Chapter 22

Lance sat in the stillness of Dr. Shannon’s office, his mind still reeling from what had just happened not 30 minutes earlier. With a heavy sigh, he looked at the phone sitting on the doctor’s desk. He knew that he needed to let the others know about JC, but he just couldn’t get his thoughts together in order to do that.

A tentative knock on the partially opened door brought Lance out of his thoughts.

“Hello? Is anyone still in here?” asked a female voice.

Lance ran his hands over his face to wipe away any traces of tears and cleared his throat before answering.

“Uh…yes,” he said as he stood up from the couch and walked over to the door to pull it open. Once it was open, he discovered that Sharon Lewis was standing there. Lance immediately looked down at the floor, embarrassed that the stranger may see that he had been crying.

“I just came to check on you and to see if you had heard anything yet about Joshua.”

Lance glanced up at the woman and shook his head no fearing that if he did venture to speak, his tears would fall again. He then cleared his throat and brought his gaze back down to the floor. Sharon saw the look of fear and worry on Lance’s face and her motherly instincts immediately kicked in. Not exactly knowing how he would react to her next move, Sharon decided to take a chance at offering Lance some comfort. She took a careful step toward him and held her arms open. He looked up and without thinking twice walked into her embrace. Lance was so grateful for the compassionate embrace. They held that position for several minutes until Lance finally began to pull away.

“Would you like to sit down and talk?” Sharon asked.

Lance nodded numbly and the pair walked over to the couch that Lance had left earlier. After an awkward silence, Lance spoke. “Thank you for the hug.”

“You looked like you could use one.” Lance gave her a small smile at the remark. “I am so sorry that what Emilianne said upset Joshua so much. I never would have known…” Sharon shook her head in disbelief and in guilt.

“How could anyone have known. Emilianne just asked a simple question, but at least I have a better idea of what’s been bothering him.” Lance took a deep breath before turning to look at Sharon.

“How is Emilianne doing? I hope that what she saw didn’t upset her too much.” Lance was very concerned about the whole matter and knew that JC would be thinking the same thing when given the chance.

“She was a little upset, but I explained to her that Joshua just became very tired all of a sudden and that Dr. Shannon would take good care of him. That seemed to make everything okay for her.” Sharon gave Lance a small smile. “My daughter thinks that Dr. Shannon is on the same pedestal as God, policemen, her teacher and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”

Lance gave a small chuckle at the remark. “Yeah. We all think he’s the greatest.”

There were a few moments of uncomfortable silence before Sharon spoke again.

“The reason that I came back was to find out if you would you like some company while you wait for your family or friends to come?”

“I haven’t called anyone yet. I can’t seem to get my thoughts together.” Lance looked down at his hands, ashamed that he had not been able to carry out a seemingly small task.

“I understand you know. When Emilianne had her accident, neither David nor I was able to call anyone. We were just too upset, but a long time neighbor of ours had come to the hospital with us and just stepped right into the job. Stephanie made all of the phone calls and took care of getting family members from the airport to hotels and the hospital. She was a real godsend.” Sharon stopped speaking and took one look at Lance. She saw that he looked so lost...so confused. The _expression looked so familiar to her and it made her realize that it was her turn to return the favor that her friend Stephanie had done for her.

“I don’t know you well enough to make the phone calls for you, but I can sit here with you while you make them if that would help.”

Lance looked up at her. “Thank you,” he whispered. “I’d appreciate that.” He stood up shakily and made his way over to the doctor’s desk. He picked up the phone and took a deep breath before dialing the familiar number.

Jan knew that in order to help the boys out, she would need to have the opportunity to speak to each of them individually and in private. She would just have to pick and choose the best way to approach each one so that she would not seem to be butting in…which was exactly what she planned on doing. She had already had her talk with Lance and could already see that the results of that talk had been positive. The two of them had actually swum together that afternoon before he was to accompany JC to Dr. Shannon’s office for his meeting with Emilianne Lewis. Jan and, more importantly, Lance knew that he was going to be able to overcome his fears. Hopefully JC would be on his way to overcoming his fears with this first meeting with Emilianne.

“Hmmm…I wonder how that’s going,” Jan said to herself as she continued to putter around the kitchen. She quickly began setting out plates, napkins, and utensils on the table before spreading out the food on one of the long kitchen counters.

“Almost ready for them,” Jan murmured to herself. Her thoughts were interrupted by lightly bouncing footsteps coming into the kitchen.

“We aren’t going to wait for Lance and JC?”

“Oh, hi Chris. Good nap?” Jan looked over her shoulder at Chris, who was standing in the doorway, stretching.

“Yeah…good one. What about JC and Lance…they aren’t going to be eating with us?”

“JC had told me before they left for the appointment that it might be well after supper time when they would get back and not to wait for them.” Jan wiped her hands off on a towel and crossed the room to fix a glass of water.

“Well, can I help?” Chris asked as he walked over to the counter with the food on it.

“You have impeccable timing Chris.” Jan tuned to look Chris and saw that he had an amused _expression on his face that she was just itching to take care of.

“Planned it that way,” he said with a smirk as he leaned against a kitchen counter, nibbling on a piece of lettuce he had swiped off a plate.

Jan smiled at the man and laughed. His timing was just perfect…she had already done most of the work, but she could easily pop his bubble.

“Well, since your timing is so good, you can plan on helping me clean up the kitchen after supper then.” Jan grinned at Chris whose face suddenly turned from a look of amusement to one of confusion.

“You got me didn’t you.”

“Yep…I did it very well if I say so myself. “

Okay,” he said absent mindedly as he still tried to figure out how both Jan and Lynn could always rope him into KP duty so easily. With a shake of his head, he walked out of the room.

“Oh, Chris…” The ringing phone interrupted Jan’s sentence.

“I’ll get it!” Chris bellowed as he ran back into the living room to answer the phone.

Jan winced at the loud noise and rolled her eyes before returning to her job of getting supper on the table.

Minutes later, Chris ran back into the kitchen.

“Jan.”

Jan could hear the fear in his voice and quickly turned to look at Chris. She was alarmed to see that he was as white as a ghost.

“Chris…what’s wrong?” Jan trotted up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. She was surprised to feel that Chris was shaking.

“That was Lance at the hospital. JC collapsed in Dr. Shannon’s office. He’s been taken downstairs to the emergency room.” Jan felt her stomach twist tightly into a knot, but she kept her voice calm.

“Go tell the others while I take care of things in here.”

Chris quickly ran out of the room as Jan began turning off stovetop burners and the oven all the while praying for JC’s well being.

JC could hear movement and voices surrounding him…floating about him. He wanted to reach out to those voices, but the distance just seemed too great for him to do so. He felt himself once again beginning to drift away until he heard a familiar voice speaking to him directly.

“JC…JC…I need you to open your eyes for me. Wake up son. You’re in the emergency room…I need you to open your eyes for me.”

JC recognized the voice as being Dr. Shannon’s but what was he talking about…emergency room? Why would he be in the emergency room? Suddenly, he remembered what had happened to him in Dr. Shannon’s office.

“Whoa…take a look at that monitor,” exclaimed one of the nurses standing near JC’s bed.

Dr. Shannon looked up at the heart monitor and saw that JC’s heart rate had increased rapidly as had his breathing, but he was not showing any signs of waking.

“JC…JC…” Dr. Shannon reached out for JC’s hand and gave it a painful pinch, but there was no response from the young man.

“Gena…I want you to check his blood pressure. Steve…I need Valium, 2 milligrams, IV push stat. Joanne…lets put him back on high flow oxygen.”

There was quick paced activity as Dr. Shannon’s orders were carried out. Within minutes, JC’s heart rate had returned to normal, as did his breathing. Dr. Shannon then named off a list of tests that needed to be run. After assignments had been given, Dr. Shannon took a moment to look down at the sleeping young man before him. With a shake of his head, he picked up JC’s hand, being careful to avoid the IV line.

“I’m so sorry JC that the meeting didn’t work out. I’m so sorry.” Dr. Shannon remained in that position for some time until he was called away to another patient.

“Keep me updated Steve,” he called out to one of the interns, as he headed for a partitioned area in the ER.

“Yes sir.”

Heavy traffic prevented Jan, Justin, Joey, and Chris from arriving at the hospital as quickly as they had hoped to. When they finally did arrive, Joey and Justin headed for the ER hoping that they would be able to get some news of JC’s condition while Jan and Chris headed upstairs to Dr. Shannon’s office to be with Lance.

It was 15 minutes later when Joey and Justin joined the others in the doctor’s office. They had not been able to find out any information other than that tests were being run and that JC was still not conscious. Sharon Lewis had already left once Jan and Chris had arrived, and now the group began the all too familiar game of waiting to hear from Dr. Shannon.

Twenty-Three