The Great Escape: Favor

It was already ten minutes past eleven, by the time that I got a chance to look at my watch again. The meeting had gone over a few minutes, even though we had started on time. I knew that if I left now, then I could still make it to the restaurant on time.

As everyone dispersed from the meeting however, I started to help clean up. The chairs were almost stacked by the time Roxy could finally stop my helping efforts.

“Oh no, you don’t.” She put one hand on the stacked chairs. “Didn’t you say that you were going to have lunch with your husband and daughter? What are you still doing here?”

“I guess it’s in my nature to see everything until the end.”

“Yeah? Well it’s in my nature to get you to your lunch date, on time.” She gestured towards the door we had all come in from. “Gloria and I will finish up here.”

Grabbing my purse from underneath the table, I headed towards the parking lot. As my phone rang, my first thought was that it was Kevin calling to see where I was, but the number didn’t look familiar. “Jackie Clark.”

“Hey, Jackie—it’s Denise. Did I catch you at a bad time?”

“Denise.” Walking to my car, I opened the door and got in. “You just had surgery—you should be resting.”

“I know I should, but I guess I forgot how hard it to sleep here when you’re the patient.” There was some hesitance in her laugh, and I shook off how eerie it made me feel. “No, I’m calling because I found out some news about Claudia Joy—”

“How is she?”

She hesitated again. “When Frank came to visit, he wouldn’t give me a straight answer at first. I had to practically pry the information out of him.”

“What information are we talking about here?”

“After Claudia Joy was put under anesthesia, she had a reaction and they had to restart her heart.” I cursed underneath my breath and I turned off the engine just as Roxy and Gloria came out of the building. They both had a box in hand; grinning and chatting as they headed towards Roxy’s car. “She’s in a coma, Jackie.”

So focused on what Denise had just told me, I didn’t realize Roxy was tapping on the passenger door window—with that expression that inquired to why I was still sitting here in the parking lot. I unlocked the car door and she opened it with her free hand. “What are you still doing here?”

“Is that Roxy?” Denise inquired, groaning as if she had just sat up in bed.

Wiping the shock off my face, I felt like I could hardly focus.”Roxy and Gloria were just carrying some things to the car. I was about to head to lunch with Kevin and Sophie.”

“I didn’t know that Sophie was visiting. You’ll have to tell her hi for me.”

 “I will.”

“If it’s too much to ask, can you tell everyone the news about Claudia Joy?”

“I would be happy to tell them.” Although I wasn’t so sure about the happy part—I knew that Denise was also in no condition to tell everyone.

“Thanks, Jackie. I’ll talk to you soon then?”

“We’ll get together as soon as you start feeling better.” I bargained, turning towards Roxy and 

Gloria, who was now standing beside her.

“Then I think I will try and get some sleep. I think the medicine they gave me is finally starting to kick in.”

“Just promise me that you’ll take it easy.”

“I promise I will take it easy until I recover.”

“Bye, Jackie.”

“Bye.”

Roxy cleared her throat. “You going to tell me who you were talking to—or are you just going to keep staring at your phone?”

I smiled apologetically. “Sorry. That was Denise.”

“Denise called you?” Gloria chimed in; excitement and relief in the tone of her voice. “How’s she doing?”

“Yeah, I mean if she called you . . . she must have made it through surgery okay, right?”  Roxy added, not quite as convinced as Gloria was.

“She actually didn’t say too much about the surgery—other than it was a little hard to sleep at the hospital.”

Roxy had that far away look in her eyes, as if recalling a distant memory. “I know it’s only been about three hours since the surgery, but has she heard any news about Claudia Joy?”

“She made it through surgery—”Both Roxy and Gloria gave a relieved sigh at the news. I, on the other hand, felt my stomach knot up. 

“I’m sensing there’s a ‘but’ in there somewhere.” Roxy cut in, noticing my lack of shared excitement.

Nodding in agreement, I took a moment to compose myself. “Claudia Joy made it through the surgery, but had a bad reaction to the anesthesia. When Denise asked Frank about her, that’s when he told her that they had to restart her heart and that she was in a coma.”

Gloria looked worried. “So what does that mean for Claudia Joy? Do the doctors know if she’s ever going to wake up?”

“Poor Michael. I can’t even imagine what he’s going through right now.”

I didn’t have any answers for either of them. When someone in the group—or their spouses—got injured, or had some medical emergency, we often turned to Denise for answers (for good reason, as she always had that calming nature about her).

“Right now, I think we should stay positive. Although I haven’t known Claudia Joy for very long, I know that she has a very strong-will and a fighting spirit.”

Roxy put a comforting hand on Gloria’s shoulder. “We have to hope for the best in these situations. We all knew—including Claudia Joy—that there would be some risks when she went 

into surgery.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“Why don’t you go finish loading those boxes in the car?” Roxy gestured to a bundle of boxes that had appeared there while we had been talking. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.” Backing away, 

Gloria went back over to the car and began loading things into the car. “You should probably get going. Let us know if you find out anything else?”

“I will.”

She gave a small smile of appreciation, and pulled her phone out of her pocket. ”In the meantime, I’ll call Roland and Pamela and fill them in.” I nodded as she closed the passenger door. I watched as Roxy balanced the phone on her shoulder as she said something to Gloria and stepped to the 

curb.

As I waited for a car to pass by down the road, I quickly glanced at the clock and realized that I would be almost a half hour late for lunch. The way things had been going with Kevin lately, I dismissed the thought of calling and letting him know that I was on my way, since he hadn’t already called. I just figured that this way, it would give them a little more time to catch up.

But the closer I got to the restaurant, the more my thoughts scattered like broken glass. I figured that in that time, Sophie could have fed Kevin anything but the truth, about what she had really been up to while away at college. Although she didn’t know it yet, I knew that he wanted to talk about at least one thing that had happened while there. I just hoped that he could wait long enough for us to discuss the matter—or that we could get through lunch in one piece; saving the greater matter, until we were in the privacy of our own home.