by V. L. Brock
So I simply looked her in her pale blue, glassy eyes that were surrounded by yellow, wrinkled flesh, and smiled as I fought the need to squeeze her hand tighter. I wanted to keep her there, with me. I wasn’t ready to let her go. She’d miss so much if I let her leave me–– leave us. When I was clinging onto her hand, I was clinging onto her life; I was making sure she wouldn’t go anywhere. I was being her anchor, holding her to this plane.
“You…” the word traveled on a rasping breath. Her heavy eyes fluttered closed for a moment before opening with a small weighted smile on her lips. “You are so handsome. My handsome, smart, talented boy. You’re going to break some hearts, you know.”
I felt her thumb trying to graze my palm when I muttered for her to stop. She was going to wear herself out too much with these long speeches.
“No, you listen to me. You listen to your Ma. I have never been so proud of anyone in my life. The day will come when you’ll fall in love. And when you do, you love her with your final breath. Just like me and your Da. Love isn’t about wasted chances, it’s about the chance of a future, understand? Promise me…”
I didn’t want to think about life without her, I couldn’t see past what was happening there and then to the happiest of moments, let alone wanting to see those milestones in my life, which she wouldn’t be able to witness. Reluctant, I muttered, “I promise.”
“Come here,” she whispered. So like a good son, I inched closer to her, practically folding myself over the bed. With a deep breath, her brow crumpled as she lifted her weakened arm and cradled my cheek, looking me in the eyes. “I love you, Gerry, my son. You never forget that.”
I hated where the conversation was heading. It felt so final, and that thought alone stripped any strength which I possessed from my body. Just as she used to when I was a lad, she dried a tear from my cheek. “No tears, Ger. You’re stronger than that.”
“Ma, stop please. Is there anything I can get for you?”
With a sweet, relaxing smile, she dropped her hand from my face and lulled her head further back into the stack of pillows propping her up in the big bed. “Play something soothing for me. You’re so talented, Gerry. Don’t let it go to waste.”
Of all things, she had to choose that.
I reached around the back of the chair, and fetched the orange guitar then got into position back on the edge of the chair. “What shall we play?”
She smiled sleepily, “Our song.”
As I sat on the seat, my head dropping to study the cords, I nodded my head and began to strum away, my eyes closed:
“Just give me your hand,
Just give me your hand,
And I’ll walk with you,
Through the streets of our land.
If you give me your hand,
Just give me your hand,
And come along with me.
By day and night,
Through all struggle and strife,
And beside you, to guide you,
Forever my love.
For love’s not for one,
But for both of us to share,
For our country so fair,
For our world and what’s there.”
Licking my lips, I steadily let my eyes reopen and set the instrument on the floor, before reaching out to her frail hand. She didn’t move. I looked over her face, her eyes were shut, her mouth curved. I couldn’t see any movement from beneath the lids. Not even her eyelashes were fluttering.
“Ma…Ma…” panic-stricken, I didn’t know what to do, so I nudged her and watched her chest closely to see it rise. It didn’t. She was frozen. “Ma…MA!” I freed myself from the seat and hovered over my mother’s lifeless body, still calling her name, while her words revolved around my mind. I love you, Gerry, my son. You never forget that.
I wouldn’t forget, but words and sentiment wasn’t what I needed. “MA, please, Ma, don’t leave me. I need you…I need you…please…come back…come back…”
******
“Walker…Walker…”
Her voice was a distant calling, but when I felt her gentle hand against my shoulder, I looked up at her from on my knees, shards of the last memory of my Ma clutched in my hands. It took a moment or two before I realized she was holding my phone against her ear.
As if my night couldn’t get any fucking worse, she opened her mouth. “It’s Laurie.”
My world stopped moving and crumbled before me. I felt my body shaking, my breathing fast and heated. I didn’t need to ask her questions, my jaw and eyes were already demanding the answers. As I pushed away from the floorboards, I reared up, Kady’s eyes following me every inch, causing her head to tip back.
“Her apartments been smashed up, too.”
Scaring her was the last thing I wanted, but I still noticed her flinch when I snatched the handset from her clutch. “Laurie?”
“Walker, what do I––?”
“Don’t do anything; just get your arse over to my place, NOW!” I spat down the speaker, still hearing Laurie calling my name as I forced the phone into Kady’s grasp.
“Walker, what are you doing?” she called from behind. As I rushed to the door with heavy feet, she called again, “Where are you going?”
On the threshold, I paused and glanced over my shoulder. She looked terrified, but I couldn’t stay there, and I knew Laurie was on her way. “Lock the door if you can, don’t answer it to anyone other than Laurie.”
Before she could get her final protesting words out, I was already sprinting down the stairway, taking them three steps at a time.
I sunk into the bench seat of my truck and forced the key into the ignition as I peeked up at the fourth-story bay window. I could see Kady’s shadow in the window, watching me from high like some guardian angel.
I pulled out, turning west. When my foot met the floorboard, I secretly sniggered to myself. It wouldn’t be me that needed the guardian angel tonight.
Within ten minutes, I was spitting out, “Come on you stupid fuckin’ piece of shite,” when the lights turned red alongside Bricksdale Square. My leg bounced while my anger rose and the steering wheel was DeLaney’s throat, my knuckles turning white with force.
If he thought he was going to get away with this, then he was the delusional one who deserved to be locked up in Pine-Fucking-Wood. He had no fucking idea of what he’d just done.
Reeving the engine, the lights turned green, and I sped down the road, taking the first right, and onto the street of ridiculously colored houses. My headlights were turned off once I slowed to a stop alongside the only white house on the block.
For once in my life, I didn’t try to restrain the anger and rage which made my body tremble––the same anger and rage that was the catalyst for too many years of my own destruction. Instead, I let it control me. When I opened my eyes, I unraveled the beads from the rearview mirror and held them in my hand, against my lips. In the eye of the storm, and the solitude of my truck, I did something I had only done twice in nine years. I prayed.
Looping the beads around my neck, I took the cross in my hand and kissed my knuckles before looking up at the house through the driver’s window. “In Nomeni Patri, Et Fili, Et Spiritus Sancti,” I muttered, tucking the beads into my shirt, and as I crunched my knuckles, I took my first steps into Hell.
Chapter Sixteen
Kady
I watched him from the window as he pulled off at lightning speed. The rage he felt easy for all to witness in the swift and hastiness of his driving.
I had no idea what to do. Should I tidy up? Should I leave everything as it is and call the police? My head was throbbing, my heart racing. How could such a great day be turned into complete and utter shit is beyond me. I finally decided on having a much needed drink, hoping that a dose of alcohol would ease the knot of trepidation and fear forming in the pit of my stomach, as my thoughts tethered to Walker’s departure, continued to make my body quake.
I was uncapping a bottle of Bud from the refrigerator when I
heard a knock at the door. With haste, I made my way down the hallway and into the disorganized living room. Yet, my steps took on a degree of stealth I hadn’t known I was capable of, as I approached the apartment door.
“Kady, its Laurie.”
My shoulders drooped and a sigh was loud and potent even through the wooden barrier. As I unlatched the door and pulled it open, Laurie practically lunged at me with her arms spread.
“Thank God you’re okay,” I spoke into her hair, before loosening my arms from around her neck and pulling her further inside, closing the door behind her.
“Kady, it’s a fucking mess. Everything has been smashed: my TV, my glass carriage clock, mirrors. My couch has a huge gash along the backrest. Don’t get me started on the kitchen and my bedroom.” She took a moment to scan the area which we were standing in. Had it not been for the lack of possessions in Walker’s apartment, I knew it could have been much worse.
Offering the shaking, petite brunette something to calm her nerves, she nodded her head and murmured her thanks. By the time I uncapped a bottle and made my way back to her, she was squatting in the heart of the barren room where splinters of guitar wood lay in a pile.
“Here,” I handed her the drink. She rose and took it with thanks. “Laurie, I’m scared of what he’s going to do.”
“Liam?”
I couldn’t care less what happened to Liam. I’d order him dead if I could, at least that way I’d know where he was. “No. Walker.”
Taking a draw of her beer, she set it on the floor before approaching the mismatched chair, setting it on its legs in its rightful position. “Kady, you have no idea how badly he wanted to hurt Liam, knowing exactly what he was doing to you. He couldn’t hurt him or warn him off because it would’ve made things worse for you. He couldn’t go to the police because it would’ve been his words against yours and Liam’s. But right now, as of tonight”––she walked toward me and set her hands on my shoulders––“Shit just got personal.”
“I don’t understand.”
The small derisive snort which was ousted from her nose was met by the upturn of her lips. Her hazel eyes were the hardest I’d ever seen. “Intentionally or not, DeLaney has just signed his death sentence.”
Those words should have brought comfort. But comfort was the furthest thing I felt. My stomach knotted painfully while my heart clogged in my chest. As twisted as it may have sounded, Liam was the life source, Walker and I were merely vital organs attached to him. If anything happened to Liam, we wouldn’t survive.
Why not you ask?
Because one of two things would happen: Walker would be in jail or dead.
We cleaned up the majority of the apartment, placing the furniture the right way up and back into its rightful place, and brushed the shattered glass into the dustpan.
For the eighth time in forty-five minutes I looked out of the window, examining the night as the sound of sirens in the distance passed by at speed. Regardless of how hard I tried, shifting the mass of worry lining my stomach as I considered that each fleeting blare was intended for Walker, proved impossible. When I saw the truck pulling up outside, my heart stopped and my worry abated. I watched as Walker slammed the door shut, rounded the hood and rested against the passenger side door. He struck his lighter and lit the cigarette that was being held between his lips.
Needing nothing more than to get to him, I rushed from the window, dropping the dustpan on the coffee table as I passed. Laurie called my name once I reached the apartment door.
“He’s back,” I muttered from over my shoulder and ran down the stairs as quickly as my legs could manage. I just wanted to hold him in my arms, and the sheer desperation of that one simple gesture alone, had me admitting to my worst fear: I didn’t think I’d ever get the chance to again.
The sidewalk turned to quicksand, my hasty steps to get to my man, halted. I was standing immobile taking in the sight of him. With his head down, his focus aimed at the sidewalk, all I could see was his white shirt, disheveled and bloodied. I swallowed harshly and fought for breath when he lifted his head, his dark eyebrows rising and arched as he peeked up at me with his timid expression which never failed to make my heart swell.
I summoned every ounce of energy, and my steps toward him, were rushed once again. On instinct, my arms laced around his neck and tears I had been warding off for the last forty-five minutes, were freed into his collar.
“I thought…I thought…”
“Shush, it’s alright, darlin’. I’m here.”
I pulled away and with both hands framing his face, he blew the smoke out of his lips through a sideways gap. He was covered in blood. His right eyebrow had a gash through it, causing more blood to trickle down the side of his face, the same blood trails were made from his lip and nostril.
“What about all this blood? Are you––”
The cherry on the tip of the cigarette glowed in the night as he took another drag, his hand resting on my hip. “No need to worry, darlin’, it’s not my blood.”
I couldn’t believe that he was there with me and that he was okay. Tears of gratitude and love gushed down my cheeks as I threw myself into his arms again, sobbing, “I love you,” into his shirt.
“I love you, too. Can you do me a favor, Kady?” pulling back, I nodded for him to continue. “Can you go inside, get me a beer ready. I’ll be in in a minute; I just need to cool down.”
“Of course, please, hurry up.” I reached up onto my toes, and totally uncaring of the amount of blood staining his face and trickling from his lips, I pressed a kiss to his mouth, before turning around and seeing Laurie in the doorway. “You coming up?”
“In a minute,” she responded while I pushed my way through the doors, feeling safe knowing that he’s was back with me, and relatively unharmed.
Laurie
Six gradual steps felt like a mile. I crossed my arms over my chest in a bid to fend off the late night chill before I opened my mouth. “Are you okay?” I asked him during which he took the stick from his mouth and flicked the ash onto the sidewalk.
“I need you to do something for me, Laur. And I need you to keep it a secret otherwise it won’t work.”
More secrets? Don’t get me wrong, I loved Kady like a sister, but since I stepped into her life, all I seem to be doing is keeping secrets, whether it is for her or from her. Either way, my life seems to be one giant trunk filled with secrets nowadays. “Go on.”
When he peeked up at the black sky speckled with silver stars, I knew he was having trouble telling me whatever he was about to tell me. By then, I was standing toe-to-toe with him; crimson soaked his white shirt, causing the material to cling to his body.
“Walker, what is it? You’re scaring me.”
“I can’t take any risks in what could happen now. I need Kady safe––”
“Walker, regardless of if I said I’d go with her, that woman will not go anywhere without you, I can bet my life on that.”
His cigarette was an inch from his mouth as he muttered, “That’s why I need your help,” then his lips wrapped around the butt once again.
Threads of my hair weaved around my fingers as I fisted my hands through it in exasperation, freeing and equally exasperated sigh. “What do you––” The hardness in his eyes and firm-set of his profile had me halting any further words. I shook my head, “No, Walker you can’t––”
With one swift thrust from the side of the truck, he pushed himself straight and stepped into me. “I have no choice. I’d do that every day for the rest of my life if it means that I can keep her safe,”––the flick of his nails resounded through the darkness when he flicked the remnants of the cigarette in the opposite direction, and his smoky, bloodied hands were instantly framing my face––“Please, cousin. I can’t think of any other way.”
Kady
Walker was perched on the edge of the couch, his feet shoulder-width apart, his elbows on his knees.
Despite my relentless questions of what hap
pened, he remained unusually silent for him. Laurie’s demeanor wasn’t much better than Walker’s either. She was silent, curling a lock of hair around her finger with a scowl cemented in place.
“I didn’t want to touch the guitar,” I murmured, my voice getting lost to the void in the room.
A hefty breath left the man on the couch beside me. I watched intently as he remained stock-still, studying the gathering of splintered wood and strings in the heart of the apartment.
From my position on the arm of the sofa, I leaned into Walker and rubbed his shoulder with a soothing quality. “We can buy another one––”
“It’s not that easy, darlin’.” Gradually, with a twist of his head, his attention was torn from the instrument to me. “It’s the memories it held.”
I wouldn’t argue with that. The pain and loss cast in his eyes from under hooded lids, was the most melancholic I had seen. From the arm of the seat, my body slipped down to meet the cushions below. Walker’s neck was circled by my arms as I held him close to me, offering a form of reassurance, letting him know that I could understand his loss without sounding patronizing.
“We need to get you cleaned up.” I went to lift my body from the seat once I pulled away. With his hand in mine, he shook his head. “What do you mean, ‘no’?”
“Things could have been worse, Kady. Please, I just want to hold you.” Smiling, I pressed my body into his, making us both to fall back into the couch. I didn’t care about the blood staining his shirt, I didn’t care about the smoke on his breath or the blood I tasted as I kissed him fiercely.
I didn’t care about anything, but us.
“You can stay here for a few nights okay, cuz. You’re not going home yet,” was the last thing I heard, other than Walker’s beating heart under my ear, as I drifted off into a disturbing sleep.
Four heavy, brutish thumps against the apartment door started me awake. Gasping for breath, my heart practically jumped out of my ribcage.
“Shush…it’s alright, darlin’.” Walker smiled, soothing me from the edge of the couch with his hand on my knee, a silver cloud of smoke bleeding from his lips in a weightless dance.
