Getting the Facts
“Should we visit Bill?” said Loie. They had just pulled around the first corner. “The hospital is kind of on the way home.”
“Yep, yep,” said Bucky. “We really should. Maybe if nothing else we can find out what’s really going on.” It took a few minutes for the Lovebunnies to interpret the directions to the hospital Loie had printed out from the Internet, using Dad’s computer. Then they had an interesting drive through a part of Baltimore they rarely saw, along Middle River. They got a nice view of the skyline, across the river, in the sunset.
“Oh, look, that’s the Brooklyn Bridge,” said Bucky. “Aren’t those little stone towers on the bridge?”
“Yes, I guess they are,” said Loie.
“So that must be Hanover Street,” said Bucky. “It’s the bridge from downtown to Brooklyn. We must be getting there.” Loie laughed.
“Oh, no,” she said. “I just realized what you were saying. I thought you were making a joke about someone moving the Brooklyn Bridge to Baltimore.”
“Oh brother,” said Bucky. “Look at the map and tell me what to do. Oh brother.” The directions from the Internet took the Lovebunnies onto Reedbird Street and into the hospital parking lot by Middle River.
“We were supposed to come here bird watching,” said Bucky as they parked. “That’s a little park over there, and it’s supposed to be a good place to spot shore birds along the river.”
“Back when we were going out spotting with the scope?” said Loie.
“Sure, to see the reed birds,” said Bucky.
“Oh, no, of course,” said Loie. “Reedbird Street.”
“Exactly.”
Nephew Bill looked a bit wan, sitting in his hospital bed, eating his hospital supper. He was glad to see Loie and Bucky. They explained that they’d been in Glen Burnie, and thought they should stop in on the way home.
“But you don’t look like you’re at death’s door,” said Bucky. “Your color is good. What’s wrong?”
“It’s some kind of pneumonia,” said Bill. “Something people aren’t supposed to get.” He went on to tell them how Amanda and the boys had caught a flue when visiting at a friend’s, and so, he thought, had he.
“Then, like the night before last, I just couldn’t stand it. I hadn’t been sleeping at all, ’cause every time I tried to lie down I felt like I was choking. I couldn’t breathe. Amanda said I should come to the hospital, so last night I did.” Apparently the doctors were puzzled, and so was Bill. Loie and Bucky never did find out what exactly Bill had, because he didn’t know, Amanda was too sick herself to be at the hospital pestering the doctors for the zact words, and Bill was just too tired and relieved to be feeling better after beginning a course of antibiotics to be worried about the details.
Bill told the Lovebunnies more details of the last two weeks’ mishaps, the broken thumb, the ruptured eardrum, the flus.
“Josh’s thumb looked like a cartoon, when someone gets smashed with a hammer. His thumb just swole up more and more. They took an x-ray and said the tip bone was broken. We don’t know how.”
The original story, from Aunt Dolores, had been that it happened in a door.
“We think maybe the boys were playing with their heavy trucks, and Evan jammed Josh’s hand, but we don’t really know. Josh never complains, he never says anything if he’s hurt or sick. So all we saw was this thumb swelling up like a balloon.”
Bill told Loie and Bucky that he had been in the middle of renovating their apartment, painting and rearranging, when they all got sick. Just by a rotten coincidence, Amanda had lost her job, and couldn’t pursue a lead she had on another one.
“She has to stay home with the boys. I hope I’m out of here in a day or so, so she can go to an interview. Anyhow, don’t let me keep you here. I’m just really glad you guys came by.” After a bit more commiseration and pleasantry, the Lovebunnies took their leave. On the way out to the elevator, Loie said, “Should we…”
“Yep,” said Bucky.
“…take Amanda some… Oh, good.”
“I don’t have any cash.”
“I do. I went to the bank yesterday and withdrew what we need for two weeks. I can get more on Monday. So should we give her…”
“Yep, fine. Stop off in the gift shop and get a card to put it in.”
“OK, yes, that’s a good idea. You go to the desk and see if someone can give us directions to the house. It’s on Talbot Street.” By now Loie and Bucky were down to the first floor in the elevator. Bucky went ahead to the front desk, and the lady there did seem to know the way to Talbot Street. He began to walk back to find Loie, who was taking a rather long time to buy a card.
“That was a mess,” said Loie. “I listened to some long rigmarole about how the cards weren’t in the same place they had been for the last umpteen years, and how one rack had been moved but the other hadn’t, and oh brother.” Bucky rubbed Loie’s back as they walked.
“OK, done is done. I think we know where we’re going.”
The Lovebunnies did indeed navigate their way, partly by directions and partly by Loie’s kind of knowing where they were.
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