Touching the Moon Read online

  Two trays of chicken fingers, four baskets of French fries and two pitchers of beer later, Julie stood.

  “I need to swing by the veterinary office, gentlemen. It’s been a lovely afternoon.” She shook hands all way round.

  Dan rose with her and laid a few bills on the table, nodding at the men as he took his leave.

  “I’ll walk with you, Julie,” he said, taking her elbow.

  “Thanks, Dan.” They moved toward the exit door. “You don’t want to stay?”

  “No,” he said. “It was a good time, but I’ve got some work to do also.” When they reached her car, he brushed off a light dusting of snow.

  “You’re a good man, Charlie Brown. Thank you for today.”

  “A peck on the cheek, here.” He lowered his head to receive payment.

  She kissed him, then said, “Give me the other side.” She kissed him there too.

  “Two kisses. Well, well, Ms. Hastings. You give me hope!” His eyes narrowed. “How is that wolf of yours?”

  “Oh, he comes and goes. And don’t worry. He’s not cutting through town. I watched him the other day. He moves about through the forest in back of me.”

  Don nodded thoughtfully.

  “I don’t leave him in the house alone.”

  “There’s something not quite right about him. I can’t put my finger on it.” Dan scanned the sky. “It’s the eyes, I think. They are… very knowing.”

  She shivered. “I know that he was a little aggressive with you, but he’s very gentle with me.”

  Dan scowled at her, then spoke firmly and not with a little heat, “A little aggressive with me? I want you to be careful, Julie. I really do. I don’t think you should be letting him inside at all. This is Officer Keating addressing you now.”

  “All right,” she said, a sternness coming into her voice as well. “I will take your counsel under advisement.” Her posture grew rigid and there was a firm and stubborn set to her jaw also.

  “Hey,” he said soothingly, “I’m just concerned about you.” He smiled at her, but his eyes were troubled. He reached for her and tugged her arm as she turned. “Julie, I’m not trying to boss you around. I’m just trying to keep you safe. It’s my job. It’s my nature.”

  8

  Cole Peterson greeted her at the veterinary office door the next morning with a hot cup of coffee in a go-cup and a medical kit.

  “I’m due up at the Double Bar Ranch this morning,” he said, his face frowning. “But my arthritis is acting up. I’d like for you to cover for me.”

  “Of course!”

  “Tim Whiting is afraid that one of his best bulls has infectious kerato conjunctivitis, and he doesn’t want to contaminate the herd.”

  “Does he have the animal in isolation?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any words of wisdom?”

  “Whiting is an ex-Vietnam vet. The only thing tender on that farm is the beef.”

  She smiled. “Roger that, Chief. I can be tough.”

  “I know. That’s why you’re still here.”

  As it turned out, Whiting had been just a tad bit paranoid. The bull had an infected tear duct which was easily remedied. She treated the animal with an antibacterial eye-wash and gave instructions on how to repeat the application in her absence.

  “I’ve taken a blood sample just to make sure that we’re not dealing with a systemic infection,” she told him. “Why don’t you wait until the results confirm my diagnosis before returning the bull to the herd?” He nodded at her words. “But I think you’re going to be all right.”

  He nodded again, but there was genuine fear in his eyes. As an ex- Vietnam vet, she was sure that he wasn’t comfortable with any abnormal bodily fluids. Tropical diseases were ruthlessly quick and debilitatingly effective in ushering you to a watery grave, and most of that water was your own.

  She cleaned herself up then headed back to the office, handling her vehicle like a practiced snow driver.

  “No drifting, no drifting,” she whispered to her Corolla as she rounded a sharp s-curve.

  She took her foot off of the accelerator immediately, her jaw falling slack in surprise. A squad car was off to the side of the road with its door open and lights flashing. A red sedan pulled out full-speed just as she slowed. Her eyes caught the tag – BDR 421 – then the policeman, lying in a pool of red in the snow.

  In her panic, she slammed on the brakes and spun 360-degrees before she skidded to a stop in the middle of the road. She felt as if she were in slow motion as she put the car in park and pulled the emergency brake. She left the engine running and the car door open as she bolted in total panic to take care of… Elliott!

  He was on his back with a gunshot wound and bleeding out. She opened his jacket to examine the wound. The bullet had nicked an artery. A thin jet of red blood pulsed from his chest like a geyser with every heartbeat. He was still breathing, but his breathing was labored.

  “Elliott? Can you hear me?”

  He didn’t respond.

  She raced to the squad car, grabbed the radio and froze. Elliott Rand, cop. Barbara Rand, police receptionist and dispatcher. It clicked in a nano-second. Her voice was pure stainless steel when she squeezed the toggle.

  “This is Julie Hastings. There is an officer down by the red barn with the hex sign. Gunshot wound. We need a Medivac with blood on board. Issuing an APB for a red car, Bad Dog Running 421. Plates with a setting sun.”

  She heard Elliott’s mother respond. “Roger that. All units. All units. Officer down on Bluemount Road.”

  Julie raced for her medical kit and the spare blankets she kept in the trunk and wrapped Elliott as warmly as she could, then ran back to the squad car.

  “Barbara,” she said, breathing hard. “I need your permission to clamp an artery. I’m not a people doctor. I’m a vet, but I don’t think the Medivac is going to get here in time. He’s losing too much blood. Will you allow me to do what I can to save your son?”

  It was a brutal way to tell Barbara the bad news, but Julie had no time for polite protocol.

  “Yes,” came the quivering reply. “Oh, God. Please. Please save him, Julie.”

  Julie released the radio and raced back to Elliott, donned surgical gloves and staunched the bleeding. She had to take a deep breath to steady her hands. “It’s just a little pig,” she chanted over and over as her fingers slid inside his chest cavity. “Just a little pig.”

  By the time the helicopter had arrived, she had stopped the bleeding, but that didn’t change the fact that Elliott had lost too much blood.

  The helicopter blades never stopped turning as the paramedics strapped Elliott to a stretcher and loaded him on board. She climbed in with them and watched as they cut the sodden clothes off of his body, wrapped him in heat blankets and heat pads then hooked him up. They delivered an I.V. in one arm and administered blood in another.

  And it wasn’t going to be enough.

  She watched Elliott’s blood pressure fall in disbelief. She had tried so hard. She squeezed her eyes shut in frustration, then slapped the inside of her elbow. “My blood type makes me a universal donor and I’m clean. Let’s get a transfusion going right now into another part of him.”

  “How much do you weigh?” asked the paramedic.

  “I’m 130 pounds.”

  The paramedic just looked at her. He wasn’t buying.

  “I’m a medical doctor,” she countered. “I know the risks. I’m telling you that my weight is 130. Stick me. He’s got a family. People who love him.”

  “And you don’t?” the man countered.

  “And I don’t,” she said. She wasn’t bitter. She wasn’t sad. He could see the naked truth in her eyes.

  “Please,” Julie said, “Let’s save this young man.”

  Person-to-person transfusions were uncommon, but not disallowed if the situation was desperate enough. It was desperate enough. There was risk on both sides. The recipient ran the risk of contracting disease. The donor ran the ris
k of donating beyond the safety limit. There was no way to monitor the transfusion amount.

  Julie showed her credentials and rolled up her sleeve.

  The pilot radioed in, “Command, this is Chopper One. We’ve got a situation. I’m going to need two stretchers and two immediate blood transfusions upon arrival.”

  The men at the police station, who were monitoring the emergency channel, frowned in confusion. Dan, traveling with his siren wailing and his lights flashing en route to Rapid City Hospital just clenched his jaw. He knew exactly what was going on.

  If Julie died, he was going to kill her.

  Dan entered the hospital room smelling of stale coffee and nervous sweat. Julie was hooked up to numerous monitors and was receiving a pint of blood. She was milk white and fighting little tremors.

  “Dan!” Her relief was written all over her face. “I need a blanket or two or ten.”

  “I’m on it.”

  She closed her eyes and heard an enormous amount of shouting, then felt nothing but warmth. Dan pulled up a chair and sat beside her, holding her hand.

  He swallowed, taking in the antiseptic white walls, white bed, and the gunmetal gray machines surrounding it. “Julie?”

  “Yes?” she whispered, eyes closed.

  “How much do you weigh?”

  “Enough. Enough to save a life. Sometimes, Dan, breaking the law is the right thing to do.” She paused. “Has he slipped into a coma?”

  “No. They cleaned him up, removed a bullet, sewed him back together and gave him more blood. He’s going to be just fine.”

  “I was hoping so.”

  “You saved him.”

  “Yeah. Only because I am a vet, and I was working on a Copper Pig.” Her tongue was sticky inside her mouth. She had to swallow, before she continued. “Funny, huh?”

  “Very funny, Julie.” He rubbed his thumb back and forth on the back of her hand. “We caught them. Bad Dogs Running. We caught them.”

  Her smile was fleeting. “I’m so glad.”

  “How do you feel?”

  “Fine.”

  He smiled. As a cop, he could smell an untruth a million miles away. “You don’t lie very well.”

  “I’ll have to practice up.”

  He squeezed her hand. “What can I do for you, Julie?”

  She was suddenly very focused. “I left my car in the middle of the road.”

  “Shhhh,” he soothed. “We took care of that already. It’s sitting in your driveway. The keys are at the station.”

  “I had a blood sample for the lab.”

  “We figured that out too,” he said. “One of the men delivered it to Cole Peters. Cole said it was still sound. Don’t worry.”

  “Okay. Okay. Thank you, Dan. Thank you so much.”

  “Anything else I can do for you, Julie?”

  “When I wake up, can I get a hot cup of coffee and a Krispy Kreme?”

  “You’re easy, Ms. Hastings.”

  “That’s what they all say.”

  The next day, Dan delivered. There was a hot tray of Krispy Kremes and a café latte from a gourmet coffee shop at perfect sipping temperature. She inhaled everything.

  The hospital released her and she traveled back to Fallston in Dan’s squad car. She slept most of the way. He didn’t want her leaning against the car door so she leaned against his shoulder instead, wrapped within his right arm. He smelled of man and metal and gunflint.

  He deposited her on her doorstep with a furrowed brow. “I’m going to get some carry-out and come back,” he said.

  “I’ll be okay.”

  “Yes. Yes, you will. As soon as I feed you some dinner.”

  Dan opened her kitchen door and escorted her into her house, flipping on lights in the process. “Do you have any special cravings?”

  She looked at him. “I should pack protein.”

  “Huh?”

  “Beef. I need red meat.”

  “Got it. Brisket. Beans. Rolls.”

  “Coleslaw?”

  “I swear. Women do love their vegetables. I’ve never quite understood the attraction.”

  He left to fetch something to eat while she snipped off her hospital bracelet and took a shower. Her body felt sluggish and slow. It wasn’t fair. She wasn’t the one with the bullet wound. She could only imagine how Elliott was feeling right now, but then he was probably on some serious pain meds.

  She examined the dark purple bruising on her left inner elbow. Tough to hit a vein clean while racing through turbulence. Her right inner elbow wasn’t nearly as bad, but was twice as sore.

  She sported a baggy pair of old sweats upon Dan’s return. He took one look at her and grinned. She looked like a freshly scrubbed waif in swaddling clothes. She was sitting at the kitchen table drinking orange juice. He kissed her on the forehead and kept her sitting while he set the table and refilled her glass.

  “Eat,” he commanded. She was ravenous. “Drink,” he ordered.

  She downed half a glass. He refilled it.

  “When will Elliott be released?” she asked.

  “Not for a few more days.”

  “Please tell him that my thoughts are with him and that he is as pretty on the inside as he is on the outside.”

  Dan grinned. “I’ll tell him and his mother both.”

  Julie shut the door, locked it and slowly made her way upstairs. She looked at herself in the mirror. She had dark circles under her eyes. She let out a pent up breath. Small price to pay for saving a life.

  She was about to crawl into bed when she heard the soft and lonely howl of a wolf by her window. She made her way downstairs and found Big Boy sitting patiently on her kitchen stoop. She opened the door for him slowly and he entered with care and caution.

  “You know that I’m not well, don’t you, Boy?” she asked softly, giving his neck a loving scratch.

  She moved slowly back up the stairs and he dogged her ploddingly. When she slipped beneath the sheets, he put a paw upon her bed.

  She patted his big foot gently. Next thing she knew, there were two paws upon the bed. She rolled toward him only to find him inching himself slowly up upon the mattress.

  She pushed feebly at his chest. “Down, Big Boy.”

  He just kept climbing, nudging her over, nuzzling her neck. She didn’t have the strength to fight him, so she fell asleep wrapped around him like a stuffed toy. He took up half her mattress.

  9

  Although Julie was back to work within two days, Elliott was out for three weeks. On his first day back at the station, the force and their spouses threw a little welcome home party for him. Naturally, Julie was invited. Little did she know that the party was for her too.

  Dan stood up after everyone had greeted one another and shared with the group Julie’s comments about Elliott being as pretty on the inside as he was on the outside. Elliott’s mother was a river of tears, her teardrops catching in the corners of her smile.

  Then Dan grew serious and told the group how Julie had convinced the paramedics to take her blood and save Elliott. “She told them that it was worth the risk to her person to save Elliott because he had people who loved him. She, on the other hand, had no one.”

  Julie hung her head and tried to swallow the large lump in her throat. Leave it to Dan to ferret out what happened in the Medivac. She looked up at him, her face stricken.

  “I would like for you all to show her just how wrong she is,” Dan said.

  The rest of the morning was a blur. A sea of faces swam in front of her. She was hugged, cried upon, kissed and squeezed. By the time everyone broke for coffee and cake, she was a bundle of nerves.

  Elliott approached her, sat down next to her, and nudged his thigh against hers. “Everyone’s so thankful, Julie, but no one more than me.”

  Dan stood behind her, placed two warm hands on her shoulders and kneaded gently, trying to soften the muscles that were knotted in tension. Julie looked up at Dan with troubled eyes. She wasn’t happy with him. He pursed his
lips at her frown and squinted his eyes.

  “Don’t you dare go giving me any trouble, Ms. Hastings,” Dan murmured. “I will lock you up for disturbing the peace.”

  On Valentine’s Day, Gray stopped by to see her with a litter of puppies that needed shots. He stood there like a gigantic and silent pillar in black. Black boots, black jeans, black belt, black shirt, black eyes, black hair.

  She glanced up at Gray as she worked. He was staring at her intently, a pensive expression on his face.

  “Mr. Walker?”

  “I forgot to return your cookie tin.”

  She sighed, releasing a breath she wasn’t aware that she had held. “You can return it anytime. There isn’t any hurry.”

  When she finished with the puppies, Julie escorted Gray to the reception area and shook his hand good-bye. His hand swallowed hers in a rocky cavern of muscle and callus. The raw strength behind his gentle touch was enough to snap her eyes upward.

  At that moment, Dan Keating rose from one of the plastic chairs in the waiting area and captured her attention. “Officer Keating,” she said in surprise. He also toted a carton.

  “Another box? Gray had puppies in his, what’s in yours?”

  “Posies,” he said, pulling out some purple African violets in a green ceramic bowl. “The office could use a little color.”

  “Oh!” She was nonplussed. “They are lovely. Let’s put them right here on the end of the counter.”

  He set them where instructed.

  “Lookin’ good,” he said, nodding in her direction. Her blouse dipped low. The skirt was tight. Her hair had slipped from the loose band at the nape of her neck and her curls framed her face softly.

  “They do,” she said, looking back at the flowers in order to hide her blush. It was not what he meant and they both knew it.

  Dan glanced awkwardly at Gray, then turned to Julie. “May I speak to you officially for a moment?” He was using his cop voice.

  She frowned in confusion and ushered him into examination room #3, waving good-bye to Gray in the process. Her nose sniffed the air automatically, hoping for freshness. It smelled faintly of antiseptic and cold metal. A hospital smell, but not unpleasant.