Derone
Appearances
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
10. The Silent Witness
I mean, he was hooked at that time. He was hooked up to every gadget in the hospital, you know, to monitor this and monitor that. And I remember when he would be storming, I'd be watching the heart rate monitor and just like seeing it over 200 beats a minute. I'm like, I'm hoping this helps. And then I'd rub his legs a certain massage in certain ways. And they'd and the heart rate would drop.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
10. The Silent Witness
I said, I'm hoping I've got something to do with that. I said, you know, I hope it doesn't hurt. He said, yeah, he remembers me doing that, and it did help.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
12. Bad Batch
He gets thrown to the ground. He keeps yelling out, what did I do? What did I do?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
12. Bad Batch
I didn't notice any difference. I mean, I asked Jacob about that too. What was something different about yours? I mean, it's weird. Didn't make sense. We were both using the same drugs that came from the same person from the same batch. How come I was okay? Somebody did something.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
9: Signed, Sealed, Silenced
I'm down in my downstairs. It was a split-level house. I'm downstairs in my room, and I hear this commotion going on upstairs. And there was a caretaker. There was Elle and Max. And probably Jake was in the bed. And I saw this noise, and they're fighting each other. Elle and Max are going at it. She's, like, clawing at his hand, and he's kicking her. And I finally said... Max, stop. Get out. Go.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
9: Signed, Sealed, Silenced
Just go. Go, go, go. So he left, and, well, so now she took out a restraining order against him, and he wants him getting arrested.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
9: Signed, Sealed, Silenced
That's why I heard the thud when she hit the ground, and I came running up.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
9: Signed, Sealed, Silenced
He goes, I'm going to go find him. He breaks into my house, smashes the glass sliding door in with a concrete cement block. And Ellen was home in bed, I guess. And she called the cops. He winds up getting arrested. But Jacob wasn't in the house, you know. Max got to go all around the house. He was able to call me up and said, Jake's not there.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
Ellen decides that we're going to have a welcome home party for Jacob. He's coming home in the ambulance. It was my job to go to McDonald's to get him a McFlurry. I don't know how she gave it to him. I think she did. She pumped it into his feeding tube. I'm trying to remember. It didn't make any sense. Or did I get it for her, but... Yeah, I remember that was my task.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
And I'm thinking to myself, what is this ridiculous nonsense? The guy's lying here, home on hospice, and you're having a party?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
I had several cars in the driveway. I had an old Lexus that Jake was driving around a bunch. I had an electric car that didn't get very good mileage. And I had my wife's Nissan. Anyway, so I was letting her have access to a vehicle.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
She called for an ambulance, and they took him right into Boston, to Master General. And I get a call from her, and she says, Jake's at Master General. I said, do you need a ride? She goes, no, I'm already on my way. And she hangs up. I drive in. I get there, and I'm heading up to Fourth Floor Lunder Neural ICU, and all of a sudden I'm surrounded by security.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
I don't know if you've been to Mass General, but there's security guys wearing these nice suits. They look like Secret Service agents with a earpiece, and I'm not allowed in. to see Jake. I'm like, I'm his father. They said, I'm sorry, you're not allowed. His wife says, you're not allowed in. So, well, I said, yeah, two can play this game. No more car for you.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
My stepdaughter wound up negotiating the deal. I'll let her use the car, and I can go see Jake.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
I couldn't allow myself to feel much of anything. It was impossible. I mean, nobody could come to my home because she didn't want anybody. Everything had to be her way.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
And that's kind of caused some friction because she would do stuff and then she'd call me an idiot because I wasn't either doing it the way she wanted it done or she hadn't told me how she wanted it done and assumed that I should just, no. She had this thing about making sure that his urine was not very yellow. It should only look a little yellow. It shouldn't look like a bright yellow.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
We had this big syringe. She'd say, Now you fill this up and you push in three things of water. I thought that's an awful lot of water. The feeding and all the water that she would pump in was way too much. And I said, are you sure? She goes, yes, I know. She was like adamant about it. I said, okay, I can't argue with her. Jake told me it was like I thought I was going to explode, literally.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
I was like, oh, my God. And I'm, like, trying to read his eyes. I said, I don't think he likes this. I'll slow it down. Every now and again, I go, I'm not giving him this water. She just made me self-conscious, and I just felt like I was a person who didn't belong in my own house.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
I walked into her room to ask her a quick question, and she was just talking at me and kept talking. But meanwhile, her shirt is, like, all open so, you know, I can see her breasts. And even more than that, she's sitting like this, a crotch shot. All I'm thinking to myself is, why is she doing this? Either she's completely unaware of what she's doing, or she's doing this on purpose.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
And I just felt really uncomfortable. And the longer she stayed under the roof of my house, the more I really wanted her to go away.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
We had this lockbox to keep his medication in. And then she accused me of stealing his medication. I don't need to steal his medication, number one. I don't want to steal his medication, number two. And if I wanted any medication like that, I know where to go get it.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
Someone's in the mail for check fraud. And I'm thinking, what else can she come up with?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
You're just having a good dream, huh? That's Brownie. She's a good dog. It's nice to be a dog. So you don't have to think about those things.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
She seemed to, you know, take good care of her pets or whatever. They seemed to be important to her. But if they were in her way, she had no problem with, like, just pushing them away real hard. And she seemed to like Brownie. But obviously, once I was out of the house, she was rid of me. She decided to not allow Brownie back in the house once she exited the house.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
All in like within an hour of my leaving my house under the threat of arrest if I didn't get going soon. You know, after saying my final goodbyes to Jacob, my phone rings and it's one of his caretakers saying, Elle threw your dog out the door and wouldn't let her back in. I said, what? I said, where's my dog? She goes, I have her. I brought her home. I said, okay, I'll come get her now.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
So I went. She bought her a new leash and collar and something to eat. Being very sweet to her. And I got to make sure the hotel's okay with the dog.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
one of his caretakers said to me hey she's telling talking about getting rid of all your wife's stuff no no no tell her I said not to touch my wife's stuff anyway I saw I made the grave error of sending Al's mother a text message through Facebook messenger I guess asking that she please not touch any of my wife's stuff That was a violation of my restraining order.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
Friends and relative people were saying, how can you let her do this? I said, you don't understand. It's not a matter of letting. She's done it. How can you let her keep Jacob away from you? I said, there's nothing I can do about it.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
She didn't get to keep my house, and that's probably what really pisses her off. But she also caused damage to it. Somehow, she flooded the upstairs hallway, and the master bedroom carpeting was wet. I don't know if she purposely took buckets of water and just dumped them on the wood and the floor to just wreck the house or what. He started getting better, and she distanced herself from him.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
She posted on Facebook that she was leaving him. She wrote this whole long thing about justifying her reason for leaving Jacob. She wasn't going to be getting any more like pats on the back now that he's doing better. I mean, what's in it for Mark?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
She went to see some old boyfriend, whatever. She disappeared, trying to figure out whether she's going to stay married to him or not. She shows back up. I took her out for breakfast, and we had a chat. And, you know, his wife is talking about dumping him. And all I could think of is he wants her. So how do I make her stay for him to make him happy?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
The talk I gave her was meant to, like, kind of pump her up for doing the right thing. I told her, look, you know, I don't know if you've ever had to take care of somebody or been close to somebody dying. I've done it twice. He is your husband. Part of you loves him. I understand you're angry with him, but maybe let the anger go for now.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
You know that the chances of him surviving this are really poor, and... All I know is that if you leave now and just take off, you might really regret it later. If you take care of somebody all the way to the end of their life, it'll be like probably, I'd say, the greatest thing that you can say that you have actually done for someone.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
And I looked at that and realized that she was going tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Yeah, everybody's going to think how great I am. And I'll tell you the truth, part of it was a little selfish on my part because I just couldn't fathom how the hell am I going to take care of him all by myself. Maybe, you know, between the two of us, maybe we can make it work.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
Over time, I just saw more and more kind of horrible stuff. But I know that Jacob is in love with her. You know, I didn't want to wreck it.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
She was constantly talking about herself, how she does so much and this and that. But she's sticking me with most of the work, you know, and then she'd disappear for hours. And, you know, I got to do this. And then she'd come back and then she'd criticize everything I've done. That sort of thing.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
11. One-Hundred Pound Baby
It should be like the sing-songy kind of banal chat about how wonderful everything is. And, you know, and Jacob looks like he's doing better today, don't you think? What do you think? And I'm thinking to myself, no, he's going downhill fast every day. I don't know whether it's wishful thinking. You know, I'm trying, yeah, maybe a little better. Maybe. Maybe.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
He says, well, I took it out of the refrigerator at your house. I said, oh, so you took my Coke and sold it. Well, that's called 100% profit. So, you know, I was teaching business. I didn't see anything really wrong with it. Now, he got in trouble for it at school, and he got in trouble for it with his mother, and I let him go.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
We went to BJ's Wholesale Club, and he bought a case of soda, so it only cost him like 25 cents per can. And he says, the kids wound up smartening up some, but, you know, he was still able to sell them for a few dollars apiece at lunchtime, if only he'd only bring one or two cans a day. So B's like, who wants it the worst? That's how you create demands. And you limit the supply. Very smart, Jake.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
And then the next thing he did was selling, this got him in bigger trouble, the selling cigarette lighters. All of a sudden, that was like a big no-no. I remember he wound up getting in trouble freshman year of high school. He got caught and arrested in school because they found marijuana in his locker. Jake told me, he says, it was in my pot. It was in my locker, but it wasn't mine.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
It was a friend's, and he wouldn't give up the friend. They were going to let him go if he turned the guy in, so he wasn't a rat. You got arrested. I remember we got him a lawyer. We would shut it up. No, don't do it again. Slap on the wrist.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
I think that's what kind of made him go towards drugs as a way to escape and to kind of alleviate anxiety. But the problem with doing drugs is that it takes you out of yourself so much. It numbs your senses to the point where you get apathetic. And I think he Although, you know, he had spurts of enthusiasm for doing something.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
He decided, you know, like he was interested in the culinary arts because I had a restaurant. And I said, if you want to do that, you know, great. Finally, something that he wanted to do. So I let him go to cooking school while he was still in high school. He became a chef and he was really good at it. But then... Yeah, then his mother died, which brought on more depression and more anxiety.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
I didn't even realize the drugs he was taking. I thought he was just a pot smoker. His drive and his interest seemed to be waning all the time. And I was hoping that, you know, he would really stay excited about something because he wasn't. He wasn't into school, except for the social. Jake was always in trouble over not doing well in school.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
You couldn't stay angry with Jacob because he was always just a sweet kid. I didn't want him to have the kind of relationship that I had with my father because I was afraid of my father. You know, and I also knew, well, I got to be his father and not just his friend. It was like kind of both.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
I just wanted him to have great experiences and to try to get him to be exposed to everything that the world has. Unlike the way my parents used to be, try to like guide me one way or tell me, why don't you do this? I just would let him ask if he needs something or help. But he didn't ask a whole lot. And if whatever, if he needed something, you know, I'd help him with it.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
I wasn't the kind of person that thought babies were cute or beautiful. So I was just hoping he would be looking all right. But he was beautiful. He was a beautiful baby.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
As he grew up, very gregarious and liked to have fun and was jovial. And then as he started to get a little older, he started developing anxiety.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
He was, you know, basically depressed. I think clinically depressed, but he didn't want to deal with it. And so his mother and I had differing opinions on how to cope with it.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
3: Wayward Son
Because these kids had so much cash in their pocket to spend, my son would figure out what they wanted and would supply it. So he would come to school with one can of Coca-Cola, 12-ounce Coke, warm, but whatever, and he'd hold an auction at lunch. He says, I got $20 for one can of Coke. He goes, Dad, how much does a can of Coke cost? I said, well, let's see. How did you get that Coke?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
6: Blink Twice
He was getting all his reports from the hospice nurse, not from Al, and somehow, miraculously, he didn't die. He was still alive.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
6: Blink Twice
Derone says, you know, I have no idea what's going on with Jake. I haven't heard anything in months. I'm going to get the police to give me an escort. Do you want to come? I said, of course, I really want to see him. So the police officer comes. We go. We ring the doorbell. Nothing. We knock, knock, knock. Nothing. The cop goes with us. We're like, the drone said, can we look through the windows?
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
6: Blink Twice
I mean, I don't understand how no one could be home. He's supposed to be in there on hospice. So the cop went with us and we looked all around and there was no sign of anybody living there. And we were like, where the heck is Jake? Did he die? What if It was the worst feeling because you don't know if he's dead or what the hell's going on. It was gut-wrenching. It was so bizarre.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
6: Blink Twice
He was calling hospitals. He even went and started walking around hospital floors and looking in rooms, peeking in. He was going to nurses' stations and asking questions. Nothing. Couldn't find anything.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
5: Making Peace with Death
He said, you better come. He's dying. I said, I can't come. There's a restraining order against me. He says, we got that taken care of. Just come.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
5: Making Peace with Death
I just lost it, and I started screaming and burbling, and I ran downstairs, and I ran upstairs, screamed at her some more. She screamed back at me. I ran back downstairs, and I took a deep breath and let out slowly, and I said, okay, for Jacob's sake, I'm going to make this go away. So I calmed down.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
5: Making Peace with Death
I was gonna go upstairs she meets me at the top of the steps and I saw I'm like two steps below and I went to put my hand on her shoulders and she yells out you're strangling me and then I was about to laugh and then hits me in the head with a soda bottle and I lose my balance and I do a backflip down the stairs. Anyway, I wound up like needing seven staples in my head. I broke my wrist.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
5: Making Peace with Death
I was concussed. I may have blacked out for a second, but... And then I had all this blood in my eyes and I called 911. The ambulance stopped a block up from my house. And I'm yelling at them, hey, I'm over here. They go, we know. I see you, come get me. And they go, no. We have to wait for the police.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
5: Making Peace with Death
So I went, kind of crawled up the street, and they started cleaning me up and took me to the hospital. I get slapped in handcuffs and get treated, and I finally get booked to the jail. Tuesday morning, I get to go to court, and, you know, I'm one of the last cases. I'm in front of the judge. I'm coated with blood. She stood up and she said, I'm deathly afraid of him. He's going to kill me.
Blink | Jake Haendel's Story
5: Making Peace with Death
That's all she had to say. Well, Judge Grant's sort of restraining order against me, so I'm kind of like shell-shocked, and I wound up hiring the best criminal lawyer in Worcester.