The Transplanted Heart
 by: Hankster

© 2009 by the author

The author retains all rights. No reproductions are allowed without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at...

Chapter 7

Several weeks went by and Roger did not hear from Matthew.  He searched for his face among his congregation, but he never saw him.  Christine, who managed the church office, kept the records of donations for income tax purposes.  Roger enlisted her help and they found seven Matthews.  Roger knew them all.  He resigned himself to the realization that he would probably never hear from Matt again.

Then one afternoon there was a knock on Jimmy’s office door.  “Come in,” he said automatically.  A young man walked in.  He smiled disarmingly at Jimmy.

“What can I do for you?” the pastor asked.

“I’m relatively new here,” the man said.  “I’ve been coming for the past few Sundays with my boyfriend.  I used to go to St Benedict Episcopal, and someone just happened to mention to me the other day that you and Father Graham were partners.”

“Yes we are.  Do you know Roger?’’

“Intimately.  You stole him from me, you bastard.”  The deranged Matthew whipped out a pistol, aimed it directly at Jimmy’s chest and fired point blank before Jimmy could react.  Then he took the gun, placed it to his temple and shot himself.

Jimmy felt a strange vibration in his chest.  He felt as if he was disintegrating.  He was getting light headed, and was somehow floating in air.  He looked down and could see Matthew lying in a pool of blood.  Indistinctly he could see another person lying close by, but he couldn’t tell who it was, or if he even knew the man.

He became aware that someone was calling his name.  He looked up and there in front of him was Robbie.  They grabbed each other and embraced.  Robbie was crying.  “It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.  You were supposed to have a long and happy life.  I wasn’t supposed to lose my heart twice.”

“I know,” Jimmy said.  “You promised me years of happiness with Roger.”

“Nothing like this was supposed to happen,” Robbie wailed.  They held each other tightly trying to comfort one another.  Suddenly Jimmy was ripped from Robbie’s arms and everything went black.

When Darryl heard gunshots coming from Jimmy’s office, He ran toward the sounds without thinking that he might be in danger himself.  He threw open Jimmy’s door, stopped dead in his tracks and gasped.  Trying to avoid all the blood, he ran to Jimmy’s desk and called 911.

At the precise moment that Jimmy was shot, Roger was dictating a letter to Ellie.  Suddenly he felt like he had been stabbed in his chest and he let out a shriek.  He looked down fully expecting to see blood all over. 

“What’s the matter?” Ellie screamed. 

“I don’t know.  I’m OK now, but I got this pain in my chest.”

Heart attack, Ellie thought.  She ran to her desk and got two aspirins. She made Roger swallow them over his objections.  As he was downing the aspirins, he heard Robbie telling him to go to Jimmy.

He has rejected Robbie’s heart, was all he could think.  Without heed to Ellie he ran out to the parking lot, got his car, and headed for Jimmy’s church.  He drove recklessly, but he got there without incident.  The area around the church was blocked off by a slew of police cars.  He was unable to drive in to the church parking lot, but he saw an ambulance speeding away.  Roger instinctively followed the ambulance to the hospital.  They went to the very hospital where Jimmy had received his transplant.

At the emergency room entrance the paramedics unloaded a gurney and rushed into the ER.  Roger parked and followed them in.  He assumed it was Jimmy.  He had never gone into the church to check.  A team of hospital personnel were working on the man on the gurney.  Roger could not get close.  He tried to get the patient’s name, but for the moment he was admitted as John Doe.

Roger wisely called the church and asked for Darryl.  The switchboard did not want to put him through, but when he told them who he was, they connected his call.

A weeping hysterical Darryl was on the other end of the line.  Between bitter sobs, Roger learned that a young man had entered Jimmy’s office, shot Jimmy, and then shot himself.  Jimmy was barely alive and was taken to the hospital.  The police took the murderer away in a body bag, and as of now Darryl didn’t know who he was.

Roger went to the nurse’s station in the ER. The nurses recognized him immediately.  “Good morning Father Graham,” one of them said.  “Can I help you?”

“Yes, the man who they just brought in, the one who was shot, he’s a fellow clergyman.  He has no family at all.  His church family is all he has.  Can you get me any information?  We’re like brothers.”

The compassionate nurse told Roger to have a seat and promised to find out what she could.  “Thank you,” Roger said and broke out crying. 

“They just took him into the OR.  I’ll check on him for you,” she said.  Before she went into the OR, the nurse got Roger a cup of water.

It seemed forever, but it was only a few minutes when the nurse returned. “Your friend had a heart transplant here several months ago.”  Roger nodded.  “He’s very lucky,” she continued.  “The bullet missed the heart by a hairline, but his left lung was punctured.  He’s in the OR now.  The doctors are trying to repair the lung.  If he survives the operation it will be a few days before we’ll know what his chances are.  He was shot at very close range and he lost a lot of blood.”

“Thank you,” Roger said, as the tears flowed again.  The staff asked him to please wait in the hospital lobby, because the ER tended to get pretty hectic at night and it was getting late.

He sat in the lobby waiting for the operation to be over and for some more news.  He was praying hard when someone called his name.  He looked up to see Peter.  “I was just passing through the lobby to go home and I saw you. What’s happened?”

Peter sat down next to Roger.  His horror grew as he heard the story.  “How come Ellie didn’t call me?”  He asked nobody in particular.

“God, I never called her back.”  Roger got on his phone and Ellie answered immediately.

“You had me worried sick,” she complained.  When Roger filled her in on the shooting, they both started to cry so hard that Peter took the phone.

“I’ll stay with Roger,” he told Ellie.  Why don’t you come down here as soon as you can?  We shouldn’t leave him alone.”

The words weren’t out of his mouth when Darryl and William showed up.  They tried unsuccessfully to comfort Roger and finally they decided to leave, since there was nothing they could do here.  They made Roger promise to call as soon as he knew something.

Ellie showed up about a half hour later.  She and Peter never left Roger’s side.  He had no appetite, but they made him drink juice or coffee, whatever they could get down him.

Rabbi Joe was making his late afternoon rounds when he heard the news.  He rushed down to the lobby and found Roger.  He threw his arms around him and rocked him gently as Roger sobbed against his chest.

“Don’t lose faith,” he said.  “We are all praying.”

Shortly after Joe left, Peter went to find out what he could.  He came back in a few minutes.  “The operation just ended and they are taking Jimmy to ICU.  The doctor will be out shortly to speak to us.”

The doctor recognized Roger immediately as one of the hospital chaplain’s.  He also knew that Jimmy and Roger were life partners and he determined to treat Roger as a blood relative, and ignore hospital privacy policies which allowed only blood relatives to receive news about or to visit a patient in ICU.

“The good news is that he survived a very delicate and complicated surgery.  It will be at least 48 hours before we’ll know what his chances are.  If he’s a fighter, I believe he has a better than even chance to make it.  Is he a fighter, Roger?”

“You bet he is,” Roger said slightly relieved.

“There are some policemen in ICU.  They want to question him as soon as he wakes up.  They won’t let anyone stay with him until they interview him, so why don’t you go home.  I’ll leave orders to call you if necessary.”

“Thanks doctor.  I think I’ll just hang out here.”

“You can stay with me tonight,” Peter said.  You shouldn’t be alone.”

“Please everybody, I appreciate your concern, but I really would like to camp out in the hospital tonight.  I promise to keep busy.  I’ll make my rounds in the morning.”

Finally everyone gave into his wishes.  Roger settled into the most comfortable chair he could find in the lobby.  He called Darryl and brought him up to date.  Before hanging up Darryl asked him to stay with him as well, but he declined.

Just before midnight, a young man came running into the lobby.  He went to the information desk and the women at the desk pointed at Roger.  The young man hurried over to Roger.

“Father Graham?” he asked.

“Yes.  Do I know you?”

“No, but I think you know of me.  My name is Ira Lawrence.  I am, I was, Matthew’s friend.  I am so sorry for what happened.  Had I been smarter, I might have prevented it.”

Roger put his hand on the young man’s shoulder.  “How could you have prevented it?” he wanted to know.

“When I met Matt, I immediately fell in love with him.  He was so shy that I found it appealing.  I tried to get him to open up, but it was useless.  We went out a lot and I tried to maneuver him into bed, but he kept insisting that he wasn’t gay, which was pure bullshit.  My gaydar never lies. 

“One day he told me that he had a long talk with his minister and that now he thought he might be gay after all.  He said that you advised him to go to the gay church with me.  I actually hoped that now, he would go to bed with me, but he kept on resisting my pleas.

“Last Sunday after church a few of us were in the social hall having a cup of coffee.  Matt mentioned that he used to go to St Benedict.  One of the guys asked if he knew you.  He said he did.

“The guy then asked if he knew that Pastor Jimmy and Father Roger were life partners.  He never answered.  He just leered at all of us and ran out of the hall.  He was acting like a crazy man.  I could see it, but I didn’t think it would lead to anything as violent as this.  I also attributed his virginity and his inward personality to his being shy, but now I can see how sick he was.  God, Father, I feel so guilty for not telling anyone.  I am so sorry.”

Ira began to cry. Roger put his arms around him to console him.  “Go home now, Ira,” Roger said.  “You could not have known what would happen or prevented it from happening.  Don’t let this ruin your life.  I am making it an order.  Go in peace and pray for your pastor’s life.”

Ira kissed Roger on the lips and ran from the lobby.  Roger fell asleep, and slept for three hours from sheer exhaustion.  In the morning, his position allowed him to wander freely through the hospital.  He found an empty room, where he showered, but he had to put on the same clothes.  He knew he would have to go home for a brief while to change, but he wasn’t going to leave until Jimmy woke up.  He went to the cardiac ward where Peter worked and found his friend.

“Can you tell me anything?  Is there any news?” Roger asked.

“Yes, I was looking for you.  Jimmy woke up about an hour ago.  The cops are questioning him now and then he is being transferred to the surgical floor.  Unfortunately, I won’t be his nurse, but I promise to look in on him.”

“How is his condition?” Roger asked.

“Serious, but stable.  He’s not out of danger, but they are watching him very closely.”  That didn’t sound too bad, and Roger allowed himself to breathe. 

“Can I hang out in the lobby until they bring him to his bed?”

“You can, but he won’t be there for two or three hours.  Why don’t you go home, freshen up, and by the time you get back, he might be there.”

That made sense to Roger, and he told Peter he would see him later.  On the way home, he stopped at his church.  He knelt before the altar and prayed like he had never prayed before.  He felt something at his side and he knew that it was Robbie, who was praying also.

To be continued...

Posted: 09/04/09