Update and Friday Fiction

 

December was a dud as far as writing went. Vertigo is not conducive to standing in front of a computer screen. But in terms of family and hubby time, December was fantastic.

 

January is proving a tad interesting as the vertigo has changed from constant, to sporadic, and I never know when I'll wake up feeling fine, or like I stepped off a tilt-a-whirl. Fortunately I'm beginning to have more good days than bad, so I am back at my WIP with an eye to finishing it this month. And I'm blogging again. In other good news, my daughter is living with me again (temporarily).

 

She rejoined our family for a short term, because her husband was laid off from his job two weeks before their wedding in August. His attempts to find work in this area were less than successful (our area has few good paying jobs, and those employers that do pay well either laid off workers, or locked them out in the last eight months), so he and my daughter decided to broaden his employment search. Within one day of sending resumes off to various locales in BC and Alberta, he received a call inviting him for an interview. Three days (and a ten-hour drive) later, he interviewed--and was hired on the spot, only a few days before Christmas. He agreed to start January 6th. So...

 

The days between Christmas and New Year's were a frantic scramble as my son-in-law packed up the basement suite he and daughter had been renting (she had to work) and moved all but their personal hygiene and necessary clothing items into storage at his grandma's, while I rearranged a spare room to accommodate he and my daughter, until his departure Jan 4th. He is now working at his new job, while she remained here at her job until she can find work there. Today, she completed her second telephone interview for a new position in the new city. Fingers crossed she is offered the job. Being newly wedded is difficult enough; living eight or nine hours apart (by car), while living in a relative's spare bedroom (he's staying with cousins), makes it that much harder. But for me, it's a bonus, because when daughter goes, a piece of my heart will go with her.

 





The happy couple.

 

As for our moving saga...we plan to re list the house in March, and fingers crossed, it sells. I think we're all ready, the kids still at home included, to end the wait and just get on with whatever comes next. I'm truly looking forward to 2014. It's already started with a bang, and I expect it will only get more exhilarating from here.

 

Oh, and because it's Friday, here's a snippet from my current (very rough) WIP...

 

 

Love On A Wild Sea, 2013 copyrighted material

 

 

Rufus had removed the mask from Captain Hanes's face and was packing it away in the doctor's kit, but a faint indent and some redness remained on the captain's skin marking the mask's placement. She traced the line in one of his cheeks soft with a week's stubble, and ran her thumb lightly over his closed eyelid.

"Will he…is he…"

"He'll be fine," the doctor said quietly. "Sore, tired for a few weeks from loss of blood, but he'll recover with no more than a scar to show for his troubles."

She looked up, met the doctor's gaze, and offered a tremulous smile.

"Thank you," she murmured, barely able to speak for a sudden ache in her throat, or see for a glaze of tears. "Thank you for saving him."

The doctor was silent a moment, his gaze on her, the rag he had been using to dry his hands caught between his palms. He looked down, and resumed wiping the moisture from his wrists and fingers. "He should awaken shortly. The anesthetic is short acting."

Almost as if cued, Captain Hanes stirred, coughed, and then reared up suddenly, his eyes wide, and arms flailing. Felicity gasped and tilted away, but the doctor was not startled by the abrupt awakening. He leaned in, braced one forearm on the captain's chest and grabbed his closest wrist with the other hand.  

"Easy there, Mr. Hanes," he said, his voice calm but authoritative. "You were shot, but I've removed the bullet. Now lay back and relax before you undo my good work."

Captain Hanes stared at him a moment, his eyes wide and unseeing, and then he blinked and seemed to return to himself. He fell back, his decline aided by the doctor who shifted his arm from the captain's chest, to behind his shoulders.

"There now," the doctor said. "If you will roll slightly—no, the other way. To your uninjured side—that's it. I would like you to draw a couple deep breaths and cough. Miss Grabner, if you would kindly hold this to Mr. Hanes's mouth, while he clears his lungs."

Felicity shook off an odd sense of detachment, induced, she presumed, by a combination of fatigue, shock, and observance of the captain's mute obedience of the doctor's orders, like a child obeying a strict father. She had never seen him so…docile, and for some reason it…scared her.

She whisked the clean rag from the doctor's hand, applied it gently to the captain's mouth, but with a quick shake of his head, he took it from her, and cupped it over the lower half of his face. A few deep breaths, each one followed by a brisk coughing fit, and he sagged back to lie flat on the table.

The doctor applied the larger funnel-shaped end of a short cylindrical apparatus made of polished wood to one side of the captain's chest, and bent to rest his ear to the smaller funnel-shaped end. He followed the same procedure on the other side of the captain's chest. Nodding, he straightened and asked, "Do you believe you are ready to sit up?"

In answer, the captain braced his elbows on the table, and started to push up. Felicity slid an arm around his back, and ignoring a flare of useless immodesty at the feel of his sweat-slicked skin under her palm, helped him slide his legs around so they dangled over the edge of the table.

"Actually, that is not an ideal position for me," the doctor said. "Would you mind straddling a chair next to me?"

Felicity attempted to support the captain by one arm as he eased off the table, but again he declined her assistance and leaning on the tabletop, he shuffled around it to sit as required and enable the doctor to listen to his lungs from the back.  

"Now breathe in, and out, deep as you can, Mr. Hanes," the doctor asked, his face turned in Felicity's direction but his gaze distant. He smiled a minute later, and his eyes their regained focus as he straightened in his seat. "Good, good. I hear nothing to indicate fluid in your lungs." He twisted the smaller end of the stethoscope loose and removed it. "You are a very lucky man, Mr. Hanes," he added as he tucked the different parts of the device into velvet-lined declinations in his kit designed to the hold the different shapes. "An inch to the right and the bullet would have perforated your lung. An inch higher and it may very well have severed your subclavian artery. There would have been nothing I could do for you in either case. As it is you have torn muscle and cracked and chipped ribs, but barring sepsis, they will heal, and you should be back to normal in a few weeks."

            "Sepsis," Felicity repeated, stricken.

            "Yes. Penetration wounds are the worst for that I am afraid," the doctor said as he closed the lid of his kit and locked it. "Ah, Rufus," he continued, looking up as a shadow stretched across the room. "What did you determine?"

            "There's a team and a wagon in a pen out back. Can hitch them up to take everyone back to town."

            "Yes," the doctor said and glanced to where Arden and Silas lay. "That would be best. But I would like to examine them first, to ensure they are fit for travel."

            "I'll get the horses hitched." Captain Hanes pushed off the chair to his feet. "You can assist here," he added to Rufus.

            "You can't," Felicity exclaimed and put an arm on his. "You're injured."

            The captain tilted his head to look at her, his green eyes grave. "You know how to hitch a team?"

            "Ah…well…no."

            "Can you lift your maid, or Silas, on the table for the doctor?"

            She looked at each of the people in question. "Well…no, but—"

            "No buts." Captain Hanes lifted her hand free of his arm. "There's three Blackmore brothers down, but according to the doctor, another eight nearby. We can't afford to linger here any longer than necessary. I cannot trust that the others are as poor of marksmen as the one that shot me."

*End Excerpt.*