My Journal

By Harriman Nelson

2. Cold Turkey

I’d barely gotten more than twenty minutes of sleep last night due to sporadic coughing. The few cough drops I’d found in my bathroom’s medicine cabinet hadn’t helped. Of course, they were left over from a few winters ago.

“It’s just a bug,” I told Jamison at NIMR’s Med Bay. “I must have picked it up on our flight back from Boston and it’s finally decided to show itself.”

But it wasn’t a bug, he’d told me, and the EKG and blood work proved it wasn’t.

Will  shoved pictures of smoker’s lungs in my face. Dirty, black tarry lungs. He insisted I stop smoking, ‘cold turkey’ or I’d not only have lungs as bad but also be courting a heart attack. And that I couldn’t hide the fact even from myself that I’d been frequently short of breath. A sure danger sign.

Then he played his trump card, telling me that unless I quit my beloved cigarettes, my new found relationship with Lee was going to be a very short one. And he used my X-rays to prove his point. I was well on my way to an early grave if I didn’t change my lifestyle.

 “It’s not going to be easy,” he stressed, “nicotine patches can help, at least to minimize withdrawal symptoms. As for the ‘oral fixation’ most smokers don’t even realize they have until they quit, I suggest electronic cigarettes.”

“Oh good grief,” I muttered. “I’m not a baby that needs a pacifier!”

“But you will stop? Today? Now?”

“All right, all right. I’ll stop. Give me the damn patches. But promise me that you won’t tell Lee about how tarred up and gummed my lungs already are, or how close I came to having a heart attack last night."

“But surely, you could use his support...”

“He’s got enough on his plate as my business partner and as captain of the Seaview without having to worry about me. I want your word that you won’t tell him how bad it is. Will you do that much for me?”

“I don’t agree with you, Admiral, but I give you my word as a physician, that I won’t say anything more than that you’ve decided to be proactive against any complications common to smokers.”

I grabbed his shoulder gratefully, and left. No doubt I could trust him. Doctor/ Patient privilege and all that.

A few hours later I just couldn’t stand being around Angie’s cheerfulness, so I escaped to the sub pen.

I was halfway down the ramp to Seaview’s berth when a flash of red whooshed past me.

“Look out!” Riley, screamed on his downward path, his feet in strap on roller skates. “I can’t stop! Ohhhh shittt!” he added as smashed right into his skipper.

Lee had apparently just strode down Seaview’s gangplank, still limping a little, his nose in a report, when he stepped right into the crewman’s path. The impact sent both flying onto the hard concrete. The bag of fast food in the crewman’s hand had also gone airborne, its’ contents scattering every which way. Including on top of Lee.

The men on the dock and aboard Seaview scrambled toward them as did I. Surprisingly, Chip Morton, reports in hand, didn’t join us.

“When I told you to use your roller skates to pick up the delivery at the gate,” Lee said, his legs still sprawled out in front of him, “I didn’t mean it literally.”

“Oh. Skipper, I’m so sorry,” Riley said while he picked lettuce and tomato slices off of Lee’s hair and shoulders, “are you okay, sir?”

“Why bother to ask?” Chip said as he finally strode down the gangplank and stepped over Lee’s legs, “he’ll only say he’s fine.”

“Chip...” Lee warned, frowning.

“I was just going to come to your office, Admiral,” Chip said, totally ignoring his captain.

Lee cast Chip’s back a sorrowful look, and firmly shook his head ‘no’ toward me, insuring that I ‘leave it’, whatever ‘it’ was, alone.

Chip handed me some reports, while Lee was being helped up by his crew only to find he’d damaged his other ankle. Splatters of mustard and ketchup oozed down Lee’s shirt. At least, I hoped it was ketchup.

“Perhaps we can go over these reports in your office?” Chip demanded I return my attention to him. “Away from any further... disruptions?”

You could have heard a pin drop. But Lee, being Lee, said, “Good idea, Mr. Morton.”

“You will go to the Med Center, though, won’t you, Lee?” I asked, trying not to sound too nervous. He was still recovering from a gunshot wound from our experience in Boston, a damaged ankle from yesterday, and now this.

“The Corpsman will fix me up just fine. He’s already aboard checking the inventory. Besides, Will has a full schedule at the Med Center today. I don’t really think I want to disturb his new father’s-to-be class. We have, how many men now, Mr. Morton, awaiting the stork? Four? Five?”

“Seven, Captain Nelson-Crane,” Chip replied, using Lee’s new name properly, yet almost scathingly.

“Ah, yes,” I said trying to ignore Chip’s tone, “I completely forgot about that class. Perhaps we can go over these reports later, Chip. I really think I should attend. I may not ever need to know how to change a diaper, but in case one of our female staff goes into labor, I believe we should all know what to do before help arrives.”

“As you wish, sir. It’s none of my business, but are you coming down with a cold? You seem a bit winded.”

“Just a bug. Doc’s already seen me. Nothing contagious,” I lied.

It wasn’t long before I soon found myself squirming in my seat as Will showed us slides and videos of the varying stages of labor. By the time the infant ‘crowned’ and was finally delivered, I was sure I’d lose my lunch.

Lt. Frank O’Brien, one of the new father’s to be, had already fainted, Chip was a bit greenish, (he’d decided that as XO he should know what to do as well.) After all, we did have female guests aboard Seaview at times and Doc or Corpsmen might be occupied saving lives.)

Several other attendees as well were also showing various stages of queasiness. At least I wasn’t alone.

“Now here’s where the new father is usually asked to cut the cord,” Will said.

That did it. I hadn’t tossed my cookies but I found myself a few minutes later being revived with a sniff of ammonia by some of the Med Bay nurses and the ever faithful Kowalski.

“Nothing to be ashamed of, sir,” Ski was saying, “er...would you like a cigarette? Might help.”

“Er, no. I’ve quit...”

“You’ve quit? No kidding! That’s great, sir!”

“Never mind that now. Where is everyone? How long have I been out?” “Lt. O’Brien came to but then he started to throw up. He’s still in the head. Mr. Morton didn’t pass out, but he came pretty close to it. Doc cancelled the class and said he’d appreciate it if you don’t allow any pregnant women aboard Seaview, even if they’re your egghead scientist buddies.”

“You can bet on it.”

I saw Lee later. There were still some boxes piled on top of each other, but his new office looked remarkably better.

“You okay?” he asked as he looked up from one of the folders still cluttering his desk.

“Awful. And you?”

“I’ve been better,” he sighed and nodded to a cane against the bookcase. “I’ve been beached from anything more strenuous than paperwork.”

“Lee,” I asked as I sat down in the chair opposite, “I know you don’t want me to ask about Chip, but, what’s with his sourpuss attitude toward you?”

“Leave it for now, okay, Harry? Give Chip and me time to sort things out on our own?”

“All right, son. But settle things between yourselves soon. By the way, I need to tell you before you hear it from the crew; I’ve given up smoking. Cold turkey.”

“What? On your own? Did Doc badger or blackmail you into it? He’s been badgering me about coffee.”

“I just decided I don’t want to have complications later on.”

“That doesn’t answer my question. It would take an atom bomb to make you stop on your own.”

“Lee,” I warned.

“All right. I won’t ask. So, how about supper at Sharkey’s Diner tonight?”

“Thank you, but I’d rather eat in. How about pizza, or Chinese? My treat.”

“Thanks, I’d like that…Harry, you’re not hiding, are you? I mean, from the public?”

“I suppose I am actually,” I admitted.

“Can’t say I blame you,” Lee locked away the folder, and sighed.

“What is it, Lad?”

“I miss my old office.”

“Too bad,” I grabbed his shoulder as he got up and picked up the cane. “By the way, I’ve changed my mind about supper. Sharkey’s it is.”

“We don’t have to go if you really don’t want to.”

“If you’re in the mood for Sharkey’s, then I’m in the mood for Sharkey’s.”

It remains to be seen if we’ll be on the Ten O’ Clock news, but come what may, at least they’ll know that we Nelsons don’t run away from anything.