Vader’s jaw tightened. “Yes.” Technically, his mother lived with him, since he owned the house. But he saw no need to explain anything to these assholes.
“How old are you? Over twelve, right?”
Oh, how he wanted to rip the guy’s sneer right off his face. Then he felt Cherie’s hand squeeze his thigh, which had gone as tense as rebar. “We’re leaving,” she said, glaring at her housemates. “If you can’t manage to be polite for one lousy drink, we’re out of here.”
“But Cherie, he lives with his mother. I moved out when I was eighteen.”
“Nineteen for me,” said Nick, flopping his hand in the air.
“Bet she still does his laundry. Fess up, Vader. Does she do your laundry?”
Vader tried to crack his jaw open, to say something, anything, but it had gone as hard as concrete. He could brush off a lot of abuse, but if they said anything rude about his mother, he couldn’t guarantee civilized behavior.
“You’re being an ass, Soren,” hissed Cherie. “I want you to stop this.”
“Do you call her when you’re going to be late? Does she give you a curfew? Does she give you cookies and milk after school . . . I mean, work?”
Vader leaned forward, gripping the edge of the table to keep from striking out. He let his narrowed eyes and deadly serious voice get his point across. “I’d advise you to stop. Right now.”
“Or what? You’ll sic your mother on me?”
Vader’s hand whipped out and grabbed him by the throat. Soren’s eyes went wide as beer goggles. The fierce satisfaction of it nearly made Vader dizzy. He wasn’t a violent man, really he wasn’t. Most of the time. “You got anything more to say, let’s go outside and take care of this. Much as I hate this bar, I don’t want to make a mess of it.”
“You see, Cherie?” Soren tugged at Vader’s wrist, but had about as much effect as a mosquito. He squeezed out more words in a thin wheeze. “This is what he’s really like. A big, dumb, violent moron. You can’t be with someone like him. Look, he’s trying to strangle me.”
“If I wanted to strangle you, you’d already be unconscious, instead of just an idiot,” Vader said tightly. “I’m not even breaking a sweat. Now you want to do this or what?”
“No,” said Cherie, distress trembling in her voice. “No fights. Vader, let him go. He’s not worth it.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” Vader muttered. But it felt too good to have the little asshole right where he needed to be—at his mercy.
“I’ll let you go if you apologize to Cherie for ruining her evening out. Then apologize to the Dodgers for not knowing who they are. And you can damn well apologize to me too, for making me put up with your crap.”
Soren narrowed his eyes, and again tried to pry Vader’s fingers away from his neck. He only succeeded in making Vader tighten his grip.
“I’m not hearing any apologies. You ready to go out back and settle this?”
“What are you talking about? No one does that anymore. Does this place even have an ‘out back’? What’s back there, Dumpsters and shit? That’s so old school, dude.”
Vader had to give him credit for hanging in there. “I guess I’m just an old-fashioned guy. Now what’s it going to be? I don’t care either way.”
Soren’s mouth opened and closed as if he were a desperate fish. Vader didn’t look forward to thrashing him; it would be no challenge, and Cherie wouldn’t like it. He’d probably end up putting a scare into him instead of actually fighting him. The guy needed to learn a lesson, and if he had to be the one to administer it, he’d do so. And enjoy every moment. He was mentally readying himself for battle, when Cherie tugged frantically on his sleeve.
“Vader, something’s wrong with Nick,” she cried.
Chapter Nine
Keeping his grip on Soren, Vader swung his head toward Nick, who was slouched sideways against the wall, his body stiff as a plank of wood, his neck arched, and his eyes rolled back so far that only the whites showed. His limbs spasmed and his eyes blinked uncontrollably.
Instantly he dropped Soren. “Get out,” he ordered. “Out of my way.”
Soren scrambled to obey. Vader swept everything—napkins, ketchup bottles, salt packets—off the table, then clambered over it.
“Has he ever had an epileptic seizure before?”
He loosened Nick’s jacket. The T-shirt underneath didn’t constrict his airways, so he left it alone. When he waved his hand in front of Nick’s face and got no response, he knew the guy was having a full-blown seizure. Mentally he began a count, figuring he’d already been seizing about a minute, depending on how far into this episode he’d been when Cherie first noticed
He looked back over his shoulder. Soren appeared to be completely shell-shocked, staring at his friend as if he were watching a horror movie. “Soren! Here!” Vader snapped his fingers, dragging Soren’s attention his way. “Has this happened before? Does Nick have epilepsy?”
“I . . . I don’t know.”
“Not as far as I know,” said Cherie. “He never mentioned it. Should I call 911?”
“Yeah. You’d better.”
If this was his first occurrence, he needed to see a doctor. If Vader was wrong, and it wasn’t epilepsy but some kind of drug reaction, Nick needed an ambulance right away.
“Soren. Has he taken anything? Any sort of drug?” When Soren gaped in confusion, he elaborated. “Ecstasy, meth, crack . . .”
“What? No. He had a quad latte with sprinkles, that’s it.”
Vader nodded. “Back away, you two. I need some space.” In one strong movement, he lifted Nick’s still rigid, spasmodic body off the cramped booth and lowered him to the floor. He turned Nick’s head to the side in case he vomited. When he pulled his hand away, something wet clung to his hand. Blood was dripping down his fingers from the back of Nick’s head.
He glanced up at Cherie, who was speaking into her cell phone. “Tell them suspected epileptic seizure and a head injury. He’s been at it for about three minutes, but I think he’s coming out of it now.”
Nick’s eyes fluttered open. “You got light all around you . . . I’m dead, aren’t I?”
“You’re not dead. You’re having a seizure, but you’re going to be fine.”
“Dead and gone. All y’all are ghosts. Ghosts made of light. Did you know ghosts are made of light? I’m so tired.”
And then he was seizing again, his body racked with more convulsions. “Tell them to hurry,” he ordered Cherie.
“They’re on their way. Is there anything else we can do?”
Vader tilted Nick’s head back to the side, crouching close enough to monitor him, but far enough not to get in the way of a stray limb. “Just keep him from hurting himself. Seizures usually only last a few minutes. Would he have told you if he’d had them before?”
“I think so. I hope so. I don’t know why he wouldn’t.”
He had to give Cherie credit. Although she was clearly frightened, she wasn’t making things more difficult. He couldn’t say the same for Soren, who flopped to the floor with a wad of napkins in his fist. When he tried to stuff them in Nick’s mouth, Vader shot an arm out and pushed him away.
“I read about this,” Soren protested. “We’re supposed to keep him from biting his tongue off.”
“He could choke on those. It’s the worst thing you could do. I know it looks scary, but he’ll be okay.”
“What about his tongue?”
“His tongue’ll be fine too. Just let him be.”
Luckily, the familiar sirens of the San Gabriel Rescue Squad grabbed Soren’s attention just then. As soon as Vader saw the first paramedic, he identified the squad as Paramedic Unit 3.
“Laney,” he greeted the paramedic. “Victim’s been seizing off and on now for about six minutes. He became fully conscious once for about ten seconds. He seemed delusional. Blood on the back of his head. His friends say he’s never seized before, at least that they’ve witnessed, and that he hasn’t taken anything.�
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“These are his friends?”
“Yes. Soren and Cherie.”
Soren jumped to his feet. “I tried to help him but Vader wouldn’t let me.” He waved the wad of napkins in the air.
“You’re fucking lucky he didn’t.” Laney bent next to Nick and felt his pulse. Three more paramedics arrived with a gurney. “Now move back, everyone. Vader, good job. You got blood on you, need help with that?”
“Nah. Where are you taking him?”
“Good Sam. You guys can follow. No napkins though.” She winked at Vader. “Never off the job, huh?”
“You know it. See you in a few.”
In their quick-moving, bustling way, the paramedics whisked Nick onto a gurney and out the door. Vader straightened up, feeling a kink in his back from being hunched over so long. All activity in the bar had stopped; everyone was staring in their direction.
“That’ll teach him to order a chick drink,” Vader said mournfully, adding a comically sad shake of his head for good measure. Someone chuckled, and the tension left the room as if he’d popped a balloon with a pin.
“Is that really appropriate?” Cherie hissed.
“Why not? People need someone to tell them it’s going to be all right. Dumb jokes do the job quicker than anything else.”
She gave him an odd look, as if she was trying to figure him out. He didn’t think there was much to figure out, but whatever floated her boat. He gave her a crooked smile and threw enough bills on the table to cover their drinks.
Cherie was relieved when Vader offered to drive to the hospital. It had been such a shock to see Nick’s head jerk against the wall like that. At first she’d thought he was joking around, then she thought he’d been shot. She’d seen deer twitch that way, after her father or brothers had shot them in the woods. The sight had always upset her, especially because she or one of her sisters would have to field-dress it. It had almost—but not quite—been enough to turn her into a vegetarian.
When she’d heard Vader call Nick’s fit “epilepsy,” she’d been hugely relieved, though Nick might not feel the same way.
“Do you know much about epilepsy?” she asked Vader. He lifted one huge shoulder in a shrug. She noticed that he still had a streak of blood on his T-shirt.
“The seizures usually only last a few minutes. Once he gets a real diagnosis, the doctor will tell him how to handle them. You guys will have to know too. It’s important that the people close to an epileptic are prepared.”
His serious tone matched his demeanor during the entire incident. Truly, it had been a real eye-opener to see Vader in action.
“How’d you know what to do?”
He shot her a slightly amazed look. “I’m a trained paramedic. Just got my recert last month.”
“Oh.” Should she have known that? Probably so. For a moment, she felt ashamed of herself for not educating herself more about what Vader did at work. But the topic always made her anxious. She hated thinking of him in danger. Besides, the more questions she asked, the more he might ask. So she’d kept her curiosity to herself.
“It’s a good thing you came out with us,” said Soren from the backseat. “Without you, I don’t know, man.”
Vader lifted his gaze to the rearview mirror, as if trying to make sure Soren wasn’t being sarcastic. “Glad I could help. But he would have been fine. Someone would have called 911. He wasn’t in any real danger.”
“We don’t really know that yet, right?” Soren’s voice sounded thin with anxiety.
Cherie jumped in. “They said he’d be fine, so we shouldn’t even—”
“Actually, Soren has a point,” said Vader. “Until they do a real workup on him, we don’t even know if it’s actually epilepsy. That’s just my off-the-cuff assessment, and I ain’t even close to being a real doctor.”
Cherie put her hand on his forearm, where ropes of muscle and tendons intertwined. “You got it right,” she said with a sense of complete and utter confidence. “Even the other paramedic thought so. I have no doubt. None whatsoever.” And she really didn’t. Watching Vader move so quickly, so precisely, with so much confidence and knowledge, had probably cured her of ever doubting him again.
“No one gets everything right.” Vader waggled his eyebrows at her as he pulled into the parking lot of the Good Samaritan emergency room. “Even the King.”
For some reason, the sight of Vader’s Elvis-like lip curl, the one he pulled out when he wanted to be especially goofy, reassured her all the way to the soles of her feet. If Vader could joke around, then everything was going to be fine.
The benefits of being with a firefighter kept piling up. Inside the hospital, the charge nurse, who had to be at least fifty, greeted Vader with a wide smile. “Just can’t keep away, can you?”
“If I’d known you were on shift, I’d have been here hours ago.”
“You sweet-talker. But hell, after the night I’ve had, I’ll take your flattery.”
“Rough one?”
“Big accident down past Burtonville. Your guys were on it. Ten injured. No firefighters though,” she added quickly, as Vader tensed. “Now who are you here to see? Besides me, of course.”
“Epileptic seizure at a bar. His name is Nick—”
“His full name is Nicholas Willingham, the Third,” said Cherie. For a moment, the nurse actually seemed surprised to find someone else with Vader. “Has he regained consciousness yet?”
“I don’t know,” said the nurse, after giving her a very hard once-over. “Why don’t you wait here while I find out what I can. Vader, you can come with me if you want. Lord knows you’ve been back there enough times. Hey, did you get a haircut, honey? Looks good. Wait’ll Tracie gets a look at you.”
And she whisked him off through the big double doors that swung open into the forbidden land, leaving Cherie to wonder who Tracie was, and just what she’d unleashed with her barbering skills.
“Well, that takes the cake.” Irritated, Cherie plopped down in an uncomfortable gray molded plastic seat. “We’re his friends, not Vader.”
“If it weren’t for Vader, we’d probably still be waiting for her to notice us,” Soren pointed out, slouching into the seat next to her.
“Hmph.”
“You know what? You’re not going to hear anything bad about Superman out of this mouth for the next . . . oh, I don’t know. At least a week.”
“Superman?”
“It fits. He’s crazy strong, and he has a secret identity.” Soren hunched over his iPhone. A glance at the screen told her he was updating his Facebook page.
“Are you telling everyone Nick had a seizure?”
“Yeah, so?”
She snatched the phone from his hand. “Don’t you dare. He doesn’t even know he had a seizure yet. What is wrong with you?”
“Chill out. He won’t mind.”
“Don’t you take anything seriously? What if he’d died?”
“You are seriously demented.” He shifted one seat away from her, crossed his arms sulkily, and stared at the muted TV, which was tuned to a Jeopardy! episode.
“What did you mean about Vader having a secret identity?”
“You know, he acts like a player. Then he turns into Superman. Now give me my phone back.”
“Fine. But no Facebook until Nick says it’s okay.”
Soren snatched the phone out of her hand, but she didn’t get a chance to make sure he obeyed because just then Vader, surrounded by nurses, came bursting out the double doors. The sight was like something from a music video; time seemed to slow as she watched. He could have been a rock star in the midst of an adoring harem of nurses and a patient in a wheelchair. He towered over them like some sort of sexy giant. They were all gazing in his direction, all smiling with varying degrees of delight combined with exhaustion.
Then time sped back up and he was in front of her, then bending down to look her in the eyes. “You okay?”
“Me?” She snapped out of her trance. “Yes, of course.
How’s Nick?”
“He’s fine. The doctor’s with him now. They want him to spend the night here, so I thought we could go grab some of his stuff for him. Soren, do you mind staying here? He’ll probably want to see you as soon as the doctor’s finished.”
“Yeah. Sure. Is he, like, normal and all?”
“No. Neither of you is what I’d call normal.”
The worry immediately cleared from Soren’s face. Vader really had a gift for this, Cherie realized. She took the hand he offered and let him haul her to her feet.
Back in the truck, she spoke that thought aloud. “How do you do that? How’d you know what to say to Soren so he’d stop worrying?”
“He’ll still worry. But even a short smile can make a big difference. Hospitals are stressful.”
“I know. And he was being a total jerk. He wanted to put Nick on Facebook!” The thought still made her furious. She fully expected Vader to share her disgust.
But he just shrugged. “People react to trauma in different ways. I’ve seen all kinds of crazy-ass shit. Fire’s eating up her house and some lady’s looking for the coupons she clipped that day. A lot of people put up a shield. It looks like they don’t give a shit, but they’re just protecting themselves. That’s his best friend in there and he’s freaking out. Give him some slack.”
She screwed up her face and pretended to check her watch. “About a half hour ago, didn’t you have your hands around his throat, about ready to haul him out back and beat the tar out of him?”
“Yes. That was different. He was being an ass for no reason, except that he needed a good ass kicking. If I had to be the one to do it, I wasn’t about to back down.”
As if drawn by a magnet, she glanced over at him. The lights from the big dashboard silvered his face, molding the strong lines of his features. The haircut really did wonders for his face, bringing out the beauty of his eyes and balancing his muscular jaw with his jutting cheekbones.
“How did Tracie like your haircut?”
“What?”
Four Weddings and a Fireman Page 9
