By Kyle Roberts
RUSTON, La. — Summer ’13 was supposed to be a typical break for newly-graduated C.J. Gatlin — killing time in at home, taking vacations, so on and so forth.
“We went to the beach that summer,” Gatlin said. “I think we went to Six Flags — I worked out a little bit to get ready for college.”
His now-wife Emaleigh remembers how typical any day that summer would have been for the two, who started dating when C.J. came to Ruston High.
“We were a month shy of being together for a year,” Emaleigh said. “It was just another average day for us.”
Transferring from Central Louisiana to play his last year of football for the Ruston High Bearcats as the starting quarterback, C.J. earned himself a preferred walk-on spot at Louisiana Tech for football, where he was slated to be enrolled in the fall to study engineering.
It all changed within seconds on a Saturday morning that August.
Identifying himself as “accident-prone” after walking away from a rollover wreck the year before, C.J. recalled the day starting as normal as the one before: clearing a ditch near his in-law’s house in a neighborhood that is adjacent to what is now the “Rock Island Greenway.”
C.J. was driving a Polaris Ranger and hauling out debris to kill time on this particular morning for a neighbor. Unbeknownst to C.J., and a great irony here, is both Emaleigh and her mother, Tanya Bickham, had tried multiple times to call C.J., and unable to reach him, they both assumed he had an accident.
“When I called her back, she told me where she was, so I headed her way,” C.J. said, noting he accelerated and pointed the Ranger in her direction. “I was going back to get her, and then I felt the steering wheel shaking, and it jerks to the right and then left quickly. I saw I was about to hit a tree, so I tried to jump out.”
But C.J. didn’t jump out in time. Instead, he hit the roll bar full of the Polaris full force as it careened into the tree, knocking him though the passenger seat and onto the ground. At this point, his body goes into shock, and he goes completely numb.
Emaleigh heard the cracking of the branches and knew something was wrong.
“I didn’t see the wreck happening, but I heard it — and it was just a terrible sound,” Emaleigh said. “I can still hear it in my mind. And when I get to him, the Ranger is headfirst into a tree.”
Amazingly, C.J. is standing up and able to talk, and at no point during the entire process did C.J. lose consciousness. But what C.J. doesn’t quite realize at this time is that the skin of his face and scalp had become detached. C.J.’s exact words to describe it were “my left eyebrow is touching the back of my neck.”
Emaleigh’s instincts have kicked in by now, knowing that she’ll need to act fast while staying calm for C.J. And what she does next has now become a bit humorous in retrospect for the family.
“I’m yelling for her to call 9-1-1,” C.J. said, laughing. “And she’s calling her mom instead. That’s the best part. I literally was like, are you kidding me?”
In retrospect, her rationale for dialing her mother first is very sound.
“We’re in the middle of the woods, and nobody else is going to know how to get to where we are,” Emaleigh said. “And I don’t want to say anything in front of C.J., but I’m trying to keep him calm and awake. I’m telling him what I’m doing and that it’s bad — but that it’s going to be okay.”
Emaleigh then holds C.J. close to her — attempting to apply any pressure to quell the bleeding.
“I put his head in my lap,” Emaleigh said. “I tried to reattach the scalp to his skull the best I could. And I’m holding it there — I’m trying to make sure he stays with me. I don’t want him to pass out.”
Bickham located C.J. and Emaleigh on the property before driving back to find the ambulance to lead the way. By this time, Emaleigh had called Christine, C.J.’s mother, who was at the school where she was working at the time. Christine knew something was off when she answered the phone.
“Emaleigh never calls me,” Christine said. “She told me C.J. had been in an accident and didn’t really say anything else. I called my husband (C.J.’s father, Chris) and left the school for her house. I had only been there once at this point, and I couldn’t remember where it was. And then I see an ambulance behind me, and I pulled over to follow it to the house.”
The ambulance and Christine then headed into the woods towards C.J. and Emaleigh, and when they approached the crash, she realized the full extent of her son’s injuries.
“I’ve never experienced anything like that,” Christine said. “It was very hot outside, and I almost passed out just from the grotesqueness of it.”
Fearing a head or spinal injury, the first responders on site put C.J. in a neck brace and strapped him to a gurney. And given the severity of his wounds, he would need to be air-lifted to LSU-S in Shreveport. A helicopter would be waiting at a clearing adjacent to Glen View Elementary School in Ruston. C.J. is still awake as they load him on the helicopter.
“We were about to walk back to the sheriff’s vehicle, and I hear him yell for us,” Christine said. “I was thinking he was going to tell us that he loves us so much. Instead he yells “Hey, this is my first helicopter ride!” I remember thinking — no way he called us back to tell us that.”
Everyone made their way to LSU-S as C.J. entered surgery to reattach his scalp. Family members, Ruston High Coaches Chad Reeder, Billy and Brad Laird, and a host of friends all came to the waiting room just to sit with the Gatlins and Bickhams as they awaited news.
“Looking back, it’s such a God thing because everybody showed up when we needed them,” Emaleigh said. “It was very heavy in the waiting room because we were waiting on results, and we had no clue what we were going to hear.”
Awake the entire time, C.J. would take nearly 300 stitches to his face, all with only local anesthesia, meaning he was awake for the entire procedure.
“The doctor and I talked the whole time,” C.J. said. “I don’t remember her name, but she went to school in Iowa. I got to watch every stitch, and we had a 3.5 hour conversation. It was just crazy.”
Despite some nicks from the needle, C.J.’s biggest discomfort was being hungry — he hadn’t eaten at all that entire day.
“I had the best Burger King cheeseburger when it was all over,” C.J. added.
Following surgery, his recovery was incredibly easy despite bouts of impetigo and the needed blood-cleaning from his scalp (“It was like Jell-O when you touched his head,” Christine said). Now, the only physical reminder of the accident is the scar that runs along his face — a scar that has healed so well over time that it’s only noticeable when one is actively looking for it.
Miraculously, ten years later, C.J. has no cognitive issues whatsoever from the crash. Now married to Emaleigh with daughter Chooty and son Tripp, C.J. is an assistant coach for the Ruston High Bearcats, who will be playing Friday night against Southside in the quarterfinals. He uses his story as a teaching opportunity for his players.
“Every day is a gift,” C.J. said. “I let my players know that anything can happen at any moment. I struggle sometimes with small things bothering me. Now I ask myself if these things really matter. In the grand scheme of things, would this be really worth my two minutes of being upset?”
Emaleigh also has a reminder of the miracle from Christine: a Pandora angel charm for her bracelet.
“It’s a way to say to her thanks for being there,” Emaleigh said. “She really helped make sure he was taken care of that day, and we were very blessed.”
And for C.J.? Well, no more ATV rides from here. And a confession all these years later:
“I’ve always stuck to the story that I was only going 20-25 miles per hour. This is the first time I’ve ever admitted it: I was going way faster than I should have been.”
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