Ardmore

There is virtually no sex in this story. Your comments, good or bad, are always welcome.

Chapter 1: My Babe in the Woods

It took perhaps a dozen rings for the noise to register. At that point, fingernails across a blackboard would have been more welcome. Moving towards the direction of the sound, my hand felt its way across the nightstand. Consciousness slowly reemerged as my eyes caught sight of the clock. It was 2am. The answering machine was off for I was determined to pickup only if the ringing continued. Then I remembered I was alone, and immediately my heartbeat quickened.

For the second time that evening, I had been jarred from a sound sleep, the first awakening having occurred several hours earlier in response to a bad dream. I could blame that episode on exceptionally spicy chili. Now someone else was determined to reawaken me. I sighed knowing I was partially to blame for the incessant ringing.

The answering machine was off because Allie was out for the evening and Drew had borrowed the car earlier. If either of the kids called I didn't want their message to go to the machine. Of course, Drew might be home by now; our son was a notorious sound sleeper and anything short of a bomb blast would go unnoticed by him.

When you are the parent of two teens there is one call you dread ever getting. I was waking up to the growing apprehension that this might be the one. If it was, I didn't know how I would tell my wife Adrienne. She was away and I was entrusted with the children. I took a deep breath before hearing what I sensed would be bad news.

A couple of days ago my wife had left for a 4-day social workers conference in Harrisburg. I offered the family car since it was only a two-hour drive but she chose instead to ride the train and take a cab to the hotel. All the sessions were scheduled on site and there was little use for a vehicle. This left the car free for the kids to use. I prayed that that one small decision had not led to a major problem.

Using the pillows as support, I snatched up the receiver.

"Hello?"

"Mr. Martens? Mr. David Martens?" said a male voice.

"Yes, this is he. Who's calling?"

"Mr. Martens this is Lt. Havlechek of the Pennsylvania State Police. I'm calling about your wife Adrienne."

"Adrienne? What's wrong?" I steadied my voice. I was now fully awake and listening intently.

"Sir, your wife was a victim of a shooting. She's been airlifted to St. Vincent's Hospital in Williamsport."

"Shooting? Oh my God…is she?"

"They're working on her now Mr. Martens, the doctors give her a good chance, that's all I know."

"How did this happen?"

"We're looking into that sir. So far, all we know is that at about 11pm your wife was spotted wandering near the West Rim Trail. She was lucky to come across several campers in the area experienced in treating her wounds. They got her to an emergency clinic in Ansonia. From there she was taken to the trauma center in Williamsport."

I was trying to follow him. What was he talking about? He said something about some West Rim Trail and Ansonia (which must be a town) and then Williamsport? Perhaps I had heard him wrong. So I had to ask, "Williamsport? Why there, weren't there any available hospitals in Harrisburg?"

"Williamsport was the closest trauma unit. We're not near Harrisburg. I know this isn't making all that much sense to you at this early hour. Let me give you my cell number. "

"I'm sorry Lieutenant, I've got to get our children together and then I'm coming up there."

"Mr. Martens, let me have your cell number too. I'll let you know if there's any change in her condition."

When the call ended, I was sitting on the side of the bed in a daze. So many of my emotions were contending for dominance. Fear, anger and sorrow all made an appearance within seconds, and fear was winning. One thought kept being repeated, Adrienne had been shot.

I had to get going. I'd been to Williamsport before. A few years back I took our son Drew and a couple of his best buddies to the Little League World Series there. I remembered the route; it was almost four hours away by car. If I left now I'd probably arrive shortly after seven.

I walked down the hall to Drew's room and was relieved to find him asleep. He would want to come, so would Allie. With that, I went searching for my cell knowing my daughter's number was on speed dial.

When I called her, I was immediately placed into voice-mail. I tried a couple of more times with the same result. She had turned her cell off again. Damn it! How many times had I told that girl to ALWAYS keep her phone on? Well, I would just have to leave her a message. With luck, she would get it before we left.

The next person to call was my brother-in-law Gary. I got him on the first ring, and was thankful that it had been him and not Giselle, his wife. She would have been overwhelming at that time of morning. As for Gary, he sounded worse than I did, but quickly became lucid when I explained the situation. He lived less than 5 minutes from us so we would pick him up on the way.

I then returned to Drew. I could not, would not, leave him alone. He was extremely close to his mom and unlike Allie, he was immediately available. Of course, I soon regretted my decision for when he awoke there ensued a barrage of questions, most of which I could not answer.

I left him to get dressed, relieved to be removed for a moment. Drew had asked the questions I had not thought to ask of the Trooper. It dawned on me that I knew nothing of her injuries, save they were from a gun shot. Taking a deep breathe I forced those issues to the back of my mind. We needed to get to my wife and that task required all of my concentration.

While my son was getting his clothes together, I was left to do some last minute trip planning. I fired up our computer and connected to one of the map sites. The Lieutenant had mentioned Ansonia, Pennsylvania. I had never heard of it. When I checked, I learned that Ansonia was about two and a half hours away from Harrisburg by car, or a distance of 146 miles.

Had Adrienne been kidnapped and taken to that location? She had been shot. Did she have other injuries? Would she ever be the same after this ordeal? Would she live? The questions burst forth even against my best attempts to suppress them.

The Lieutenant also said she had a 'good chance'. He implied that her injuries were life threatening, and he was referring to gunshot wounds. Wounds? He had used the plural. That last acknowledgment almost brought on a bout of hyperventilation. I fell to my knees and said silent prayer and remained kneeling letting the minutes pass.

I had to get a grip. I was beginning to lose it like Drew had done earlier. Besides I didn't know these things, what I knew was that Adrienne had been shot, was in the hospital with good prospects for surviving and that she was 'found' 146 miles from where she was supposed to be. The police were investigating. I would wait until I could speak face to face with them; until then it would do no good to alarm myself or my family with paranoid speculation.

After packing some clothes, an exercise that took less time than locating the car keys, we were off to pick up Gary.

Fortunately, it was a clear, dry July night. The roads revealed little traffic as we headed up towards the mountains and then made a left turn going halfway across the state to Williamsport. We made good time but it was still the longest trip of my life.

There wasn't much conversation from me in the car. What small talk there was came first from Drew reminiscing about funny things his mom had done, particularly her cooking disasters, then there were more stories from Gary about her childhood. Even so, the stories could not absorb the distance and most of the trip was made in silence. I knew that each of us thought of the questions we were afraid to pose to one another. Would she live? Who had done this terrible thing to her, and why?

Why would someone harm Adrienne? Suppose they went after her to get to me. No, that made no sense. We led very ordinary lives. Did I know anyone capable of such violence? Maybe twenty years ago, but that time in my life was long past. Certainly that one incident so long ago could not have been the catalyst for this. Even so, I briefly pondered that possibility, and then I reviewed my wife's situation.

Adrienne was a supervisor on her job. She dealt mainly with families in crisis: those suffering the ravages of abuse and neglect, most of whose casualties were children. Her cases were the worst of the worst in the county. Burnout amongst her colleagues was a constant concern, yet my wife managed to thrive in this environment, due in large part to our strength and support as a family.

Perhaps someone related to one of her clients had sought some form of retaliation. That possibility seemed remote too; the direct case workers were more at risk. In a way that was disappointing, it made the violence random, and much more frightening.

In case they had not thought of it, I calmly explained to Drew and Gary that we were likely to encounter the media at the hospital. Adrienne's shooting would be big news in that part of the world. Knowing the media from prior encounters, I instructed them to divert all inquiries to me. In that way we might get her some of the privacy she would require to heal.

Sunrise came when we were about an hour outside of Williamsport. Gary called ahead to the hospital. They would not give him any information other than to verify that my wife was a patient.

He still needed to do something, so he called the hospital again and they gave him directions to follow upon entering town. I then asked him to get directory assistance to transfer him to the Gennetti Hotel. We would need a couple of rooms for at least a few days. It was mid-July and I hoped they would have vacancies. The Gennetti was the tallest building in the area so I could navigate to its doors by sight.

Chapter 2: Official Uncertainty

Like the hotel, the hospital was relatively easy to find, made so as there were very few cars on the streets. The world was just waking up as we entered an empty emergency room. We were all anxious to see her. It took only a few minutes to reach the attending physician and get approval for a short visit, albeit one at a time. I went in first.

The lights were dimmed and the room had an eerie glow. Adrienne was sleeping and I was reassured to find her breathing on her own. That was the only break. She looked like she had been in a car wreck. Her face showed several small abrasions, her eyes were puffy, and her skin discolored.

Adrienne's shock of curly hair sat over her brow in an awkward position. I moved strands aside as I bent to kiss her forehead. When I picked up her hand, it was cool to the touch. She seemed so helpless, then as I gently squeezed her fingers, my eyes began to fill. Why not me? Why couldn't it have been me instead? I would have gladly traded places at that moment.

It's imprinted in our genes, this thing men have, this directive. It comes down to three words never spoken among us, but understood nonetheless. The father protects. The father protects. Against all odds and the absence of hope, a man will willingly sacrifice himself for his family. He is always on guard for dangers that might befall them. Should those dangers prove overwhelming then he is left with only one feeling…guilt.

My wife was all of five foot seven and about a hundred and forty pounds. Lying in that bed, she seemed much smaller and so very, very vulnerable. Who could have done this to her? They could not have known her. She was one of the most compassionate and gentlest souls on the planet. Adrienne could not even bear to see violence on television; much less confront it in person. She did not deserve this. We did not deserve this. We could have lost her.

The doctor entered and began looking her over. I caught him outside, anxious to ask more questions. He said that they had removed only one bullet from her body. That one had entered near her collarbone and bounced around lodging near her elbow. The other bullet was a pass-through.

Fortunately, neither had hit vital organs, but the wounds were serious. She would be out of it for probably the rest of the day because of the sedatives but a full recovery was expected. According to him we could probably take her home in seven to ten days.

I expressed a desire to have Adrienne moved to Lankenau Hospital which was a scant four miles from our home. He estimated that she could be transported the day after tomorrow and he would begin the process by contacting the physicians at the other end.

When he left I cozied up to the nursing staff. I began by thanking them for all they had done for my wife. My mother had been a nurse so I knew that the real answers about my wife's condition could only come from them. The nurses said she seemed to be more at peace the last few hours. It was then that I got a recounting of the events leading up to her admittance.

Adrienne is tenacious so I guessed she was admitted in an extremely agitated state. That was confirmed. What I did not know was how important was the couple whose campsite she wandered into. They were instrumental in saving her life. Her shirt was literally soaked in blood, but because of the color of the fabric it was hard to see except close up. They thought at first she had passed out drunk but decided to check her body thoroughly. It was then they realized that she was in shock.

By the time the EMTs arrived they had her bleeding under control. She was still in quite a bit of pain and went in and out of consciousness several times during the trip, and they struggled to calm her after she arrived.

The staff thought that somehow she knew I was there with her and that explained her peaceful slumber during my visit. True or not, it was unsettling. I was beginning to experience a reoccurrence of the guilt for not having been there to protect her. It was a feeling I had struggled with earlier, that and a slowly building rage for the one who had shot her.

When I returned to her bedside, I was more confident she would survive, but there would likely be many months of physical rehabilitation ahead. It was implied that she would probably need some time in counseling too. Whatever it took, we would help her to get back to normal. We had faced adversity before.

I thought back to another chaotic time in our marriage, to our first health crisis six years prior. At that time Adrienne complained that vaginal sex was becoming uncomfortable. While we tried different positions, the problem persisted for several weeks. My wife generally avoided doctors so I had to prod her to see one. Upon further investigation, she was diagnosed with a significant fibroid tumor. The growth was not cancerous but it was quite large, large enough that she underwent surgery to have it removed. In the process, the doctor determined the need for a hysterectomy.

So at age 35 my wife was thrown into early menopause. I thought Adrienne adjusted quickly to the new reality. She wasn't happy about menopause but she was relieved that the tumor was no longer a worry.

I smiled inwardly; for me the procedure had its benefits, albeit short lived. At first, after she had healed sufficiently, our sex life took off life a rocket. For a month Adrienne was insatiable. We were at it every morning, in the evening when I got home and then again as we made our way to bed for the night.

My wife has always been passionate about our couplings. When Adrienne gives of herself in sex, she commits her entire being. At least that is how I always felt. So intimacy between us had always been very satisfying. Now it became much more frequent and spontaneous as well. My sleep was being sacrificed every night but I wasn't complaining. Except for embarrassing the kids a few times with the noise, things could not have been better.

Then a month after it began it abruptly ended. After a couple months of my complaining, Adrienne spoke with her doctor and her hormone supplements were changed. Our frequency of lovemaking settled back into what it had been before her procedure. That was the only aspect of that ordeal that I missed.

It had been one wild rollercoaster ride for those months. I was just thankful that the original cause, that damned cyst, had not been cancerous. The thought of losing Adrienne was almost impossible to bear, but we survived that nightmare and we would survive this one; we had to.

I laid another gentle kiss on her forehead before I left. I knew that Drew and Gary were anxious to see her. While they visited, I would duck out and check us all into the hotel.

Not much had changed in her condition when I returned. The feeling among the three of us bordered on guarded optimism, at least it was for both Gary and I. Drew was not adjusting as well. He was noticeably distraught. We took a walk outside to talk for a while. I tried to sound reassuring using that voice that only Dads can use in situations like this, and it seemed to work.

When we returned Gary was sound asleep. I left my son and went back to visit his mother. Seeing her asleep, knowing that she was going to make it, I suddenly felt fatigued. I do not know how long it took but I drifted off to sleep too after taking a seat by the bed. The next thing I remember was being gently shaken.

"Mr. Martens," I heard as if from afar. I looked up then over at Adrienne. She was still sleeping. The hand on my shoulder belonged to a young nurse about my daughter's age. I shifted upright in the seat.

"We need to ask you to leave for a few minutes while we examine your wife."

"Is she OK?"

"She's doing fine. We're just going to move her to another examining room for some tests. She should return in an hour or so."

I reluctantly rose and made my way to the hallway. Looking at my watch I saw that it was now close to 11am. I had been out for over 3 hours.

I took a position on the opposite wall of the hallway while they wheeled her away. As I watched her go by I saw two state troopers standing at the nurses' station. The older of the two, a man I guessed was in his early fifties, began walking towards me. His face had a familiar look though I knew we had not met before.

"Lt. Havlechek?" I said when he was in range.

"Yes, and you are Mr. Martens," he replied offering hand. "I was hoping to speak with your wife. I hear she's still under but improving. That's good to hear."

"Yes, thank you for that. She's still out of it, but sleeping better than she has in weeks actually." I added with a wry smile.

"Well it's not urgent anymore. We got our guy; we also have the murder weapon, and a full confession."

As he said this Havlechek was gauging my reaction. It came quickly. I pushed back against the wall to brace myself as I leaned forward, supported by my hands on my knees. I was breathing slower now.

"Thank God. I don't know what I would have done if that bastard had gotten away. That IS good news. But what do you mean by the murder weapon? He killed someone?"

"Yes, your wife's friend, Jane Glattfelder"

"Jane?"

"We found her body at the campsite."

"Oh no, not Jane…she was good people." I closed my eyes for a second in an attempt to regain my composure. "Have her parents been notified?"

"Yes," was all the Lieutenant would say. I still wanted to know how this happened. How did this man kidnap both my wife and her friend? Taking a deep breath I asked, "Did this animal say how he managed to kidnap both Jane and my wife?"

"Kidnap? He's not being charged with kidnapping. The campsite I mentioned was not his, it belonged to the women. As best as we can determine your wife and her friend arrived there on Tuesday. That's one of the facts I need to verify with her when she wakes. I take it by our conversation earlier that you didn't know they were there?"