Unbroken Connection
Page 20
“You don’t need to call us unless she’s in pain.”
“What should I do?”
She stares at me like I’m an idiot. “Give her that ring.”
I look down at Leesie’s ring, uncovered and sparkling, still out in the open.
The nurse puts the pillow down on the left side of the bed. “If you promise to lie really still, you can sleep beside her.”
“Are you sure?”
“You’re her fiancé, aren’t you? You’re the first thing she’ll want to see.”
“But—”
“She’s fine. Just battered. Nothing we can’t fix up.” She looks at Leesie and then at me, sniffs, and leaves. I guess even nurses like a love story.
I stand there—frozen—too tired, too stunned to move. I breathe in and out—free dive cycles. Thirty times. Maybe more. Get all the way to packing.
Leesie stirs, and I’m by her side in a second. Sit on the bed and lean over close to her face. Her eyes move under their lids, but they don’t open. Her top lip is split and swollen, but her bottom lip is unscathed. Perfect. Mine. I bend down and kiss it. Maybe that will bring her back to life.
Her breath stays steady. She’s sound, sound asleep.
I’m dropping with exhaustion. I sit down in the chair, throw the blanket over me, doze a half hour. Wake up sore.
That pillow next to Leesie glows white in the streetlights shining through the window.
She’ll never know. I sit carefully on the bed’s edge, lie down on my side facing her and the machines. An IV runs out of her right hand. She’s got wires and stuff all over the place. I reach out to touch her hair—pull back my hand—prepare to stare at her all night.
A few hours later, her fingertips on my face wake me.
“Babe.”
“Michael.” Her fingers move to my lips. Awkward. It’s her broken hand. She can’t move them much.
I kiss them.
“This is way better than my last dream. You made me go diving and there was all this icky stuff on me weighing me down. I couldn’t get my buoyancy right.”
“Poor, Babe. I’m sorry.”
“But this—you beside me. I’ve dreamed this so many times. It’s my favorite.” She tries to smile, winces.
I lean over and very carefully suck on her bottom lip.
“Hmmm.” Her eyes close. “That feels so real. Like you’re here.”
“I am here.” I sit up and twist around so my face is full in her line of sight.
“No.” Her eyes open, but she stares straight through me. “You’re far away with that beautiful, beautiful girl.”
“That’s all a lie. I’m here.”
She tries to shake her head and gasps.
“Are you in pain?”
Tears escape her eyes. “Don’t go.”
“I’m just going to get the nurse.”
I sit down by Leesie again and cradle her broken hand as the nurse pulls the needle that leads to Leesie’s IV out of her hand, inserts another needle into a plastic port stuck there, and presses down on the syringe.
Leesie’s eyes close and struggle open. The nurse leaves.
“Kiss me again, please.”
I do, and she giggles.
“Rest now.”
“No. You’ll disappear on me.”
“I promise I won’t.” I vow to never let her out of my sight again.
Her eyelids get heavy. She fights to keep them open, keep eye contact with me.
I touch the side of her head that isn’t shaved. “Do you know where you are?”
“Somewhere beautiful with you.” She pats the mattress beside her.
I slide down next to her. She puts her hand on my chest and drifts away.
I watch that little hand the rest of the night.
Chapter 33
MORTALITY
LEESIE’S MOST PRIVATE CHAPBOOK
POEM #68, THE WHOLE TRUTH
Pain mounts and rolls, wakes me from a nightmare.
Michael is stretched out beside me,
my dream made flesh.
“How’d you get here?”
“Time portal.”
“Got to get me one of those.
I think I totaled the pickup.”
“You remember?”
Crashing, smashing. I close my eyes.
“You’re in the hospital. You’re going to
be okay. Don’ try to move much.”
“Why are you here?”
That hope I found on the mountain
ridge tries to rise through layers
of plaster and gauze, needles and
machines, drugs and hot
knives of pain.
Michael slips a gold chain over his
beautiful, perfect, messy-haired head,
opens the latch, and slides
a familiar gold solitaire ring off the links.
“To give you this.” He puts
the ring on the half of my third finger
of my left hand
that isn’t covered in a cast.
The smile I can’t stop hurts my lip.
“You think I’ll say ‘yes’
now that I’m helpless.”
He swallows hard and looks away.
“I just wanted to see it on you.”
“Right.” The flickering vision
that sparkled in my
heart like that ring on my finger
in the dawn’s cold rays
dies. “You have her.”
He looks at me with so
much love I can’t breathe.
“Would you say yes?”
There’s intense pain and
betrayal in his voice
that I don’t understand.
My eyes break away
from the promise in his.
“Not anymore.”
He takes my hand,
cradles it in his,
bows his head over
the cast like it’s sacred.
“There is no her.”
Dear, dear Lord I want
to believe this.
“That’s a huge lie
made up out of nothing.”
The burning in my soul ignites
struggling mountain top hope
and lights my smile again.
He kisses me—fat lip
and all. “Freak, I love you.”
I touch his face to make sure
he’s real, rest my head
back on the pillow, relaxing
as my stone ice heart melts,
in the warmth of Michael’s.
He tells me my injuries like an on duty nurse.
Nightmare images emerge in horrible confusion.
I interrupt. “Where’s Phil? Is he hurt, too?
I hunted post crash and—”
Dreams? Nightmares? They have to be.
“He’s okay—like me—right?
They patched him up, too?”
Michael’s eyes tell me before his mouth
has a chance.
“No.”
That memory isn’t real.
A drug-induced hallucination.
I didn’t kill my brother.
No, no, no.
Michael holds me
best he can. “He’s gone.”
“No. I don’t believe you.”
“You have to.”
Sobs attack, ripping raw throbs
through my wounded body.
Dear God, no! I killed him?
Guttural sounds I didn’t know
I could make come from a place
of terror I’ve never been.
“Please, no!”
I scream,
scream,
scream
into Michael’s shoulder.
A girl I don’t know runs into the room
waving a needle.
“No!” I scream at her.
I break from Michael,
lunge forward.
Nausea induced
by the jagged blades
ripping through my chest, right
shoulder and arm rock me.
I vomit on Michael
and the sheets—still
screaming,
“No,
no,
no.”
Michael’s arms return, his chest
supports my body, his neck pillows
my head.
I clutch his arm, with fingers
I can barely use.
“Don’t leave.”
He strokes my cheek
and neck, soothing, soothing,
and whispers,
“Never.”
Chapter 34
STONES
MICHAEL’S DIVE LOG—VOLUME #10
DIVE BUDDY: Leesie
DATE: 04/25
DIVE #:—
LOCATION: Kellogg, ID
DIVE SITE: Shoshone Medical Center
WEATHER CONDITION: overcast
WATER CONDITION: no rain yet
DEPTH: way, way over my head
VISIBILITY: doesn’t matter
WATER TEMP.: doesn’t matter
BOTTOM TIME: the rest of our lives
COMMENTS:
I’m still holding Leesie when there’s a commotion outside the door.
“I’m sorry.” The nurse speaks so loud she’ll wake Leesie. “You must be mistaken. Her fiancé is already here.”
“Leesie Hunt?” a guy says. “I’m her fiancé.”
Freak.
A dark-haired guy I should remember pushes past the nurse into the room. “Who the hell are you?”
Oh, yeah. It’s coming to me. I point at him. “Hold it. Brazil? Right? You’re home?”
And obviously not into the friend thing, either. “Let go of her now.”
I frown at him. “She told me not to.”
He eases up to the other side of her bed. “Well, I’m telling you to get your hands off her.”
I shift my grip. “I’m Michael. Is it Jason? Jared?”
“Jaron.”
“That’s it.”
The nurse follows him and glances at me—kind of freaked. “Did you lie to me?”
I glance down at the ring on Leesie’s finger. “A little. He’s lying, too. They’re not engaged.”
“How would you know anything?”
“She’s wearing my ring.”
The nurse grins at me and gives Jaron a dirty look. She hears Leesie’s parents in the hall asking about her and leaves us to it.
Jaron and I endure a strained testosterone moment of mutual loathing. Leesie’s mom rushes into the room. “Michael! You made it. We spoke to your grandmother.” She sees Jaron, too, and hugs him.
Her dad comes around to the left side of the bed where I’m sitting with his daughter in my arms and puts his hand on my shoulder. “The nurse told us you’ve been here all night. Thank you, son.” He looks toward Jaron. Holds his hand out to him. “Leesie will need everyone who loves her close.” His eyes go from Jaron to me and back.
Leesie’s mom walks around the foot of the bed. “The nurse says she was awake in the night.”
I nod. “She asked about Phil. I told her. She took it hard.”
Her mother’s face disintegrates. She turns away, hides in Leesie’s dad’s chest. He holds her, rubs her back, stares out the window—fighting for control. “Thank you, son. That must have been heavy going.”
My eyes burn, and I focus on the top of Leesie’s half-shaved head and the fresh-stitched wound that slices across it. It glistens with ointment and blue plastic sutures. She’ll have a bad scar on her forehead.
The nurse returns, needs Leesie’s parents to sign something. Her mom throws some kind of inner switch, swallows the emotion, and gets ready for business. They go out into the hall.
Jaron sits in the chair.
I don’t move. “So I guess you finally came to your senses.”
“Same to you.”
“She backed off—not me.”
“Phil told me about you.” He stares at my sandaled feet. “You can’t understand what infidelity means to us.”
I’m not going to deny lies to this guy. It’s none of his freaking business. “That’s one thing I get.” I try really hard not to let my voice reveal how badly I want to rip his toenails out. “Kind of a universal instinct, bud.”
He leans back and crosses his arms. “Why aren’t you still in Thailand?”
“An old guy at your temple in Hong Kong kicked my butt into gear.”
He sits up. His arms open. “What?”
“I had this feeling something bad was happening.”
He nods. “The accident.”
“No.” I stroke Leesie’s arm. “You.”
He drops his face into one hand and rubs his eyes.
“Tell me.” I’m crazed for asking the enemy, but he’s an expert. “You’ve been converting people for two years. Am I a hopeless case?”
“The Spirit converts. We just find, teach, and love the people along.”
Love? Right. “The Elders I met seemed more concerned with protecting the flock.”
He shakes his head. “Sorry, but I can see that. You don’t look like the average Joe Mormon.”
“Jerks.”
“Probably. There are plenty of jerk missionaries. I babysat a few. But we’re not all idiots.”
“So—in your professional opinion—you think I could do it?”
“You have to let the Lord do it.”
“That’s where it gets tricky?”
“He brought you here. You listened to that.” He frowns. “That says something.”
I actually smile at the guy. “Thanks. It’s big of you to say that.”
He shrugs and folds his arms again. “Not at all. She needs to get over you before she can love me.”
I shake my head. “I’m not letting go of her.”
“I found her in a lot of pain—even before all this. If you caused that, I hope you burn in hell. But if you are her answer, and you’re willing to do what you need to—especially now—my question won’t matter.”
Leesie’s hand, ghostlike, rises to my face. Her fingers rest on my cheek. I turn my head and kiss them.
Jaron leaves. Don’t blame the dude. I wouldn’t want to see her with him.
I bend over her and whisper, “You eavesdropping?”
Her eyes open. “Uh-huh.”
“Should I put you down?”
She starts to shake her head, winces and stops herself. “No.”
“I could get Jaron to take my place.”
“No.”
I kiss her ear.
“I’m thirsty.”
I pick up a cup of ice water with a straw that sits on the table that goes across her bed and hold it up for her.
“Not for that.” She drinks anyway. “Is my breath gross?”
“No.” I put the cup down.
“Good. I need to kiss you.”
“Now?”
“Yeah. I don’t think I can live another minute not kissing you.”
“I’ll have to put you down.”
“Okay.”
I slide out from behind her—ease her onto the pillow.
She puts her hand up to her plastered nose. “Do I look like something that escaped from Skullcrusher Mountain?”
“More classic than that. Bride of Frankenstein.”
“You still have to kiss me.”
I obey—lightly brush the side of her mouth with my lips. “Queen of Frankenstein.”
She closes her eyes. “I am a monster. I killed Phil.” She turns away from my next kiss.
“It was an accident. Accidents happen.”
“Vehicular manslaughter. Reckless homicide. That’s what they call it.”
“You watch too many cop shows.”
“They should put me in jail.”
“Shut up. You promised me a kiss.” I turn her head back towards me.
Her eyes ache with grief, regret, shame, horror.
“I should be stoned.”
“They’ve given you plenty of drugs, babe.”
“No. The Old Testament kind—big rocks. People throw them. Everyone hates me. They should hate me. I hate me. Stoning would be good. Vengeance for all.”
“Freak—you did get brain damage.”
LEESIE’S MOST PRIVATE CHAPBOOK
POEM #69, MANNA LIPS
His lips, like manna, sift
down from heaven.
He’s so, so gentle.
I’m so, so not.
Crazy, frantic, teeth, tongue—
I need to swallow him.
What does it matter now?