~ PG ~Donatello goes on an unexpected trip to New England. Told from his POV - six (short) pages
It felt like only moments before I woke up, but the chill in the air told me otherwise. My eyes were still closed and I felt the tarp over me, but my internal clock whispered that the sun must have gone down and left me in the relative safety of darkness. Still, I lay motionless and waited, listening for any sound that would tell me there was a human nearby. I heard nothing except for the low hum of machinery - a sound that hadn't been there when I'd begun my unexpected nap.
I uncovered my head and opened my eyes. I was right about it being dark, I could barely see a thing in the truck's bed. I felt around and discovered a bunch of fishing poles, a tool box, and a Styrofoam cooler. I nudged the cooler in the hopes that there may be something edible inside. It was a little heavy but not too much so.
I sat up cautiously and my brain began to spin again, I closed my eyes and waited for the sensation to pass. When it finally felt as if I could look around without passing out, I opened my eyes and looked at the Styrofoam cooler. I took off the lid but found nothing inside except for a few half-empty night crawler containers and an pack of hooks... whoever the guy was that owned the truck, he was certainly a fisherman.
I looked out the cap's rear window at the darkness. I wasn't where I had been before, that much was certain - but only that much. It was too dark to tell anything else except that this place wasn't the city. I could just make out a building about a dozen yards away; my eyes followed the brick structure's lines upward to where the building itself gave way to a smokestack so tall that it vanished into the night sky. I got dizzy looking up, so I lowered my eyes back to what was right in front of me.
It slowly registered in my mind that I was probably at an industrial park and the building before me was most likely the power house. I said silent thanks that whoever owned the truck hadn't looked in the bed - I didn't even want to think about what might have happened to me if I'd have been found. Unconscious, there would have been nothing I could do to avoid being captured - and the Springfield Zoo would have had a new exhibit. I smiled despite myself and wondered if Springfield actually had a zoo.
I shivered - it was very cold in New England and there was no way I was going to get anywhere until I warmed up and my mind got clearer. I slid cautiously out the back window and my foot hit the ground a little harder than I'd have liked. The cold had numbed my foot enough to make me forget the pain until a little pressure reminded me like someone slapping me in the face. I growled under my breath and limped towards the building, grimacing every time gravel slipped under the makeshift bandage on my foot.
I didn't see any windows but there was one door; I tried to turn the knob and it didn't move. Examining the keyhole, I saw it was an old-style lock and easily taken care of. I glanced around the ground and came up with a short piece of thick wire - a perfect lock-pick - it took me only a few seconds to get the door open after that.
Inside it was much warmer and brighter... a welcome change. I slid myself into a convenient shadow as the door creaked shut - and then I had a look around. The place was large - a nineteen-fifties vintage boiler room. The dull hum of machinery that I had heard from outside was now a much louder din that seemed to come from everywhere at once. I felt right a home amid the clanks and hisses.
I had a little fun slipping around the shadows, examining all the machinery that I'd have loved to take back to the lair and rebuild. The main attractions were two very old, very large boilers; one was up and running and the other looked as if it were in the middle of an overhaul. I poked around the parts for a few seconds, wondering what was what in the greasy mess. I confessed to myself that I was a little better with modern machinery than I was with stuff fifty years old. But I also knew it was nothing I wouldn't be able to figure out, given half an hour or so. I was so wrapped up in my wondering that I didn't notice when a man walked up behind me.
"Hey!" he yelled so as to be heard over the machines. "How'd you get in here?"
I turned instinctively and looked the guy in the face. He looked to be around seventy years old - tall and thin, with white hair that stuck out from under an old blue hat with USS Rush in white letters across the front. His eyes grew wide when they met mine and a sudden fear came over me. This guy... at his age, he could very likely have a heart attack from the shock of seeing me. I stood motionless, watching for any of the warning signs.
He just tilted his head to the side and drew his eyebrows together. "Well, I'll be damned," he said calmly. "Where did you come from?"
"Uhm..." I was a little surprised at his nonchalance. "Outside," I said, pointing towards the door.
He looked at the door and then back at me. "What'd you do, pick the lock?"
"Yes... actually," I began haltingly. "I'm sorry if I..."
"Forget it," he said, waving his hand at me. "I keep telling 'em we have to change that thing..." He stared at me again and shook his head, smiling. "God, I thought I'd seen it all..."
He was holding a wrench and tossed it to the floor beside the pieces of boiler. Then, with a nod, he beckoned me to join him. He lead the way through a machine shop and into a room off from the main powerhouse. I limped steadily behind him, not quite sure why except that I didn't have anything else to do at that moment.
Inside the room it was quieter and not so hot as it had been near the boilers. There was a table with several chairs and off to one side there was a row of lockers - directly opposite them was a counter with a coffee maker and a microwave on it. There was also a big old refrigerator that had a calendar and a bunch of notes stuck to it with magnets. On the wall over the coffee pot hung an antique clock that must have been in the building since it was constructed - it still ticked along, keeping time. I made a mental note that it was 11:56 PM.
"I don't know who you are," the old guy said. "But I'll wager you aren't from around here."
"I'm Don," I told him. "And you're right. I'm not from around here."
"New York?"
He had surprised me again. "How'd you know?"
"Your accent."
"I wasn't aware I had an accent," I stuttered.
The man grinned. "Trust me, it's there. By the way, I'm Jim."
"Good to meet you," I said, holding out a hand which he gripped and shook enthusiastically. "I'm a bit of a mess..." I said, looking down at myself.
"Yeah, you do look like hell." He pointed to a door across from the one we had come in. "There's a shower in there - help yourself to it."
I smiled and nodded, unsure as to why this stranger was being so kind to me. But for some reason it felt all right. I didn't get the feeling that he was going to turn me in as soon as I turned my back - I trusted him like I had trusted Linda.
The hot water in the shower felt good, though the soap stung in my wounds. I didn't let it bother me much, it was a kind of pain that I could live with. I must have been in there for half an hour, just enjoying the sensation of being clean and warm after so much time being just the opposite. Eventually, with the aid of the smell of fresh-brewed coffee wafting in from the kitchen area, I decided it was time to get out of the shower. I wrapped myself in a large towel that was hanging on a nail outside the shower stall and made my way to a first-aid kit that I had noticed when I'd entered the shower room... I helped myself to some clean bandages for my foot and arm. Glancing in the mirror, I noticed for the first time that I also needed one on my head for where it had met with the street. I stuck a large Band-aid on it and walked back into the kitchen area, still wrapped in the towel.
Jim was sitting at the table with an unlit cigar in his mouth and a newspaper held out in front of him. He looked up from his reading as I entered.
"Here," he said, putting down the paper and reaching for a nearby pair of coveralls. He tossed them to me and I caught them with my injured arm. To my own surprise, I didn't wince.
"These are my nephew, Kevin's. He won't miss them," he continued.
"Thank you," I said, holding the outfit out before me. Kevin, apparently, was not a small man. I took off the towel and hung it on the back of a chair and then slid into the roomy coveralls. I had to roll the leg cuffs up four times and the sleeves up twice before they fit me.
"Sorry I ain't got any shoes your size," Jim said, examining the fit of the coveralls. He pointed to the coffee pot and a stack of mugs. "There's coffee if you want some."
"Thank you," I said again. At that point I really needed a cup of coffee. I limped over to the pot and poured myself a mug full, putting in two sugars and a lot of milk.
"There's some dinners in the fridge, too."
I looked in the freezer and came out with a macaroni and cheese dinner, I popped it into the microwave and waited patiently for the beep. It didn't take long and I took my hot meal and coffee to the table, sitting down across from Jim. He was back to reading the paper but had put his cigar down and was sipping on his coffee.
"Jim, I'm, uh... I mean, thank you for this," I said.
He looked at the mac and cheese and wrinkled his nose. "I don't like that stuff, anyway. That's Tony's', I think."
"No, I mean..." I tried to figure out what I wanted to say. "Well, for not having a heart attack, for starters."
He set down his paper and laughed. "You kidding? My blood pressure's so low you don't test it, you have to dig for it."
I smiled at him. "Why weren't you afraid when you saw me?"
"Should I have been?"
"That's the way it usually works."
He thought for a few seconds. "I've seen a lot over the years," he said, leaning forward. "From what I can tell, I've still got a lot more to see before I die. So, you tell me something - how did you end up in Chicopee?"
"Chicopee?" I asked. "I thought I was in Springfield."
"It's pretty nearby. I live in Springfield."
"Then it must have been your truck that I..." I let my voice trail off.
Jim took another sip of coffee. "So, you gonna' tell me the whole story or do I have to wait for the movie to come out?"
I took a bite of macaroni and a drink of coffee. "It gets pretty complicated."
"Good," Jim said. "Then it won't be boring."
I smiled and began to talk. I spent the better part of an hour telling Jim everything that had happened to me on my unexpected journey. He listened patiently and with an occasional smile. For some reason that smile reminded me of Master Splinter, I guessed that they must be about the same age.
"You have any family, Don?" Jim asked when my story ended.
I looked down at my empty cup and then back up at the human. "Yeah," I said in a low voice. "There's our teacher, Splinter... and I have three brothers."
"They have names?"
"Leonardo, Raphael, and Michaelanglo," I told him.
Jim smiled again. "I guess that makes you Donatello, right?"
I was so shocked I nearly stood up. "Wha...? How'd you know that?" I asked, wide-eyed.
"Well, they're named after artists, why not you? Donatello is the only one I know that goes with Don."
I sighed. He was right... "Yeah, I guess so," I said. "You have any family?"
"Two daughters," he said, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket. As he talked, he rooted through it. "One of them lives in Florida with her boyfriend." He showed me a picture of an attractive lady with two young children on her lap. "That's Carla. Those are her girls, Aimee and Becca... I think they're four and six now."
"They look just like her," I noted.
Jim grinned. "Thank God they don't look like their father." He pulled out another picture and handed it to me. "That's my youngest, Erica."
I took the picture and examined it. The girl was chubby and about sixteen years old. She had pretty eyes, though, and looked more like her father than Carla had.
"That was taken about two years ago," he said. "I gotta' get onto her about sending me more pictures."
"Where is she?" I asked, curiosity getting the better of me.
"Japan," he replied. "She's in the navy over in Yokosuka."
"Yokosuka?" I asked, certain that I had pronounced it wrong. "Where's that? Near Tokyo?"
"Actually, its closer to Yokohama... right across the bay."
"What does she do?"
"Works on the tugboats. She's right in her element over there... writes to me all the time about how much fun she has working on the big diesel engines."
"She's an engineer?"
"An engineman, yeah..." Jim said. "You into that kinda' thing?"
I laughed out loud. "Yeah, you could say that. I'm the one that fixes everything at home... builds everything, too..."
"Great," Jim said, taking the pictures back and shoving them in his wallet. "You can come with me on my rounds."
Jim and I walked around the plant, taking readings and checking for leaks. It was interesting, though not exciting. Jim and I got to talking again and I told him about a few of the things I had created to make our lives a bit easier living in the sewers. He smiled and told me that I sounded like him when he was young... always building, constructing, fixing... inventing. I felt a kinship with him and wondered if it would hurt me to stay a little while longer... maybe there was something I could learn from him. Then I remembered that my family didn't even know where I was.
"Jim," I said, following him again into the kitchen room, "is there any chance I could use the powerhouse's phone to call home?"
Jim shook his head. "Uh-uh... it's for local calls only. Damn tightwad higher-ups didn't want to spring for long-distance."
"Is there anywhere you know of that I can call from?"
"You can use the one at my place. I get off work in three hours, think it can wait that long?"
I nodded. "Waited this long..." I said. "Thanks again, Jim..."
He waved his hand at me again. "No problem."
I thought for a few moments and then looked up. "That boiler out there - the one in pieces... are you overhauling it?"
"Yeah, why?"
I shrugged. "I don't have anything better to do right now..."
Jim smiled. "Aw, what the hell..." he said. "Why not?"
We walked out to the powerhouse and got to work.
