In Love With An Older Man 8

Cindy's head hit the windshield, and her chest slammed into the steering wheel, hard. The next thing she knew, several strangers were outside her car, knocking on the window and anxiously asking if she were all right.

Cindy looked at the car's hood, which was scrunched up like an accordion, and groaned loudly. "Gary is going to be so upset," she muttered. By the time she had opened the car door and stepped out, a police cruiser was waiting. Cindy told the policeman about the driver who had been weaving between the lanes.

"You'd better stop him before he hurts anyone else," she insisted.

"He's already been apprehended," the policeman told her. "His sobriety is being tested as we speak. Are you all right? Do you think you need to go to the hospital?"

"I...I don't know," Cindy stammered. "My head and chest hurt, and I'm two months pregnant. I guess...I guess I better go." The policeman called an ambulance, and Cindy was driven to the hospital.

Cindy was given an X-ray, cat scan, and ultrasound. To her tremendous relief, both her babies appeared to be fine.

"You have a mild concussion and a couple of bruised ribs. You were lucky this time," the doctor told her. "Still, I think you need to stay here overnight for observation, especially since you're pregnant."

Gary arrived a short time later, in a state of emotional upset in which she had never seen him before, and it frightened her.

"Jackie! Oh, Jackie..." Gary clutched Cindy tightly, and to Cindy's alarm he was crying. Cindy had never seen her husband cry before.

"Gary! It's me, Cindy. I'm all right!"

Gary looked at her in confusion for a moment.

"Cindy...it's you...I thought...I thought..." He couldn't go on.

"Gary, it's all right, honest. I'm fine, the babies are fine, everything's going to be fine. Really!" Cindy tried desperately to get through to him, and he did seem to visibly calm down over the next few minutes.

"The patient's husband seems to be in worse shape than the patient herself," a nurse remarked later, when Gary had stepped out into the hallway.

"It's because of what happened to his first wife," Cindy explained.

Next to visit were Mick and Carla Bradford.

"Oh, honey, are you all right?" Carla rushed to her daughter and embraced her. "I can't believe it. First Billy, and now you."

"I'm fine, Mom. Just a slight concussion and a couple of bruised ribs. It's Gary I'm worried about. He really freaked out. Called me by his first wife's name. He must have had some kind of flashback."

"Gary's fine. Jake and Carly are with him," Mick told her.

"Gary's freaked out because of what happened to his first wife, and Mom's freaked out because of Billy. I'm the only one who isn't freaked out, and I'm the one that it actually happened to," Cindy muttered to herself before drifting off to sleep that night.

Gary arrived with Jake and Carly to check her out of the hospital the next day.

"You're on bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy, young lady," he joked. Then he grew serious. "I'm so sorry for the way I reacted yesterday. I feel so badly that I upset you. It's just that when they told me what had happened, and then I saw you lying there in the hospital, I thought that it was happening all over again."

"Gary," Cindy said gently, placing a hand on his arm. "Did you go for counseling after Jackie died?"

"I talked to the rabbi a lot, and he helped me come to terms with it."

"Do you think you should talk to him again?" Cindy made a mental note to speak to Rabbi Schwartz herself about the situation as soon as she could.

"I'll be all right." Gary grinned.

"You know, honey, there's no shame in admitting that you need a little extra help from time to time."

"I said, I'll be all right!" Suddenly angry, Gary jerked his arm away. They rode the rest of the way home in silence.

"I think I'll lie down and rest awhile. I've got a little bit of a headache," Cindy said when they arrived at the house.

"By all means, sweetheart. Please take good care of yourself." Gary hugged her closely. "God, Cindy, I really could have lost you. All three of you." His voice was so soft that it was almost a whisper.

"But you didn't. We're still here." Cindy lovingly touched his face and stroked his hair.

"I watched her die, Cyn. She was only thirty-five years old." His voice was choked with unshed tears.

"I know." Cindy rubbed his back gently. She felt his pain and wished that there was something she could do to take it away.

"I love you, Gary."

"I love you too, Cindy. God, I never realized how much until this happened." They held each other tightly for a long time, without saying anything more.