I’m too stubborn for my own good.  That’s what Marissa tells me.  That’s why I got into that mess in the carpet store.  That’s why I was trapped in a collapsed sub-basement for hours not caring if I lived or died.  Not caring about all the people I’ve managed to help or the people I love.

 A few days ago I was on a date with my girlfriend Erica.  We went to the movie at the Planetarium.  Some wise guy a few rows back, a High School student I think, managed to break up a reasonably romantic moment when he threw a paper airplane.  If I’d gotten my hands on him I probably would have strangled him.  Erica and I had missed so many dates when we first became interested in each other because I always had to run out and take care of some disaster printed in The Paper.  The constant lying and making up excuses had taken its toll on my health.  I had two fainting spells after suffering severe stomach pains.  The first one happened in a doctor’s office.  He told me I needed to reduce my stress level.  Boy was Marissa all over me about that one!  I was determined to keep The Paper a secret no matter what.  It didn’t matter that as she pointed out that she and Chuck and my parents and even Erica’s nine-year-old son Henry knew about it.  I considered it a secret and it was going to stay that way.  (I’m also not very logical sometimes I guess.)

 The second one happened right there in the dining room of the restaurant.  My own place - McGinty’s.  I’d just spent several miserable hours trying to get home through the sewer system after getting myself trapped in the basement of the legendary Biograph Theater.  You know the place - the one where John Dillinger supposedly met his girlfriend only to be gunned down by a slew of law enforcement agents when he came out.  You see I had to prevent the place from being destroyed by a fire caused by a faulty circuit in the basement.  My faulty logic went to work in this case again.  I used a broom to prop the bulkhead door open.  The broom wasn’t strong enough; the door slammed shut and locked me in.  Anyway, when I got home I was cold, stiff and soaked in sewage.  When I tried to apologize to Erica I got those stomach pains again and down I went.  Marissa looked awfully skeptical when I told her I was going to tell Erica about The Paper.

 And this was just a couple of incidents. There was the divorce from Marcia.  I never wanted it.  I was very much in love with my wife but apparently I wasn’t good enough for her.  Then she was going to marry my ex-boss Phil Pritchard.  I was too stubborn to tell Marissa and Chuck how I really felt but I did eventually confront Marcia about her impending marriage.  I wouldn’t let go the Teddy Bear Bomber incidents either even though it brought me into conflict with Detective Crumb again.  Too many things over the last two and half years that I refused to accept help with.  I felt that The Paper was my responsibility and mine alone.  After all Marissa is always telling me that The Paper comes to me for a reason.

 When the movie was over I told Erica that I only had one incident to handle.  An apartment building fire caused by a faulty boiler that would explode.  Several lives were at stake.  I deserved the reprimand Erica gave me.  To think that I was going to take the time to take her out for coffee.  I don’t know what I was thinking.  Well, I gave her a quick kiss and off I ran.  The building was easy enough to find.  A multi-story brick building.  Down I ran to the boiler room in the basement.  Locked.  No key was found during my frantic search so I ran back upstairs and pulled the fire alarm and started evacuating the tenants.  This one young mother needed a bottle and an extra blanket for her baby.  It was so cold outside that day.

 Once outside I asked if anyone had a cell phone.  When one man responded in the affirmative I asked him to call the fire department.  My next move was to check the paper again to see if the story had disappeared.  It hadn’t.  Not completely.  The headline now said that one man, an older man, apparently a transient, had taken shelter in a shed on the roof of the building.  So back I ran; this time I had to run up the stairs.  I wasn’t all the way to the top when the boiler exploded.  The blast halfway knocked me off my feet.  The door to the roof was jammed.  Apparently the old boot I found had jammed it.

 When I finally got out on the roof I found the homeless man, Jeremiah Mason, hiding in a storage shed near the door.  He was so terrified of me because he thought I was going to hurt him.  When I told him there was a fire he became even more frightened.  He thought I blamed him for the fire.  I reassured him that he wasn’t and tried to hustle him down the stairs.  I’d lost too much time running back and searching for him.  The flames and smoke were already on their way up the stairwell - we couldn’t go down.  Looking around frantically I saw a ladder on the roof.  Somebody apparently had been doing some repairs or remodeling up there.  I took the ladder to the edge of the roof and spread it out across to the roof of the building on the other side of the alley.

 As I crawled across I made the mistake of looking down.  I got really dizzy and almost fell myself.  I never could stand heights.  I got trapped in a tree house with my dad once and I thought, when that rope broke, that we were never going to get down.  Somehow I managed to get across and checked the paper again.  I turned around to face Jeremiah and tried to get him to crawl across.  He was jumpy - nervous.  He told me he was when I told him what we were going to do.

 Jeremiah was almost all the way across when he lost his balance and started to fall.  Quick as I could I reached out and grabbed him.  But I couldn’t hold onto his hand and he was too far away for me to get both hands on him.  If I could’ve just gotten both hands on him I think I could have saved him.  But he slipped from my grasp and fell to his death leaving me stunned and speechless on the roof of that building.
 

I was still there, speechless and in shock, when the fire department arrived.  One of the firefighters took me by the arm and led me down the stairs and out to the street where Detective Armstrong took me aside for questioning after he talked to the tenants of the burned building.  He was kind enough.  He saw me sitting there staring at the people I’d just helped, especially the young mother with her baby, and asked me if I wanted the heat turned up.  He must have thought I was shivering because I was cold.  I don’t remember feeling anything.  I know I was in shock.  Marissa said as much when I finally got home that night.  I answered his questions as best I could and then, when he let me go, I went straight to a seedy bar and tried to drown my sorrows.  I drank one shot of hard stuff after another and never knew what I drank.

When I stumbled into McGinty’s that night Marissa and Erica were all concern.  Erica noticed how cold I was on the outside and went to get me some coffee.  She had no idea how cold I’d gotten on the inside.  I couldn’t feel anything.  Marissa was worried about me.  I know she was.  I don’t drink hard stuff very often and certainly not enough to get drunk on.  I hardly ever have more than a beer and I can’t remember the last time I got to finish one.  She tried to get me to eat something but I refused.  I told her I was tired and I was going to get some sleep.

Sleep?  What’s sleep?  I didn’t sleep that night.  Every time I lay down and closed my eyes I saw Jeremiah Mason’s terrified face as his hand slipped from my grasp.  I saw his broken body on the roof of that car parked in the street below.  I heard his scream as he fell and I cried out in agony as if it were me.

The next morning I ignored the cat and The Paper when they arrived.  The Paper was still outside my door when Marissa arrived to check on me.  And boy was I nasty to her.  I know that she understood I was still in shock and distraught over what had happened but that’s no excuse for snapping at the one person who’s always been there for me.  She offered to handle The Paper with Erica’s help but I took it away from her and threw it out the window.

Going to Jeremiah’s funeral that day didn’t help matters any.  I couldn’t say to his sister that I was the one let her brother die.  That it was all my fault she’d never see her brother again.  Then the strangest thing happened.  An old man came up to me after she left and handed me a newspaper.  Not just any newspaper mine you, but my paper.  The Paper.  The one I had thrown away.  When I turned back to confront him after watching Jeremiah’s sister and escort drive away he was gone.

Later that day, after it was dark, I went home to the loft again.  Marissa started me when she spoke to me out of the dark.  She’d let herself into the loft and was sitting there in the dark waiting for me.  She told me it was time to get over the shock and let the tears come.  That I’d never be able to move on until I did.  If I think now that I was nasty to her that morning I should really kick myself for the way I spoke to her this time.  I told her “I love you very much but don’t tell me how to feel”.

Next morning The Paper arrived as usual.  I picked it up and the cat and threw them both violently.  Cat I threw on the floor while The Paper went on the table where yesterday’s Paper still lay.  When Cat jumped up on the table and knocked The Paper down I started screaming at him.  No one can imagine how stunned I was when I picked it up and saw my obituary staring me in the face.  And there was no clue as to why I went to that building where I was supposed to die.  Not one tiny little clue.  All the article said was that I was killed when the sub-basement of a deserted carpet store collapsed on me.

I went out and checked out the store.  It was an old derelict that should have been torn down a long time ago.  But there it stood the place where I would meet my end.  When I got back to McGinty’s I was so convinced that I would die that day that I sat at the bar writing a note to the lawyer leaving everything to Marissa.  She heard me when she came in that day.  If she could have seen my face or the letter she’d have bawled me out right then and there.  But she can’t so I was safe for the moment.  She couldn’t see that I was lying to her.  That, being the stubborn fool that she says I am sometimes, I was lying when I told her I was ok.  I kept lying to her instead of admitting that I wasn’t and letting the tears come right then and there.  Maybe I wouldn’t have gone through this nightmare if I’d listened.  Instead I finished the note, addressed the envelope and put it on the shelf behind the bar in between some liquor bottles.  Then I made good my escape, just like when I’ve finished my business with the paper, and went into the office.

In the office I sat down at my desk and picked up the phone.  I called Chuck in California.  I wanted to say good-bye and thanks.  Chuck whines and complains but he’s always been there for me when I really needed him.  Until he moved to California but he was still here in spirit.  I almost laughed when I thought about the receipts and stuff that Erica found when she took over as bar manager.  It was so typical of Chuck.  I got his secretary.  She wouldn’t put me through because Chuck was in an important meeting.  He would have talked to me and maybe talked some sense into me if he’d picked up but he secretary absolutely refused to disturb him.

Then I called home.  I wanted desperately to talk to Mom and Dad.  To say good-bye and to tell them that I love them and I missed them.  But they weren’t home.  I might have cried then and there.  Especially when I heard Mom’s voice.  I mean, I love my dad, but he’s not the most emotional guy in the world.  He loves me, I know that, but he’s not real good at knowing when something’s bothering me.  Mom, now, she would have known as soon as I opened my mouth that something was wrong and she would have gotten it out of me and then I would have cried.  But all I did was leave them a message.  A message that must have scared the heart out of them ‘cause I don’t usually leave messages just to tell them that I love and miss them.  I usually try to avoid them.
 

Marissa and Erica came into the office right after I hung up the phone.  They’d found the letter to the lawyer and they were scared.  Scared that I was going to go out and kill myself.  Marissa, the psychology student, says I’d lost my will to live.  That, because I’d “let” Jeremiah die, I didn’t deserve to live.  She and Erica were sure that I was out to kill myself.  They were both extremely worried when I told them that my obituary was in the paper.  They were even more worried when I admitted that I’d gone to the building to see what was what.  It was boarded up and I’d tried to call the right people to see about it being torn down. But tearing down derelict buildings was not a high priority with the City Engineer or the owners of the building.  Even when the girls expressed their concern I still wouldn’t cry.  Instead I lied to them.  I told them I was going upstairs to my room.  What I did was go up stairs to my room and out the fire door.  Down the fire escape I went off to say good-bye to Chicago and the life that I’d known for the last few years.

While I was out wandering around I saw the same old man that I saw at the cemetery.  My own troubles forgotten, I started to follow him.  I found myself near the carpet store.  I saw the two teens go in and I checked my paper.  I tried to ignore it.  I was through with The Paper.  I’d told Cat I didn’t want it any more and I’d meant it.  I was going to die that day so how could I do anything for it any more?  I watched them go in and I started toward the store.  Then I stopped, turned around and started to leave.  My mind was assaulted by images of the two kids being crushed by fallen debris like I was supposed to do.  That did it. I couldn’t just walk away and let those two kids be killed in my place.  I ran down the street and into the store.  The kids were resentful of my intrusion.  They argued with me.  But, when the building started to collapse when the girl wasn’t quite all the way up the stairs, they quit arguing.  Resentment turned to terror as she had difficulty reaching the top of the stairs and safety.  They’d barely gotten to the top of the stairs and were on their way out when the place started falling down around my ears.  Debris crashed down around me and when it hit me in the head I blacked out.

I don’t know how long I was out.  The first time I woke up I had to drag myself out from under a pile of debris and then I promptly collapsed.  I couldn’t move very well - I was so sore and dizzy.  Then the building started to collapse again.  More debris fell on me.  I don’t think I blacked out as long this time.  When I came to I saw this bright light a little ways away from me and then I saw him - the same man I’d seen at the cemetery and on the street!   He was there in the building with me!
 

Standing in the light he started talking.  He knew I was having a problem with the paper.  He told me he’d been there.  He gently chided me for thinking I was alone.  He never yelled at me.  He just told me that he’d been in the same situation.  I guess he meant he’d lost someone too.  He listened to me as I struggled to explain how I felt.  That I didn’t want to handle The Paper any more.  That I just wanted to wake up one morning and not know what was going to happen.  That I just wanted to wake up.  He listened patiently as I finally broke down and cried over the loss of Jeremiah.  He didn’t blame me for failing to save Jeremiah and he didn’t yell at me.  Instead he just stood there calmly and told me to count the living - not the dead.  Count the living?  How could he expect me to count the living when all I could think of was Jeremiah and how he had fallen to his death because I couldn’t hang onto him any longer.

The next thing I knew images of the people that I’d saved over the last two years were flashing through my mind.  Little Amanda Bailey - the six-year-old hit and run victim.  I carried her to the hospital when a power failure caused a traffic jam and no ambulance could get through.  Jim Matthews, a middle aged African American man was a depressed Vietnam Veteran who had planned on committing suicide.  I got him to help save a young Asian woman that Chuck was seeing when a protection racket set fire to her father’s warehouse.  Saving her gave him the will to live again.  Harry, the CPR instructor.  Kevin, the young cancer victim.  The Secretary who was going to jump from the roof of an office building because her fiancé was late coming back from a European trip.  She thought he’d found someone new.  Then I saw Crumb’s old partner, Paul Moreno.  He’d run afoul of a crooked D.A.  Rebekah, the little girl that had almost suffocated in the refrigerator.  My stomach hurts just thinking about that one.  That happened at the same time that I was having the stomach pains.  I’d decided to tell Erica about the paper but I’d left it on the bar and Patrick had picked my paper up by mistake.  I almost didn’t get to Rebekah in time.  Another child’s image flashed before me, the little girl whose neighborhood needed a traffic light.  A cement truck almost hit her.  And then there was Sal.  He was part of a mob that got out of hand during a blackout.  He helped me save Mr. Lee’s grandson when the curious kid fell out of a window at the church I’d left him and his sister at.

As these images assaulted my consciousness my tears continued to flow but at a slower rate.  When I got my mind back on my present circumstances I found that the old man had disappeared.  But his words and those images had done their job.  I no longer wanted to just lie there and wait to die.  I struggled to my feet and called out to whoever might be around to hear me.  The fire department rescue squad heard me and started once more to dig their way through to where I was trapped.  A hand reached down and grabbed mine.  That hand pulled me to safety.  I don’t know what happened to my paper.  I guess I left it behind.
 

It was dark when I reached the street level again.  There were a lot of bright lights shining on the building.  A mob of reporters was waiting for me.  But I only saw two people as I was helped from the building.  Through the throbbing pain in my head and my leg I saw Marissa and Erica waiting for me.  I could see Erica say something to Marissa as the firefighters helped me along but I couldn’t make out the words.  When I reached Marissa I didn’t say a word.  But she reached out to me and, when she found my hands, pulled me to her for a hug.  It was exactly what I needed at that moment.  Especially from her.  No scolding.  No “Why were you so stubborn?”  No “Why wouldn’t you let me help you through this?”  Just a tearful hug from the best friend I have in the world outside of Chuck.  The one person who encourages me, scolds me, helps me run the restaurant so I’m free to take care of The Paper, gives me a push when she thinks I need it.  When she let me go with a cough I turned to Erica who was also crying.  But, as I think about it now, Erica’s tears were somehow different.  I don’t think she realized up until that moment the kind of situations that I get into with The Paper.  But she was trying to smile bravely as she told me “I thought you were dead”.  I hugged her too and then the Fire Chief or Captain or whatever he was came to me and told me that he needed to get me in the ambulance.

Marissa has told me for years that I’m too stubborn for my own good.  I guess I finally realized it that night.  Again I was awake all night but this time I wasn’t mourning Jeremiah.  I was sore, restless and searching for something.  And I owed Cat an apology for the way I had treated him.  When he arrived the next morning I was already dressed.  I had a bandage near one eye and my leg still hurt some but not nearly as bad as the night before.  I limped over to the door and greeted the Cat.  As I picked him up I asked him how he was.  When he meowed at me I told him I’d missed him too.  Walking over to the kitchen I put him and The Paper down on the counter.  Going to the fridge I found a bottle of milk.  I offered it to Cat.  Then I spotted some tuna and asked Cat if he’d like some tuna.  The look on his face told me that he wouldn’t refuse that treat.

Lying on the counter near The Paper and Cat was my copy of Lost Chicago.  It was open to a page about the Sun-Times.  The picture on that page was of the old man I’d seen during my ordeal.  The one who’d come to me in the collapsed sub-basement of the carpet store.  The one who’d broken through my stubborn streak and made me cry before I made myself any sicker or allowed myself to die in that black hole.  His name was Lucius Snow and he was my predecessor with The Paper.  He was the only one who truly understood how I felt and was able to get through to me - the one who’s too stubborn for his own good.

Email the author: Janet.E.Brayden@nae02.usace.army.mil
 

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