Part 3

Not Easily Broken: A Novel
By Bishop T. D. Jakes

(Page 3 of 3)

She looked at him slantways, clearly skeptical. They'd walked out of the house fifteen minutes before the dinner was to start, and Dave thought they were going to make it. The drive was silent for the first three or four minutes. Maybe, just this once, Clarice would resist the urge to take up her campaign for him to sell his janitorial business and find work "that amounts to something." But just after he pulled out onto South First, she said, "David, I know you don't want to hear this, but-"

He felt his shoulders droop and a sigh went out of him. He fastened his eyes on the road ahead and let Clarice's lecture tumble past his ears without stopping, like some kind of really annoying elevator music. Why couldn't she just be satisfied with him the way he was? What was wrong with All-Pro Janitorial and Carpet Cleaning? It was a good business, and he'd built it from the ground up, one contract at a time. After years of teaching and coaching, he finally had his dream: self-employment. They had a nice house and two low-mileage cars, and the only reason Clarice was still selling real estate was supposed to be for vacation money. These last couple of years, though, Dave had begun to suspect there was more to it than that.

Dave watched the firefighters positioning the Jaws of Life, a steel contraption with hoses and handles leading off every which way. The blades looked like they could cut through the hull of a battleship, and as Dave looked on, the firefighters positioned them at the seam between the passenger door and front quarter panel of his pickup. He heard the whine of the hydraulics and watched the blades bite into the frame of his truck. The metal growled and popped as the bottom hinge separated like construction paper cut by scissors. One of the men bent to support the door's weight as they moved the Jaws to cut the top hinge.

"Lean away from the door as much as you can, ma'am," one of them said to Clarice as Dave approached. "Can I help?" he asked.

"Stand back for just a moment, sir, and then we'll get you to help us make sure we get the door off without hurting her."

The Jaws sheared the top hinge and the door's weight settled into the firefighter's hands. Slowly and carefully, checking with Clarice all the while, they peeled away the caved-in door. Dave scanned Clarice's right side and was almost sick to his stomach.

Her leg below the knee was bent as if it contained pipe cleaner instead of bone. Already the swelling and purpling had transformed her shapely calf and ankle into something resembling a huge spoiled sausage. Her red high heel was still on her foot, but the flesh of her ankle had swollen around it so that the edges of the pump were starting to cut into her.

"Oh, baby girl. We got to get you to a hospital." "That looks like a pretty bad break," a firefighter said. "Anybody heard from the paramedics?" He reached for his walkie-talkie.

Clarice was moaning softly now, like a child worn out from too much crying. "It hurts, David. It hurts so bad."

"I know, Boo. We gon' get you fixed up soon as we can." He held her face and cooed to her, even as he wondered where on God's earth the ambulance could be.

In a minute or two, the ambulance whooped to a stop and the paramedics started unpacking a stretcher. As Dave looked on, they gently and efficiently unfolded Clarice from the ruined pickup and positioned her on the stretcher. They unfolded something that looked like a beach toy and wrapped it around Clarice's leg, fastening it with Velcro. They started pumping air into it with a small electric pump.

"Inflatable splint," one of the paramedics told Dave. "Should keep her leg still and more comfortable until we get her to the hospital."

A policeman tapped Dave on the shoulder. "Sir, I've already talked to several witnesses and the driver of the other vehicle. Everybody seems pretty unanimous that the kid ran a red light. Could I just get a couple of minutes? It'll be that long before the ambulance is ready to transport her. Just need your name, address, phone number, that sort of thing."

Dave talked to the officer, all the time keeping one eye on Clarice and the paramedics surrounding her. They put a neck brace on her. "Just a precaution," they said. They told her that her leg appeared to be broken in several places below the knee, and that she had severe bruising all along her right side and arm. One of them cut the shoe off her foot. Dave remembered the day Clarice had brought the shoes home. "Forty percent off at Talbot's," she told him triumphantly. Dave wondered how long it would be before she'd be able to wear spike heels again.

The paramedics loaded Clarice into the ambulance and Dave excused himself from the police officer. He crawled in beside his wife and took her hand. "How you doing, Reesie?" She looked at him. "What's going to happen, David? Where we going?"

"To the hospital, baby. We got to get your leg fixed." But she must have been addled from the pain, because it was like he hadn't said anything. "Where we going, David? Where we going?" She kept saying it, over and over, like she was talking in her sleep.

Dave patted her hand and wished the ambulance would hurry up and get moving.

Copyright © 2006 by TDJ Enterprises, LLP

About the Author

Bishop T. D. Jakes is the author of several books, including the bestsellers The Lady, Her Lover, and Her Lord; Maximize the Moment; His Lady; Loose That Man and Let Him Go!; and Woman, Thou Art Loosed!, which is also the basis for a bestselling video and CD. His weekly television broadcast, Get Ready with T. D. Jakes, airs on Trinity Broadcasting Network and Black Entertainment Television, and in Europe and South Africa. Recently named one of the nation?s most influential minister by The New York Times, Jakes is the founder and pastor of The Potter's House in Dallas.