Part 5 (1/2)
In the ER room, Hannah winced every time the nurse's aide wiped around Brock's gash, the pink slot of open skin that was half an inch wide. Hannah had to bite her fist when the doctor administered twelve st.i.tches to close it up. Brock's s.h.i.+rt was covered in dried blood, what had dried into a dull brown-orange color. His ribs and stomach swelled with ache. He'd have a collection of ripe bruises.
Dr. Mihn asked him, ”How did this happen again?”
”I, uh,” Brock trailed off, scrounging for an excuse. ”I fell down the stairs. Wild party. The old man needs to calm down.”
”Yes, he does,” the Asian doctor said, disapproving of his reply. ”Well, you'll be fine. Let the st.i.tches heal. In four weeks, come back to get them taken out. You'll have a mean battle scar.”
You said it, Doc. A battle scar.
Hannah stepped up to Dr. Mihn. ”So he's fine then?”
”s.h.i.+pshape beyond a few bruises. The old man is no worse for the wear.”
After receiving the treatment, they walked out of the emergency room, and Brandy waited outside with her head in her hands. He wasn't sure what to expect. She glanced up at them when they approached her. She rose to her feet, and Brock sized her up. He didn't feel anger. He only wished for an honest chance to win her over.
After a moment of drawn out silence, Brandy walked up to Brock. He went stiff, but when she pulled him in for a hug, he hugged her back. She whispered to him, ”I'm sorry, Brock. Hannah's right. You didn't deserve that.”
”But you feel better, though. Be honest. Come on. You liked punching out my lights. Mopping up the floor with me. Exchanging fisticuffs.”
Brandy laughed without meaning to, and said, ”Rearranging your face.”
”Throwing me under the bus.”
”Cleaning your clock.”
”Knuckle sandwich delivery.”
Hannah stepped in between them, ”Enough.”
Brock extended his hand to Brandy. ”Clean slate?”
Brandy conceded. ”As long as you don't press charges, yes, clean slate.”
Brock led them out into the parking lot and back to the car. ”All right, let's get home so I can ice down my b.a.l.l.s.”
After receiving more genuine apologies from Brandy on the way back to their apartment, and Brock accepting each of them, they called it a night. Hannah explained she had packed a bag for the trip tomorrow, and it was in her trunk, so the sisters had a short talk while Brock sat in the car. When Hannah returned, they drove to his apartment. There, Brock showered and then they went straight to bed. He couldn't sleep, though, tossing and turning, once again concerned about Angel. He snuck into the living room, turned on the standing lamp, and started jotting in his notebook.
Maybe it'll be as easy as letting Angel punch in my face and all will be forgiven. No, Angel's different. It won't be so easy to win her back. Our whole family situation is messed up. I wonder what Mom's doing these days? Does she care about her two children? She has to know we were c.o.keheads. The news broadcast it to the whole world. I guess she's out of my life either way. I could look her up, but I guess one battle at a time is enough. Win back Angel if I can, then I'll see about the black widow.
Seeing blood again brings the memories back. It's the very reason I went to rehab and dragged Angel kicking and screaming with me. It was after one of our notorious parties. One hundred people were there. Too many strangers at that party, many of them sub-Hollywood people, those on the outskirts of work or completely shut out of work. All I remember is when they left, and I was blitzed out of my mind. I'd snorted c.o.ke and somebody had given me a strange pill. I still to this day don't know what it was.
I was walking around our outdoor pool when the party was over. Vomit, popcorn, empty wine, champagne, and beer bottles floated in the water like party flotsam and jetsam. I don't know what convinced me there was somebody drowning in the middle of the pool. I saw a floating skirt or a dress, a piece of clothing, and I swore I caught a face and heard screams choked by swallowed water. So I throw myself in, and I'm fired up out-of-my mind. When I land, it's like falling into quicksand. I fight it, thras.h.i.+ng hard, extending my neck to keep my face above the surface, and I could care less what bile I'm floating through, this woman's screams, she's seeing her dying moment, and I was determined to save her.
The quick sand was thickening, and something was pulling down on my ankles like an undertow, but I was inches from the woman, and when I reach out to lift her from harm, my arm cuts right through her. Her flesh is liquid, and the force of my grip, it tears her asunder, and it's as if I've fallen into her body, trapped in her ribs, tangled in her arms and legs, and I'm covered in so much blood, as if I was the one who killed her, as if my body was so strong, she was like a wave that crashed and broke against my body.
I'm screaming and crying out, horrified that I'd killed this woman, and now I'm drowning, so terrified, and I'm sinking fast, caught up in what really is a dress somebody tore off and discarded into the water. And then a hear a splash of water. Angel has come in after me, but she too is blitzed as h.e.l.l, and when she grabs hold of me, we both sink faster, both heavy as anchors, and we hit the bottom. Running low on air, Angel claws at my body imagining me to be G.o.d knows what, and she's really scratching up my arms, and real blood spreads across the water, and when I catch the pool light above us, I somehow snap out of it, throwing aside the dress, and I lift up Angel whose practically pulling me back down. She thinks something above us isn't safe, and I force her up, and when we reach the surface, Angel stares at me like asking me what the f.u.c.k just happened. We both don't know, but we're so scared, we realize we can't keep doing this.
It was so real, I swear my arm just cut through that woman when I tried to grab her. I had nightmares in rehab about the woman and trying to rescue a dress. I risked my life and my sister's life over a f.u.c.king dress.
Brock stopped writing, shutting off the previous life he had lived. He returned to bed, careful not to wake Hannah. He stared up at the ceiling for minutes, his thoughts going on and on about Angel and their life at the mansion, before he drifted to sleep.
DIGGING UP THE YARD.
13 Days After Piedmont Cemetery Melted James Matthews, or ”Old Man Matthews” as the neighborhood kids dubbed him before everything changed in Blue Hills for the worse, plunged a shovel into the square of dirt in front of his oak tree that stood the closest to his house. After two feet of earth was dug up and pushed aside, he reached down and claimed his prize. What would prolong his life that much longer.
A rusted coffee tin.
James ran into the house and locked the coffee tin into the wall safe in his private study and quickly rushed back outside. James double checked he had his .38 pistol tucked under his belt loop in case anybody got any funny ideas. He shot Mrs. Jenson and Mr. Ryerson between the eyes when they broke into his house and turned over the G.o.dd.a.m.n place until it was as good as a crime scene after a burglary.
They wanted his money.
Everybody wanted money.
James remembered how life used to be about two weeks ago when the town first became a high alert, take no prisoners, survive or die situation. He was a retired funeral director, having enjoyed nine years of retirement. During his career, the neighborhood children created stories about him in corners of the schoolyard between turns in kickball, in various alt.i.tudes on the swing sets, or walking home from school.
Old Man Matthews doesn't drink, but he sure loves to huff embalming fluid...
Old Man Matthews likes to keep his bed filled with the corpse of his wife when he digs her up from her grave on the night of their wedding anniversary...
Old Man Matthews roams the cemetery imagining each of the corpses under his feet are naked and on his gurney...
Old Man Matthews doesn't wear his rubber gloves when sticking his finger in places he shouldn't...
Old Man Matthews enjoys the sound of sutures breaking dead corpse skin...
The stories became increasingly sordid the older these children became. Small town embalmers and funeral directors earned this t.i.tle without any wrongdoing. He didn't care. After everything that had happened in Blue Hills, none of it mattered. The kiddies were dead. Their mommies were dead. Their daddies were dead. Their friends were dead. None of them mattered. Dead. Dead. Dead.
James combed his backyard and stopped at the set of lawn gnomes by the front hedges. He penetrated the earth with his shovel, digging behind them, locating the sweet spot, knowing he didn't have a lot of time left out in the open before somebody would happen upon what he was doing.
Reaching deep enough inside the hole, James scooped out the rest of the dirt with his hands and claimed another coffee tin. Hurrying back into the house, he bolted the front door secure and locked up the tin coffee can inside his wall safe. Staying in the house, James kept the .38 in his hands, waiting for the man with the golden axe to come a knockin'...
HITTING THE ROAD.
Brock and Hannah's goal was to hit the road by eight in the morning, but they were running late. During their shower together, Hannah took in his collection of nasty bruises. ”I am so sorry my sister did that to you. I had no idea she was planning that. She said she only wanted to talk to you.”
”It's okay.” Brock signaled for her to cease the apologies. He toweled off after the alleviating hot shower, watching Hannah stand in the shower wrapping a towel around her hair before drying the rest of herself off. ”I know you didn't have anything to do with it. The ghost of Bruce Lee entered Brandy, and she released her anger. That's a victory. Now she has to give me a shot. Kicking someone's a.s.s never cleared the air between two people as successfully as last night.”
”She used to take Karate, actually. She's a blue belt.”
”What does that mean? Maybe the colors of your belt indicate the color of bruises your moves will leave on someone's body.”
Hannah eyed him lovingly. ”You're a good sport, Brock. You had every right to b.i.t.c.h slap her for that beating. I wouldn't have batted an eye.”
”You don't mean that. If I hit your sister, you would've left me. End of story.”
”Maybe. Maybe not. But you didn't have to let her beat you up so bad.”
”I didn't let her,” he said, playfully outraged. ”She was swift.”
Hannah hugged him from behind. ”You sure took your beating like a champion.”