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“Girls!” came an unfamiliar man’s voice from the kitchen followed by a shouted swear word then a loud thump.
“Oh shit,” Madison squeaked, then jumped from the sofa with me following close behind.
We skidded into the kitchen where a good looking, dark haired, tanned man lay sprawled out in the doorway which led to what looked like the garage. He was half in, half out of the kitchen and his eyes were closed, but his chest beneath his blue polo shirt was still moving. Panic tried to freeze me in place, but the girls’ cries of distress galvanized me into action. Someone had to be the adult here, and it looked like that task feel to me.
“Sir,” I said as I knelt next to him, avoiding the drying pool of blood near the doorway his wife had left behind. “Mr. Ahhh…”
“Dad,” Viola wailed while Madison said, “His name is Juan.”
“Right.” I felt his pulse, which was strong and gave his cheeks a little slap as I said, “Girls, does he have any illnesses that you know of?”
“He has high cholesterol,” Madison said through her tears. “Mom’s always yelling at him to stop eating foods that jack up his cholesterol.”
I had to press my lips together to hold back a rather hysterical giggle. “But no history of seizures or anything like that?”
“No, what’s wrong with him?” Viola asked, her sobs breaking her words into little hiccups of sound.
The man in question began to mumble something, then scrunch up his face like he’d smelled something bad.
Praying with all my might that he wasn’t having a stroke, I leaned forward and said, “Sir, Juan? Can you hear me?”
He mumbled something back that I didn’t understand, and my fear increased until Madison said, “He just asked who you were in Spanish.”
“Oh, um, does your dad speak English?”
“Yah,” Juan mumbled in a heavily accented voice as he raised a shaky hand to his face. “I speak English. Where am I? What happened?”
Viola and Madison dropped next to me, then the three of us helped him sit up.
“Ow!” he hissed as he tried to prop himself up with his right arm. “Son of a bitch, my arm hurts. Why does my arm hurt?”
“Dad,” Viola said as she patted his cheek. “You must have seen Mom’s blood and passed out, like you did that one time at church.”
“Or that other time at camp,” Madison added.
“Or that time when your brother—”
Juan gave his head a shake. “Yes, yes, we get it. I sometimes pass out at the sight of blood. Shit, I remember why I’m here.” He looked at me, his dark eyes wide with panic, “My wife? Is she okay?”
“Yes, she’s going to be fine. She’s probably at the hospital with Tyler by now.” I glanced at his arm when he shifted then swallowed hard and said in a reedy voice, “Juan, I need you to look at me.”
He did, his gaze slightly cloudy, and probably the reason he wasn’t feeling the broken bone in his arm.
Viola, Madison and I were all looking at his forearm, where you could clearly see a bump where there shouldn’t be one. My brothers had both broken their arms when we were kids, and I was sure I needed to get Juan to the hospital. Or at least into the car, before his shock wore off and the pain set in.
“Juan, I think your arm is broken. No!” I snapped when he went to look down. “No. Do not look down. Madison, toss that towel on the counter to your dad. You’re not bleeding Juan, but your arm is for sure broken. We need to get you to the hospital.”
“Shit,” Juan whispered, and I could see his eyes wanting to jerk down and stare at his arm. “Shit. Mindy is going to kill me.”
“Yeah, well we can meet up with her at the hospital. Um, kids! Right, you have kids. Madison, can you get your brother, please? Check if he needs a diaper change. Viola, grab the baby bag and make sure extra diapers and food are in there. Does he still take a bottle or a sippy cup?”
“Sippy cup,” Viola said. “Mom keeps his juice boxes in the fridge. I’ll grab a couple of those and snacks for him.”
“Good girl, and thank you so much for helping me out. I really appreciate it.”
Viola sprinted out of the room while Madison headed off to get James out of his playpen.
I knelt next to Juan and took the purple hand towel Madison had tossed nearby to put over his arm and stabilize it the best I could. “There, okay, now let’s get you into the car. Think you can stand on your own?”
“Who are you again?” he asked in a bewildered voice as I helped him get to his feet.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m Nora, Tyler’s date.” I pointed to the cute wrought iron key hooks on the wall. “Which one is the key to the van?”
