My Brother Before Cornbread

Since 6th grade I had a friend that we considered brothers. His mother was the PE teacher at our high school, so, Lance and I found ourselves doing tricks on the trampoline and other gymnastic stuff. Lance and I spent a lot of time together. Spending the night with each other doing things together that made us inseperable. In about 1973, Lance's mom and dad got a divorce and his mom married my grandmother's younger brother. That was great for us. We were know calling each other cuz. It was a great friendship. In October of 1974, I was at the hospital where my mom worked. I used to love to go to work with my mom. Everytime an ambulance pulled in I would tell my mom that I was going to the ER to watch the Doctors and nurses work. Mom was not worried about me because she had many friends who worked in the ER to keep an eye on me. October 13, 1974 my grandmother happened to be in the hospital and as I was standing at the window I saw the flashing lights of an ambulance and quickly made my way to the ER. When I walked into the ER the first person I saw was our football coach with the front of his white shirt covered with blood. I did not know what was going on and was afraid to ask Coach Darnell when in walked the door was Doug Prater, Lance's brother. He had Buddy Massaro helping him into a treatment room. I grabbed a shoulder and helped Doug into the room. Soon, the nurse came in and wanted Doug to give a urine sample. He was not visibly hurt but I could tell that his mental state was not right. My questions about what had happened came without any answers. After sitting in the waiting room for a while I saw Lance's mom and dad come through the doors and were immediately taken to a room for family, only. While I was racking my brain trying to figure out what was going on I saw a guerney rolled out of a treatment room with the body covered in a sheet with massive amounts of blood at the area of the head. The nurse that was pushing the guerney by me stopped as I stood up. I reached for the sheet and uncovered his head and it was Lance. I do not remember walking to the 7th floor, where my mom worked and starting crying and could not stop. Mom called down to ER and found out what happened and immediately called my dad, who came and picked me up. It took several months for me to get back to some normalty. I made a promise that if I ever had a male child I would name him Lance. On June 3rd, 1985, I did have a male child and his name is Lance, who is attending U Mass with the hope of getting into Harvard Med. I have no doubt in my mind that he will accomplish this goal. He does have an angel named Lance looking out for him.        theblogmeister