by Meli Raine
“HOLY FUCK!” John shouts.
“I knew my live feed would come in handy some day!” Tiffany gushes.
“WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?” John screams.
And then it comes together for me. Tiffany’s “camera work.”
Sexcam work.
“I run a live streaming webcam show from my house,” she explains, standing slowly, walking over to a fern and waving her good arm. “Before Drew came over, I made sure my live feed was set up so they could all cheer me on as I filmed my big break.” She blows a kiss at the fern. “Hi, guys! I love you! Thank you for taking good care of me!”
Tiffany looks at her bloody arm, and drops like a sack of potatoes into a dead faint.
“How did they get my secret video?” John screams, his voice climbing into high registers of the doomed.
“Your video?” I ask, balancing ten thousand threats on the head of a pin as I try to get him to keep talking just long enough for me to disarm him.
Lindsay looks at Jane, then grins maniacally at John. She has blood in her teeth.
“Jane did that. Hacked your system. Funny how a ‘dumb bitch’ outmaneuvered you.” She makes a weird, over-the-top huffing sound. “Two dumb bitches.”
She looks at me. “I told you I had a plan.”
My God.
She’s luminous.
John looks around the room as sirens peal in the distance.
He’s at his most dangerous now. I have to act.
He pauses. Catches my eye.
And then he pulls the trigger on the gun pointed at Lindsay.
Chapter 10
Lindsay
I think that memory is like a mother.
It protects you when you need to be sheltered from a cruel world.
It forces you to face reality head on and develop a tougher skin.
It tells you that all that really matters is being kind and good and decent.
And reminds you that you are more than the sum of all your parts.
The bullet rips into my shoulder as I drop to the ground, sensing what John’s going to do before he does it, a mantra of Fuck no you don’t whipping through my mind like blood in a centrifuge. I fall on poor Jane, who is a warm lump under me.
A body – Drew! -- arcs over me, just like Superman, arms outstretched, torso elongated like he’s faster than a speeding bullet.
Except Drew isn’t.
The bullet got me.
Drew crashes into John, who falls on top of me. John’s hand goes to my throat, then all his weight is off me. He’s dangling in air like a puppet, his head snapping to the right at an unusual angle. A horrible, deep crunching sound vibrates into my back teeth. How does he do that? It’s like a special effect, only this isn’t CGI and when John falls to the ground, Drew is behind him, arms pumped, face berserk and ferocious, eyes on me.
That’s where my memory steps in and says enough.
Wood splinters in the distance and then the room is filled with men in black and heat, an impossible number of guns, and they’re all crowding around us, Silas and Mark Paulson barking orders, Drew screaming my name as the men in black fatigues cover the room with their red lasers.
If I weren’t in pain, so hot, so cold, so wet, so tired, the bouncing red dots would make me laugh.
And then I’m off Jane, on the couch, a blanket on me, someone pressing hard on my shoulder, making me scream. Drew’s above me, his mouth moving but the words aren’t there. Who pressed his mute button? Someone turned off all the sound in the world.
Stretchers appear in my peripheral vision and then the warm blanket is off me, cold air stinging the lava-hot part of my soul. I don’t have a shoulder anymore, just a place where the heat all lives. I open my mouth to scream but I stop, bracing myself.
Then I exhale, so slowly it’s like blowing through a straw.
And I don’t care.
The pain doesn’t matter.
Drew’s staring intently into my eyes but I can’t look back. It hurts. He thinks I’m here but I’m not. I left. I left back in that bedroom with my mouth on John’s, his lips a sick caress of the damned.
I close my eyes.
“We’re losing her!” Drew says.
Are you? You’re losing me?
Good.
I don’t want to be found.
Drew
I let Paulson grab my arms and pull me back only because the med crew is there to put oxygen on Lindsay, to stem the flow of blood from the gunshot wound, to save her.
“You saved her,” Paulson says in a voice meant to shake me out of my reactive mode.
“She’s unconscious!”
“She’s in shock,” he says, shifting to a calm civilian tone. “She’s not going to die, Drew.” He looks pointedly at Stellan’s body, the section from the waistband of his jeans to mid-thigh a blanket of blood, the handle of the knife poking out from his crotch like an obscene joke. He looks like an extra from Bad Santa. “Unlike some people in this room, she won’t die.”
I follow his gaze and watch Stellan’s chest.
No movement.
He’s definitely dead.
Jesus. Lindsay did that. I watched her stab him. I helped by kicking the knife home. There is a reservoir of pure strength inside her. I’ve always known it, but to watch it in action is a form of strange beauty.
They’re all dead. All three of our tormentors. A group of SWAT officers, Mark, and Silas start talking to me in serial, each question too loud, too swift, too perfectly pointed for me to focus.
The medical personnel wrap Lindsay in thick blankets and prepare to move her to a backboard. Once she’s secured, they put her on a stretcher, one person applying pressure to the gunshot wound, the others pulling her away.
I gravitate toward her.
I meet a wall of men.
I go around them.
Mark’s hands are on my shoulders, rock solid, unyielding. His hold communicates a distinct message.
You’re not going anywhere, Drew.
A high-pitched whine fills my ears, an industrial sound like a pneumatic wheeze, the sound of machinery and motors functioning in the distance. It’s louder and louder, and soon I don’t understand Mark’s words.
Instead of focusing on him, I watch the television, which has cut away to an aerial view of my apartment. Tiffany is next to the television, surrounded by paramedics, and she’s breathing into a paper bag. The look she gives the female medic who hands her an oxygen mask should make my heart hurt.
Can’t hurt something that’s locked away in a box, though.
“You did it,” I hear. I turn sharply, following that voice.
It’s Silas.
“You did it, Drew. You said you’d get them, and you did.”
“We did.” I look toward the doorway where the paramedics are maneuvering the stretcher with Lindsay on it. I step forward, but Silas gently blocks me.
“You can’t go with her.”
“Why not?”
“She has a GSW, Drew. They’ll get her to the nearest hospital then med-flight her to LAC.”
“That bad?” Shock ripples through me. I’m doubly determined to follow.
“You’ve broken so many laws. We have to take you into custody.”
“That has to wait.” I push past him. He lets me, but Mark’s right by Tiffany’s front door. He’s a wall, a barrier, a border between me and Lindsay.
“You have your own wounds, Drew.”
I brush him off. “I’m fine.”
“Looks like you broke something in your left hand, and you’re limping. You’re not fine.”
“I’m fine. I’m not letting her leave without me. I’ll ride in the ambulance with her.”
“No.”
“Fuck you.”
“No to that, too. You don’t understand how bad this is.”
“And you don’t understand how bad this is going to get if you don’t let me go with her.”
“Is that a threat?”
“It is
what it is. Let me go with her, damn it.”
“I can’t. I have to take you into custody.”
“What?”
“You just killed a man on live television, Drew. So did Lindsay. Jesus Christ, millions of people just watched this scene as it unfolded! You killed two people here. I can’t just let you go.”
“Then take me to the hospital with her.” I start coughing. I taste blood. I lick my lips.
His face fills with alarm and he waves a medic over. “Pull up your shirt,” Mark orders.
“What?”
Without asking, he grabs my shirt. My belly is covered in nasty contusions, bright red marks deep. I inhale sharply and feel a diffuse pain, spreading through me like sunshine when you’re camping in the pines in the northern woods, that moment when the sun pours through and chases the cold away.
“You could have internal bleeding.” He’s somber, glaring at me like I’ve done something wrong.
I cough again. More blood.
“No. I have to go with her -- ” The coughing fit consumes me, followed by a sudden tightness inside my gut, like someone’s twisting and pulling a rope in me. My organs are playing tug of war. I’m aware of thirst, then pain, my eye fuzzy, vision weird. During the lead-up and the fight, I fought it all off.
The body remembers.
The body demands to be heard.
“God damn it,” Mark snaps, holding my arm. “We need another stretcher for him!” he shouts as a strange pounding fills the room, like thousands of soldiers in formation, headed for war on a hollow gymnasium floor.
“I’m fine.” Cough. “I’m -- ”
I’m tired.
So tired.
And then I’m not there.
Chapter 11
One day later...
Lindsay
The nurse’s assistant comes in at four a.m. to take my temperature. She flips on the lights. Fluorescent lights suck. I don’t say a word. She comes to me with the thermometer, sticks it under my tongue, pushes something on the handheld machine, then waits. She hums a jazz tune. I’m an obedient patient.
She records the results and leaves, turning off the lights.
I shift in the hospital bed, my mouth dry. I swallow, then gag. I need water. I look at the pitcher on the table-tray above my thighs.
Might as well be on the moon.
My one good arm has a million tubes in it, covered with so much surgical tape I look like a mummy. But if I don’t drink, I’ll keep gagging, and when I gag or cough, my shoulder screams out in heated pain.
So I have two choices.
Suffer or suffer more.
Not really a choice.
Like an inch worm, I move to my back, then feel for the bed controls, my good hand fumbling. They’re tangled in the sheets, but I get them eventually. Pushing the button to raise my head is an art form, one I haven’t mastered.
Because this is the first time I’ve done it.
I woke up around midnight, groggy and unreal, with no one here. Someone noticed. I think I’m in ICU because of a sign I read. The doctors called my name, flashed lights in my eyes, asked me to nod and squeeze their hands. I did everything they wanted.
Except speak.
I can’t.
Okay, I probably can. But I can’t. My voice is broken.
Just like my soul.
It’s not raw or injured. The mechanics of verbalizing are present.
But the part of my brain that connects to my mouth to interact with other people is gone.
Poof.
I have no will to speak. I have no will to speak because that requires looking at people and being looked at and emotional demands and processing and I just can’t.
I won’t.
My body is naked under a thin hospital gown, covered with a sheet and a few of these warm white woven blankets. I have a tube sticking between my thighs and I jolt as I move up. It’s in me.
In me.
I freeze.
Then I realize it’s a catheter. Gross. Screw that. I reach down under the covers and remove it, something inside me uncomfortable with pressure, then a strange pop feeling. A small amount of water pours out. I’m not peeing the bed. I can tell. There’s water coming out of me, but it’s over.
Done.
The tube isn’t in me. Nothing is in me. I toss the tube off the end of the bed. I can pee on my own.
I have to be allowed to control that.
I push the remote button to move the bed because I’m starting to die if I don’t get water in my mouth.
Maybe I press the wrong button because instead of feeling the bed move, the nurse’s assistant rushes into the room. She’s followed by two people in scrubs, a tall man with dark brown hair and kind eyes, and a short woman not much older than me who smells like peppermint tea.
“Hey there,” says the man, who reaches for my good arm, touching the biceps with a warm palm. “Look who’s getting feisty.”
The short woman frowns at him and gives me an eye roll. “That’s not patronizing at all.” She expects me to react. To smile. To join the joke.
I don’t.
I can’t.
I appreciate the attempt. They don’t understand. They’re trying to talk to Lindsay Bosworth. They’re trying to connect with someone they assume is a whole human being with a distinct self, with plans for the future and a rich inner life. Someone who has emotions and nightmares and memories of the horror she just experienced.
But that Lindsay doesn’t exist.
They’re interacting with a fictional character they’ve created in their well-meaning minds.
“Your parents will be here in two hours. Six a.m. sharp, we told your father. He’s been so worried,” Dr. Brown Hair says, his eyes showing he’s troubled by me.
“Your mother, too. We couldn’t get her to leave yesterday,” Dr. Short Woman says with a snappy tone. “She’s a stubborn one.” She looks to me for a reaction.
I just stare ahead, then close my eyes.
And wait for them to leave.
But no.
They’re not going anywhere.
Dr. Short Woman grabs the pitcher of water, pours some into a cup, and pops a straw in. “Here,” she says, tapping my good hand. I raise it and grasp the cup, slowly moving it to my mouth. Twice I miss.
Third time, bullseye.
The water is a relief. I swish it around, moistening everything, removing some of my suffering. As I swallow, they watch me. They expect me to react, to emote, to speak.
I just swallow and breathe.
I rest my head against the mattress and put the half-full cup on the stand.
“Higgs, take a look,” Dr. Short Woman says to Dr. Brown Hair, who I guess is actually Dr. Higgs. She’s pointing to the end of the bed. “She removed her catheter.”
He frowns. “Maybe it fell out?”
“A Foley catheter with a water-filled balloon? No.”
They look at me with a new level of interest.
Dr. Higgs smiles and shrugs. “I guess we can consider her ambulatory now. No more catheter. Lindsay can use the bathroom on her own.”
“Lindsay?” Dr. Short Woman says in a worried voice. “Can you speak?”
I nod.
“Would you please speak?”
I shake my head and sigh.
Nothing they do for the next five minutes can pull me out of my shell. If I wait them out, they’ll leave, and then I can just be alone with my pain.
Someone adjusts an IV. Dr. Short Woman presses a piece of plastic into my good hand. “This is for pain medicine. Push it whenever you need a dose. You can only get one dose per hour, though. It will help you sleep.”
I push the button.
And wait.
By the time they leave the room, my pain is hovering in the corner, watching me like a spirit that doesn’t know it’s dead.
Drew
“I mean it, Harry. I’m not leaving until I can see her.” I’m squared off against him, face to face, right outsid
e Lindsay’s hospital room. After a torturous night in my own hospital bed, and debriefings and interrogations from more law enforcement agencies than members of a baseball team, I’m here.
Battered, bruised, and checked out of the hospital against medical advice.
But here.
“Drew,” he says, his voice compassionate. “Monica is on her way. Lindsay just woke up a few hours ago. We have her under careful guard. Let us see her first.”
“Of course. But I need to see her after you.”
“That might not be good for her mental health. The trauma...”
“You think I don’t know about the trauma? I witnessed most of it.”
He flinches. “So did half of America, on national television. That live feed complicates everything.”
“You mean having your naked daughter on television cutting off her attacker’s cock may hurt you in the polls.”
“You think I’m that cold?”
Before I can answer him, Monica sweeps down the hall, her face lighting up as she sees me.
I experience déjà vu. Last time she looked at me like that was four years ago.
“Drew!” she gasps, pulling me in for a fake hug, two fake kisses on my cheeks. She’s a cloud of perfume in female human form.
Those eyes express genuine emotion. “Thank you for what you did, Drew. You’re the one who cracked this all wide open.” Her side-eye glare aimed at Harry leaves nothing to interpret. She’s pissed at him. “Unlike some people,” she elaborates, “you weren’t snowed.”
Harry just clenches his jaw and sighs.
“Then again,” she adds, leaning in, “we could have done without the whole world seeing Lindsay naked like that. The live feed was brilliant, though.”
I give Harry a look.
“We haven’t been briefed yet on all the specifics. But Nolan Corning is in custody, has already resigned from the Senate, and an ad hoc investigation committee is underway. We know now that he reached out to Blaine, who pulled John and Stellan into the mix. Their goal was to paint my daughter as a whore, to discredit me, to derail my future in politics. Corning had one hell of a web he wove to make that happen.” Harry gives me a cold look I can’t read. “Unfortunately, the perpetrators are all dead. We have you to thank for that.”
