The Accident
by Frank Bill

With the phone in one hand and a dial tone on the other end I'm still waking up. Between each ring I'm somewhere amidst being drug by a tractor-trailer and a billionaire becoming a street vagrant.

When the doctor's 'suck-retary' questions what the appointment is for I tell her anxiety. Depression. Maybe even shock, I don't know. Take your pick. Why a patient cannot call his doctor and say, I just feel like shit today, is an enigma.

Suck-retary is what my wife Ima refers to as the relationship between a doctor and his secretary.

On the phone, the sucretary is asking if I have seen the doctor for these symptoms before?

"In his office," I say, "several months ago."

Looking in the bathroom mirror, the corners of my eyes are crusted eight balls. To think I made fun of people like this whenever I was younger.

She says, "Did he tell you to come back for a follow up visit?"

Well I didn't call to talk. Sometimes I don't comprehend these people, places and things. All of these nouns. I don't know their definitions.

Yes, I tell her, 2-6-70, that's my date of birth. And yes, 264 Eastern Estates, that's my correct address. Tomorrow, she says, an appointment tomorrow morning. I tell her yes, that will be fine.

Muffled I hear her say bi-polar. What the hell is bi-polar? I yell. I'm not bi-anything, curious or sexual. I'm a Homosapien. A straight white male.

Now she's explaining, "this condition." She calls it. Oh, I see, so you think I'm a recluse. A nut bag.

Now she's apologizing. Saying she wasn't implying that toward me. But I say, "Yes you did imply that I'm one card shy of a full deck. Look lady I don't think I like you very much." I'll show her. Running to my bedroom. Opening the nightstand. "How about that?" I say, "Can you hear that? What is that? It's the slide on my 9mm Glock."

"What's a Glock?" She says.

Well its not a toy.

"Today?' I say, "Oh now you can fit me in today. Two hours, no problem, I'll be there. Yes, Frank. Mr. Frank  ***%*." The things a person must do to get an appointment with his doctor. The next thing you know I'll end up in some asylum or self-help circle walking around with a 'Barney Bib' around my neck, while drooling. Plastered on my back will be a name tag that says, "Loser."

Walking through the house, the thing about my wife, she's never around anymore. Either she's gone to work before I wake up or I'm in bed a sleep before she gets home. Leaving a post-it for her I write, "Ima, Went to the doctor’s office. Be home later. Stanley."

After signing in I explain to the front desk that I'm not bi-polar or any other type of transgender. Then, in the waiting area, seated next to me, an old raisin of a female says her sphincter muscle has been rebuilt three times. Looking at her I say, "Your asshole has been rebuilt three times?"

"Yes," she says, "My sphincter muscle."

Her face resembles over baked brownies with enough lip stick and eyeliner to restock Revlon. Her hair has been colored so many times it resembles a safety hazard. I say, "Isn't there a limit or are you giving birth?"

Her rainbow eyelids almost separate from her eyes as she mumbles something and sits somewhere out of my sight.

There's the weigh-in, checking the blood pressure and taking the temperature. I've lost weight, no fever but my blood pressure is a little high.

Boxed-in a small waiting room, with a steel sink and an examining table, I feel like I'm in a legalized prison cell. A quarantine for the sick. Beneath the closed door, outside, in the hallway shadows run in and out of the light. Half sentences double as conversation between voices I do not recognize. If only they could close their damn mouths. Instead I close my eyes, grit my teeth and pace the checkered floor.

When Dr. Towell enters the room I'm in such a state, I imagine wrapping my hands around his neck.

Closing my eyes, he says, "How are we today Frank?" Asking questions like this you question his ability. I'm in his doctors office. He is the doctor.

"Since the accident," I say, "not so good."

Gesturing for me to sit down he says, "What's wrong?"

Staring at his uni-brow I begin by process of elimination. I tell him all I think about are people giving me the finger. I even dream about a severed arm dressed in an Armani suit chasing me around the hallways at work. Trying to force me into an elevator. Then I wake up flipping myself off, calling myself a sorry ass prick.

"How long has this been going on?" He says.

Several months on the dreams but sometimes at work I just yell, "no I'm not," for no reason. If a phone rings my heart skips a beat. Co-workers try to speak with me and I snap, "Who gave you permission to speak?"

Similar to right now, the nursing staff, walking up and down the hallway, I want to tell them to shut their damn mouths. Only I don't tell Dr. Towell this.

With white miniature scabs flaking his thinning hair, Dr. Towell says, "Have you tried to ride an elevator since the accident?"

"No," I say, "I use the stairs every day. Even passed a petition around at work so people wouldn't use the damn elevator."

"Did it work?" He says. No, I tell Dr. Towell, it didn't work. These people I work with are so insensitive to my recovery. They're a bunch of lobbyist for the button pushing generation.

I say, I really thought everything would be ok. I thought I was bigger than all of this.

"Completely understandable." He says, "But these things take time, what you are experiencing is PTSD."  He explains that this is short for posttraumatic stress disorder. A medical condition caused from witnessing a horrific event.

Great, I say, I'm a recluse. Some vagabond of non-reproductive tissue.

No, he says, you're having a rough time.

Sure I am, it's not every day that a person dreams about a severed limb chasing them around their place of work. He prescribes me a medication known as Zoloft. Great, now I'm a science project for the medical community. The side effects are upset stomach, dry mouth, indigestion and agitation.

"I’ve got all of those already." I say. "Are you trying to make me better or worse?" You have to question these things or else you will end up toothless sucking up Coronas in Tijuana with a guy named Valdez, with no memory of how you got there.

He says they're only temporary. That's what he told me about the headaches on my last visit. He says I may not experience any of the side effects. Oh and try to get some exercise. It'll help reduce the stress.

Shaking his hand and exiting into the hallway his staff is speaker loud and all I can think about is stabbing a pencil in someone's eye to reduce my stress.

Going back, several months ago, this was me. Looking at my reflection.

Then my reflection was split in half by the chrome doors. One atom segregated into two parts. The doors stopped. Not completely closed but not completely open. Then the elevator starts moving up, up, up. And with a man's arm in your grip, you're pulling and he is screaming. No, he's yelling, "Do something." With his arm caught in-between the elevator doors. He's on the outside looking in.

Me, grasping his arm with one hand unable to conform, to let go, pushing buttons with the other and he's pulling his arm yelling, "You little prick what are you gonna do?"

A bell ringing, this a signal for the emergency stop, only it doesn't stop. Nothing works. I say, "I didn't invent the elevator."

He's giving me the finger. Flying me the bird. I'm pulling his arm thinking -no big deal, just another expensive suit.

"You son of a bitch." He says, "Let go." Something in me changed. Thinking, he's an unappreciative knuckle sandwich. That wedge you can't pick out of your ass. Letting go of his arm, I try to pry the doors open, through the crack of the doors, his face is a soaked candy apple and he's still floating me the bird. The elevator's jerking, slowly moving up, up, up. By now he's on the tips of his toes. In times of panic, you panic. Wishing you would have paid more attention in that Elevator Safety Class.

He's yelling, "You prick." And I wonder, what would Mac-Guyver do?

Now at home, the last thing I remember about that day, in the elevator, aside from wanting to go home, the doors were open and there was a lot of red. The kind of red you would find in a slaughterhouse after butchering a cow or a pig. And I thought someone at the Red Cross could have used it. All of the red.

With half of an arm lying in the elevator, the shredded ends of a suit spotted with red, the middle finger fixed in the upward position, I realized some people bleed to death. While others die because they can't bleed.

After that everything was foreign. I was a stranger. Looking at the man on the gurney with his eyes shut I say, "You gotta weigh out the benefits, the positives, without the limb you weigh a little less. Free parking, a larger bathroom stall reserved for you at public places. Even a special license plate." He said nothing.

My wife always told me you have to turn a negative into a positive. But after that she wasn't around very much. She wasn’t what you'd call a supportive partner.

Outside of our house, the grass is a dark tripping hazard sticking to the rubber soles of my Adidas. Inside the house, all of her clothes are missing. Closets are empty. Her mirrored vanity of Mary-Kay cosmetics are missing. Walking behind a self-propelled Lawn Boy mower, somehow I've misplaced my memory. My wife. She didn't even leave a post-it. That's normal, you know. Common courtesy. Where you are going. How long you will be gone. Somehow I've misplaced my wife.

Walking behind the mower, more and more lights from the surrounding homes are being turned on. I refer to them as Nosey Neighbors. I'm trying to mow my lawn; I'm engrossed in responsibility. Recovery. A doctors recommendation, it's called exercise, maybe they should try it sometime instead of watching it.

Rounding the garage, to my left, I can see outlines moving behind the curtains of Brent's home. Brent Wallace and his wife Vickie are the neighbors you drink beer and cook out with on the weekends. Always talking about their son Steven who enjoys playing with purses and pretending he's a girl. They call it a phase.

Behind me, the Connleys are peeking out of their double-pane windows. They have a child named Kip. He always misses the first step off of their deck falling face first onto the ground. Then he cries like a wimp.

What they all have in common, they're nosey bastards. They're all in this together trying to drive me crazy. They should mind their own business. Or help find my wife. What I could do is call my mother-in-law. But that would be a bad idea considering she's six feet under. Then my father-in-law would really have an excuse to hate me. In-laws and their grudges.

Brent's standing on his back porch, one big silhouette with a bright light behind him. At least I think its Brent. He's yelling something but I can't make out the words. Can't he see I'm busy?

His voice can't propel a twenty-two-inch cut mower. That's bigger than John Holmes.

What is Brent thinking. I've got work to do. Problems to solve. A wife to find.

Probably wants to borrow my new mower. At least He can hear. Carl, he lives across the street. He's the reason I bought a new mower. After borrowing my old mower, he didn't check the oil and burnt the mower up. Blew it up actually. Then he borrows the weedeater. Runs the choke full throttle. Sounded similar to Leather Face sawing up a corpse in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Caught it on fire. Smoked the entire neighborhood. Just because you're deaf doesn't mean you're dumb. The entire neighborhood smelt the smoke. Someone even called the Fire Department. A week later Carl falls asleep smoking a cigarette and burns his back porch down. Now, if you live in this neighborhood you are considered a 'High Risk' on your 'Home Owners Insurance Policy.'  That Carl, he's a son of a bitch.

Word of advice; If you have any deaf neighbors do not let them borrow anything electric or gas powered without close supervision.

Brent looks like an enormous firefly with his big Mag-Lite walking from his yard to mine. I have no time for small talk, my wife is missing and I have a yard to mow. Things to do. To figure out.

Brent is shinning his Mag-Lite in my eyes, the mower is idling and he's wasting my time. The light must be a halogen, all I can see is a silhouette. His outline. "Hey," I say, "If you want to help, follow me with the light so I can see better."

What am I doing?  He asks. This is one guy you do not want as your charades partner.

Well I'm not testing my allergies, I say, what does it look like, I'm mowing my lawn.

"Frank," he says, "Are you okay? It's two in the morning and people are trying to sleep."

Oh I see, now everybody else's life is more important than mine.

Distancing myself from Brent, the mower still running, one step is no longer a step, it's a slip. A fall. With my foot under the mower what I experience is one swipe of pain followed by a feeling of stupefaction. With the operator presence control bar tied down and the drive control lever in the downward position, the lawn mower proceeds forward. Mowing the lawn without me. It's in autopilot.

Looking down at my foot everything is blue, green and yellow spots surrounded by black mass. Brent, standing above me, at least I think it's Brent, blinding me with the Mag-Lite. I say, "Get that damn light out of my face."

My ass, wet with dew, I'm blinking my eyes trying to see what used to be my right foot. Now it's a fountain of red spraying up into the air. Unorganized wires without caps.

Brent is touching my shoulder and he says to stay calm. I say I'm fine just quit touching me. I can hear the mower in another yard. Mowing someone else's lawn. And to think I was nearly finished.

"Are you alright?" Brent asks.

I tell him aside from losing my toes and not knowing where my wife is at, sure, I enjoy sitting here like a gimp. Spending quality time with my neighbor. Noisy Bastard. This is what 'having neighbors' gets you. Sometimes you just want to poke out someone’s eye with an ink pen. Not a Bic. But a Paper Mate Flex Grip, its thick and comfortable. Why don't you go wake Carl up and we can burn my house down or better yet let him burn up my new mower.

The mower is becoming more and more distant. Motion lights are lighting yard after yard.

Looking down at me, Brent says, "Frank, your wife left you after the accident."

Staring up at this aberration I say, "What are you talking about?"

"Your father-in-law and the elevator." He says, "He blames you for losing his arm."

Sometimes you want to pretend you're someone else. Pretend what happened was one big accident. That your wife is on her way home and your father-in-law loves you like his own son. But instead you're looking up at Brent and everything around you is turning black. And you're wondering, will this nosey neighbor ever call an ambulance?

BIO: Frank Bill is a Southern Indiana writer of regional/gritty short stories. He has publications in or forthcoming from Thuglit, Plots With Guns, Pulp Pusher, Talking River Review, Darkest Before the Dawn and Hardboiled. An untitled novel is currently in the works. Check out Frank's blog: http://frankbillshouseofgrit.blogspot.com/.