Chapter 6: RUDE AWAKENING *

Approximately one hour later I woke up, but instead of being in my bed, I was in the dining room. The dining room was next to the bedroom, and I was leaning up next to the dining-room window. As I tried to pick up my head for the first time and shake out the grogginess, bright lights shone in my eyes from the right. I didn't know where they came from. I looked to my left and saw a haze, a cloud of smoke. This seemed odd.

Lights flickered to the left through a big opening and a breeze blew in. I tried to focus my eyes and at the same time smelled something foul: sulfur, tar, burning rubber, and plastic. It was a horrible stench. A cold chill went through me, the kind that goes right to your bones. Again, I tried to focus my eyes and rub the crusty sleep out of them. I was definitely in the dining room, and the wall between my dining room and bedroom was missing. That didn't make sense. Where was the wall? I saw the lights again and realized a full-size pickup truck sat motionless in front of me. I was beside the front right tire. I shook my head, trying to shake the cobwebs out. I must be dreaming. What's this truck doing in the middle of my dining room? I thought. What's going on here? Is that a blue and white pickup truck in the middle of my house?

I stood up as best as I could. I was near the passenger door of the truck. The stench was stronger than ever, and a cloud of smoke surrounded me. Then I saw a man step out of the driver's side of the truck. He was a large man, scraggly, wearing a baseball cap. A gash sliced his forehead and something trickled down it. It was red but I couldn't completely focus to tell exactly what it was. I asked myself, Who is this man in the middle of my dining room?

He saw me. "Is there somebody else in the house?" he asked.

Is there somebody else in the house? I thought. Who is this strange man in the middle of my house? His question echoed faintly in the back of my mind as I tried desperately to process thoughts coherently. Is there somebody else in the house? What's this truck doing in the middle of my dining room? Is there somebody else in the house? Who's this strange man standing here asking questions? Where is my bed? What am I doing in the dining room? Is there somebody else in the house? What's this stench? What's this smoke? What is going on here? Is there somebody else in the house? SOMEBODY ELSE IN THE HOUSE? AVA! My wife! Where is my wife?

I freaked out and started running around the truck. I ran into my bathroom trying to turn on lights, thinking that if I could just get some light I could see more clearly what was going on. I flicked the switch in the bathroom but, for

some reason, the lights didn't come on. That was odd. I ran out of the bathroom and back into my bedroom. I leaned up against the wall and searched for the switch. Finally, I found it, but it was no good. No lights. I ran into the kitchen. Nothing. The hallway. Nope. The living room. The foyer. Still none. I tried every single lamp. I even hit the switch for the T.V. No dice. I couldn't get anything to work. There was no power.

I stumbled to the far side of the house to a second bathroom. I reached around the wall, flicked the switch and - bingo - lights came on. Relieved, I stepped into the bathroom. Something had been dripping on my legs. It was on my arms, too, but I didn't know what it was. I felt something crunch in my mouth, so I spit into the sink. I lifted up my head and looked in the mirror. I was groggy and my eyes had to try to focus.

I stepped back in shock. I could barely see my face in the reflection in the mirror. There was a stream - a waterfall of red - flowing down my face. It was blood. I could now see it going down my chest and onto my arms, over my underwear, and my legs, and onto the floor. I felt that crunching in my mouth again. Again I spit. Huge hunks of bloody glass plopped into the sink. I searched for a towel and found a white one. I turned on the faucet and put the towel under the water to dampen it. I wiped my face, thinking that if I cleaned up the blood, I'd have a better idea of how badly I was hurt. The towel made a scrunching sound as it scraped over pieces of glass that were imbedded in my cheek.

With the blood temporarily gone, I saw a huge hole in my cheek and stuck my tongue through it. Again, I spit a large chunk of blood and glass out of my mouth into the bowl. The blood had started to flow again as I watched it splash into the sink. Wiping my face again, I threw the towel into the basin and turned to leave the bathroom. I slipped on blood on the way out.

I walked through the hallway, past the other bedrooms, and into the main opening to the living room, not knowing where Ava was. I stood there for a second, trying to catch my breath from all the frenzy. As I looked into the room, the headlights from the truck blinded me and I couldn't get a clear view. I moved my head around to avoid the brightness of the beams. I then stepped around to the side and noticed that the front of the truck was in the back of my living room.

The man still stood there, leaning casually on the driver's door. He had a blank look on his face as if to say, "Where am I and who are you?' I glanced above the pickup and saw that the whole inside wall of my bedroom was completely gone. The only thing left of that wall was one two-by-four piece of wood dangling from the ceiling where the bedroom doorway used to be. Behind the pickup the whole back brick wall of the bedroom was completely gone. Street lights glowed outside. The lingering, thick haze gave these lights an eerie, surreal look.

I slowly crept toward the truck and looked around in the rubble. This rubble used to be my outside bedroom wall and my inside wall, the wall that separated my bedroom from my dining room. I saw broken bricks, splintered wood, pieces of plaster board. Shattered glass reflected the headlights. Plywood. And sheetrock in the mix. It was all gathered up around the truck in a heap. My house was a complete mess.

My body began to tingle. I glanced underneath the truck. What in the world? There was a corner of our blue mattress. I looked closer and now I recognized the blue sheets. I leaned closer still and saw something moving underneath the truck - then it hit me! My eyes opened wide as it became apparent to me what had happened.

"God, no!" I shouted. "Ava's under the truck!"

I grabbed the truck and rocked it back and forth. I pushed. I lifted. Anything to move the truck off Ava. They say that sometimes in the heat of an emergency adrenaline runs so high that it gives you the strength of ten men. I felt as if I

had that, but still I could not move the truck at all.

I screamed for the man to help me move it. He stood there and did nothing. I screamed out for anyone to help me. "Somebody, please help me move this truck! My wife is under this truck! Somebody, please help me save Ava! She's gotta be here. She's not anywhere else in the house. She's underneath this truck!"

My cries were in vain. I felt lonely and helpless. I stopped to catch my breath and looked at this man, puzzled about why he was still standing there and not helping me lift the truck. Then I heard banging on the front door. I ran to it and opened it up. In stepped an older black man. I had no idea who he was or why he was there. His eyes were filled with tears. They were hollow and transparent.

"Oh, my God," he cried. "I can't believe what just happened. I saw the whole thing happen."

I felt frozen and numb at that moment. Partially for him because I felt the emotion in his voice and from his face. And partially because it started to hit me - the impact of what he was saying, the desperation in his eyes. An icy chill ran through me, like a sudden north wind that cuts you to the quick. I saw him put his hands down on his knees as his head slumped in disbelief.

Not knowing what to do, I ran past him out the door and down the street, two houses down. I banged on the front door of our neighbor's home, screaming and yelling at the top of my lungs, for him, his wife, his family, somebody to come and help me lift the truck up off of Ava.

"Help! Help! Somebody please help me! My wife is under the truck! Help me, please! Somebody please help me! Help! Help!"

I ran through the neighborhood in my underwear, a bloody mess, yelling and screaming for help. I turned around and ran back to my house. As I turned, I saw flashing lights in front of my home. A small crowd had gathered. I couldn't make out the faces of anyone.

Two paramedics grabbed me from behind when I ran back into the house, something any boy from Brooklyn reacts to by instinct, and I struggled to tear loose. They took me into the front bedroom and laid me on a couch. I was frantic and hysterical. I begged them to forget about me and to attend to Ava. '"I'll be all right. I think Ava's under the truck. My wife is under the truck! See if she's okay. Don't worry about me!"

'You're going be fine, sir. We have everything under control," one paramedic said. "We know where your wife is. Other paramedics are working with her. Just try to relax and calm down now for us, okay?" They kept assuring me that she was fine and everything was going to be all right.

"Call my wife's parents. They live close by. Let them know what's going on,' I said.

"We'll call them soon. We need to take care of you," they reassured me. 'We'll take care of Ava. It's going to be fine with both of you."

They talked about my injuries. Lacerations crisscrossed my face and burns covered different parts of my body. One injury startled me. "He has a broken left forearm," the shorter paramedic announced to the other.

"A broken arm?" I asked in disbelief. I had been trying to lift the truck and banging on a neighbor's door. 'No way! I can't have a broken left forearm.'

They assured me that I did. I then looked at my left arm and did a double take. It was swollen up to the size of a small watermelon. A deep indentation that looked like a tiremark and a tire burn, with something black and dark was visible on it. My arm went limp every time I tried to move it.

By this time my arm was throbbing, my face felt as if it were on fire, and my heart was racing at two hundred miles an hour. The paramedics continued to assure me that Ava was okay.

Then, strangely, out of nowhere, a Bible verse popped into my head. It was a scripture that I remember learning in my early childhood - the 23rd Psalm: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For thou art with me."

This verse rang in my heart and my spirit, and I didn't know where it was coming from. Was God telling me something? Was I about to die? Was Ava about to die? What was going on? My mind was racing. I didn't know what was going on. I lay there crying, praying, and wondering.

All of a sudden, they loaded me on a stretcher, carried me out the front bedroom, wheeled me past the people outside, put me in the ambulance, and closed the doors. Somebody please wake me up from this bad dream, I pleaded in my mind.

As the ambulance drove away, I saw the house. I saw the lights flashing, people gathered in front of the house, and what looked like a huge opening in the side wall where the bedroom had been. I saw our house in the distance getting smaller and smaller. I wondered, What happened to me? Where is Ava? Is she okay? Will everything be fine? And what in the world is going on here?

* Chapter 6 from the best seller Triumph Over Tragedy, by Bobby Petrocelli