked around. "You do all this yourself?" He asked me.
"Plumber and his sons did the bathroom, except the cabinets, and the plumbing and septic tank, but I did everything else," I told him.
He shook his head. "That fat old crook Mary-Beth sure got over on this one. The place looks like new."
I hiccuped a sob. "I couldn't stop. Once I started working, I couldn't stop," I said, tears running again. "Every time I stopped, I remembered she was dead, and it hurt so bad I wanted to die."
"Are you sleeping, Sam?" He asked me gently.
"When I collapse," I told him honestly. "I've been sleeping in the back of my truck even though the house was finished. I don't know why."
He got up, walking into the kitchen. "This your pistol, Sam?"
"A .45?" I asked.
"Yup. On top of a note," he picked up the piece of paper, adjusting his glasses. "Son, do you remember writing this note?"
I shook my head. "No," I told him.
"Rambling. Disjointed. Apologetic. Written to multiple people at once," He mused. He turned back and walked back over to me after setting my pistol down on the table. "When was the last time you had a good night's sleep?"
I started crying harder, my head pounding and my stomach twisting. He gave me a few moments, waiting till I could talk.
"I woke up, and she was dead in my arms. Autopsy said it was a congenital heart defect. Said she didn't feel any pain, she just didn't wake up," I cried.
"Uh-huh," The Doctor said. "Can see why you aren't sleeping right."
He dug in his pocket, pulling out a cell phone. "I'll be right back, Sam. You just lay back and let the bag do its work."
I heard him call someone in the hallway, then he walked back out. He lifted up the phone from the charger, pressed the button, listened to the dial tone, then set it back down.
"Place looks like a showroom, Sam," He said, sitting back down next to me. He flicked the IV line with a finger. "You slept a single night in here?" I shook my head. "You eaten a single meal in here?" Again I shook my head. "So you fixed it up, and have been living in the back of your truck?"
"Yes, sir," I said, hanging my head.
When he put it that way, it sounded stupid.
"Not surprising," he said. "How long were you married?"
"Over fifteen years," I told him. "We'd loved each other since we were kids."
"Nobody made sure you saw a doctor or a priest?" He asked. Again I shook my head.
"Some friends came to help me bury her, stayed a couple weeks with me, but they had to leave again," I told him.
"How long after they left did you leave?" He asked me.
"Three, maybe four days," I told him.
He nodded. "That's about right," he said. "When's the last time you ate, Sam?"
I thought about it. "I don't know, two, maybe three days?"
He got up, going to the fridge and opening it. "No alcohol?"
"No," I told him. "Used to be an alcoholic, I'm in recovery."
"Thank God for small favors," he said. He got out some sandwich meat, some cheese slices, and got the loaf of bread out of the breadbox.
"All right, Sam. My nurse is picking you up some medication to help you sleep and regulate your moods," He told me. "I'll need your real name and Social Security Number to get your medical records from the VA."
"It's a legal name change," I told him. "Judge approved. I sent in the paperwork to the VA already."
He nodded, spreading mustard on a piece of bread. "All right," he gave an exasperated sigh. "For a rich man, I don't think you've been to the doctor much."
I shrugged. "Not really."
He put the sandwich together and started making himself one.
"You took a lot of damage, Sam English," He said. "Your brain isn't equating the damage Johnathon Bomber took with Sam English, but it's the same body," He said. "You need monthly checkups, medication."
He put together the second sandwich and turned away, putting the ingredients away.
"The big thing is, we need to get you on a regular sleep schedule, and regulate your moods so you can sleep in the house instead of in the back of your truck like some kind of hobo," he said, picking up the plate. He walked over and sat down. "I think you'd probably react badly to Valium, looks like you've probably taken a few bad head injuries, and that's a surgical scar around that puckered scar on top of your head."
"Wouldn't believe me if I told you," I told him. I accepted the sandwich and took a big bite. He started eating the other.
Part of me knew he was eating to get me to eat out of sympathetic reaction.
"Try me," He said, wiping pickle and tomato juice off his goatee.
"Shot in the top of the head by a KGB hitman. Bullet partially exited the room of my mouth, got lodged in my sinus cavity," I told him, shrugging.
He nodded. "Yeah, I'm not going to try Valium. That bullet probably altered your brain chemistry."
We finished our sandwiches and he looked at me. "You get mood swings?"
I shrugged. "Not that I noticed."
"Well, I'm going to give you mood stabilizers anyway, till we figure out what's going on in your brain," he said. "I've got a colleague in Irving, used to be a psychologist with the VA. I can ask him to come up and if you pay cash, we can keep this between ourselves."
I opened my mouth to tell him I was all right but stopped, looking around the house.
I'd rebuilt an entire house in less than two weeks. I'd worked myself into sunstroke and apparently at one point wrote a suicide note.
Pru was dead.
I wasn't all right.
As headlights washed over the big bay window I nodded. "I think maybe I should."
"Good boy," Doc Rutheford said. He looked out the window. "That's my nurse now."