by C. S. Won
“Well, you know, a little lifting got my—”
She threw herself into him. “Of course I’ll marry you,” she said, voice muffled against his body. Jae wrapped his arms around her and gave her a gentle rub, placing a hand to her head as she began to cry again. Gabe stood up and took his cell phone out, taking a picture of the moment.
“Wanted to do things right, after what happened the last couple times,” Jae said.
“I was half expecting a thunderstorm to come in and interrupt us again.” She pulled away from him, cheeks red with dried tears and smeared makeup. “You do seem to have a knack for bad moments.”
“Well, you know what they say: third time’s the charm, right? And now with my bad luck finally behind me, maybe we can start looking ahead toward the future.”
“Kids?”
“Sure, why not? An army of kids filling our home with laughter and love.”
Madeline smiled, putting a hand on her stomach.
Chapter 10
Caroline Masters dragged her feet, counting the number of times her sneakers squeaked as they slid across the floors. Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-one. A trivial task, something she never used to do, but it was a habit she developed to help take her mind off of Adam Erste, the malcontent she was assigned to care for. The very thought of him filled her with a special kind of dread, and it took everything she had to resist the urge to turn around and make a run for it. Why did they have to assign her to him? Of all the nurses here, why was she selected to be one of the unlucky few assigned to be his babysitter? Did she somehow offend an administrator? Was this punishment for some vague infraction she incurred in the past? She didn’t understand. Why did it have to be her? Why?
Before her assignment with Adam, her days used to be fulfilling. Genuine enjoyment was a part of her work, and she actually looked forward to each new day. But now? Nothing but misery. She hated waking up in the morning, rolling out of bed, putting on her uniform, driving the commute to the hospital and looking at this ugly, creepy, disfigured, burnt man in the face while she brought him his food or changed his clothes or endured one of his many abusive rants.
Adam Erste ruined her life. She hated everything about the man and wished he would go away.
Of course, she wasn’t the only one who felt this way. Nobody liked him, and many had expressed similar sentiments about him. Even Nancy Sturgens, one of the kindest, most patient nurses Caroline knew had been whittled down by Adam’s abrasiveness, her ever-present smile vanished from her face and replaced by a hard frown.
Caroline stopped outside of Adam’s room and paused. A long, drawn-out sigh escaped from her lips. She closed her eyes, trying to beat down the burning hatred growing in her core. No choice. She had a job to do, no matter how much she hated it. The urge to quit was alluring, but she had to resist the temptation as she had bills to take care of and student loans to pay off. She pulled her hair back into a knotted bun and put on the widest smile she could muster, fake as it was. Endure, that was all she had to do—that was all she could do. Endure and hope the hours went by quickly so she could escape this hell and go home.
The door creaked as she entered.
If there was one thing she hated more than dealing with Adam Erste, it was the heat in his room. It was like a sauna with the settings turned all the way up, oppressive in just about every way imaginable. She hadn’t done anything of note since walking in, and already sweat was forming in every crease and fold of her body, acting as an adhesive between her skin and her uniform.
Delia Walker was already in the room with Adam, standing next to him as she jotted down some readings on a clipboard. Her hair, pulled far back from her scalp, was matted and frizzled, and every so often she had to wipe away the film of sweat shining on her face, droplets falling from her chin and collecting into a puddle on the floor around her. She turned to Caroline with weary eyes, wearing a frown that surpassed the width of her face by an inch or two.
“Hey,” Delia said.
“Hey,” Caroline returned, opening a closet and removing a fresh blanket and some fresh bed sheets.
“Where’s my greeting, Carol?” Adam asked.
Caroline didn’t even bother. She learned that it was best to avoid speaking with him, to only respond when it was absolutely necessary. It was difficult—not to mention unprofessional—but it had to be done for the sake of her sanity.
“Still giving me the cold shoulder? Fuck you, then,” he said.
Caroline grimaced. Provocations from Adam came often, and today appeared to be no different. Just another body blow she had to endure if she wished to get through the day without losing her mind.
“My ex-wife gave me the cold shoulder during our last year together, that rotten whore. Treated me like I was wallpaper, something that was just there and not to be noticed.” The room grew noticeably hotter. Caroline tugged at her collar. “The day after our divorce she was already with another man, a firefighter from a different station. Later on, I found out she had been fucking him for about seven months prior, sometimes in the very bed we used to share.” He looked at Caroline with those two white circles in that melted, burnt face of his. “You remind me of her. Every time I see you, I just want to throttle you and strangle that slender little neck of yours.”
Caroline gripped the blanket and bed-sheet in front of her like a shield. This was the first time that Adam had ever threatened her and it scared her. His routine usually centered on petty insults and rude remarks, but they never crossed the line of threats. This was new, and it unsettled her.
Adam laughed. The sound rattling from his throat resembled more of a choking sound than a guffaw. “I’m just fucking with you, Carol.”
That didn’t make her feel any better, and she only gripped the blanket and bed-sheet tighter, the material bunching up in her fists. Delia looked spooked, too, or maybe just really tired. Caroline couldn’t tell.
“Well, what do you want, Carol?” Adam shrugged his shoulders. “You just come here to look stupid as usual?”
She shook her head. Come on. Don’t let him rattle you like that. You’re stronger than that, girl. “No,” she said, clearing her throat. “I’m here to change your sheets.”
“And she speaks! It’s a miracle.” Adam feigned celebration. “Why are we changing sheets already? You changed them out a couple of days ago.”
She approached the bed, courage gathering up in her chest. Adam leered at her with that disgusting, horrible face of his. “It’s standard procedure. We do it to prevent grime from building up. Clean sheets are always better than dirty ones.”
“What a mind-blowing axiom. Who said that one? Plato?”
She ignored that. “Delia, can you bring the wheelchair?”
Delia nodded. She moved to the corner of the room where the wheelchair was located and rolled it over to bedside. Adam sighed. “Fuck, how annoying.” He made a move to get up—dragging his legs underneath him, tucking his elbows at his side—being slow and deliberate about it. Delia moved next to him to assist, placing an arm on his back, but Adam shrugged her off, giving her an evil look. “Get off me. I don’t need your help, bitch.”
If it weren’t for us, you’d be crying like a baby, Caroline thought. Judging by the frown on Delia’s face, she was probably thinking the same thing too. But she kept quiet, standing off to the side while she waited for Adam to get into the wheelchair. He took his sweet time doing it too, making a show of it almost. Caroline sighed. She couldn’t understand why Adam was acting like this. She’d seen him moving about as easily as anyone else, maneuvering with surprising agility and ease. There was no reason for him to move so slowly, unless he was just being incorrigible, which seemed plausible.
The wheelchair sighed as Adam dumped himself into the seat. Delia gripped the handles of the chair and began to push him next to the window, but he protested. “What are you doing? Put me next to the TV.” Delia obliged with a sigh, turning Adam around and rolling him next to the TV. “Now get
away from me.” He flicked his hand, waving her off. Delia sighed again and did as she was told. Adam leaned sideways in his seat to turn the TV on, tuning it to a channel of his liking.
Delia went to the other side of the bed and helped Caroline replace the old sheet, folding it into a neat square and placing it to the side. Much to her surprise, the sheet was cleaner than she thought they would be. Usually, there was a dusting of flaked skin littering his bed, bits and pieces of small scab fragments and hardened skin chips covering his blanket and pillow. Had he finally stopped shedding? Would be nice, if true. Dusting off the remnants he left behind was such a tedious task.
A loud crash caught Caroline’s attention, and she looked up to see Adam kicking at the TV stand, television set shaking a dangerous dance, inching closer to the edge each time his foot met the base. “I can’t believe they’re showing this chink fucker again.” Adam slapped the wheel of his chair, clearly displeased at what was being shown on TV. He kicked the stand again, face flushed with anger.
Caroline rushed over to him, hands raised in a plea for him to stop. “What are you doing?”
He pointed at the TV. “They obsess over this guy like he’s something special, but he’s not. He’s a fucking nobody. Fawning over a fucking Asian, how pathetic.”
She looked at the TV and saw footage of a firefighter, covered head to toe in ash, running out of an apartment fire with a little girl in his arms. The little girl, despite the raggedness of her appearance, was in much better shape than her rescuer. It was older footage. Caroline had already seen something similar a few days ago, but she never got a chance to find out who the rescuer was and was curious to know.
“Who is that?” Caroline asked.
“It’s Jae!” Delia said.
“A loser,” Adam tried to correct her.
“Who?” Caroline asked again.
“Jae Yeon. He was the other firefighter a couple floors down. He was in that coma. See, there he is,” Delia said. They showed a picture of him smiling into the camera, confirming Delia’s assertion.
“Whoa, you’re right,” Caroline said. They never assigned her to him, but she heard from the others how pleasant he was to work with—far more than the creep she was assigned to now.
“God, I love him,” Delia said.
“What did you say?” Adam asked.
“The guy on TV. You know him, right?”
“Yeah, I know him. He’s a piece of shit.” His eyes darkened. “He tried to kill me.”
“I can’t get enough of him.” Delia gave a small laugh.
A scowl dug into Adam’s disfigured face. “You’re getting wet over this loser? Believe me when I say the man does not stack up to the legend.”
“I don’t care; he’s great.”
Caroline chuckled. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were in love.”
“You wouldn’t be wrong.” Delia laughed again.
“Sorry to burst your bubble, but he already has a girlfriend. He will never be with you, no matter how hard you wish for it.” Adam appeared to take great pleasure in saying that, a smile finding its way onto his lips, perhaps thinking that dropping such a bombshell would devastate her.
“Sadly, you’re right.” Delia frowned, and then shrugged her shoulders. “But I’m not mad. His girlfriend is gorgeous. They make a good match. I even heard he proposed to her.”
There was silence. “When?” Adam finally asked, in a hushed tone.
“A couple days ago. My sister is friends with the lucky girl.”
“Sorry to hear that, Delia,” Caroline said.
“It’s fine. I didn’t have a chance, anyways.” Delia laughed again. “I heard they were going to Restaurant Eugene later tonight, to celebrate their engagement.” She sighed and looked at the TV with a certain longing.
“Really? Wow, fancy place from what I hear. Now I’m getting jealous.”
The room grew even warmer, more so than what Caroline was accustomed to. Delia noticed it, too, rolling up the sleeves of her uniform to reveal skin greasy with sweat. Caroline went over to the window and threw the panels open, but even the winter cold seemed to bring little relief from the fever.
“They’re getting married?” Adam asked.
Delia and Caroline turned to look at Adam. He had his head down, so it was difficult to see any expression, but Caroline could see the white flash of gritted teeth and the curves of a hard frown. His hand was gripped tight against the armrest of his wheelchair.
“They’re fucking getting married?” He threw himself from the wheelchair, legs kicking at the air, eyes wild with rage. He grabbed the television, pulling at it until he severed its cord from the power outlet, and hurled it across the room the best he could with just his one hand. It shattered against the wall in a shower of chipped plastic and splintered glass. Caroline screamed and ducked beneath the window.
“How could she fucking marry him?” Adam kicked his wheelchair away, knocking it over onto its side, one wheel rotating in a squeaking circle. A bandaged fist rose into the air and came crashing down on a nearby drawer in a deafening thud. Adam bellowed out his fury. “How could she do that to me?”
Delia ran over to him and grabbed his shoulders. “You need to calm down, Mr. Erste. You’re too—”
“Don’t touch me!” He took a swing at her, his charred lips curled into a snarl, twisting his body to administer a quick, back-handed blow. Delia spun back, hand to her cheek, a patchwork of anger and hurt and surprise on her face.
“What the hell!” Caroline said.
“How dare you hit me,” Delia said. Her cheek swelled into a bright shade of red. “How dare you touch me, you son of a—”
Fire consumed her in a violent detonation, a great roar echoing outward, flaming red coils scorching off her skin in a wild dance, casting a swirl of seething colors across the room. Caroline reared back, gasping, as did Adam. Both raised their arms to protect their faces, gawking at the scene that had suddenly, without warning, unfolded before them. Delia staggered back and let loose a horrible, high-pitched shriek of pain. Her screaming mouth was a black hole in the fire eating away at her face. She fell to the floor and grabbed the nearest thing she could—the corner of the bed-sheet—and yanked it toward the ground with her. The sheet ignited at her touch. From there, it spread quickly, dispersing itself and painting portions of the room in a boiling mural of red and orange. She crawled toward Adam, still screaming, reaching out with a flame-emblazoned arm in an appeal for help, but Adam, eyes wide with astonishment, took a few steps away from her. He shunned her as if she were some vagrant that he wanted nothing to do with. She then turned to look at Caroline with eyes that were no longer there, her face a featureless thing. But her strength had already faded, her arm falling to the ground, unmoving, and her screams settled into wet, gurgling sounds. She rested her head on top of her arm, as if she were about to take a nap, and after a final shudder, grew still. The fire continued to burn, steadfast and unrelenting.
Caroline made no effort to stamp out the fire that consumed her friend. Paralyzed by fear, all she could do was stare at the flames twisting before her. She wasn’t even sure what had just happened. One minute Delia was fine, and then the next she was suddenly encased in a great conflagration, as if someone had doused her with gasoline and lit the match
The sprinklers above her came alive, jolting her from her daze and drowning the room in a downpour of cool water that at last brought some relief from the heat. Delia’s fire wilted, dwindling until nothing was left but a cord of lingering smoke. With the fire stricken away, all that remained was steaming flesh as black as oil, naked but for a few strips of burnt clothing sticking to the husk. Delia’s legs and arms were turned inward into a fetal position, and her mouth was stretched open in a silent scream. Blacked teeth showed in her gaping maw. Vapor drifted out of her eye sockets in thin, ashen strips.
Caroline wanted to vomit and nearly did, her gag reflex overwhelming her. The events occurred with such terrifying
speed that they left her disoriented. Her mind was still trying to process what had just transpired. Adam, however, seemed unbothered. The corpse of his nurse appeared to be of no concern to him. He ignored it, not even sparing so much a glance. He stood as he was, water trickling down the grooves of his mangled skin, transfixed by his own hand like it was some sort of lost treasure. Delia gaped at him. What was he so fascinated by? Did he not care or realize that one of his nurses was lying at his feet, dead and burned?
A rush of running footsteps echoed outside the door, which swung open to allow entry to a small group of doctors, nurses, and security guards. “What’s going on here? Who was . . .” The sentence trailed off into hushed silence. One by one, stunned faces looked at the burnt corpse laid out before them, motionless in a shallow film of water.
“Oh my God.” A nurse turned away, heaving for breath, face turning pale. A doctor stepped forward, feet making ripples in the water.
“What happened? Whose body is this?” He asked.
“Delia, she was on fire.” Caroline said it with monotone bluntness. She stood on shaky knees. “I’m not sure how it happened. She was fine, but then all of a sudden she just went up in flames, almost as if she just . . . spontaneously combusted.”
“Spontaneously combusted? What are you talking about?”
“I don’t know how else to describe it. It’s the closest thing I can correlate it to.” Caroline looked at Adam, who was still staring at his hand, and wondered if he had something to do with it. He had, after all, slapped her right before she burned up, so it was possible he might have done something to her, but a quick study revealed no weapons in his possession. Then what could have caused it?
The doctor shook his head, his face expressing utter disbelief. He looked at Adam. “How is the patient? Is he okay?”
“I think so. The fire didn’t catch him.”
“Escort him to another room. I need to call the police and have them investigate what just happened here.”
Caroline hoped Adam would be cooperative enough to comply. She approached him, resisting the immense temptation to take a look at Delia’s body, and as she moved closer she heard him whispering something under his breath, lips moving rapidly without pause. She came in closer. He was repeating: “I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to . . .” He didn’t mean to do what? What was he talking about? She placed a hand on Adam’s wet shoulder.