up on the cot and took the coffee from him.
“Thank you Charlie.”
The coffee was hot and burned my tongue when I tried to take a drink. Charlie laughed.
“I did the same thing. That coffee’s damn hot!”
Then he handed me an egg McMuffin.
I couldn’t control my tears as I looked at that horrid little breakfast sandwich and thought it to be my last meal.
Charlie saw my tears and said, “Would you prefer the pancakes?”
I smiled at his tenderness and said, “No, this is fine. Thank you.”
“Why are you crying?” His words were quiet and concerned.
“I miss my kids. I have three kids, Ollie, Kevin, and Margaret. I’m afraid that you won’t let me see them again.”
“Egg McMuffin was my Margaret’s favorite when she was a little girl.”
I ate the sandwich and felt better but thoughts of my kids lingered in my head and I had to work at keeping my imagination in check.
“While you were away, I did some thinking and I’d like to get your input on those thoughts; are you willing?”
I opened trying to engage in a conversation that would give me an idea of some kind.
“Ok,” Charlie said as he looked at me in absolute seriousness. “I’ll listen.”
“You don’t know this yet, but both Rick and ‘Mandy’ are my friends and I know that they love each other and should be together. Rick is very stubborn but he is also very smart. We could ask them to come to us so that we could talk to them and remind them that they love each other. What do you think?”
I stopped talking and just let him mull over what I said.
Out of the clear blue the idea of never having a catch with my kids brought on the tears again.
“Do you cry a lot?” Charlie asked me.
“Only when I think someone hates me and might keep me from having a catch with my kids again.”
I said quietly not knowing if that would spark his anger.
“Who hates you and your kids?”
He asked his confusion complete.
“Don’t you hate me Charlie?”
He was still confused.
“You said we’re friends. I don’t hate friends.”
Keeping it simple, I said, “Thank you Charlie. That makes me feel so much better.”
I finished the coffee and asked him to take me to the bathroom again. He stood up, roughly took my arm, pulled me along, opened the door, shoved me in, and threw my purse in after me.
The purse felt like my dearest friend. I went through it looking for my phone or anything that may be of use but a flash gift from my recall showed me that I dropped the phone on the seat of my car when Charlie tazered me. I took a mental inventory of the contents and used the products that I carried to clean myself up and brush my teeth. Found a hair-scrunchy so I pulled my hair back into a pony tail. I felt so much better.
Back in the ‘cot room’ Charlie was sitting on the stool next to the cooler drinking a bottle of spring water.
As I sat on the cot I felt ‘Hebly’ in my pocket and had an idea. I looked at Charlie for a minute.
“Charlie, I think better when I’m having a catch with a friend. Would you like to have a catch with me?”
While I spoke I pulled ‘Hebly’ from my pocket, got a minute sense of the reconnect which caught my breath but I recovered quickly and tossed ‘Hebly’ into the air a couple of times.
Charlie smiled and put out his hand for me to throw the object to him. I complied and sent ‘Hebly’ in Charlie’s direction in a lob that Charlie watched with such intense attention that I nearly laughed at how cute he was. Charlie caught ‘Hebly’ and held it for a few minutes taking his time to examine both of the faces and the dangling legs and the big ‘Michael feet’ and the rubber manicured hands. I was surprised that he recognized me as one of the two faces. I walked over to him. He looked at me and showed me my face on ‘Hebly’. Then he pointed to the Michael face and carried the question in his eyes without speaking.
“That’s the man I love.”
I simply spoke the truth.
Charlie nodded his head and smiled and threw ‘Hebly’ into the air nearly reaching the ceiling. When ‘Hebly’ returned, I snatched it out of the air in a move that surprised and pleased Charlie.
“Let’s have a catch,” I said and handed ‘Hebly’ to Charlie before I moved back over to the cot to create the necessary distance between the two of us for a good catch.
Our eyes met and then Charlie threw ‘Hebly’ to me in a pitch that anyone else would say was way too fast but Charlie didn’t really know who he was dealing with when it came to a catch. I snatched ‘Hebly’ out of the air and peppered it back to him with the same speed so that he could know what his pitch felt like to me.
His eyes lit up when he saw me catch his fast pitch and he was even more impressed when I sent it back to him using the same velocity. His laugh was deep and contagious. He caught my return pitch and sent me another even faster than before. He made me laugh but I had no trouble catching his pitch. I returned it to him in a side arm pitch that tickled him. He caught the pitch and returned it in the same way.
Charlie was like me, he never missed a catch and his pitches were hard and fast. He laughed but never let that get in the way of catching and pitching. For every pitch I sent him, he duplicated it on the return. We sent ‘Hebly’ back and forth until I could barely lift my arms. We had been playing a straight catch; I didn’t use distractions and didn’t have to read his tells because he had no tells.
My need to always be the greater player surprised me as I tried to figure a way to end the catch without losing. I decided on a distraction that always worked. I waited for the opportunity to put the distraction into action.
I winked at Charlie and he laughed but otherwise it had no affect on him. I saw his hand position and knew where he would be sending the object so the decision was made. I dove for the object but knocked it straight into the air. My body rolled to a stop on the floor but I caught little ‘Hebly’ in mid-descent and sent it back to Charlie in a sweet round house that smacked him in the face and bounced to the floor.
We both doubled over laughing.
“Again,” Charlie said.
“Let me pee first. You made me laugh too much, Charlie,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
“I’m going with you, I gotta go, too.”
When we stepped out of that little room. There were shouts from the police for Charlie to ‘put your hands on your head’ and I could see about 15 guns pointed at him. Charlie was 4 good-sized steps behind from me. I feared for him and took those steps back and completely closed the distance between us. I put my body in front of him and wrapped my arms around him to shield him from those who seemed intent on doing him harm.
Charlie, in a knee-jerk reaction, wrapped his arms around me and we stood together a force against impossible odds and umpteen deadly weapons. After only a few seconds, I saw Charlie smile at something and looked to see what brought on the pleasure. Rick was advancing to us with Amanda at his side.
I started to cry as I asked that Charlie not be harmed. I told them he’s a good person and didn’t intend on hurting anyone.
After a very long time, the police took Charlie away and the paramedic put an antiseptic on the circular booboo on my side and then a comforting bandage. I spent the following hours at the police station answering questions and begging them not to harm Charlie.