They Were Dolphins, Chapter 5, part III

He was nearly able to master the bike by this time. His brother trotted behind him a long way whenever the boy rode the bike for a few hundred metres. They passed the house with the koi and pagodas and stopped to look at the large colourful fish.

The brothers separated at the sward and the boy fish on his bicycle rode along the asphalt pathway to the tennis courts. The courts were a perfect place to practice riding. They were completely flat, smooth, and offered a fence for easy launching and balance. After forty laps around the courts, the boy could ride a complete circuit without stopping.

Two men had been playing tennis when the boy had rode up and started practicing. They were clearly annoyed with him after such a long time. The boy thought their annoyance was amusing and resolved to continue riding in circles around the courts until they said something to him. The men never said anything to him, however, they simply hid their disgust and eventually quit playing. One of the men called out to the boy as he was riding past, asking if the boy oughtn’t be home by now.

The boy took that was a fortuitous sign and left the courts to ride the pathway back to the middle of the park. The boy couldn’t find his brother. He was pleasantly surprised, however, to find that he could easily ride the bike and tell it where he wanted to go. He was an expert biker now. He tried to do a bunny-hop, mimicking how older kids hopped their BMX bikes. The boy only succeeded in throwing himself off his bike, but luckily landed on the grass to the side of the path and was unhurt.

Chastised, he learned his lesson and had to run-hop-skip next to his bike to start riding again. He rode along the streets next to the park and followed the stream toward the shopping centre. This was similar to riding down the streets in front of his home, so he was very comfortable and was able to sail down the street a long way without stopping.

He reached the intersection before the shopping centre and was unsure what to do at the intersection. He was an expert pedestrian, but did not know the rules for bicycles. He knew to look for the red hand (don’t walk) or the green person (walk). But from the street, the signals looked different. He stopped riding and walked his bike up onto the sidewalk.

He walked to the corner and oriented himself as a pedestrian. This was much better and he knew what to do now. However, the sidewalk did not have a ramp to go down. So he rode back three car lengths on the sidewalk to use a driveway to go to the crosswalk. As he rolled helplessly down the incline, his feet couldn’t find the pedals. A car screeched near him and he turned the handlebars in annoyance.

He still couldn’t find the pedals, and suddenly he was thrown to the pavement. He wasn’t aware of any pain, but he did land heavily on his shoulder and cracked his head on the pavement. He sat up and climbed out from under his bike. A white car loomed above him. He didn’t know it was a Toyota Camry with the high front end that had pushed him forward rather than scooped him over the hood.

He was able to stand, which he took as a good sign. He noticed that the front wheel of his bike was twisted like a folded pancake. The gravity of the situation was beginning to dawn on him. He could hear some distant noises like bells ringing or bees buzzing. He covered his ear with one hand and found that he had a hard time lifting his other hand to his head.

Traffic stopped and people rushed to see what had happened. The driver of the Corolla came out and asked he was okay. The boy nodded, he was trying to pick up his bike, but it was wedged beneath the bumper of the car. Someone pulled him back and told him to sit on the sidewalk in the shade. He kept repeating that he was fine, but that he wanted his bike.

A siren approached and an ambulance pulled up. Two EMTs in blue outfits sat down with him. They checked his eyes, felt along his neck and sides. They asked him who he was and how to contact his parents. He didn’t want to tell them his name, and especially did not want them to tell his mother. He told them he wanted to go back home.

They asked him if anything hurt. He grabbed his shoulder on side that fell, and they pressed him in several spots where he cried out. They nodded to each other and pulled out the stretcher from the back of the ambulance. The boy was ecstatic to take a ride in the ambulance and delighted to get into the stretcher. They strapped him in and loaded him into the back.

A helpful person brought the twisted metal of the bike to the ambulance, and unsure what to do, the EMTs loaded it in next to the stretcher. The boy was absolutely thrilled. He would be able to have an adventure in an ambulance and then come home with the bike as if nothing had happened.

At the hospital, the EMTs transferred the boy to a hospital bed and left the bicycle outside at the entrance. A doctor came to see him and asked the boy the same questions the EMTs had. He finally revealed who he was and repeated a string of numbers he had been taught to memorise. He knew vaguely that it was an address and phone number, but the details were lost on him.

The doctor smiled and said that his name was the same. The boy didn’t believe him. The doctor asked the boy his birthday and the boy told him. The doctor smiled more broadly and said that was his birthday as well. The doctor joked that they might be twins. The boy was absolutely livid. There’s no way the doctor could have the same name and birthday. They didn’t look anything alike and the doctor was obviously much older than the boy.

The doctor chuckled and assured him that they shared the same birthday but not the same year. The boy wasn’t sure how that worked, but he calmed down somewhat. The doctor left and the boy was alone for a while. He rested comfortably on the hospital bed and decided this was the best place to come for a death, if he were mortally wounded. The walls were perfectly white and everything was completely clean.

He was used to walking and playing in dirt and mud, with trash and filth on every side. He was a bit disappointed, if he was honest, that he hadn’t suffered a death blow from the car. It might be easier to die than to face the fact that he had ruined his new bike and was going to get in trouble for that. He only hoped that they would let him out of the hospital so he could get home before it was too dark and his mom got suspicious.

The doctor returned and remembered the boy’s name. That was a convenient trick to fool the boy into believing the story about having the same name, he decided. The doctor told the boy he would need to take an X-ray of his shoulder and they had already gotten permission from his mother.

The boy paled visibly and the doctor was kind. He explained that his mother was obviously upset, but glad that her son was alive and unharmed. The boy didn’t believe any of it, and hoped the doctor was just trying to scare him. The doctor explained that boy probably had a fractured bone in his shoulder and they needed to see inside the bone to find out how serious it was.

The boy had heard about X-rays and had been taught to be very afraid of them. His mother had explained how bad X-rays were since she was a medical student. She had said that they were, in fact, evil, and made by the devil. The boy asked the doctor if they were made by the devil. The doctor laughed and said they were not.

The boy next asked a strange question, but one which the reader will understand. The boy asked if dolphins have bones as well. The doctor was confused, but answered that they did. Dolphins were mammals too, like humans.

The boy knew that, and he knew what mammals were. Dolphins gave birth to live young, and they had hair on their noses when they were young. The doctor beamed when he heard this, he said the boy was very bright and his mother must call him “son”. The boy agreed, failing to see the pun.

The boy then asked if they looked inside his bones with the X-ray machine, would they also see if there were any dolphin bones inside him. The doctor was still confused but answered that there were no dolphin bones inside him. In fact, the boy would be able to look at the pictures they took for himself.

The boy learned a new word that the doctor slipped out “clavicle”, and he learned that dolphins have one too. So the boy confirmed that he was a dolphin once and for all from a real doctor who had examined him. The case was closed and he felt that a lot of his life was explained easily now.

He rested back on the bed and was surprised when his mother came in, followed by the four men he had seen earlier in the car, also the pastor and even Mia. They all came in to give him the best wishes for his recovery. He was embarrassed with the attention and tried to shrug off the concern they expressed. He had some pain in his shoulder when he shrugged however, and everyone told him to lay still and not move until the doctors were finished with him.

Mia gave him a folded piece of paper. She had drawn a get well card on the way to the hospital. It was drawn on the same sheet he had typed his love confession. She had drawn a large heart around the words and also two stick figures holding hands. He was nearly in tears at that and tried to explain that he was in a lot of pain, that was why he was crying.

She gave him a gentle hug the bed and the boy quickly wiped his eyes with his good hand. Everybody left when the doctors came in to wheel him to the X-ray. He lay down on a hard table with an uncomfortable metal plate under his shoulder. He was covered from the neck down with a lead cape. Everyone evacuated the room as he was told to stay completely still. A buzzing noise indicated X-rays were flooding his body and then the noise stopped. He was wheeled back to the room and his mother came back to check on him.

She was tearful and maudlin. She said she never wanted to lose him. She explained that he was the first born, the most important. She said that she didn’t know what to do without him, if he had been hurt seriously or killed, she might never have been able to survive. That was a heavy load for the boy to bear but he understood at some level she was trying to comfort him.

She further explained that he was not alone, that everyone cared for him, as he saw, everyone came by and was concerned and loved him. He didn’t believe all of that but he did nod. He didn’t really believe the four men and the pastor cared much about him. There was some strange smell on her breath and she slurred her words a little bit.

She continued and said that she knew some homemade remedies for broken bones. She would be able to heal him as soon as he got out of the hospital with their dangerous “medications” and X-rays. The boy asked if she was a doctor, didn’t she want to work in a hospital? She answered that she was learning about “Western” medicine so that she could practice more traditional “healing arts” based on “Eastern philosophy” but that she needed the information that the “institutions” could provide to come up with her own methods.

The boy had no idea what most of that meant, but he nodded. The doctor came back and explained that there was a slight fracture of the clavicle, but there was nothing serious, and the boy could go home with simple sling. The boy asked to see his bone pictures, and the doctor showed him on a lighted box on the wall. He pointed out the fracture, although it was difficult to see anything intelligible at all. The doctor prescribed Tylenol for pain and bed rest for two days. His mother lectured the doctor on the dangers of acetaminophen and told him she didn’t need his toxins entering her son’s body.

The doctor shrugged and left. As the nurse came in to discharge the boy, the noticed that he was limping as they walked down the hall. She asked the boy what was wrong and the boy said his toe hurt. He pointed to the pinkie toe and it was definitely swollen. His mother was upset that he hadn’t said anything and the nurse told him he should have spoken up earlier. The boy tried to explain that it hadn’t bothered him until now when he had started to walk.

After a lengthy round of checking the pinkie toe and another X-ray (which his mother was visibly upset about), the toe turned out to be perfectly fine. The boy was released once again.

In the lobby, the forlorn bicycle lay in one corner. The pastor was waiting with Mia and he lifted the bike into the back of the VW van. The pastor said this was the second time he had helped them with a car accident, and the boy suddenly realised why everyone had come: his mother’s car was broken from the previous accident and she had needed a ride. So he confirmed for himself that their concern was false.

The adrenaline and excitement was wearing off, so the boy suddenly started to feel very tired and worn out. They might have given him something at the hospital because he was starting to feel woozy.