Brokenhearted in Bakersfield

  27 - BACK FROM THE LIGHT Suddenly I was startled awake by a different voice, and the phantom of Edna vanished like so much swamp gas. “Are you all right?”   My aching bones rattled at the sound of a familiar and strangely sweet voice. “It’s time for your injection,” the words poured over me like syrup, and my vision revealed an angel all dressed in white. “Mercy, you finally stopped babbling about monsters trying to pull you into some hellhole,” she said while preparing my shot.   “We were worried about you.   The morphine just didn’t seem to be taking.   But you seem a lot better now, thank goodness.   Ready for a little booster?” “Are you an angel?” “No,” she smiled angelically.   “I’m just your nurse, Dorothy Gotti.”   She proudly pointed to her name tag.   “But call me Dottie, everybody does.” It all seemed so familiar to me.   She held up the syringe and gave it a little thwack with her finger and asked, “Do you remember saving Jezabel Jewett?” Jezabel Jewett?

  28 - AN UNEXPECTED TURN When I woke up next, Nurse Gotti had taken up position around the nurse’s station.   I weakly raised my hand to wave her to come next to my bed.   Once she came over and leaned down to catch what I had to communicate, I howled like a Kentucky pig caller, “Release that clamp on my IV and let those painkillers flooooow!” Nurse Gotti jumped back and rubbed her ear.   Her face contorted real weird, and she began to laugh again, like a mad doctor in a scary movie, so I started to scream like a hysterical little girl and I kept right on screaming, until she called for some backup. Another nurse came running in with another needle.   “Dorothy, what happened?   I thought he was over his dementia episodes.   What triggered this?” I heard Nurse Gotti say, “You know, Molly, I can’t explain it.   The patient was fine one minute, and going completely nuts the next.”   Nurse Gotti grabbed my arm.   “Help me, Molly,” she said.   “Sit on him, will you?” I got my s

  29 - ULELE Passenger trains don’t stop in Ulele anymore, so I was forced to jump off that rattling deathtrap-on-wheels when it passed through my old hometown.   Folks in First Class would’a had to jump too, but then, First Class folks don’t have a good reason to stop in Ulele. I tried to tuck and roll in a fetal position like I used to, but moving at over 40 miles-per-hour meant a hard landing no matter what, including more than a few rough scrapes before reaching a full stop.   After bouncing and spinning and flailing through the scrub and the trash, I just laid out on the hot gravel to the side of the tracks where I rested awhile.   Even as I don’t bounce so good like I used to, it now takes me a lot longer to get back on my feet. After one deep breath of air I knew immediately where I was.   Ulele, California.   It was proudly famous as The Natural Gas Capital of the Whole Damn World.   My old hometown was shrouded in a dark blue haze, and the whole place smelled like the