A story by Richard McCuistian

The hospital sign responded to the deepening twilight and flickered to fluorescent-fired life as Mona Patrick turned in at the hospital and drove toward the parking garage. 

It seemed as if she spent more time here every year. Having found a parking place near the elevator that would carry her to the hospital lobby, she reached down and slightly rearranged her prosthetic leg before opening the car door. With all their expertise, the professionals had never been able to get it right, and she always had to make an adjustment before she got out of a car or she would fall flat on her face.

            She had been a nurse then, working at this same hospital. The sights and smells of the parking lot always triggered a replay of the accident in her mind. She had been making her way between an old pickup and one of the concrete support columns when the truck inexplicably clicked out of park and lurched forward, pinning her leg to the immoveable concrete with bone-crushing force. She always winced visibly at the thought of the white-hot pain. Two men had been nearby, and they came running from different directions to investigate her cries for help. They put their backs against the front of the truck and used their legs to move it away from the column, allowing her to fall away and drag herself to one side while they held it there.  Her leg had been crushed at the knee, and the resulting infection brought about the loss of the lower part of the limb.

            What troubled her the most was the timing of the whole thing. Mona never understood why God let that old truck roll forward at the instant when she was in front of it. Five seconds either way would have spared her the pain and the trauma of it all, not to mention the eventual loss of her job at the hospital and the evaporation of her engagement to Bob.

            In addition to her physical pain and horror at the amputation, Mona had been emotionally crushed by Bob's sudden callousness as he simply broke off their engagement, asked for his ring, and walked out of her hospital room while she watched him go with a broken heart and hot tears streaming down her cheeks. The very person she needed most had abandoned her, and she wanted to die, right then.  Later she discovered that Bob had run into her friend Rhonda while they were both visiting her. One thing led to another, and Bob and Rhonda had become involved.  Mona’s accident became nothing more to Bob than a reason to abandon her for her good “friend” Rhonda, who still had two nice legs. Bob and Rhonda eventually married and moved away. Mona was fiercely angry with Rhonda, Bob, and God, and a dark and persistent bitterness entrenched itself in her heart.

            Finally, Mona shared her heart with one of her deepest and most trusted friends. She had known and trusted old Doctor Kibane ever since he had diagnosed her mother's cancer. In those trying times, when she had been down, out, and all alone, Dr. Kibane had been the rock she leaned on.

Mona and the wizened old doctor were sitting across from each other in the hospital cafeteria one afternoon when she quietly vented her frustration and anger to him, how she felt betrayed by the God she had loved so much. She felt forsaken, forgotten... She confessed to Ed Kibane that she had even begun to question whether or not the God of the Bible even existed.

            "So, Ramona, you've lost a leg and a boyfriend and you think there isn't a God? What if I told you there were hundreds of E. coli bacteria on this knife? Would you believe me, or would you ignore my warning and eat with it?"

            "It would be dangerous not to believe you, Ed."

            "Likewise, my dear, it's dangerous to believe there's not a God when you know He has lived in your heart since you were a little girl. We all experience pain, disappointment, loss... Remember in the book of James where he writes that we should consider it all joy when we encounter trials? You'd better surrender your anger to Jesus and let Him clean up your attitude. There are worse things you could experience than losing a leg." 

He was right, of course. She re-acknowledged God on her one remaining knee that evening before she went to bed and asked His forgiveness, but she still held on to most of her bitterness, silently and privately waiting for God to make things up to her. She knew she'd get her leg back when He finally called her home, but that seemed a long time to wait.. Mona buried her bitterness very deep, and the folks who sat next to her every Sunday during worship services had no idea... But everything in her life had changed, and the only way Mona could fight her dark and persistent bitter anger was to throw herself into the lives of others.

            Today Mona was at the hospital to visit a neighbor, an old friend who had almost died from Walking Pneumonia.  She generally came to visit whenever anybody she knew was here. In the five years since she had lost her leg, Mona had visited scores of people, encouraging them, comforting those who had lost or were losing loved ones to cancer, AIDS, etc.  She was able to help a few friends and acquaintances who had lost limbs for one reason or another, and her perspective was unique because of her own experience with a prosthesis that didn't work quite right.

            Mona was still considered very attractive by those who knew her, and her one remaining leg was smooth and shapely. Before her accident, a scout for a lingerie company had seen her in a swimsuit at the beach and recruited her to model a line of panty hose his company was marketing. It had paid very well, and she would have given up nursing for a modeling career if she hadn't been "hit by a truck." That was the way she jokingly referred to her accident.

            She noticed a man who looked vaguely familiar in the hospital lobby, and he did a double-take as she walked by. Mona smiled inwardly, thinking that she could still turn a head or two, even with a "peg for a leg" so to speak.

            Mrs. Rhodes was in four-fifty-three and in good spirits.

            "Well, looky here!"

            "How are you, Mrs. Rhodes?"

            "I guess I'm almost well. They're supposed to be releasing me if Dr. Card says it's okay."

            "You sure recovered fast. We worried about you at first, and we were all praying for you."

            "Well, praying generally brings healing, if it's God's will."

            "RIGHT," Mona thought every time she heard a statement like that.  "Why did God let me lose my leg?" she always thought, "How could it have been His will? What good could possibly come of it.  Things might have been so much better if…”  her train of thought was interrupted as she realized Mrs. Rhodes was speaking again.

            "...heard from Rhonda's mother the other day." Mrs. Rhodes was saying. Rhonda had lived in the same neighborhood with Mona and Mrs. Rhodes before she had run off with Bob, but now her mother lived in Charlottesville.

            "Oh?" It was hard for Mona to hide her contempt, and she made a conscious effort to keep her lips from curling into a sneer.

            "It seems that Rhonda divorced Bob because he had become abusive. Bob always had drinking problem, but Rhonda never knew about it until after they married.  From what her mother said, Rhonda had been covering bruises with makeup and long sleeve blouses since the first week she and Bob married, and she finally got enough of him last fall. You'd never have figured Bob to be a wife-beater, would you, Mona?"  Mona was stunned. One thing that had made Bob's departure from his commitment to her so unexpected was the way he had treated her up until the day he took his ring and left. He had always seemed kind, gentle, and caring, and she had never known of him using alcohol...

            "...good thing you never married him, now, isn't it? Losing that leg might have been a blessing in disguise." Mona was still lost in thought, trying to imagine Bob in that context. What might have been had occupied her thoughts for five years, and now to find that marrying Bob would have been a colossal mistake. What pain and disappointment Rhonda must have gone through in the five years since she and Bob had left Mona in a lurch and married!  On one hand, she was sorry for Rhonda, but on the other hand...  She squelched the suddenly forming thought that Rhonda got what she deserved. Nobody deserved that.

            On her way out of the hospital lobby, Mona noticed the man she had seen earlier sitting in one of the chairs near the information desk. He was handsome in a rugged sort of way, and the loose windbreaker he wore seemed to be filled with nice set of arms and shoulders. His belly was flat, not flabby, and he was clean shaven except for a carefully trimmed mustache and his dark hair was cut military style, closely cropped above his ears, a little longer on top and neatly combed. He caught her eye, then folded up his newspaper and stood up, stepping out to meet her.

            "Hello... I don't know exactly how to ask you this, but didn't you have an accident down in the parking garage a few years ago?" She stopped and peered into his soft green eyes. He extended his hand in greeting and she took it briefly. His hand was slightly rough and calloused, but gentle and warm in hers.

            "Yes sir. Who wants to know?"

            "My name Bund. James Bund..." she laughed spontaneously.

            "Mona Patrick.  You're kidding about your name, right?" He sighed and his shoulders slumped a little as he released her hand and pursed his lips.

            "No, I’m not kidding, but I do get that response a lot when I introduce myself. What I wanted to say was that I was one of the men who moved the truck after it pinned your leg."

            "Oh....  Well... no wonder you looked familiar!" She suddenly felt cruel and awkward for making fun of his name.

            "So how are you doing?" he wanted to know.

            "Well, I have a stainless steel leg now that doesn’t work nearly as well as the original, and I don't work as a nurse any more, but other than that I guess I'm okay."

            "I don't mean to be forward, but if you have the time, I'd like to take you somewhere for a cup of coffee." Mona thought about it for a moment. Her heart beat a little faster. He was the first guy who had even halfway asked her out in five years and she didn't even know him. She was dreadfully lonely, but who could she really trust? The guy was awfully attractive, and what a name! Still, maybe she owed him a few minutes and a cup of coffee for helping that other guy heave the truck off her. Mona made a snap decision she hoped she wouldn't regret later.

            "You presume a lot, Mr. Bond. But I suppose a quick cup of coffee would be okay."

            "Bund" he corrected

            "Bund, my mistake, I’m sorry. Okay Mr. Bund, you've got a date with me in the hospital cafeteria in thirty minutes.  I'll meet you at the table by the window with the big plastic pot of ferns.  And don't be late."

            "You got it!" he said with a broad grin.

            She watched him walk away and thought for a moment that he would make a good James Bond.

            ******************

            The cafeteria was crowded with hospital employees, and it seemed so natural to sit here at her favorite table with a handsome fellow who seemed interested in her despite her "bionic" leg.

            "I've been working undercover with the police department for about ten years now," he was telling her.

            "So how do you like it?"

            "It's a job. It’s exciting at times, dirty and depressing at others. I'm slowly establishing a set of informants and contacts on the street, and I've been initiated a few busts that would never have happened otherwise. I’ve received regular bonuses and promotions, and I may wind up with a pretty decent retirement if I survive another ten years."

            "Are you a Christian, Mr. Bund?"

            "Yes, as a matter of fact I am."

            "Do you believe in luck or chance?"

            "No, not in the sense that most people do."

            "What do you mean?"

            "Well... I think God works through circumstances to enrich our lives and prepare us for the future. Why do you ask?"  She took a sip of her espresso and wondered why she felt like opening up to this guy, then plowed ahead.

            "Oh, I've struggled for the past five years with the fact that I wouldn't have suffered the loss of my leg if God had waited a few seconds before He let that truck roll forward. It seemed like chance to me, like bad luck."  James Bund peered at her for a moment through the steam from his coffee and his eyes narrowed a bit. He cocked his head slightly and studied her eyes before speaking again.

            "Can I tell you a short story?"

            "Sure, I’m all ears."

            "A few years ago I was struggling with a really awful case involving a serial rapist. He was one of the worst this city has ever seen. He would rape and murder his victims, some as young as ten years old, some as old as seventy, put them in crudely built pine boxes, and bury them in an abandoned cemetery out near Haston. After he buried each victim, he would move a cemetery marker from an old grave somewhere nearby to mark his victims' graves. It was a perfect hiding place. Think about it. Who would look under an old cemetery marker for the body of a murder victim? The cemetery was so old that most people didn't even know it was there, and nobody ever went out there." Mona was hanging on every word.  She had heard snatches of this story on the news, but had never known the details.  Bund took a sip of his coffee, glanced out the window at the city lights, and continued.

            "Well, this jerk chose one of his rape victims very poorly.  She was a thirty year-old woman who was on the local martial arts kickboxing team, and it was a small matter for her to get the better of him. During the struggle, she kicked him in the groin. And while he was rolling around on the ground, she got away. She hadn't gotten a good look at his face, but she had managed to put some nasty fingernail scratches across his forehead that started above his hairline. She had some nice hair samples of dark, reddish brown hair under two of her fingernails when she came to the station house and gave us her deposition."

            "One day, I stumbled across the guy we were looking for in a totally unexpected place.  I was sitting in my car waiting for a doctor I was supposed to arrest on drug charges. I didn't want to embarrass the good doctor inside the hospital, so I figured I'd serve the warrant and pick him up in the parking garage.

            "Then I spotted this guy getting out of a van with two parallel scratches on his forehead that started above his hairline. I used my binoculars to make sure. It might have been circumstantial, but I decided the doctor could wait, since he didn't know I was coming anyway.  The guy with the forehead scratches appeared to be killing time for a few minutes, and I put in a call for backup while I was watching him. A nice late model car driven by an attractive lady pulled into the garage and parked a few spaces over from his van.  She exited the car and I noticed that the direction she was walking would take her right by the van. Then I saw the scratched guy flatten himself against the column so she wouldn’t see him until she passed the place where he was standing. I quietly opened the door, got out of my car and reached in my jacket for my pistol when I heard you scream. He and I rushed over and moved the truck. The rest is history."

            "So what happened to the rapist?"

            "He's on death row. Over a two-year period, he had raped and murdered seventeen women and buried them all in that cemetery near Haston.

“So, ask me again if I believe luck or chance. Do you know how many women were spared because you walked in front of that truck and it pinned you to the column?  I was able to arrest that rapist right there on the spot and take him away because the circumstances surrounding your accident flushed him out and lowered his guard. He never expected to be arrested for rape and murder right after coming to help a woman in distress!"

Mona sat silently until all her bitterness had passed. Suddenly she realized how fortunate and how selfish she had been for the past five years.

“Are you married, Mr. Bond?”

“Why no, as a matter of fact.  The funny thing is that I was about to ask you the same question…” What might have been had disappeared from her thoughts, and she realized that her circumstances were just about to change again, but maybe this time it would be a change for the better.