VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, [2] ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 23:09:18 08/27/99 Fri
Author: Mary Ellen
Subject: "Hank--Johnny, he's not. . ."

Joanne locked her gaze straight into Hank Stanley's eyes. She wanted to hear the truth, no matter how much it hurt. Hank wanted to lie. He wanted so much to lie and spare her feelings. Really what he wanted to do was lie to himself, to his men, to the whole world, to fate itself! He desperatly wished that all it took was to say John Gage was alive and suddenly he would be.

He'd always figured if ever he was required to 'break the news' to Joanne, it would be over Roy. Yet, here he was, about to render poor Joanne as much a widow over Johnny as she would ever be about her own husband.

"Joanne," Hank began bearly whispering. "We just got word from UCLA. Johnny's d. . ."

"Hank, don't!" Joanne suddenly cried out and put her pulled her arms up in front of her as if trying to shield herself from a blow. This is ridiculous! Joanne chided herself. It's childish! Just because she doesn't hear the words doesn't make them less true. Johnny was dead! He had to be! It was the only explanation for everything that was going on around her.

"No, Hank, you don't have to say it. Johnny's gone, isn't he?" she said trying to spare Hank any more agony than he was already experiencing.

Captain Stanley just nodded the confirmation then turned away.

With her worst fears made real, Joanne felt as if she had just been jettisoned to the other end of the universe. She immediatly closed up like a morning glory in the evening chill. She looked around and realized that she was still in the Emergency Room of Rampart General where she had been dozens of times before. Everything she saw around her was the same. The same walls, the same floor with the same colored pathlines, the same nurses station, the same treatment rooms, the same faces. Nothing had changed. Nothing except the fact that Johnny was gone and he was never coming back and now everything was different.

For Joanne, it was like having been pushed through some sort of plexiglass wall. She was still in the same room with all of Roy's co-workers and yet she felt so separated, so detached from them all as if in a completely different part of the county. But there was no time for pity now! Her head was spinning enough with Roy's injury--now Johnny's death! Joanne couldn't think now! She just wasn't able to concentrate! She had to sit down. She had to go someplace quiet and sit down and sort through all she'd been hit with in the last few hours.

As she turned to go to the lounge, she fixed her sight on the elevator that had just taken Roy to surgery. She actually envied her husband now. Envied the position he was in, despite his injuries. Roy still didn't know. Roy still had that one spark of joy that had been so callously stripped away from the rest of them. The hope that Johnny, too, would make it. The possiblity that everything would turn out alright and that soon they'd both be back to riding the squad, tearing up the streets of LA County. My God! He'll never pull out of that station with Johnny ever again! Hot tears suddenly welled up in Joanne's eyes and something deep down inside her began to ache sharply.

"I wish you peace, my love." She gently whispered in the direction of the elevator door. "I wish you peace in these last moments of ignorance you shall have." Once Roy was out of surgery, once he awakened and had regained some bit of strenghth, he would have to be told. He'd have to give up that spark of hope, as they all had, and join them on this black planet of mourning to which they had all been exiled.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]
[ Contact Forum Admin ]

Forum timezone: GMT-8
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.