“I’ll get you out of there,” Derek said.
“Thank God.” My voice sounded desperate. I could only see Derek’s shoes, but then he got down on his knees, bent over, and shifted the planks onto his shoulders. I wasn’t sure how he summoned the strength to do it, but he managed to stand up slowly, steadily, with the full weight on his shoulders and back. After a moment, I could feel the load being lifted off me.
“You have room to crawl out now, Brooklyn.” He said it gently, as if I were an injured animal.
“Thank you,” I whispered, and reached out for the old man. “Come on, let’s get out from under here.”
The old guy didn’t respond and I wondered if he had passed out from sheer fright. That had been a lot of weight pressing down on us. Up on my hands and knees with inches to maneuver now, I shuffled out backward, dragging the man with me to safety. It was slow going, but we made it. Thank Buddha, because my arm muscles were beginning to cramp.
Once we were both out from under the wood, I collapsed on the linoleum floor.
Now that the danger was past, Derek and Randolph were able to let go of the flats. The heavy wood crashed to the concrete floor with a loud reverberation. Dust clouded up. Randy bent over and rested his elbows on his knees, gulping in air.
Derek was breathing almost normally after his amazing rescue mission. He knelt down and rubbed my back. “Are you all right?”
“I’ll get there. Is that old man okay?”
“He’s winded but he’ll be fine,” Derek said. Then he lowered his voice and asked, “How did they fall?”
I twisted to look up at him. “I have no idea. I must’ve nudged them, but I didn’t think I was that close.”
He helped me stand up, then pulled me into his arms and held on tightly. “Damn it,” he muttered. “I want to know how that happened.”
“I do, too,” I said. One minute the heavy flats had been secure against the wall, and in the next heartbeat, they were toppling over. It took too much energy to relive the nightmare, so I squeezed my eyes shut and clung to Derek for another minute.
“I wasn’t sure where you went,” I said.
“I was answering a phone call in the dressing room,” he explained, stroking my back. “I’m sorry. I never should’ve left you alone.”
“It’s okay,” I whispered, but I knew I wouldn’t have come so close to being crushed to death if Derek had been with me.
From over Derek’s shoulder, I watched my would-be rescuer stir, then wheeze as he crawled a few feet over to the wall.
“Let me help you,” Randy said, and lifted the old man by the arms until he could sit up and lean against the wall.
The old guy was still trying to catch his breath. His hair was pure gray and matched his thick, gray eyebrows and bushy mustache. He was gaunt and his cheeks were hollowed with age. He was probably in his seventies and wore thin, round eyeglasses and a dark green janitor’s uniform with an old-fashioned name tag sewn onto the front pocket. It read GARTH.
He was still wheezing. I couldn’t believe he’d been so brave.
“You must be Garth,” I said, pointing to his name tag.
“Sure am,” he said, and gave me a shaky grin.
“You were really brave to help me,” I said. “I’m Brooklyn, by the way.”
He waved off the introduction. “I know who you are, missy. I’ve seen you doing those book segments. You’re a smart one.”
“Thank you, Garth. Thank you so much for trying to save me. You could’ve been killed.”
“Ah, that was nothing,” he said, embarrassed by my gratitude.
“Do you work here?”
“I’ve been a janitor here for a while now.” He had to stop talking to suck in more air. He was completely worn out. “Good thing these young fellas came along when they did or we woulda been squashed like two bugs.”
“Yes, good thing,” I murmured, still trying to figure out how I’d caused the flats to fall. Maybe we’d had a small earthquake. I hadn’t felt one, but it wasn’t outside the realm of possibility that the earth had trembled enough to jar the planks away from the wall.
Randy helped Garth to his feet. I suggested that we call an ambulance to have him checked out at the hospital, but he refused to let me fuss over him.
We watched him walk unsteadily toward the door leading to the dressing room hallway and disappear.
“I hope he’s okay,” I said.
“I wouldn’t worry about Garth,” Randy said. “He’s pretty spry for an old guy.”
The three of us walked back to my dressing room and closed the door. Derek insisted that I lie down on the sofa and rest for a few minutes.
Randy sat in the orange chair and Derek took the swivel chair.
“That was weird,” Randy said, raking his hands through his perfect hair, clearly shaken by the episode.
I nodded. “I was thinking there must have been an earthquake. Did you feel anything?”