Thanks to Blackrandi for again organizing this event. Sadly due to time constraints no editor was able to look this story over-so truly all and any error are mine. So- "Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip, that started from this tropic port, aboard this tiny ship. The mate was a mighty sailin' man, the Skipper brave and sure...."
*
I closed the door after taking one last look at my sleeping 9-year-old daughter Annie. My wife Sarah was in the little kitchen making the morning coffee.
"Brad, don't forget you need to take Annie to the Doctors today, and we need to do laundry"
I nodded as I slipped behind Sarah in our tiny apartment kitchen and gave her neck a kiss.
"OK Sarah, I will try to get in and out of the clinic in a hurry this morning. How about I just take all your clothes and hit "delete"?"
Sarah laughed and reached around to cresses my groin while answering with a sarcastic voice "I love it when you talk laundry, it get me so HOT. Don't start a conversation on rearranging the kitchen cabinets or I will make you my little pinky toe and bang you on the table."
Now I laughed and smacked her shapely behind "You going to take the bus to work? The damn thing is always late."
Sarah shrugged her shoulders without turning around. "James is pretty understanding, He knows the buses in this town suck. I am just hoping the starter on the car holds out until payday."
"James" was James Madison my wife Sarah's boss at Madison Industries. A small family run operation that Sarah had been working at since a temp in high school.
I started to put on my jacket. "No luck getting a payday advance?"
Sarah signed. "No. HR said I had already maxed out that and I hate to ask James to override them again."
"Come on Sarah, James has known you since you started at the place sorting envelopes. I am sure you can get him to cut you a break this time."
Sarah shook her head. "That was before James took over from his Dad. You know James is trying to fill a big pair of shoes. He is really going by the rules. Kind of acts like Moses came down with Ten Commandments in one hand and the company SOP in the other hand." She sipped at her coffee. "Hell, I typed up half of the rules working there during the summer of my junior year in High School. James installed the dot matrix printer for the project back then."
I shook my head, "The SOPs are written on paper by people, not carved into stone by the Almighty on a mountaintop."
Sarah stifled a laugh. "James is just a big nerd, let me ask him again today."
"Sarah, he has been hounding you since you were in High school when he was a nerdy kid home from college. Just wear something clingy, it will make all the blood run out of his brain."
Sarah swatted at me. "Oh hush you, James is not that bad, just out of his depth with trying to run the company. Besides he already has bent over backward to help us. "
"It is not him bending over I am worried about."
Sarah made a face while pushing me toward the door. "Go to the clinic, and hurry back. I'll get Anne up, fed and dressed before you come back."
Nodding, I glanced out the window of our cramped apartment at the breaking dawn. The sky was blood red and reminded me of the old maritime saying. "Red sky at night, Sailors delight. Red sky in Morning, Sailor take warning."
Opening the door to leave, I looked at my watch and sighed. Today was Thursday, I had five more days until my death.
*******
Walking through the slight breeze in dawn light, I pulled my jacket tighter stopping at an intersection for the red light, and thought about an article that claimed most people and relationships can only survive three life changing events in a given time period.
My three events were coming up like waves on the beach.
First was losing my job. It was a job I enjoyed and was good at. My bosses and coworkers were fine and the company profitable. However if you stopped coming to work, for whatever the reason, you will be terminated.
Second was the loss of our family home. It was not the greatest house in the world, but Sarah and I had fixed it up, and put a lot of sweat equity into the house. Sarah had really made the house a home and with good sized back yard and separate bedroom for our daughter Anne, it was her pride and joy. But banks become possessive if you do not pay the mortgage for months on end, and even worse if you do not pay the home equity loan. Foreclosure and repossession follow soon after, no matter if the mortgage money was needed elsewhere.
The first two I could deal with. It was number Three that was the big one. Our precious daughter Anne had been diagnosed with a fatal medical condition. Even worse it was not one of the more common childhood illness where treatment was at least an option of hope. No, our daughter Anne had what was known as one of the "Orphan diseases". I will not go into detail, but basically this meant the illness was not common enough for pharmaceutical companies to expend any research into a treatment or cure because the low profit/margin ratio.
It was a miracle itself Anne was even diagnosed correctly. A fluke due to her pediatrician having a fling at a medical conference with a little known researcher from another country. Specialists were hard to find and appointments difficult to secure, which told you where all my time that used to be spend on my job went.
Insurance would not cover the specialists or what the adjusters considered "experimental" medications, (which was just about everything) so that should tell you where all the house mortgage money went.
Now the money was gone, our bank accounts bust and we were even behind on our rent. The only thing left of any value was my old company sponsored sizeable life insurance policy, which would be canceled at months end. Like George Bailey in the classic "It's a Wonderful Life" movie, I was worth more dead than alive.
The dinging of the blinking WALK sign broke me out of my thought as I looked both ways before crossing the busy intersection that our local media had called "The most dangerous Traffic Location in the State".
This is where in 5 days I would walk to my death and get money for my family.
****
My destination was a nondescript strip mall with the required Asian food take out joint, Martial Art School and Mini mart convince store
Pushing open the door with its faded "Lit LW Research" lettering, I approached the reception desk with a sliding window and picked up the clipboard hung by the wall.
The sliding frosted glass window opened and an older lady in a white smock raised her coffee cup at me.
"Morning Brad." She peered down at the list in front of her. "You here for the clinical trial of the Hair growth, the Erectile drug or Toenail fungus?"
I did not look up as I finished filling out the form. For past few weeks I had signing up to test out various medications. It was a way to make a quick buck and allow me the time I needed to care for my daughter.
"I am here for the Toenail thing." I said handing her the completed form. "Last visit."