High Water Mark by Tom Munroe

Author:Tom Munroe [Munroe, Tom]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: JMS Books LLC
Published: 2021-03-16T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

Later that afternoon, they visited the boy in the hospital. They found him awake and talking to his mother, who was keeping vigil beside him. When they entered the room, she stood up and hugged them both, tears still in her eyes.

“I don’t know what I would have done if I had lost Massimo,” she said. “He is my life ever since his father died a few years ago. He keeps me going, gives my life a purpose. Without him, well…Thank you for rescuing him.”

“It is what anyone would have done,” said Sandro. “My friend here is an emergency medical technician visiting from America. He has had some water rescue training. I also had some when I was training to be a gondolier.”

“Wow. An American trained in water rescue just happened to be here when my son fell in the canal. God must be truly watching over him. And you, I’ll bet you are a great gondolier.”

“Actually, it didn’t work out. I couldn’t quite get the balance thing. If I had tried, I think I would have been the one being rescued from the canal.”

She smiled. “Please, go talk with him. He doesn’t remember anything that happened, but I have told him all about it. I am sure he would enjoy meeting his heroes.”

They walked over to the boy’s bed. “Massimo,” his mother said, “this is…”

“Sandro.”

“Dominic.” They both shook the boy’s hand.

“I’m sorry. I never remembered to ask your names. I’m Maria. Massimo, these are the men who pulled you out of the canal. Dominic is here all the way from America.”

The boy smiled, a very disarming and cute smile. He showed none of the shyness that might be expected of a child that age. “Wow,” he said, “you’re from the United States? You’ll have to tell me all about it. But first, tell me about how you rescued me. What happened? How did you find me?”

“Well,” said Sandro, “the water was very dark and it was very hard to see. But the first thing we saw was your bike lying on the bottom. It was a good thing it was so brightly colored. It was easy to spot. So we figured you must be nearby. It took a minute, but we found you pinned underneath some of the balcony.”

“So I would never have been able to free myself from under that if you two hadn’t been there?”

“No. It was very heavy. It took both of us to lift it. You were under the water quite a while. When we got you to the surface, you weren’t breathing. Dominic gave you mouth to mouth resuscitation while I pumped your chest. You came around in a short time.”

Maria was sobbing. It occurred to Dominic that, until that moment, she had not known how close her son had come to death’s door. He reached over and embraced her as she cried into his shoulder.

“Don’t cry, Mama. I’m okay now,” Massimo said, trying to comfort his mother. She broke the embrace with Dominic and came over to the bed and hugged her son tightly.

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