# Car 54

####
© 2005 / revised 2014
K Pelle

### Chapter 38:
Caution - Exploratory Blasting

My family has always handled emergencies well. As Wil and Corinna left to pack a few things, Beth made up sandwiches of Wil and Corinna's toast, scrambled eggs and bacon, then filled a big thermos with coffee. Dad was on the phone, calling Tom. Meanwhile Mom waved me out onto the porch to talk to me alone.

"It's a good thing that you're driving them down to Calgary, since Corinna will probably need Wil's care and attention on the drive," she said quietly after the door was closed so no one else could hear. "John had some other news that's rather upsetting. When he called Sam McAdam about the accident, Sam simply told him that the whole thing must have been God's will. Sam told John that he and Ann have disowned Sandy and no longer consider her their daughter. They don't want anything to do with her in any way because of what they call her 'sins of the flesh,' so Sandy may need someone to lean on rather badly."

"Oh shit. That means she's totally alone. She doesn't deserve that!"

"Yes, she'll be totally alone and odds are that when you go to the front desk at the hospital, they won't be willing to tell you anything since you're not a family member."

"Yes they will," I snapped. "I'll think of a way."

"There is one way," Mom sighed. "But, it's asking a lot of you."

"What's that?"

"You could tell them that she's your fiancée."

All I could do was stare at her in astonishment.

"But Mom ..." I finally said, forcing myself to speak quietly.

"Oh, I know," she gestured impatiently, raising both hands to shoulder height, palms forward as if to stop my protest. "You don't want the commitment that you're afraid will come with saying that, but don't you remember how she treated you in the hospital? She saved your life."

"Yeah I do, but that was before we even knew each other so well and everything else happened."

"So? Now you do know each other, and whether you like it or not, you've been friends and even lovers. Suddenly she's alone and injured. After what her parents have done, she's going to be feeling abandoned. If she doesn't have a few friends to lean on, she's going to fall into a state of deep depression," Mom's hands gently rested on my shoulders and her eyes stared into mine. "Please Chris, just think about what you'd feel like if you were in her place, won't you?"

"Okay, Mom," I sighed heavily. "While I'm driving to Calgary I'll think about it, but no promises. However when this is all straightened out, I'm going to hunt up Sam McAdam and kick his ass from here to Halifax and back."

"You'll be standing in line," she snorted. "I can just imagine what your father will say when I tell him what her parents have done."

"Hmmph! It won't be anything compared to what I feel right now," I snapped. "I'm going to check the oil and stuff in my car before we take off, but I was wondering, do I have any spare clothes left here that would be suitable for wearing in Calgary? If I don't make it back home tonight, I'd like something clean to wear tomorrow."

"Chris, you're going to Calgary, for crying in the sink!" she laughed. "There are more stores there than I could shake a stick at. You've got your credit card in your wallet, haven't you? Just buy some new clothes."

"But the credit card is for ranch stuff," I protested.

"Young man, I handle the accounts and I can certainly find an excuse to make that fit into the books. As far as I'm concerned, you've worn out a lot more than two or three changes of clothing while working on that ranch this summer. Besides, in two days you're taking over the ranch and no one is going to make a fuss about a few dollars spent on something like this. Besides as far as I'm concerned, what you're going to be doing is ranch business. You just buy what you need and let me do the book-keeping, okay?"

I heard the phone ring, but Mom must have heard it too, because she spun about and went inside. I just stared after her; the realization was just sinking in that Grampa Bender was giving me control of all of the bank accounts of the ranch as well as all the duties. I was still standing there going over that added responsibility and wondering about the ethics of buying some clothes when Beth popped out the door.

"Hey Chris, Jessica and Jean are on the phone. Can they go along with you to Calgary? Mom said to tell you that you'll have to get them a room at the motel too. Jess and Jean heard what their folks did and they're pissed. They want to be there for Sandy. Oh, and they've been staying with Jasmine, so it's not out of the way for you to pick them up," she paused for an instant. "So, is it okay? Will you take them along?"

"Okay, Beth. Calm down. And yes, I'll give them a ride to Calgary."

"Great! Thanks, Chris," she yelped loudly, then spun on her heel and raced back inside.

I'd checked under the hood, checked my tire pressure and even washed the windshield before anyone came outside again. This time it was Dad.

"Thanks for offering to do this, Chris," he said quietly.

"Hey, it's not a problem. Sandy is a friend, but then so is Carissa," I shrugged my shoulders.

"And Jackie?" he smiled a bit and raised his eyebrows.

"I don't know her well enough to really say she's a friend, Dad," I sighed. "I liked her 'go get 'em' attitude when we were working together, but her late night ambush really bothered me."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that was an ambush, although I question the idea of you being involved with someone that impetuous," Dad sighed. "However, that wasn't what I was thinking about."

When he didn't say anything for a moment, I frowned and shrugged, trying to indicate that I couldn't read his mind.

"Liz talked to Jess and Jean about their parents and about Jackie's parents. They think if their own parents were angry, Jackie's folks would have been furious," he leaned against his pickup. "I'm not sure what you want to do about it, but we feel she'll need as much support as Sandy, or perhaps even more."

"Oh," I just stared at him, then couldn't help but grin. "I don't think the hospital would go along with the idea that I was both girls' fiancée, Dad."

"No," he managed a weak smile. "Trust you to think of that though. However, since Jess and Jean are going to go to the hospital with you, Liz and I were wondering if you should say that Jackie is your fiancée?"

"Dad, I refuse to do that. That kid is a loose cannon," I shook my head. "Physically she's old enough to have sex, but her life has been so sheltered and screwed around that she acts like she's a lot younger than any girl I know."

"Chris, she's six months older than you are."

"Yeah? Well she acts like she's twelve," I snapped. "But don't worry, I'll figure out some way to get to see her too."

Luckily for me, Corinna and Wil came outside then, followed by Mom and Beth. A few minutes later we were on our way, but not before we all got hugs and kisses from Mom, Dad and Beth. Actually, Wil and I got a handshake from Dad, but Corinna got a hug.

I had to open the trunk so Wil and Corinna could toss a couple of small bags inside, but I was surprised when they hopped in the back seat.

"We thought we'd ride back here, then Jess and Jean can ride up front with you," Wil explained. "We expect that they're going to want to talk to you anyway."

"Oh, okay," I sighed.

Jess and Jean as well as all of Uncle Tom's family were out on the porch when we pulled in, but after another round of hugs and handshakes we were on our way again. Actually I found it rather strange that everyone was making this much of a fuss about us going, but I didn't say anything.

For once both of the twins were very quiet for a while. However, as we drove across the river bridge and turned away from town toward the main highway, both of them seemed to sit up straighter and take a deep breath. I glanced over curiously and Jess smiled weakly.

"I suppose it sounds weird, but we were worried about Mom or Dad seeing us leaving the area and heading for Calgary," she said very quietly.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, they called and I talked to them shortly before we called your Dad's place. They told us that Sandy had been in an accident, but forbade us to go see her," Jean added, slightly louder and much more firmly. "I dunno what they'll do when they find out that we're going anyway."

"Probably kick us out too," Jess sighed. "That wouldn't be the end of the world for us though; Tom and Jasmine's folks said we could stay on the farm, no matter what Mom and Dad did."

"I suppose there are benefits to that," I tried to tease them.

"Maybe there could be, but there aren't," Jess snapped back instantly.

I knew better than to try to make a smart crack about that.

"Sorry. It's none of my business," I said instead, trying to be conciliatory.

"It's not your fault that Tom treats us like we were his sisters," Jean sighed softly.

"I think if there was just one of us, it would be different," Jess added quietly.

"Oh," I nodded, thinking that I knew just how Tom must feel.

"What do you mean by that tone of voice?" Jean leaned forward to look closely at my face.

"Well, when you have two gorgeous girls in front of you, anything you do with one might be misread by the other," I sighed, thinking of Carissa and Sandy. "It's intimidating as hell."

"But we're twins," Jess said in a protesting tone.

"That would make it even worse for me," I snorted.

"That's right," Corinna spoke from the back seat. "You should have seen how Chris treated Carissa and me when we were first around him at the farm. But once Wil and I decided to be close, he was a lot friendlier toward Carissa."

"That was then and this is now. Things have changed." I thought to myself.

"So while you were talking to your Mom and Dad, did you happen to find out what injuries Sandy had?" Wil asked quietly, probably trying to change the subject.

"All they said is that they thought she'd live, because all she had were a couple of broken bones as well as cuts and bruises. I don't think they even asked about anything else," Jess snapped instantly, sounding angry.

"I think Sandy will be okay, but I'm worried about Jackie though," Jean added almost as soon as Jess stopped speaking. "They said she was thrown out of the Jeep and across the intersection onto the hood of a parked car."

"The thing is, her parents are even stricter than ours are," Jess continued the explanation. "I think they'd like any excuse to have her out of the family and away from home. Heck, their boys are all out of the house now, working for the FLDS bunch from Bountiful. The last I heard they were working out in the bush at Sundre, cutting poles, and out of touch with anyone for weeks on end. That means her brothers won't even know about Jackie being injured."

"Hah, those dummies wouldn't care anyway," Jean snapped, as she jumped into the conversation again. "I'll bet not one of her family even shows up to see if she lives or dies. We were thinking that one of us could pretend to be her sister, then we might be able to at least find out what's going on."

"I don't think we could get away with it," Jess sighed softly, looking ready to cry. "We look too much alike."

"I could help you to look a little different. Carissa and I learned how to do that a long time ago," Corinna offered. "I mean you'd still look quite similar, but people would easily believe that you were cousins, not sisters."

That started a three-way girl-to-girl chatter session that shortly was extremely enthusiastic and loud enough to actually disturbing my concentration on driving.

"Hey, could you gals hold it down a bit?" I asked as the squeals and giggles broke out a bit too loudly. "Why don't I pull over to the side for a second, then Wil can come up here and you two can hop in the back with Corinna?"

"Oh yeah!" I got an enthusiastic answer.

"Um, could you open the trunk and let me get at my makeup case when we stop?" Corinna asked.

"And we need one of our bags, for some clothes and things as well," Jess added, reaching out to touch my arm. "Please?"

"Fine, but if you're going to do that, would you like me to pull into a service station with a washroom? There's one just a few miles ahead."

"Oh yes, please," Jean and Jess said in concert.

There was a small coffee shop as well as a service station at the place we chose to stop. Corinna suggested that Wil and I have a coffee while we waited for them to do their cosmetic make over because she expected it to take a while. So Wil and I sat and waited quietly after they disappeared into the washroom. It seemed to me to be taking forever, but according to the clock on the wall, it was less than twenty minutes before they came out and approached us.

What a change! Now Jess looked a bit older and a lot like Jackie and Jean looked even older, slightly heavier and even more like Sandy. I'll admit it; I just stared at them both for a moment as they broke into wide grins.

That brief period of elation disappeared by the time we were back on the road. For the rest of the trip to the hospital, Wil sat up front with me, but we hardly spoke. The three girls in the back seat spoke quite quietly and almost constantly, but by the time we arrived at Calgary General they had a plan laid out that they wanted us to follow. We'd go in as three separate groups, then if the girls managed with their masquerade we'd meet later, either at the car or in the waiting room of the hospital. At that time we could compare notes and update each other about what was going on with the three injured girls.

Jess was going to go in first and see if she could convince the nurse at the desk that she was Jackie's sister, but Corinna and Wil were going to be just a few steps behind her. If Jess needed it, they'd be right there to give her support.

That left Jean and me to wait a few moments. While we waited I explained that I'd decided that I wasn't going to use the fiancée idea except as an absolutely last resort. I didn't mind the idea of being referred to as Sandy's boyfriend, but the idea of calling myself her fiancée just felt wrong to me. I was surprised that Jean didn't argue with me at all. But when we went inside, we were both surprised to find that I needn't have worried.

The woman at the information desk was Lucille Bender, one of my older cousins.

"Hello, Chris. I haven't seen you in years," she said with what seemed like a forced smile. "Your brother Wil is here already. He told me that you and a young woman were coming to see one of our patients."

"Hi, Lucille, how are you doing? Actually, I've got three patients here that I'd like to find out about and visit if possible. Jean's sister is one of them," I managed a weak smile as I nodded my head toward Jean. "They had an accident this morning and I understand that all three were brought here."

"Yes, Wil explained that they were all close friends of yours. Is this young lady Sandra McAdam's sister?"

"Yes. I am," Jean nodded her head vigorously.

"Very good," Lucille nodded and made a notation in the book on her desk. "That means all three of those patients have someone we can contact. We had contact information previously that appears to have been erroneous."

"If you mean Sam and Ann McAdam, then the contact information wasn't wrong, they're our parents, Sandy's and mine," Jean snapped instantly, her face suddenly as menacing as a thundercloud. "Unfortunately, they aren't very good at parenting right now."

"I see," Lucille said quietly then waved a hand as if in dismissal. "We do need some form of contact information though. We have to try to establish a next of kin and contact information to ..."

"Use Jean's name, with Mom and Dad's phone number and address," I said instantly. "Sandy and I are quite close and either Mom or I always know where to find Jean."

"I thought you were living on Uncle Toby's ranch?" Lucille said, then stopped as if she'd said something wrong.

"I am. Someone needed to care for the place when he went into the hospital," I managed to keep my voice neutral, but I knew that he hadn't had one visitor from the 'citified' members of our family. "You can put down the phone number of the ranch too or even Uncle Tom's number. We all know where to find any of our friends and family in a very short time."

"Oh, I guess that explains why Jackie McAdam's sister gave me Tom's number to contact, does it?"

"Yes, her parents are here in Calgary, but she doesn't get along that well with them either," I was losing my patience. "Could we handle this in little while? We're worried about Sandy and the others."

"Oh certainly, I'm sorry," Lucille seemed to snap out of her detective mode and started to explain what we wanted to know.

It turned out that Sandy was the only one of the three who wasn't still in the operating room. However she was still in intensive care which meant that she was still groggy from the drugs. It also meant that we'd only be able to go in to see her one at a time. Lucille suggested that we go to the small waiting room on the second floor, near the emergency room and wait there, because she thought Sandy's 'cousin' was visiting with her at the moment.

"That waiting room is also where anyone having or needing information about the patients would look first for family members," Lucille said as we started to move away.

"We'll be back," I told her, guiding Jean toward an elevator I'd just seen open.

In a moment, Jean and I were alone in the elevator and she looked at me questioningly.

"Who was that woman? She seemed to know you."

"Yeah, she does," I sighed deeply. "She's a cousin and one of the city side of the family, but those of us back home don't get along with that bunch most of the time. It's a long complicated story and I'm only learning part of it myself. If you want to know about it ask Aunt Alice or Mom when you get home."

"Maybe I will ask sometime, but not right away," Jean snorted and shook her head. "I've got enough family crap of my own to deal with."

I just nodded my head, then the elevator door opened and we stepped out, looking for the waiting room. Wil and Corinna were sitting with Mr. and Mrs. Coulter as we entered the room. I was surprised when John Coulter got to his feet instantly, moving forward and holding out his right hand.

"Thank you for coming and bringing the others, Chris," he grabbed my hand and squeezed quite hard and his other arm swung over my shoulders in a 'man hug.'

"Oh I had to come, Mr. Coulter," I said, growing emotional. "I don't abandon friends when they need someone."

"Yeah, I know and dammit, call me John, you've earned that many times over," he said quietly as he stepped back a pace and I could see a tear in his eye, but at the same time, he tried to smile. "However, somehow I have to convince my daughters to quit doing things so we meet like this."

"How is Carissa? Have you heard anything ... John?"

"I'd better let Wilma tell you that," he said, stepping aside so Mrs. Coulter could wrap me in a hug.

"I'm sorry I was angry with you, Chris," she said, then didn't say much more for a moment as she hugged me tightly.

"It's okay. Things got mixed up and no one really understood what was happening."

"Hmph, that's what you think, but I'll explain later," she was crying now. "Anyway Carissa is in the operating room. They're trying to reconstruct her right ankle. They've also told us that she has a minor head wound and multiple other small injuries. But she's not in anywhere near as bad shape as Jackie is. Jackie was thrown out of the Jeep through the rear door and flew across the street, landing on the hood of a parked car and breaking the windshield."

"Through the rear door?"

"Well not the people door, the rear door at the very back of the Jeep, the one that opens upward. If a Jeep was a car, I'd call it the trunk lid," she frowned. "I don't know any other way to describe it."

"That's the tailgate," John interrupted. "Somehow she was thrown up and back, over the top of the back seat. Or at least that's where they think she was sitting."

"Holy crow! What hit them, a semi?"

"A five-ton truck, loaded with dairy products to be delivered to some big store," he growled and I could see his hands clenched tightly. "I spoke to the police and they blame the truck driver for the accident. He went through a red light and there was no sign that he braked at all. The witnesses who saw the accident estimate he was doing about fifty miles an hour when he hit Carissa. They had to use the 'jaws of life' and take off the top, the doors and most of the firewall to get her out of the driver's seat of the Jeep."

"Oh migawd," Jean squeaked, covering her mouth with her hand. "And Jackie?"

"She was seriously hurt, but they haven't told us much more than that yet," Then he looked at Jean and smiled slightly. "I want to thank you for being here."

"Well, Sandy is my sister and Jackie is family too. Blood's thicker than water, you know," she was on the edge of tears.

Mrs. Coulter never hesitated, she wrapped Jean in a hug and pulled her aside, then talked to her quietly.

"Right about now, I'd like to kick their asses," John said quietly to me through clenched teeth.

"If you're talking about the older McAdams, the line forms right behind me and so far it includes my whole family," I growled.

"Oh I can imagine. Your mother must be livid."

"Well, I'd think that about right now she and Aunt Alice will have their heads together. They'll already have figured out that Jess and Jean might be kicked out of the house too, so they'll be making contingency plans, just in case."

"Jess and Jean don't have to worry; we've got a big house, but what about you? What are your plans? The girls aren't going to be able to go to school right away and that duplex will be a bit too much for you on your own, won't it?"

"Actually I'm in the midst of changing my plans, so I can't really pin them down to anything definite right now," I shrugged my shoulders. "I'd already dropped out of the course I was planning to take here in Calgary for this year anyway, so I'm not worried about the duplex. The scholarship I won is good for another couple of years, so I might still take the electronic course next year or the year after. I don't know if I'll take it at all though, after all what good will it do me on the ranch?"

"Did you sign anything about renting the duplex? If you did, they might be able to ask for rent money until they can get someone else to lease it."

"Nope, none of my family signed anything. Heck, we haven't even seen it. That was all Mr. and Mrs. McAdam's idea, so it's their problem."

"Okay, that's a relief, but what are you going to do this year?"

"Well for now, I plan to do a lot of work on improvements to the ranch this fall; then there are some courses at Olds starting right after the New Year that I'd like to take."

"So you plan on staying on the ranch permanently?"

"Absolutely," I nodded emphatically.

"I'm glad to hear that; I think it suits you," he smiled and clapped me on the shoulder. "After all this mess is straightened up I want to talk to you about a business deal."

"Umm, what sort of business deal?"

"One that could make both of us a good deal of money, and I'm not going to attach any strings to it as far as Carissa is concerned either. Her life is her business and your life is your own. I won't horn in on that."

I hope he didn't see the relief that flooded through me, but he must have known something of how I felt. His hand was still resting on my shoulder and he squeezed gently, then moved over to where Jean and Mrs. Coulter were talking.

Just then Jess came into the room and hurried over to Jean. I could see she'd been crying, but she had a smile on her face at the moment. I moved over to hear what she said to Jean.

"Sandy is going to be fine," Jess's voice sounded sober, but slightly elated too. "She's got scrapes and bruises, a couple of broken bones in her left hand and a long cut down one thigh, but mostly she's just shaken up. No one can go in to see her for a while though. They want to move her out of intensive care, into a recovery room, then they're going to get her settled in there and let her rest for a while before any visitors can go in to see her. After that, we'll all be able to visit her, but even then she's going to be all drugged up for the pain for a while."

"So I can't see her right now," Jean asked plaintively.

"Maybe you can if you hurry, but I doubt it," Jess answered quickly. "I only got to see her for a really short time myself."

"I'm gonna try," Jean said and scurried off.

Jess and I hadn't even had time to sit down before she was back.

"I saw her, but that's all. She was already being moved," she said just before Jess hugged her tightly.

Then to my surprise, it was only a moment or two before both of them came back over to me.

"She's going to be fine, Chris," Jess smiled at me, then her face grew serious. "I talked to one of the nurses and she told me that the other two are going to be in the operating room for a while though. Since Sandy is out of it right now, and we won't hear anything for a while we were wondering what we were going to do tonight? We really don't want to go talk to Jackie's parents about staying there and they're the only people we know in town."

"I'll rent a motel room for you," I said quickly. "Mom and Dad told me to use the business card for that."

"The closest motels are right up the hill on sixteenth avenue," John offered and smiled at the girls. "We've rented a two-bedroom unit, one for us and another for Corinna and Wil. If we'd known you were coming we'd have taken two singles too."

"That's okay, John. Which motel are you at?"

"It was called 'Cattleman's Rest' and it's made to look like it was built out of logs. They're all fake logs though," Mrs. Coulter shook her head slowly. "I thought the lady said they had no single units left for tonight, but I could be wrong. I could phone them if you like, that's how I rented ours."

"I'd rather go see the rooms anyway," I shook my head and waved a hand as if waving off her offer. "We'll go find something and be back fairly soon."

When we went back downstairs, I saw a bank of pay phones and called Mom to let her know what was going on, but found that Mrs. Coulter had already called her. Then we went to the front desk and were directed to admissions to fill out what we knew about Sandy and Jackie's medical information. When we'd filled out all we could, there were still many more blank spaces than filled ones on those forms, but it was the best we could do. At least we didn't have to worry about medical coverage; thank goodness for accident insurance and Canada's universal medical coverage.

It must have been thirty or forty minutes before we could think about the motel rental again. As we were walking out to the car, I thought about our ages, then realized that I might have a bit of difficulty renting a motel room for myself, let alone another room for two teenage girls.

"I might have a problem when we get to the motel," I said abruptly.

"Oh, what sort of a problem?" Jean asked instantly.

"Well I'm going to try to rent two rooms, but we're all quite young, so it might be a bit of a problem."

"Would it be easier if we said we were your sisters?" Jess asked instantly.

"But, do you think you could rent one of those double units too," Jean added.

"Yeah, we really don't like the idea of being in a room that's all by itself."

"Not here in the city, where everyone is a stranger."

"We don't feel safe."

"Dammit, quit that ping-pong, seesaw shit," I snorted, then had to laugh. "Now I know why you drive Tom nuts though."

"Unh, no you don't," Jean sighed. "He has another reason, but it's his business and we can't say anything because we promised not to."

I glanced over and frowned at them for a second, then decided it was Tom's and their business not mine.

"Anyway, we would like to have you sleeping in the next room to us. We'd feel a lot safer," Jess said quietly.

"But, I do think it would be simpler if we implied that we were your sisters, and if we go to the place the Coulters are staying, we could say that 'our older brother' would be coming to sleep at the motel tonight," Jean grinned. "And please notice that we're not talking in a seesaw fashion either."

I nodded at that, giving them the benefit of the doubt.

"Jean and I could even tell them that our sister was in the hospital and we wanted a place that was close by," Jess suggested quietly.

"Okay, we can see what happens. I may have to phone home though and have Mom or Dad talk to the motel clerk. I've never done this before."

"You haven't?" I heard the echoed question from both of them.

"Nope. When Corinna was in the hospital in Edmonton, Mr. Coulter rented the rooms. Heck this is the first time that I've used the ranch credit card for anything other than farm supplies or groceries," I snorted. "Mom gave me orders to buy some clothes too though, so I should do that sometime soon."

"I saw a big mall just down sixteenth avenue when we were coming into town. We could go there right after going to the motel," Jean suggested.

"Sure, we'd love to help you pick out clothes," Jess grinned and winked.

"I'm not going to buy anything fancy."

"Who cares, it's shopping!" Jean said then pointed. "There's the motel where the Coulters are staying. Are we going to try to get a room there?"

"Yeah, we might as well try there first."

I was in for a surprise. The motel had reserved a double room for us and had put a tentative reserve on a single room as well. It turned out that Mrs. Coulter had called Mom when they'd rented their rooms and had told her where they were staying. Mom had talked to Dad, then had phoned the motel and told them we were coming. I suppose she'd forgotten to mention that to me when I'd called her.

When we went to see the double, I really liked it. One room had a double bed and a small kitchen/ sitting room area while the other room had two single beds. There was a full bathroom, TVs in both rooms and the tiny kitchen nook had a two-burner stove, a tiny refrigerator and some cheap pots and pans and dishes. On top of that, the place was clean and neat.

We took the double and turned down the single, dropping off Jean and Jess's bags in the room with the two single beds. We even ended up by putting Corinna and Wil's stuff just inside the door of the main room so it could be carried down the hall to their room later. Both Jess and Jean were tickled pink when the clerk gave each of us a key to the room.

"Well, we've never stayed in a motel before," Jean grinned at me when I mentioned it to them as we got into the car.

"This trip is a first for us in a lot of ways," Jess added, then giggled and I was surprised when Jean joined her.

"What was the giggling about?" I asked as I watched the traffic, ready to turn onto the road.

"Nothing, let's go buy you some clothes now," one of them said.

"Yeah, we want to go shopping," I could hear it was the other twin, but since my head was turned, I didn't know which one has said what.

So we went to the mall. I should have known better than to go shopping with two teenage girls. We didn't buy a lot other than some clothes for me, but we certainly wandered around a fair amount. We were in the mall for almost two hours and only spent about fifteen minutes or so buying my clothes. The rest of the time we spent at the mall was wasted 'just looking' at things. Of course they 'window shopped' as well, asking me a thousand and one questions about which clothes I thought they'd look good in as we stood outside one woman's clothing store or another. I finally had to put my foot down and herded the two of them to the car.

Of course they insisted that we take my clothes back to the motel and when we were there, they wanted me to wear something new when we went back to the hospital. I didn't want to bother, but they got stubborn and insistent, so I finally changed my shirt and pants, then I decided that we needed to get back to the hospital. We stopped at the admissions desk again and gave them the room number at the motel so they could reach us in case we weren't at the hospital and we were needed. Then we went back to the waiting room.

We should have eaten when we were out because it was almost another three hours before we got to see Sandy. In fact the girls got to see Jackie before we got to see Sandy again. Jackie was in intensive care by then and Carissa had been moved there while we were out. Of course only immediate family could get in to see either one right then, so Wil and I waited as patiently as we could.

After Mr. and Mrs. Coulter had seen Carissa for a short while, they slipped out to grab a bite to eat, then Corinna and Wil went to eat after the Coulters came back. Meanwhile, Jess, Jean and I were still waiting, but I'd wandered around the hospital and found a cafeteria where I could buy some sandwiches and coffee, so we weren't starving.

It's a good thing I did that, because it was after nine before we were allowed to see Sandy. Jean went to see her first, then Jess, and finally I was allowed in for a few minutes.

Sandy had a huge bruise on her left cheek that started on her chin and stretched almost to her eyebrow. She was going to have a heavy duty shiner around her left eye. Both of her arms had bandages and she had a cast on her left hand, but she recognised me. She even managed a small smile as I took her right hand in mine, not daring to hug her.

"Hi," she whispered.

"Hi, I was wondering; do you need a bedpan?" I asked quietly.

In the blink of an eye her body had levitated from flat on the bed to a sitting position and her arms were hugging me, while the right side of her head tried to meld with my right shoulder. All I could do was hold her gently as she wept.

"I'm so sorry ... so very sorry," she sobbed. "We all fucked up ... but me most of all."

All I could do was pat her on the back and try to calm her, because I didn't know what else to say. Right then I was far too emotional to think straight and I certainly didn't want to say anything to upset her worse than she was. I was still holding her when a nurse came in and hustled me out of the room.

I waited in the hall outside the door, hoping to speak to the nurse and hoping I hadn't done anything irreparable. When the nurse did come out, she saw me and smiled, then gestured for me to follow her. She stopped a few feet from Sandy's door and turned toward me.

"I don't know what you said, but I think that helped her. Now perhaps she'll stop fighting the drugs and rest," she smiled. "Thank you."

"I thought I might have done something wrong."

"I don't think so," she smiled. "She does need her rest to recuperate and I think you triggered some problem that she was worrying about. She's cleared that up now and she can relax. Hopefully, she'll sleep for ten or twelve hours."

"Yeah," I sighed. "I could use some sleep myself."

"Come back tomorrow," she smiled and reached out to touch my hand. "I'm sure that you'll both be in better shape after a good night's sleep."

Then she turned on her heel and walked away.

All I could was to sigh deeply and hope she was right.

I wandered slowly back to the waiting room after talking to Sandy and the nurse, but I was surprised to find that Mrs. Coulter was the only one who was still in the hospital. Everyone else had gone back to the motel for the night and as soon as Mrs. Coulter saw me, she told me that I should go as well. She and John planned to take turns sitting up during the night, but if anything happened that the rest of us needed to worry about they'd wake us. Since the doctors had explained that all the girls were relatively stable now she wasn't worried that anything was going to happen overnight.

I agreed with her that I needed sleep, but first I wanted to know how badly the girls had been injured. In only a few moments, she confirmed my suspicions that Carissa and Jackie were in far worse condition than Sandy was.

Both of Carissa's legs had been pinned under the dash of the Jeep. Her right leg was broken, the ankle on her left leg was badly twisted and the tendons stretched, while two bones in her foot were cracked. On top of that, she'd had a minor concussion, and her abdominal area was badly bruised from contact with the steering wheel, which meant that they were keeping an eye on her for internal bleeding. On top of that, she had minor cuts and bruises all over her body.

Jackie also had a mild concussion, a broken arm and several cracked ribs. Worse than that though, she had two cracked vertebrae in her neck, so they'd had to immobilise her spine. Mrs. Coulter said that one doctor suspected that she'd be in a spinal brace for at least three or four months and would be in the hospital the whole time. As well as that, she'd had two or three major cuts that had bled profusely. In other words, Jackie was in the worst condition of the three girls.

"That's not good," I sighed, thinking about what I'd heard of her parents.

"No, I agree," Mrs. Coulter sighed.

"What bothers me is what I've heard about Jackie's family. I don't think there'll be much support forthcoming from that direction."

"Huh, I called Ann McAdam as soon as we found out anything concrete," Mrs. Coulter snarled. "That silly witch was about as pleasant as a rattlesnake. She blames you and your family for everything, then included Carissa and our family for good measure. According to her, she wants to ship Sandy and Jackie off to BC to some Mormon compound as soon as possible, before they are 'totally ruined' by all of us."

"Yeah, that would be a place called Bountiful that some fringe sect of the Mormons have started where they marry teenaged girls to old men. For some strange reason she wants her girls to be part of a plural marriage setup," I explained. "Somehow she had the idea that our family were Mormons, that's why she tried to get her girls involved with Tom and me."

"Well whatever she wants, I think she's going to be disappointed. John is furious," she sighed heavily then. "Unfortunately, it looks like Carissa and Jackie are becoming a couple and that could be a huge problem for both of them."

"Yeah, this is 'bible belt' Alberta and the religious nuts don't like two women to be together," I nodded.

"You're taking the idea rather calmly, probably better than I am and certainly better than Corinna or John are," she looked at me quizzically. "I'm very surprised. I thought you and Carissa were really hitting it off well. Were we all mistaken about that?"

"No, we care for each other, just not as much as Carissa seems to care about Jackie," I sighed, then shrugged my shoulders. "I can't explain it, but somehow I think I suspected deep down that Carissa and I were a short term thing. I was willing to go along with what happened, but in a way it was just a series of coincidences that pushed us together. In a lot of ways it was just plain wrong, but at the time it felt right."

"Well from what I saw, Carissa was the one who pushed herself on you, didn't she?"

"Umm, I guess," I shrugged again, then grinned. "I didn't exactly fight her off though."

"At your age that's understandable," she laughed softly. "At the same time, I think Sandy is completely smitten with you and from what I understand you held her off, at least at first. Can you explain that?"

"Nope," I snorted. "I'm not even going to try, other than the fact that she told me her dad expected us to go to have sex on the first date and I rebelled against the idea that I was so predictable. Actually, the way she spoke that night, it made all guys sound like either predators or opportunists and that upset me."

"Chris, you are a very complex young man and you constantly surprise both John and me," she smiled then. "Now you look like you're going to need to use toothpicks if you plan to hold your eyes open much longer. I think you should go find a bed and get some sleep."

"Yeah, I think you're right," I nodded. "Thanks for the talk though. I feel better now."

"You're welcome, Chris," she stood and hugged me as I got up. "Goodnight now."

After telling her goodnight, I walked off feeling a lot better, but very tired.

When I was passing the front desk on my way out of the hospital, my cousin Lucille was just getting off shift and she asked if I'd join her for a coffee. I couldn't very well say no, so I agreed to meet her in a short while at an all-night restaurant that I'd noticed was near the motel where we were staying. The main reason I chose that restaurant was that I wanted to warn Jess and Jean that I'd be late. On top of that though I didn't want to drive the car more than I had to that night, because I was just too darn tired to concentrate on traffic. At the same time, I thought I should tell Wil where I was going and who I was meeting.

Back at the motel, the two girls were sitting in the bedroom with the two single beds, eating potato chips, drinking cokes and watching TV. They weren't too interested in the fact that I would be out for a while longer, but still thanked me for thinking of them. Of course they also talked to me a bit about Sandy, but like me, they were more worried about Jackie. They agreed with the nurse, deciding that Sandy having hugged me and then cried on my shoulder was a good thing. Even if I couldn't understand why they felt that it was such a good sign, I accepted their opinion more than the nurse's.

I didn't talk to them long, so it was only a few moments before I was knocking on the door of the Coulter's suite and telling Wil about Lucille. He offered to come along, but one look at Corinna convinced me that he should stay there and comfort her.

"Just don't take any guff from Lucille," he advised as I left. "Just remember, her old man was the guy who came out to brag about his brand-new Cadillac the day the farm well quit. He did fuck all to help, but got in our way and pissed us all off. Lucille was one of the kids who sat in the car, mocking us and holding her nose about the smell of the pig pens."

"Yeah, I recall," I growled.

### Chapter 39