Dean Koontz - Winter Moon

"I'm so lucky," she repeated.

"Me too. Finding you."

"You'll be home with me again."

"Soon," he said, though he knew he would be weeks in that bed and weeks more in a rehabilitation hospital.

"No more lonely nights," she said.

"No more."

"Always together."

"Always." His throat was tight, and he was afraid he was going to cry.

He was not ashamed to cry, but he didn't think either of them dared indulge in tears yet. They needed all their strength and resolve for the struggles that still lay ahead. He swallowed hard and whispered,

"When I get home…?"

"Yes?"

"And we can go to bed together again?"

Face-to-face with him, she whispered too: "Yes?"

"Will you do something special for me?"

"Of course, silly."

"Would you dress up like a nurse? That really turns me on.".She blinked in surprise for a moment, burst out laughing, and shoved a cold sponge in his face. "Beast."

"Well, then, how about a nun?"

"Pervert."

"A girl scout?"

"But a sweet, brave, and funny pervert."

If he hadn't possessed a good sense of humor, he wouldn't have been able to be a cop. Laughter, sometimes dark laughter, was the shield that made it possible to wade, without being stained, through the filth and madness in which most cops had to function these days.

A sense of humor aided his recovery, too, and made it possible not to be consumed by pain and worry, although there was one thing about which he had difficulty laughing-his helplessness. He was embarrassed about being assisted with his basic bodily functions and subjected to regular enemas to counteract the effects of extreme inactivity. Week after week, the lack of privacy in those matters became more rather than less humiliating.

It was even worse to be trapped in bed, in the rigid grip of the cast, unable to run or walk or even crawl if a sudden catastrophe struck.

Periodically he became convinced that the hospital was going to be swept by fire or damaged in an earthquake. Although he knew the staff was well trained in emergency procedures and that he would not be abandoned to the ravages of flames or the mortal weight of collapsing walls, he was occasionally seized by an irrational panic, often in the dead of night, a blind terror that squeezed him tighter and tighter, hour after hour, and that succumbed only gradually to reason or exhaustion.

By the middle of May, he had acquired a deep appreciation and limitless admiration for quadriplegics who did not let life get the best of them.

At least he had the use of his hands and arms, and he could exercise by rhythmically squeezing rubber balls and doing curls with light hand weights.

He could scratch his nose if it itched, feed himself to some extent, blow his nose. He was in awe of people who suffered permanent below-the-neck paralysis but held fast to their joy in life and faced the future with hope, because he knew he didn't possess their courage or character, no matter whether he was voted favorite patient of the week, month, or century.

If he'd been deprived of his legs and hands for three months, he would have been weighed down by despair. And if he hadn't known that he would get out of the bed and be learning to walk again by the time spring became summer, the prospect of long-term helplessness would have broken his sanity… Beyond the window of his third-floor room, he could see little more than the crown of a tall palm tree. Over the weeks, he spent countless hours watching its fronds shiver in mild breezes, toss violently in storm winds, bright green against sunny skies, dull green against somber clouds. Sometimes birds wheeled across that framed section of the heavens, and Jack thrilled to each brief glimpse of their flight.

He swore that, once back on his feet, he would never be helpless again.

He was aware of the hubris of such an oath, his ability to fulfill it depended on the whims of fate. Man proposes, God disposes. But on this subject he could not laugh at himself. He would never be helpless again. Never. It was a challenge to God: Leave me alone or kill me, but don't put me in this vise again.

Jack's division captain, Lyle Crawford, visited him for the third time in the hospital on the evening of June third.

Crawford was a nondescript man, of average height and average weight, with close-cropped brown hair, brown eyes, and brown skin, all of virtually the same shade. He was wearing Hush Puppies, chocolate-brown slacks, tan shirt, and a chocolate-brown jacket, as if his fondest desire was to be so nondescript that he would blend into any background and perhaps even attain invisibility. He also wore a brown cap, which he took off and held in both hands as he stood by the bed. He was soft-spoken and quick to smile, but he also had more commendations for bravery than any two other cops in the entire department, and he was the best natural-born leader of men that Jack had ever encountered.

"How you doing?" Crawford asked.

"My serve has improved, but my backhand's still lousy," Jack said.

"Don't choke the racket."

"You think that's my problem?"

"That and not being able to stand up."

Jack laughed. "How're things in the division, Captain?"

"The fun never stops. Two guys walk into a jewelry store on Westwood Boulevard this morning, right after opening, silencers on their guns, shoot the owner and two employees, kill em deader than old King Tut before anyone can set off an alarm. No one outside hears a thing.

Cases full of jewelry, big safe's open in the back room, full of estate pieces, millions worth. Looks like a cakewalk from there on. Then the two perps start to argue about what to take first and whether they have time to take everything. One of them makes a comment about the other one's old lady, and the next thing you know, they shoot each other."

"Jesus."

"So a little time passes, and a customer walks in on this. Four dead.people plus a half-conscious perp sprawled on the floor, wounded so bad he can't even crawl out of the place and try to get away. The customer stands there, shocked by the blood, which is splattered all to hell over. He's just paralyzed by the sight of this mess. The wounded perp waits for the customer to do something, and when the guy just stands there, gaping, frozen, the perp says, For the love of God, mister, call an ambulance!"

"For the love of God," Jack said.

" For the love of God." When the paramedics show up, first thing he asks them for is a Bible."

Jack rolled his head back and forth on the pillow in disbelief. "Nice to know not all the scum out there are godless scum, isn't it?"

"Warms my heart," Crawford said.

Jack was the only patient in the room. His most recent roommate, a fifty-year-old estate-planning specialist, in residence for three days, had died the previous day of complications from routine gallbladder surgery.

Crawford sat on the edge of the vacant bed. "I got some good news for you."

"I can use it."

"Internal Affairs submitted its final report on the shootings, and you're cleared across the board. Better yet, both the chief and the commission are going to accept it as definitive."

"Why don't I feel like dancing?"

"We both know the whole demand for a special investigation was bullshit. But we also both know… once they open that door, they don't always close it again without slamming it on some poor innocent bastard's fingers. So we'll count our blessings."

"They clear Luther too?"

"Yes, of course."

"All right."

Crawford said, "I put your name in for a commendation-Luther too, posthumously. Both are going to be approved."

"Thank you, Captain."

"Deserved."

"I don't give a damn about the dickheads on the commission, and the chief can take a hike to hell too, for all I care. But it means something to me because it was you put in our names."