The doctor assured Daniel and his parents that he would see to it that all the tests would be taken care of. They would only be charged for the X-rays and the room. The ambulance was a separate thing. He would notify them when the lab finished with the testing.
“Daniel,” the doctor said, “we will need to take a swab sample from inside your mouth. Then—”
“Oh wow, Mom and Dad!” Daniel shouted. “Just like in cop shows!”
“Neat! Cool! Yowza! Dude!” exclaimed his young friends.
“Mr. and Mrs. Reese, one of you will have to sign some consent paperwork,” the doctor said. “Then when Daniel is dressed, you are free to take him home.”
“So, doctor, even if the blood on the bandages is proven to be mine,” Daniel asked, “there is still no cut, no stitches, no bump, and no shaved spot. What do you think? How can all this be as it is?”
The doctor stood pensive and immobile. He looked directly at Daniel and shook his head. Then he quietly and slowly said, “I don’t know, son, and I can’t even began to guess. Your mother probably got it right; it must be a miracle.”
Daniel looked all around and then he asked, “Mom, did you guys bring me some clean clothes? I bet that if I really was bleeding as much as Joey said, I probably shouldn’t wear what I had on during the accident.”
***
“Come on, Mom! So I took a spill the other day, but as you can plainly see, there’s no damage. I will be more careful now, and I won’t try to jump any curbs again. If I want to go up on the sidewalk, I will get off my board and carry it. I promise, Mom,” Daniel said. “So can I go with the guys? Please!”
It was a beautiful August day in Vancouver, Washington. Daniel’s friends were gathered in the Reese’s front yard, ready to roll. Mrs. Reese looked lovingly at her son, took him in her arms, and hugged him close and tight. “All right, Daniel, you may go, but promise that you will not—I say again, not—try that curb trick again. Ever!”
“I promise, Mom. Never, ever will I try it again. Something saved me once, but I don’t want to chance it again,” Daniel said as he walked toward the front door. He stopped, turned, and then ran back to his mother and wrapped his arms around her waist. He looked her straight in the eye and said, “You are the best mom anyone could want. You have just reminded me of another mother I think I met somewhere, but I don’t know where or when. Thank you, Mom. I love you from here to eternity.”
Then Daniel let go of his mother and dashed out to be with his friends.
***
First thing Daniel did when he was outside in front of his waiting buds was to holler out and got all their attention.
“I got something to tell you all and I need your fullest attention. All of you – if not all then most – were with me when what happened to me happened. I blew the jump onto the curb and knocked myself out.” So do you guys know who said that? That part’ no more forever!
“My dad was reading a book about Pacific Northwest Indians and I picked it up one day from the chair where he had left it. I read thru it some and I came to the part where the chief of the Nez Perce Indians said ‘I will fight no more forever.’
“Don’t you guys get on me about curb jumping. I told my mother that I will jump no curbs forever. You dudes got that?”
All his friends there with him had seen him knocked out and laying in his blood. They all assured him that they would not press him to do anything that he did not want to do.
They honored his word to the fullest – no curb jumping talk. As the morning waned so did the skate boarding enthusiasm, The boys found a tree in a neighbor’s yard that threw enough shade for all six of them and they happily took to it. The house owner did not mind. He told them that they were welcome as long as they minded the flower beds and they did not leave trash behind.
Once they were all hunkered down and settled Joey turned to Daniel and got his attention. So, Danny, What do you think happened the other day? We – most all of us – saw you take the fall. And – we all saw you knocked out and bleeding. Other people saw you like that, too, man.
“Then when you woke up the next day–no bumps, no stitches, no shaved spots and no cut. Weird, huh? Can we talk about it?”
Daniel sat quiet and pensive for a time. Then he looked at all his friends – they were all riveted on him. He shrugged his shoulders, held out both his hands – palms up and said, “I do not know how to even begin to explain about my supposed head injury. I do accept what you all have told me of how it happened but I do not remember any of it – not before and certainly not after. All I know is that I woke up to a room full of people and in a hospital,”
Paul, one of the boys hunkered there, spoke up. “Danny, while you were out of it did you not hear, see or talk to any one while you were knocked out? I have an aunt that is a nurse in a hospital. She has told us – my family – that several people that were knocked out for some time or were in a coma that when they woke up they talked about where they had been and who they had met there and talked with. Didn’t you do anything like that, man?”
“No, Paul. I don’t think so but maybe, huh? I will think on it. May be something will surface,” Daniel said.
“So – we got time now,” said Arthur. “Just close your eyes and concentrate. We will all shut up while you send yourself back in time. To when you were gone – not here with us after you took that header. Where did you go to? Where were you? Did you talk with anyone there? Think, Danny, Think!!”
“Ok, guys. I’ll give it a go. Maybe Paul and Art are right and I may have something locked up in my gourd. If I try really hard maybe I can grab’ on to something that I will share with you. Quiet please – not a sound!!
All went totally quiet and still. No breeze to rustle the trees. No birds singing or chirping. Traffic – both foot or vehicular – must, too, have a dead stop. Not a sound was heard – at least not by Daniel T Reese. He had willed his consciousness to dredge up any and all memories of his past.
After fifteen minutes had elapsed Daniel opened his eyes. His pal, Joey, could not have stood it any. If Danny had not come to life just then Joey was all for shaking him back.
“Okey, okey, dude – what? What did you see? What do you know now man?” Joey screamed at his friend.
Daniel looked around taking in all of his friends. He could see that they all were super anxious to know what he had recalled.
“All I remembered was when I was a little kind. When I got my tricycle, and when I got my first bike and my dad teaching me to ride it. Stuff like that – you know? One thing tho, there were donkeys out in the street. Where? I don’t know. I looked around but could not tell where.”
“Aw, man! I think I might know where,” Bobby hollered out. There in a town up in the hills in Arizona – my dad took us, the whole family, to that town. Let me see, um? Oh, yeah, man! The town is named OATMAN. Why? You might ask. Maybe because they feed all them donkeys – and there is a lot of them – OATS. Ya knows what I mean?”
Randy, another of the boys said, “Bobby, Robert, Bob – I think all of us know what OATS are, Thank you.
“If I did see or was around asses I don’t think it was in that town. What? Why are you all looking at me like that?” Daniel asked his friends. “What, dudes?”
Joey was the first to speak. He said, “Daniel, you said asses – like maybe in butts, man!”
“I did not!!” Cried Daniel vehemently. “Did not!!”
“Yes, you did, Joey tell him. Ask any of us. You did.”
“Well, if I did I don’t know why. What do you think made me do that? What were we talking about, anyway?”
“Bobby told us about a town in Arizona where donkeys are in the street and folks feed them oats. The town is named OATMAN. Remember?” Joey said.
“Yeah, yeah! I do remember. But why would I then say what you say I said? I have not been around any girls for days and days. Have I? I don’t remember where I have been might, what I did there and who I might been there with,” Daniel told his group of buddies.
“It is only a couple of days since your dive. Maybe in time you might remember where and what you did there then you can fill us in,” Joey said. “Bet you had an out – standing time. If it had been lousy you would not want to remember it -— Whoa, whoa.” Maybe that is it! You think, dude? Don’t wanna remember?”