Though my right arm feels fit for cuttin’ off, my left is just woke up. I got him close and the bat ain't so handy, I figure I’ll put this son of a bitch down for good. Reach for my ass Glock and come up with two curly hairs and some words I ain’t spoke since1972.
Frankie Black Boots Lloyd shoves off, swings for my head. I lift my broken left to spare the right, take what impact I can and the rest deflects with the bat into my forehead.
I’m on the tile. Legs up like a dead dog. Towel flopped open, toes and fingers stretched into claws and nothin’ but hope and luck to save me.
Frankie Lloyd’s got one black boot on each side my hips, got the bat’s fat end three inches over my forehead.
Lord, I am broken hearted over what I done.
Chapter Sixteen
Come to with eyes closed and the world covered in tar paper. I got a name but don’t know it. I do recall a brain ain’t suppose to feel like it's in a table vice. Sometimes when you're awake in one situation then realize you're awake and a new one — and don’t recall the steps in the middle — and you didn't see the switch, some of those times it makes sense not to let on you're trackin’ the swap. Not until any folk ain’t announced ’emselves is afforded the opportunity.
And if they don’t, that say somethin’ too.
Last I recall I was in the laundry and that black booted slugger named — whatever — was swingin’ a maple baseball bat at my arm. I thought first off the bat was ash but as he held it over my head for me, I saw the grain wasn’t so porous.
Beep.
Beep.
This Tat’s room?
Beep.
Roll the head. Feel the soft of a pillow and smell the chlorine.
Hospital.
Oh hell yeah I recall. Black Boots beat me silly and last I thought it was time for me to square things with the Lord.
Static on the arms…
"How long you been awake?"
“Who says I am?”
I know that voice — but the exact knowledge of the fella’s name, that’s squirreled deeper in the noodle ’n I can fetch right off. Starts with a C. Grab that name and pull like an earthworm still in the ground, easy so he don’t break in two.
Worm breaks.
“You get a look at who did it?”
Ah. Abraham Church. Man in motion.
“Can you open your eyes?"
"Don't see why not."
But I keep ‘em closed on account the noise. Somethin’ squeak like can only come from rubber and linoleum. A loudspeaker ask for a doctor somewhere.
"So, I'm alive."
"Lucky twice," Church say.
"How you figure?"
"You survived two attacks. Did you see who came after you the second time? What you say now is real, real important to me."
“’Preciate you but I don’t need the protection.”
Open my eyes and swivel. It’s just me and Church.
"Cops been here?"
"Not yet."
“I can tell ’em exactly who done it.”
“Yeah?”
“Your town dipshit. Black Boots.”
“Frank Lloyd.” Church frowns. Try to use his tongue like a toothpick ’tween the cutters up front and quit after a tongue smack. Says Church, “I thought so. Puts me in an awkward position.”
“Nah fuck that. Listen. Need your help on two things.”
My brain hurt and shit if I don’t have a cast on my arm. How the — been yammerin’ three minute I didn’t know I got a busted arm.
“How long I been in here?”
“Half day.” He glance at his watch. “Twelve hours.”
“Need you to take my room key to the motel and see about my dog. He’ll need a couple cheeseburgers to communicate you’re friendly. Tell him I sent you and he’ll be fine.”
“Ahhh. Sure.”
“No, he talks. Honest.”
Church turn and look out the window. See his face reflected on the glass as he say, “Where did you stay?"
"That lodge-lookin’ place two blocks catty corner headed east of here."
"A lot of brown timbers, Tudor style? That one? Because I had it in my mind you was at the motel a couple doors down. The Caravan.”
"Well shit. I don’t know. But I doubt I’d stay at a caravan on account the name.”
“You against commerce and trade?”
“I ain’t one to complain, but you think they got any Wild Turkey about this place? My head’s got so much pressure I’m afraid for my skull plates.”
“Press that button there. See the cord? Press the button and the nurse’ll hook you up with some pain killers.”
I press like he say.
“So you’re at the Lodge?”
“Okay.”
“You got a room key?”
"Where they put my duds? Oughta be a suit ’round here someplace. Key’ll be in the pocket."
"They brought you here in a towel."
"Oh. Yeah, well, a towel and my key, maybe?”
Church open a small cabinet on wheels next the wall Hurt to rotate the eyeballs anymore, so I twist the head and it’s like steppin’ on the floor of a rat cage wired with juice.
Inside’s a white towel with a credit card size door key.
"You’ll see the Eldorado at the motel, right in front. That’ll let you know.”
Church study me and the hospital light ain’t good for his face. Make him look pissed.
“You said two things,” Church say.
“Second is I want you to come back here with Stinky Joe in two hours. I don't want him locked in a room no more, is all. You tell him what I said and tell him I said it, and he'll understand. He’s likely smarter’n me and you both."
Church shake his head. Look at his watch.
"I don’t think they’ll let me bring him to your room, so what gives?"
"Have him with you out front.”
Church’s brow start dancing on his head… thinkin’.
“You’ll be checking out of the hospital, is that it? Release yourself?”
“I got a busted arm is all.”
“Likely your head.”
“It’ll heal and if it don’t that’ll answer some questions too. Nah, I got plans. Got some things workin’. Maybe take a trip to Chicago, see a lady friend.”
Church shake his head and grin. “Amazing.”
“Thank you.”
“Whereabouts in Chicago? I got some friends there.”
“You got friends in the physics department at the great University of Chicago?”
“You’re intimate with a physics professor?”
“Well, it ain’t gentlemanly to say if I was, but since I ain’t it don’t do the woman any disrespect to confess it. I ain’t stuck her and way my head feels I don’t think I could handle the fireworks. And my back’s just healin’ from the last gal clawed me up. Might be a short while ’fore I’m ready to take on the risk.”
“Chicago University Department of Physics.”
Can’t help but beam, though his admiration ain’t rightfully earned.
Church bends for the towel and key and both knees pop afore he gets ’em half bent. Puts his right hand on the counter for support and the left wheels bounce. It hurts the head to keep turned but I do, wonderin’ if him hurtin’ more’ll make my hurt less. What you call a philoso-physics experiment so I can tell Chicago Mags.
Church swipe the key and lose his balance. Drop back on his ass.
“… damn… sonuva….”
Church finally twist so his belly face the ground and work m’self up hands on knees.
I smile and my head hurt. Results to make Mags proud.
“Like I said, Church, I appreciate you. Just tell Stinky Joe old bear — ”
“Yeah?”
“Günter Stroh. Günter sent ya with the cheeseburgers. He’ll know you’s good people.”
Church’s eyes go skinny. “Bear?”
“Naked.”
Church shake his head like I’
m the problem.
My head aches. Arm too, even in the cast. Tat and Corazon flash through the mind — how I’m gonna get ’em outta here all busted up and hurtin’ so bad I can’t think. How’ll I sneak ’em out? Tat maybe walk herself or I could drop her on a rope out the window. But Corazon? I don’t even know how bad she is.
Yet.
“Hey, Church.”
He turn at the door.
“How I get here?”
“What?”
“Ambulance?”
He wrinkle his brow like I peg him with a spitball.
“Uh. I don’t know. Brought in by a good Samaritan, I guess.” He nods. “All right. I’ll bring your dog. Be in the lot out back, right? Two hours.”
“Two hours.”
Church leave.
I jigger the baby crib wall closest the door. Pain burst white like somebody shove a signal flare in my right ear and pull the trigger.
Chapter Seventeen
Ain't decent to walk the world naked, most of us. Outta respect for the less endowed and fear of the ladies prone to ogle, I'll spare both the envy and desire.
Can't bust free in a towel and ain't decent in a hospital gown. Alden Boone needs some duds so he can become Baer Creighton in transition to the name I choose, since it’s appointed somewhere I gotta have one.
I told Church to come back in a couple hour. While he’s gone for Stinky Joe, I crawl out the bed, yank hoses and tubes and see one’s got a rolly stand. Ain’t no one in the hospital so legitimate as a bare assed fifty-somethin’ dragging an IV stand. Likewise, they’s no one less legitimate on the outside, hence the need for some passable britches and a t-shirt.
Hospital’s dead as a graveyard. I scoot to my feet and drag the IV pole with me in case they spiked the juice with somethin’ for the brain pain. Got to stoop and walk my good hand, the right, up my leg for balance and done. Feel a little light in the head, starin’ at the bright spot on the wall — where they got a x-ray in the reader. Fibia and Tibula.
Nah, that ain’t it.
My arm bones is busted ’tween wrist and elbow. Looks like a good clean break what’ll knit up in no time. He musta clubbed my head too, hence the nonstop fireworks.
Clock puts the hour at a quarter after one AM. It’s time to change floors.
I drag the IV stand. Elevator doorbell dings and once more with me inside. Brain goes a little light when the floor lifts in under me, but I catch the wall ’til the doors slide open on the critical care unit. Action all about. Light so clean and bright it smell of Ajax. These people got attitudes. Middle the night and they move about like it’s a half hour past sunrise and they already squared away a second bowl of Wheaties. A man still got his baby fat zips by in his turquoise outfit, got those white strings hangin’ from his ears and a dance in his hips.
‘Nother man in dress pants and glasses read a clipboard while he walk, somehow got the sense to navigate and read gibberish — but what impresses is that he walk straight outta Stayin’ Alive with the bell bottoms and lapels and maybe more swagger’n I’d want from a man with a scalpel.
Cut left fifteen steps then cut right. Round the bend and down the hall.
Other cop said Corazon was in surgery. I take it she’s out by now. Accourse findin’ her room should be easy as findin’ the cops. If they got any handle on who she is, even her local work, they’ll have sixteen men with flamethrowers mullin’ the place, like Arlo said, veins in the teeth.
But they’s no coppers loiterin’ about, only just the nurses eyeballin’ computer screens.
The lights is off in Tat’s room and the door’s open. Don’t look more ’nough to see a different cop on duty.
Pass a couple empties.
Next door is open and a cop sit on a chair, head agin the wall and eyes closed, but after three seconds of me lookin’, he cranks ’round and his elbow draws back. His eyes is slits.
Waren’t expecting to find Corazon so fast. If that’s her. Maybe Glenwood is full of riff-raff and the coppers got to guard every room. I give him a sleepy nod and move close to the door.
Lean forward and turn the head a bit, eyeballs twisted so they hurt, gaze crawlin’ up the bed. Them mounds at the bottom could be a small woman’s feet. Them hips could belong a girl — if she was young. Almost no chest and the shape of her gets more beautiful the closer I get to her face and know it’ll be Corazon. Got to exercise care, as the eyeballs grow damp.
Hard to see.
I lean more and now the bandages come. Her neck’s braced and her face’s wrapped most the way around. They got a hole for the eyes and mouth but the pretty brown skin I expect is swelled up purple and the air sighs out my lungs and I couldn’t hurt any more if it was Mae and her babies in that bed all beat to hell. Maybe it’s the late hour and the hurt in my own head, maybe the busted arm, maybe the drugs. The scene got me about as broke a man can be, lookin’ on a life in the balance and powerless to do nothin’.
All I know is love and responsibility, and the fact I ain’t done shit for neither. I never loved like I coulda.
Look back at the cop and turn my whole face into a question mark.
Cop nudge his head sideways and his eyes drop and take in me and my IV stand from the ground up, and when his eyes meet mine he seem satisfied I’m a busted man, can’t sleep and out walkin’ the floors.
No juice nor red.
“Too bad,” says I. “She the one from the news?”
He blinks. Nods.
“Rumor is she didn’t do anything. I heard y’all arrest her and cut her loose next day.”
“How’d you hear that?”
“My ears.”
Smile big.
“One the nurses. One the people in the blue green outfits in the elevator said it.”
I’m shootin’ sparks and glowin’ red in my soul. Never sits good to be a liar but with Corazon in the bed and me got to figure how to preserve both her life and freedom, and each one seem to exclude the other, I got to do what I got to do and I’ll lie all night if it’ll bring the right resolution.
The heart machine beeps. It’s been every couple seconds but I hear it like the first. Got to keep that beeper beepin’, then bust her out.
Cop looks at me studyin’ at Corazon too long, like I care. Shake my head.
"These black hairs. Drive like assholes and get what they deserve. Stay strong brother."
I make the fist.
He wince.
Missed his M-O by a mile.
He make a square with his hands over his lap.
“This is a law enforcement arena, sir. Kindly move along.”
“Yessir. Good day. Good night. We appreciate you — you men and gals what make up the blue line. Nothing else ’tween civilization and the wild.”
His face don’t register full enlightenment so I dip the brow and drag my IV stand. Pause toward the lady nurses and with me in the gown, my ass says hello to the copper. All stayin’ in character, as the great actors do.
But soon as that cop slip outta mind Corazon slips back in. Keep on past the nurse station and swallow down a lump. Stare at the wall ahead but I dream Corazon’s meated-up face six-foot-wide like it was shot out a film projector, froze at the worst frame, all her cuts and bruises so big I’d like to chuck a watermelon at ’em. Part of me says with the right ambition and surprise — and Glock — I could storm her room and she’d be free as fast as a cop drops dead in his law enforcement domain. An’ I’d wheel Corazon’s bed to the exit. But that heart monitor got a music to it and I like the sound of her livin’ each second, beat by beat, a whole lot better’n I’d feel if that beeper quit. And the second I took off whatever wire’s hooked to the machine I’d be frettin’ I heard the last beat.
Way they wrap her face and top half, Corazon musta run her head through the windshield.
Non-seatbelt wearin’ girl.
Keep walkin’. Blink and blink. Voices down the hall, quiet, urgent; old people voices got krinkles in the sound.
Thi
s might could be my clothing donor.
I shuffle six inch at a time. After I pressed the button Church said to press, I told ’em no meds, no painkillers, give me some water. But they give me somethin’ anyway. My head’s twice too big and fulla air — pulls the neck like a balloon pull the string.
I stand outside the room with the old people's voices and glance at the nurse station. Both faces still stuck in computers.
The krinkled voices belong to a man and woman. The man's is urgent but weak and I hesitate to call a syllable when I think I got it deciphered. But my guess is, man says he druther be dead.
I get closer and rest the back shoulders agin the wall.
"You should have seen what I saw. I can't wait for you to see it."
"You want me dead too?"
"Yes! It was so beautiful. And the Lord is there, like we always thought, just how we said. Except not like we thought. All the stuff I feared my whole life is false. I must have made it up. Look what cancer does to you.”
Wait….
“I have nothing left for this world and the other one is better.”
"You can't leave me!"
Tiny sobs replace the woman’s voice. Her face gettin’ wet.
"It's a good thing… and I want it,” the man say. “Death is where we get to see why we lived.”
I think on Chicago Mags and even recollect Günter Stroh, him sayin’ the things on the curtain ain't real. It's what behind throwin’ the image that matters. I think on him sittin’ with his head back and eyes closed, breath so soft a gnat on his nose hair couldn’t say if he was alive or dead. How I’d imagine bein’ in his head while his thoughts float off.
Is why I want his name — since the law make it that I can’t have my own. And truth is they’s so much attached the name Baer Creighton, so much evil I done fightin’ fire with fire; back of my head I think if I ditch the name and start someplace new I won’t do the evil no more, as no one’ll know me to provoke it.
It’s only me raisin’ hell.
Why is that?
Me?
Hell?
Or all the folks oughta raise it with me and don’t?
The solitary path is lonesome in the hospital, brain beat to meat and arm useless.
The Men I Sent Forward (Baer Creighton Book 6) Page 11
