Killer Coin

by Elka Ray

  He smiles malevolently and steps closer.

  I take another step back. Pretty soon, I’ll be in a corner. My panic rises.

  Gerard is short and fat, but strong. He’s quick too, while I’m half-drugged by the fumes and exhaustion. My chest feels locked tight. I’m shaking so hard I’m scared I’ll drop the hammer. I don’t dare swing again lest he grab it.

  From the garage there’s a noise—a strange, high-pitched wail. It takes me a second to realize: it’s the pig, squealing.

  Gerard turns toward the sound. His bald head turns an angry purple. “That cochon!” He gnashes his teeth. “I will kill it!”

  That second of distraction is a godsend. With my last remaining strength, I swing my hammer. There’s a sickening thud as it strikes his head.

  The reverberations electrify my arm. I stagger backward.

  “Umpf,” says Gerard, his eyes wide with shock. He clutches at his skull and collapses.

  I keep moving back, sure he’ll rise and come at me.

  Instead, he lies still, crumpled with one arm beneath him. A smooth magenta bump has appeared on one side of his bald head. I stop backing away.

  My heart skids around my chest. There’s no time to lose. On quaking legs I inch forward. I nudge Gerard’s shoulder with my foot. No reaction. He’s out cold.

  I step over him and run to Colin. Bent close, I press my face to his. I don’t feel any breath. “Colin,” I cry. I find the zipper of his coat, dig a hand under his dark jacket. His chest feels warm. But is his heart beating?

  Am I too late? Has Gerard killed him?

  Then I feel it, a deep, solid thud against my palm. Relief pulls me forward to collapse against his chest. I bury my nose against him, inhale his fresh, minty scent. Tears fill my eyes.

  But there’s no time to rest. Colin and Daphne need help. Gerard could wake at any moment.

  I will myself to sit up, to sway to my feet, and stagger back through the smoky garage. Daphne remains where I left her, inert in her shiny bathrobe.

  I pull an old, rolled-up sleeping back down from a shelf and stick it under her head. I smooth her hair out of her face, which is the color of old parchment. “Daphne?” I say. No response. But she’s still breathing.

  Nearby, the pig stirs, its legs twitching, erratically, like it’s dreaming. At my approach, Kevin emits a squeak. The pig is coming to.

  I stumble out the side door and into the empty front yard. It looks so clear and bright. Every leaf and blade of grass sparkles in the morning sun.

  I gulp down lungfuls of cold air, unable to get enough. Never again will I take this fresh air for granted—redolent of cedar and pine sap. The grass crunches with frost.

  I sink onto it and pull my phone from my coat’s pocket. Through inflamed eyes, I squint at the tiny screen. One bar. Two. Thank god. The grass’ cold wetness seeps up through my jeans. My eyes are streaming.

  With a shaking finger, I dial 911. A woman answers. My voice is croaky. She has trouble hearing me. “An ambulance!” I yell. “And the police!”

  She takes down the address and instructs me to stay on the line.

  I ignore her. After a moment’s rest, I retrieve my hammer and head back indoors. The phone connection dies as soon as I enter the basement. I stick my phone in my pocket. The only sound is my thumping heartbeat.

  After a moment’s hesitation, I keep going. I must stay with Colin. And Gerard could wake at any moment.

  I stumble through the garage, past the pig, which raises its head as I pass, and Daphne, still unmoving. My eyes scan various boxes: CAMPING, OFFICE CURTAINS, BABY BEDDING. Daphne had better read Marie Kondo. Although I’m lucky she didn’t.

  In a box marked FISHING TACKLE I find a roll of strong fishing line and a knife. This will do for restraining Gerard. It’s hard to carry both weapons one-handed.

  Gerard is still lying as I left him, a pale mound in dark clothes. I can’t see his face. Is he dead?

  Although it was self-defense, the thought brings a nauseous rush. But no, I can hear his wheezy breaths.

  I stick the knife down the front of my jeans and raise the hammer, ready to use it. I inch closer.

  His chest rises and falls. I’m scared to touch him, as if, even unconscious, he might harm me. Maybe he’s just pretending and will sit up and grab me.

  I inhale. The longer I wait, the more chance he’ll wake up. I prod his back with my toe. No reaction. But even passed out, he’s a malevolent presence. Again, I think of a poisonous toad. Toxic. Just touching him feels potentially lethal.

  I roll him onto his stomach and pull his wrists together, behind him. His skin feels clammy. He groans a little, then lies silent. I’m relieved he’s alive but more relieved he’s unconscious. After securing his wrists and his ankles I push him onto his side. He grunts, loudly.

  I back away, feeling sick. I rub my hands on my jeans. It’s like I touched something dirty.

  Colin is also as I left him, unmoving. I sink down and cradle his head. The cut up above his hairline is still bleeding.

  I tug off my scarf and press it against the wound. “It’s me,” I croak. “The ambulance is coming. You’re okay.” A lie but I need to hear it. I stroke the dark, wet curls near his ear. Dried blood crusts his cheek and neck. The sight of his eyelashes, so still and dark against his white skin, makes my heart hurt.

  “I’m so sorry,” I whisper. “I was so lame. I should have known, sooner.”

  Seeing him now, it’s so clear: I’ve loved him since we first met—the way he smiles shyly with his mouth, yet has a naughty spark in his eyes. And yet I held onto the past, obsessed with my intoxicating crush on Josh. It seems so pointless now—trading childish thrills and glamour for the real care and attention I received from Colin.

  I raise the scarf, relieved to see that the bleeding has slowed.

  But he’s so terribly pale. His stillness pushes ice into my veins. I bend closer. “Please, get better,” I whisper. There’s no sign he can hear me. “Please, be happy.”

  I imagine him and Miriam, hand in hand, striding into their bright future. It hurts to picture them, yet I’d still be glad for Colin. They’re perfect together. “I love you, Colin,” I whisper. “Please recover and be happy.”

  I’m still talking to him when sirens close in, still cradling him when I hear running feet and urgent voices.

  I turn around. “In here!” I yell. My voice is like a duck’s.

  Footsteps pound through the garage and stop. I know they’ve found Daphne.

  “We need help in here too!” I cry. More footsteps pound closer.

  I’m bent low over Colin when strong hands grasp my shoulders. “Are you hurt?” says a deep, calm woman’s voice. I look up. It’s Miriam Young.

  “No.” I shake my head. “But Colin is. Badly!”

  A paramedic bends over Gerard. Another rushes up and deposits her bag beside Colin. “Over here,” she calls to a colleague. More footsteps ring out behind me.

  Miriam pulls me into an embrace. “You have to let go of him,” she says gently. “They need to check him.”

  I allow her to lift me to my feet, to steer me away from Colin. A sob wrenches from me. I don’t want to leave him.

  “He’ll be fine,” she says. While she sounds calm, I can hear the fear in her voice. “C’mon, let’s get you outside,” she says.

  I sway against her. The paramedics shift Colin onto a stretcher.

  Walking through the garage, I lean against Miriam, all rivalry forgotten.

  Daphne has been moved outside. At our approach, the pig stirs. It raises its snout, bleary but awake. “Please get the pig outside,” I say to Miriam. His squeals saved my life. And—I pray—Colin’s.

  “We will. Don’t worry,” she says. “A vet’s coming.”

  I nod. “Will you ride in the ambulance with Colin?” I ask her. I can’t bear to think of him going alone. What if he wakes up and there’s no familiar face, or only that of the monster who attacked him?

  Miriam
shakes her head. “I think that should be you.”

  We stumble through the door. What does that mean?

  I glance at her, questioningly. While her face is serious, there’s a smile in her dark eyes. Her voice is warm: “You’re the face he’d want to wake up to.”

  For the first time, I truly look at her, or look beyond her surface beauty. I see the dark grooves beneath her kind eyes, how tired and tense she looks, like a queen whose kingdom is crumbling. She is grace under pressure personified.

  She squeezes my shoulder. “Wait and see,” she says. She smiles for real. For a second, her smile knocks the stress and fatigue right off her face. “I’ll dance at your wedding.”

  CHAPTER 32:

  GOOD MEDICINE

  Just over two months ago Colin visited me in the hospital. Now, I’m visiting him. He got out of Intensive Care last night but wasn’t allowed visitors until this morning.

  I woke up early.

  At 6:55 a.m. I’m headed toward the nurse’s desk, armed with a bag of croissants, two takeaway cappuccinos, a terrycloth eye-mask, and a box of earplugs. I remember how hard it was to sleep in the hospital—the lights always too bright and the wards full of weird, disturbing noises.

  “Bright and early,” says the nurse, at my approach. She’s in her fifties with short grey hair and pink cat-eye glasses. We met yesterday, when I was brought to the ER, where I was checked and released. Colin, Daphne, and Gerard were admitted. The pig is at the vet’s. Everyone is expected to recover.

  The nurse is dressed in powder pink scrubs. “How’s your bruise?” she asks. She nods toward my chest. “You feeling better?”

  “It’s sore,” I say. “But okay.” It looks like a bottle of ink exploded against my chest. “How’s Colin?” I ask her.

  “Lucky,” she says. A CT scan revealed he didn’t need surgery, although they’re keeping him under observation. Some cerebrospinal fluid was leaking. “He’s awake and fairly coherent. But time will tell.” She checks her watch. “He’s in Room 211,” she says. “Visiting hours start at seven but you may as well go in. Just remember, he’ll tire easily. And his memory’s pretty patchy.”

  “Thanks.” I hesitate, suddenly nervous. Yesterday, he was unconscious the whole time. Will he be pleased to see me? Will he even know who I am? He’s suffered brain trauma.

  My knock elicits a muffled “come in.” I push open the door. “Hey, Colin?”

  Stretched out in bed, he looks very long.

  His head turns. He’s got two raccoon eyes. A basilar skull fracture can do that, apparently. It can also cause long-term brain damage, although the nurse said that was unlikely.

  In their strange, dark sockets, Colin’s eyes light up. “Toby.” His voice has a slight slur. He blinks. “How are you?”

  “Good.” I come closer. “And you?”

  “Great.”

  I feel an urge to laugh and cry. Great is such an overstatement. “Are you hungry?” I hold up my bags. “Or thirsty?”

  It takes him a minute to answer. “Um, I’m not sure. No.”

  “Okay.”

  I deposit the coffees and my bags on his nightstand, then pull a nearby chair closer.

  Colin looks so dazed and vulnerable. He shuts his eyes. From the slow way he moves, I know he’s in pain. It hurts to look at him. Apart from those black bruises, he’s icy pale. He looks thin, and decades older.

  I take a seat and extract one of the cappuccinos from its cardboard holder. It’s the perfect temperature to sip. I take a few gulps, steeling myself. “Seriously, how do you feel?” I ask, worriedly.

  His eyes open, slowly. “I get dizzy,” he says. “The doctor said it’s . . .” He pauses, like he’s searching for the right word. “Normal,” he says. “I feel . . . tired.”

  “Your brain needs rest to heal,” I say. Colin doesn’t answer. “I should let you sleep.” The coffee tastes unusually bitter. “I’ll come back tomorrow.”

  His eyes open again. He reaches for me. “No. Please,” he says. “Even if we don’t talk, can you stay a little?”

  I set down my coffee and grasp his hand. Touching him seems to unlock some tension in my neck I didn’t even know was there. I bow my head and pull his hand to my forehead. “I was so scared,” I whisper.

  “I . . . I’m sorry,” says Colin.

  I sit up straighter. “No,” I say. “You have no reason to be sorry. I’m sorry!”

  I shake my head. There’s so much I’m sorry about. But that can wait. I study Colin’s hand and wrist, the IV line snaking into his blue vein. It’s like blue paint on porcelain, so precious and fragile. “Waiting for the ambulance, I didn’t know if you’d . . .” I gulp, unable to say it. “I was scared you were really badly hurt. That I’d never have the chance to tell you.”

  “Tell me what?” murmurs Colin.

  “I love you,” I say. I feel a strong urge to laugh. I’ve never said those words to any man, not since my dad left, when I was fourteen. I was scared to. Scared they’d feel like a weight hanging over me, that I’d be crushed if they drew the wrong reaction.

  Yet now, I don’t need him to react. I just want him to know, to feel loved. “I love you so much. I want you to be well and happy.” It’s a joy to say it.

  Colin smiles. “I love you too, Toby Wong.” He licks his chapped lips. “But you sure do cause trouble.”

  My heart’s a soaring bird. I fight back a smile. “I don’t cause it,” I say. “I just find it.”

  He smiles and nods, then winces. “I’m too wrecked to argue. Can I have a get-well kiss?”

  I rise from my chair and lean over him. “I’m scared to hurt you.”

  His arms close around me. He pulls me down. I’m mindful of his IV.

  “Being near you makes me feel better,” he says.

  When our lips meet, I feel better too. It’s like I was lost in the woods at night, wandering in circles, hunted . . . And now I’ve found the way home—seen that welcoming golden puddle of a porch light. I’ll never leave home again. Never.

  Our kiss goes on and on. I hope it never stops.

  But then, behind me, someone clears their throat. A theatrical growl. I look around.

  “Hey,” says the nurse. Her voice is sharp. “Didn’t I tell you not to wear him out?”

  My cheeks flush. The nurse laughs. “This is a G-rated ward.” She’s wheeling a portable blood pressure monitor. She looks from me to Colin and pushes her pink glasses back up her long nose. “I’m kidding,” she says. “Kind of. Although he does need to rest. Come back tomorrow. A daily dose of that will cure anything!” She laughs again. “I’m just jealous.” On her feet are pink Crocs that match her funky glasses. I smile at Colin. “See you tomorrow,” I say.

  He fights back a yawn. “Yes.” I’m at the door when he calls out.

  “Toby?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Can I have one more kiss?”

  The nurse cackles. She’s got the blood-pressure belt around Colin’s arm. “No way,” she says. “Your blood pressure’s high enough!”

  She wags a finger my way. “Go home,” she says. “Have a cold shower.”

  Again, I’m blushing. The nurse grins as she works. I wave from the doorway. “I love you,” I say to Colin. Now that I’ve started saying it, I can’t stop.

  I want to sing it as I skip down the hall. I’m a romantic fool and I don’t even care. I want a t-shirt: I heart Colin Destin.

  I’m walking toward the exit when my phone rings. I extract it from my purse. It’s my mother. “Hi, hon. How are you?” she asks.

  “Hey Mom,” I say. “I’m fine. I’m just leaving the Jubilee.”

  “Oh!” she says. “I’m here too. I’m going to visit Daphne.”

  Seconds later, I see her, striding toward me. She’s carrying a bunch of orange chrysanthemums, wrapped in newspaper. A giant purple tote bag dangles off one skinny shoulder.

  I wave and stash my phone. My mom has obviously been up most of the night. Her normally glowi
ng complexion is dull and her eyes have a manic, overtired glitter.

  “Hey Mom,” I say again. She strides closer.

  She’s wearing a brown coat and a long, loose, navy linen dress over matching navy tights. A string of faceted black tourmaline beads circles her throat. It’s the most sedate outfit I’ve seen her wear in years, my mom’s version of formal wear. Maybe she wants the medical staff to take her seriously and not dismiss her as some aging, weirdo hippie. The look is only slightly skewed by her rubber boots, which are printed with cherries and bananas.

  She studies me critically too, clearly convinced I should be hospitalized.

  We meet and hug—or hug as best we can with my cast and her swathe of flowers.

  “How are you feeling?” she asks again. She drove me home from the hospital yesterday morning, then spent the rest of the day fussing over me. I can still taste the vile “healing smoothie” she made me for dinner.

  “I’m fine,” I say, wincing when she squeezes me to her chest. “And you?”

  “Me?” She leans back, surprised. “Okay, just worried about Daphne, of course.” She swallows hard. “I spoke to her doctors last night. She underwent hyperbaric oxygen therapy.” She says these words carefully, like she’s learned them by heart. “She’s doing well. The doctors are hopeful.” Her optimism falters. She blinks at the shiny white floor. “But it’s still too soon to say if there’s lasting damage. CO2 can cause long-term brain damage.” She sighs. “No matter what, it’ll be a long road to recovery.”

  She’s got three bead bracelets on her left wrist and keeps twisting them. Smoky quartz for grounding. Citrine for optimism. Amber for healing and purifying. The last seems a good choice. I can’t enter a hospital without feeling like I’m bound to catch something. All those sick people! I could never be a doctor.

  My mom’s shaking voice draws my attention away from thoughts of germs and crystals. “If you hadn’t found Daphne when you did . . .” she says. She brushes a tear from one blinking eye.

  I put my arm around her. “She’ll be fine,” I say, although really—how can I know? I Googled it too. Carbon monoxide poisoning can be tricky.