Novel Yancy

Sally Dies

Sally Dies





Sally stood at Yancy's door. She appeared to be sweating that stood on her red face. She held to the door frame as he spoke to her in the door way. She could barely stand, “Yancy...” She studding as she falls onto the porch before he could catch her.





He had known that Sally had been fighting what had be thought to be a common cold. Anyone who passed her home would speak of how bad her cough was getting. He picks the small woman up, and carries her to his bed. He covers his friend up with a quilt that he had taken from the hospital as a child. Nurse Sara had made it for him.





Removing her jacket and shoes, her flash felt as hot as the embers in the fireplace. “Sally?” She could not answer. It seemed as though the more he washed her face the hotter she her forehead got.





Yancy heard a knocking at his front door. He laid the wet cloth on her head, and goes to the door. It was Sammy panicked.





“I got home..” He said as if he was about to fall a part. “dinner was burning on the stove, there were dishes on the table, and the beds weren't made... I don't know...”





“Sammy, it ok.” Yancy tried to inform the teen, but Sammy interrupts.





“Mom is gone! Help me find her.”





He guides the young man into the house and explains the events of the evening. He then leaves the boy with his mother and goes to get Dr. Hill.





###





“I don't know if she will make it the night.” He explains to Yancy as the two walk to the door. “She has pneumonia. We can pack ice around her to try to get the fever down. It is holding at 105. If we can not get it down in the next twelve hours, her organs will begin to fail.”





“Then?” Yancy questions.





“Well,” Dr. Hill looked down. “She may have four to five days of suffering before she is gone.”





Yancy looked up the stairs. “I took his father, and I have to save his mother.”





Dr. Hill gave Yancy a bottle of fever reducer, “I hope so.” Then he leaves the house. Yancy held the bottle for a few seconds. He had to compose himself before going into the room with Sally and Sammy. He could not allow the boy to see the fear in his eyes. Sammy had to have faith that his mother would pull though.





”Yancy!!” a scream caught his attention. He ran to the bed side. Sammy was holding the bowl of water under his mother's chin. She was coughing violently, and her lips dripped with blood. Yancy ran to her side. He turned Sally over to her side. “Hold her up.”





“Why?” Sammy started to tear up, “Is she dying?”





“No, it is the fever.” Yancy pretended that the doctor had explained this event too. “It is forcing the infection out of her body, and we don't want her to drown on the blood.” Yancy continues to roll up blankets and prop Sally so that fluid would run from the corners of her lips as she tried to breath.





“Greg,” a whisper comes from Sally.





“Mom!” Sammy answers, but Sally didn't utter another word. “Mom, this is Sammy. Dad is dead.”





“Sammy, she needs to sleep this off.” Yancy motions for the young man to follow him to the bedroom door. “The two of you will stay here until she recovers.” He pats Sammy on the back, “ I need more ice.”





The night was almost as long as those so long ago in the hospital after the fire. Minutes felt like hours, hours like days, days as if they were years. Sally never opened her eyes. She rattled with every breath. The fever kept rising. Yancy knew that she was not returning to health. The angel of death waited for the right time to take her from the living, but Yancy could not allow Sammy to know this yet. How could he deliver the news to Sammy that he was loosing his other parent.





Sammy slept near his mother in a chair. He did not eat or move from her bedside except to relieve himself in the bathroom. His spent his waking hours reading to Sally, changing the ice bags, and washing off the blood from her face. He could no longer feel the pain in his legs that occurred from poor circulation caused by sitting hours in the chair. He no longer felt the need to eat. He felt none of the physical stings that he first did when Sally cared for him. All he felt was the burn for his mother to return to him.


The fifth morning Yancy helped Sammy change the bed and replace the ice around Sally. She felt cooler. Sammy knew that she would be better soon. This fantasy was made more real when Sally opened her eyes. She seemed to be looking right into his eyes. She smiled. Sammy was sure she did. Her lips moved. No sound escaped them, but he knew she said his name.





“Mom!” He called out, but she did not reply. Her eyes seemed to be to stationary. “Mom!” Sammy calls to his mother again. Yancy reaches over and lays a hand on her chest.





“Sammy, she's gone.” He said with tears of loss falling from his own eyes.





“No!” He screamed. He picked her hand up, but it falls down lifeless to her side. “Mom!”





Sammy stood there. The evening air was cold with sheets of rain falling. He could not feel the wet coldness of the storm due to the emotions that he felt. He stood in the mud and watched the care takers lowered his mother into the nasty looking hole. He did not flinch one time as the drops of November rain fell onto his glasses. He did not attempt to wipe them off.





Yancy watched his young friend with a heavy heart. He remembered how bad he had hurt when he found out that his parents were gone. Between the two of them, all family either had was each other.





Yancy stood by Sammy for a moment. He put an arm around the closest thing that he would ever have to a son. “Come, Sammy.” Yancy urges the boy away. Sammy followed Yancy almost as if he was not in his own body then.





Sammy walked as though he was a mechanical robot. He did not look down to where he was placing his fee. He just animated his way down to the waiting car. Yancy helped him into the car. Sammy was drenched and shoes covered with mud. He never spoke a word on the way to the house that he had shared with his mother a mere 24 hours ago.





Sammy was in shock. Yancy remembered how Sara had treated him when he suffered the shock of the death of his parents. He undressed the young man and put on his pajamas. When they passed Sally's room, Sammy slowly walked into it. He looked at the bed. He could almost see Sally laying there. He pulled away from Yancy. He walked to the bed, and he fell onto it. He pulled Sally's pillow into his arms.





Yancy watched Sammy for a moment. He was rocking his mothers pillow as he laid in her bed. He felt that Sammy needed space to grieve. Yancy left Sammy there.





Midnight, Yancy worried about the teenager crying in his mother's bed. He slowly walked down the hall. He opened the door to the master bedroom. He saw Sammy sleeping still clinging to the pink pillow of his mother. Yancy pulls the covers over Sammy's shoulders.





Yancy did not go to his room that night. He stayed up in the living room. He would make the trip to Sally's room about every couple of hours. He was all too familiar with the pain that Sammy felt.





It was cool at 6:00 am, but Sammy woke up. He shortly remembered what had happened. He would not allow the tears to flow. He had cried so much the night before. Now at fifteen, he realized that he had to become a man fast.





When Sammy got to the couch in the living room, he saw Uncle Yancy sitting up trying to sleep. He looked uncomfortable. He takes the throw from the near by chair that his mother used to use on chilly nights. He slowly covered his friend.





Then Sammy decides that he would be cooking for himself now. He takes out two brown eggs, two pieces of bread, and the Apple butter from the fridge. He finds the frying pan on the stove and breaks the eggs into the lard. He puts the toast into the oven, and places the Apple butter on the table. He wanted to thank Yancy for being there for him by fixing him a morning meal.





Yancy woke up around 7:00 am. There at the table he noticed a plate of burnt toast, runny eggs, and a cup of coffee. He sat down.





“I cooked breakfast for you.” Sammy said. He had puffy purple circles around his young blue eyes form crying. “Mom would not like for you to go hungry.”





“Thank you,” Yancy replies as he noticed that there was only one plate, “Aren't you going to eat?”





Sammy found it hard to tell Yancy that he could not eat this morning because he did not want his friend to worry about him. “I have already eaten before you got up.”





Yancy was able to read his young friend, but he did not press the issue. He could totally understand not being able to eat the day after your mother's funeral. It had been weeks before he did ate anything that did not come from a bag and tube.


“Sammy you did a good job,” Yancy takes the last bite of his toast and sopped up the egg yellow. “ I will have the energy to put the pieces together at the office.”





He looked at the boy who appeared more like a man than he did when they first met. Sammy even seemed more adult than he had a week ago. Standing six feet tall, it was time for Sammy to do something to change the direction of his life.





“Would you like to go to work with me?”





“I would love to.” Sammy answered excited that Yancy was making good to the promise that he had made the child ten years ago. He had always promised that he would take him and teach him the job.

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