Episode VIII
Dennis' alarm was just about to go off when his cell phone rang. In fact, he swiped at his alarm first before realizing what was making that noise. Rolling over, he grabbed his phone off the nightstand and hit the button.
"Ello?" he mumbled.
"Dennis? It's Mom."
The worry in her voice made Dennis sit up and wake up a little more. "What's up?"
"It's Grandpa. He had a heart attack. Grandma was there and called 911 right away. They've rushed him to the hospital, but it's touch and go right now."
"Wow." There was a pause as Dennis digested the information. "Sounds like I need to head over there."
"Don't you have class this afternoon?"
"It's Machiavelli. I'm always looking for a good excuse to miss it." He tried a laugh, but it sounded hollow.
"You're dad's on the way in from work, too. It would be nice if you'd come."
"Say no more. I'm on my way." He hung up the phone and stared off into space. His mom's parents lived in town, and he'd always been close to them. He had no clue what he'd do if anything happened to either one of them.
His alarm clock started beeping, and he pounded on it savagely until he hit the right button and it stopped. Getting up, he pulled on a shirt, ran a comb through his hair, and headed for his beat up Datsun.
Since it was mid-afternoon, traffic was only bad, and it took him 45 minutes to reach Community General. Parking in the first space he found, he rushed into the emergency room. He found his dad waiting for him.
His father rose to meet him. "They just transferred your grandpa to intensive care. Mom and Grandma are up there now. It looks like he'll pull through."
Dennis let out a breath he hadn't known he was holding. "Thank God."
"Would you like to go up there?"
"Yes," Dennis replied, and headed for the elevator.
Labels: Dennis Brown
posted by Mark Baker @ 7/07/2005 11:03:00 AM
8 comments
8 Comments:
Unfortunately we've tended to somewhat ignore this episode in the life of Dennis (though I do throw in a mention later)--hopefully we'll come back to hear more about the hospital. This was a very human touch to his character Mark.
I love the little details, like the alarm clock, that bring reality and familiarity to the characters.
Thank you very much. Truth be told, I had forgotten this chapter until I went to post it.
Well, it was about this point in the story when everyone started complaining that Dennis was getting featured way too much. That was when I developed the new weighted probability system to try to give the characters more even coverage.
It was also about this point when I realized my misconceptions of the story and how we were to be writing and started striking out in the examples set by the rest of you.
Of course, looking through stuff, we must have skipped me some go around because I only have one more episode to date.
What misconceptions do you mean?
I wasn't having characters interacting unless told to. Don't know why, but I was writing under different rules then everyone else. :)
Oh, I see what you mean. Okay, now I have to go look for that now that you've mentioned it. :-)
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