by Bella Knight
“I’m stepping out for a minute,” called Henry, “be right back.”
“Uhuh,” he heard from the shower.
He stepped out into the hallway, “Detective Jackson,” he said, in the doorway.
The detective looked at him, “Henry. How can we help you?”
“It occured to me that the mother had no time to get clothes or toys like that teddy bear for her daughter, or clothes for herself, or even her purse with her ID.”
The detective looked around the room, with the floor foamy and pink with blood and acid, “Not much is getting salvaged from this room. I’ll have our people get stuff from the other room.”
“Thank you,” said Henry.
“No, thank you,” said Detective Jackson, “horrible thing. You take care of your soldier, there.”
“On it,” said Henry. He went back to Gregory’s apartment, locked the door behind him, and sat down on the couch.
Numa called back, “Mom is Katya Ivanova, and her daughter is Elena. We’re getting someone down there to stay with the mom. You get Gregory to get something to eat, then bring him by. He’ll be feeling helpless, and comforting Katya is the best we can do.”
“The cops are sending over clothes and a teddy bear or something,” said Henry.
“We’re on it,” said Numa, and she hung up.
Gregory came out, clean-shaven and ready to go, “We’re getting food,” said Henry, as he stood up, “then, we’ll go to Wal-Mart and get stuff for the mom. She reads Russian, so magazines are probably out.”
He walked Gregory out and waited until his friend locked the door.
“I’ll call Dimitri,” said Henry. Dimitri, their Russian friend, had been in the Nighthawks for a little over a year, “I’m sure he can find something Russian for her to read.”
Henry pulled out his phone and called. Dimitri made some loud exclamations, and Henry hung up.
“He’ll meet us at the hospital. He’s getting some things together for her.”
Gregory didn’t react at all. Gregory was dead silent, from the time he left the apartment to the order of burgers and fries at Sonic. And even to the trip on their Harleys to the Wal-Mart for a toothbrush, toothpaste, tiny bottles of shampoo, conditioner, lotion, a teddy bear, coloring books, a sixty-four-pack of crayons, and a burner cell phone with a card with minutes, to the burns unit. Henry respected his silence and said little.
Dimitri met them at the hospital, a small man with sandy brown hair.
“I am so sorry I cannot meet this woman, this Katya, and Elena, which is my mother’s name,” he said.
He thrust a bag at Gregory, “You will take her these,” he said, “magazines in Russian. Some books. A pretty notebook with paper and a pen. Nothing much compared to her terrible pain. Please, tell me what happens!”
“Of course,” said Henry, gripping his friend’s hand.
“Maybe you can find women from the Russian Orthodox church to pray with her,” Gregory said, remembering the small, ornate crucifix on the wall.
“An excellent idea!” exclaimed Dimitri, “I will go at once. Get a babushka to look after her and the little one. Maybe a priest to pray.”
“Yes!” said Henry.
He kissed the cheeks of both men, “I will go,” he said and left in eagerness.
“That was a good idea about the church,” said Henry.
Gregory said nothing. They went in and followed the maze of signs and elevators to the correct floor. Katya was standing in front of the nurse’s desk. A nurse in pink scrubs and short brown hair was trying to talk to her. Katya kept shaking her head.
“Katya,” said Gregory, “any news?”
She looked at him and burst into tears. He rushed over to her. He reached the nurse’s station to grab some tissues. He pressed them into her hand.
Gregory spoke over her head in a whisper, “Is Elena alive?”
The nurse waved her hand and brandished a clipboard in the other, “She didn’t bring a purse, and we have no ID… no insurance card.”
Henry took out his cell phone, “I’ll call Detective Jackson. He’s on his way over with the purse.”
Gregory lowered his voice, “How is her daughter?”
The nurse said, “I’m not allowed to give out…”
An Amerindian doctor swept out through double doors, “Henry!”
She nodded towards him, as he attempted to contact the detective.
“Gregory and Katya. I’m Doctor Redhawk, and I am a specialist in injuries like your daughter’s. Katya, your daughter is in surgery. She is doing well, but we need to keep her in a sterile environment while we work on her,” she said.
Katya looked and listened, nervously.
The nurse continued to sputter, “Melinda, put that down on the counter. We’ll discuss your behavior later!”
Melinda put down the clipboard, wheeled around, and left. Henry picked it up. It was a document for insurance information. He smoothed out his face. He would have a discussion with the nurse later when he was less likely to remove her spleen with her own clipboard.
“Where can we take her?” asked Gregory, “she needs a quiet place to wait.”
“Of course,” said Dr. Redhawk, “if Melinda had been thinking, that’s where Katya would already be.”
The doctor took them around the corner. The waiting room was out of the main hall and was strangely empty.
“Please, sit down,” she knelt in front of the sobbing woman, “I have to scrub back in, but I do want to let you know that Elena will be in here a very long time. She will need more than one surgery. We have a plastic surgeon ready to begin the process. Do you have any recent photos of your daughter?”
“School,” she gasped out, “school website. I was trying to make them take them down. I was afraid that Alek would find us. And he did!” She sobbed harder.
Gregory knelt down in front of her, “Tell me the name of the school. You can log in and get the photo for the doctor.”
“Harris… Harrison… Elementary.” She swiped her tears away angrily, “Saint Stella’s.”
Gregory pulled up the school’s website. He’d avoided the street usually because of the ultra-slow school zone.
“Here,” he immediately saw the photo, three kids from a school trip, “that’s Elena,” said Gregory, “the one in the middle.”
She was wearing a yellow Stella Harrison Elementary Rocks! T-shirt. She had her mother’s riot of curly brown hair, drawn back and clipped.
“Da,” said Katya, “that is my Elena.” She was trying to stifle her sobs, to speak correctly.
Dr. Redhawk used her fingers to zero in on Elena’s face, then she took out her own cell phone and took several pictures.
“I’ve got to go back in, Katya,” she said, “try to relax. It will be many hours until we are done.”
“Spasibo. Thank you, doctor,” she said. The doctor ran out of the room, cell phone in hand.
“Go ahead and cry, Katya,” said Gregory, “we brought more tissues.” He pulled a box out of the plastic bag in his hand.
“He’s almost here with the purse,” said Henry.
“You, you are the one, who…” she breathed in heavy gasps, “saved us. Spasibo. Thank you.”
“Nyet,” said Gregory, “any real man would do the same.”
She shook her head, “Alek —he would not.” She began to sob. Gregory knelt on the floor, handing her tissues.
Henry pulled out a chair and put it right behind Gregory, “Sit down, Gregory,” he said, “you don’t want to loom over the woman.”
Gregory sat, and pulled the chair up to her knees. He reached out, and gingerly touched her shoulder. Henry put all the plastic bags on the chair on the other side of Katya.
“I’ll be right back,” he said.
He came back with several bottles of water, “Drink,” he said, taking off the lid and putting the bottle in her hand, “you’ll get dehydrated, then who will be Elena’s mother?”
Katya sobbed and sippe
d. Henry took the bottle away from her, put the lid on it, and gave it to Gregory, “Try to get her to drink every fifteen to twenty minutes,” he said. Gregory nodded.
Detective Jackson put his head in the room, “Oh my god is…”
“No,” said Henry, “just traumatized, and one of the nurses was being an ass.”
“I have her ID.”
He handed the wallet over to Henry, who took it, pulled out Katya’s ID, and started filling out the clipboard.
“You a boyfriend?” asked the detective.
“Don’t ask that question where Nurse Idiot can hear you,” said Henry in a low voice.
The detective sat down next to him so he could hear Henry over Katya’s sobs, “Gregory’s talked about Katya before. He noticed Elena playing on the playground and Katya reading a book. He said Katya always looked ready to jump out of her skin.”
“Now we know why,” said Detective Jackson, “his name is Alek Ivanovich, and he’s a Russian national, been here three years on a work visa, only no one’s seen him in weeks. Worked at a chemical plant.”
Henry sucked in a breath through his teeth, “Let’s take this out in the hall.” They went out, as Gregory tried to get Katya to sip more water.
“So, Chemical Plant Asshole decides to abuse his wife?” asked Henry.
“Ex-wife. She moved to Vegas to get a quickie-divorce. Works as a cocktail server at a casino. I called, told them to give her at least a week off with pay, unless they want the LVMPD angry with them, and that there better be no shenanigans with the insurance, either.”
“Good!” said Henry.
“I got a clerk to release the paperwork and email it to us. She alleged abuse of both herself and Elena; physical, mental, emotional. Family Services looked into it, but since Evil Dad lived in Ohio, nothing much came of it. Until today.”
“He in this hospital?”
“No, and we won’t be giving any information to anyone about where either Elena or Katya are. Your boy Gregory is very good with a Louisville Slugger. That jackass is having pins an all put in his arm and shoulder. He won’t be able to do anything for a very long time. Plus, there’s the jail time, and possible extradition later on down the line. Russian prisons are not nice places, and Russians don’t like child abusers any more than we do. Less, I think. And, I don’t think he’ll be able to defend himself well with all the pins in his arm and shoulder.”
“Wish he’d killed him,” said Henry, “easier that way.”
“He could always throw a clot during surgery,” said the detective.
“From your mouth to God’s ears,” said a Russian voice behind him.
The men turned around.
Dimitri stood there with a huge samovar in his arms, “I think, what would good Russian woman want? I think, tea. Russian tea. I put it where?”
Henry opened the door. The two men followed him and helped him set up the samovar on a table in the corner, “I’ll get more hot water,” said Henry.
“No,” said Dimitri, “I go. I am sorry, special lady. I do not mean to have a big booming voice. It is what I have. I am so sorry I scare you. I go now.”
The sobs slowed, “Spasiba,” she said, “I am not scared. Gregory is here.”
“Yes,” said Dimitri, “Gregory is here. He is a very strong man, he kills anyone try to hurt special Katya, no? Of course. I will go, get the water.” He hustled out.
“You have interesting friends,” said Detective Jackson.
“You have no idea!” said Henry.
Just then, Russian voices filled the hall, “Dimitri! Where is the poor lamb? And what are you doing with all that water?”
Two Russian ladies came in, one with her gray hair covered by a scarf, the other with blonde hair sprayed to within an inch of its life.
“Oh, I see,” said the older lady, “you fill up the samovar. Good boy!”
She patted his cheek. He was unable to fend her off, his arms being full of water bottles.
“Well, don’t just stand there like an idiot,” she said, “the little lamb needs her tea.”
“Yes, Natasha,” said Boris, moving his bulk quickly across the little waiting room.
They pulled up chairs on either side of Katya, “Little lamb,” they both said, exclaiming over her.
The older one said, “I am Natasha, and this is my daughter Dina. We will spend the whole night here.”
Katya looked at them with kind, tired eyes.
Natasha stared at Gregory, “Such a fine man! Who are you?”
“He,” said Katya, wiping away the tears with a tissue, “rescued us.”
“So!” said Natasha, “really?”
“Really,” said Detective Jackson, “my name is Detective Sha’quan Jackson, but most people call me Shaun. I’ll come by tomorrow to take your statement. Now is not a good time.”
“Yes, thank you,” said Natasha as she patted his arm.
He handed Katya his card, “Just know that Gregory here broke your ex-husband’s arm in two places, and broke his shoulder, too. He will be going to prison, and probably deported back to Russia.”
Katya smiled through her tears, “He will not hurt us again?”
“No,” said the detective, “and I don’t think your protector here will let anything happen to you.”
“He is a good boy,” said Natasha, patting the hand that was holding Katya’s hand, “come, little one, let’s get you to the bathroom to wash up. Then, we will have some good Russian tea, and we will talk.”
Gregory helped her stand, and the women took her down the hall, talking half in Russian, half in English.
Jackson gave his card to Henry and Gregory, “If you need anything, just call.”
“We will,” said Henry.
“Thank you, Sir,” said Gregory.
“No, thank you,” said Jackson, “if you hadn’t reacted as quickly as you did, those would be tears of grief, not tears of shock and anger. semper fi,” he said.
“Semper fi,” said Gregory, “oo-rah.” Jackson shook his hand and left.
Descent into Hell
Doctor Redhawk came in a few hours later, after enough Russian tea to float everyone to China, to say that Elena was out of surgery, but needed isolation and rest at the moment.
“You can see her in about twelve hours,” she said, “we want to be sure the first set of grafts hold. Go home and get some sleep.”
Katya burst into tears of relief, then quickly dried them. She was finally becoming cried out. She didn’t, of course, want to go home to a bloody, wet apartment.
“You can take a shower at my place,” said Gregory.
“Pish,” said Natasha, “We call real estate agent in morning, get her much better apartment.”
Gregory held on to Katya’s hands almost to dawn, until the babushkas finally got Katya to rest.
Henry came up behind Gregory, “Go home,” he said, “you need rest too. I’ll stay with her.”
Gregory looked out the tiny window, “It’s dawn. I have work.”
Henry started to say something, then nodded, “No power tools for you, but a hammer, that you can do. Or maybe a nail gun.”
“Yes, sir,” said Gregory.
He took Gregory for a breakfast burrito and some strong coffee and deposited him at the job site. He informed the foreman of Gregory’s condition.
“We’ll keep him busy and out of the power tools,” he said, “damn… knew Gregory was a hero for the whole military thing, but this…”
“Yeah,” said Henry.
Henry called the farm. Nuna and his second cousin Inola had everything well in hand. He went back to the babushkas and gave them his number; he was careful not to wake Katya.
“I’m Henry,” he said, “here’s Gregory’s number. The boy had one hell of an adrenaline rush, plus all that tea. Won’t sleep anyway, so he’s at work. He’ll end up half-living here. I trust you ladies and Dimitri can watch over Gregory, too.”
“Absolutely,” said Natasha.
&nbs
p; “I’ll have our people come in and help with both of them, too,” he said, “we’ll give each other breaks.”
Natasha bobbed her head like a bobblehead and patted his hand, “You are a good father to him,” she said.
“Not biologically, but thank you,” said Henry, “I try.”
Many of the club members got Gregory and Katya Duty—Nuna, Inola. Even Ivy or Ace on their way to work. Tito, a few others.
Carol, the club’s attorney, came and helped Katya fill out lots of legal things, including a restraining order in case evil Alek got out. She ran the point with the casino, negotiating part-time hours for full-time insurance while her daughter healed. Gregory got off work, escorted Elena to work, and came back to sit with Katya when they allowed him in. Carol got a paper from Katya giving him guardianship in case Katya was incapacitated and couldn’t care for Elena. Doctor Redhawk left standing orders to treat Gregory as Elena’s father.
Gregory and the babushkas found a little two-bedroom apartment near the hospital. Most of the club donated time, money, or furniture to make it a small, cozy place with light shining through the windows. They turned the bedroom into a wonderland, with a princess bed, books, dolls and a dollhouse Gregory made himself.
Natasha and Dina showed up every day, sometimes bringing a Russian Orthodox priest to help them pray. When with her mother, Dina never spoke. When alone, she was so kind, gentle, and understanding that it moved even Gregory to tears. They brought in other women, who brought in hot soup and fresh clothes. They taught Katya how to knit little baby hats and booties for premmies in the hospital so she would have something to do with her anxious hands.
The girl went through three surgeries until it was determined she needed a rest from the pain.
“My little girl is in so much pain, and I can’t do a single thing to make it better,” said Katya, many times.
