by Rob Cornell
To his credit, Prashad didn’t so much as flinch. In fact, he gave me a thin smile. “We’ll get to the bottom of this,” he said.
At that, I shut him out of my mind. He had nothing to say that I cared about. I didn’t notice him leave, didn’t know he was gone until I felt a touch on my arm from someone sitting in the same chair. I jerked my arm away, thinking for a goofy moment it was Prashad, that he’d never left, that he refused to leave until I acknowledged how smart and amazing he was because he was a doctor, and doctors were the gods of the mortal world.
Of course, it wasn’t him. It was Mom.
I blinked at her. “When did you get here?”
“About ten minutes ago. I thought that was plenty of time to let you stare at the wall before you needed to snap out of it.”
I smelled something meaty. Ham. Mom had a plastic bag in her lap with a pair ham and Swiss sandwiches in it. My mouth watered, and that stupid guilt came back. Hunger won the fight, and in another three minutes my ham and Swiss was nothing more than crumbs down the front of my shirt.
With that out of the way, I gave Mom a more thorough look. She had her purse and tan tweed coat on the chair beside her. She wore a plain white blouse and jeans hitched up too far above her waist. Since when had she started dressing like an old lady?
I noticed her wedding ring turned around on her finger with the diamond pointed in the wrong direction. She had thinned out since October, and it had started to show in her fingers now, leaving the ring loose enough to twirl in whatever direction it felt like. And unlike mine, her sandwich only had a few bites out of it, and it lay on the bag in her lap, forgotten.
I pointed at the sandwich. “You need to eat that.”
“I’m not hungry.”
I waved a hand, not interested in having that argument at the moment.
“Have you heard anything yet?” she asked.
I filled her in on the couple sentences I had heard from the doctor.
She frowned and crossed her arms. “Damn doctors. We need Elaine.”
“Who’s Elaine?”
“Old family friend. A healer. Used to date Sylvester matter of fact. Sturdy Welsh woman. Cold, but good at what she does.”
From that description, I knew it had to be the same woman Sly had brought to heal me at the Silverdome. I had a hard time picturing her with Sly, though. Their builds couldn’t have been more different. The mechanics of their love, I thought, would have proved…difficult.
“I think I know her,” I said and explained.
“We need to get Sly out of here and over to her,” Mom said. She looked around the room as if it were a very insult to her existence. “You should have never brought him here to begin with.”
I strained to keep my voice low. We were already getting funny looks from the other family in the room. “I didn’t have a choice. I didn’t know Elaine’s number, let alone her name. And how would I know if she could make it in time? We don’t even know what’s wrong with him. He was on the floor, hacking up blood for the gods’ sake.”
Mom took a slow breath. “I’m sorry. You’re right. But the fact remains. We need to get him out of here, and I doubt they’re going to let us check him out and roll him to the car in a wheelchair.”
I pressed my hands against my face and rubbed. The day had started so nicely. That sun through the shop’s front window. The clean smell of paint. The sense of a new beginning after all the shit the three of us had been through. Now this. After facing a legion of vampires and a cadre of Ministry conspirators out to murder half of Detroit’s population, some kind of illness fucks up our chance at a reset?
Thank you fate, for that big, wet loogie in the face.
“We can’t get him out of here. He’s in ICU. He’s probably got all sorts of tubes and shit sticking out of him. Do you think we could bring Elaine to him?”
Mom spat a disdainful puff of air. “She wouldn’t step foot in this place. Besides, she wouldn’t know what materials she’d need, since we can’t tell her what’s wrong with him. Besides, do you honestly think these animals would allow Elaine to work magic on Sylvester in here?”
Wouldn’t that be a sight? “At the very least, she could check him out. Are you sure she wouldn’t come, just to do that?”
She shrugged. “All we can do is ask. But I know her feelings on doctors in general, and hospitals in particular.”
“Okay. Can you call her?”
“She doesn’t own a phone.”
“You’re joking.”
Mom leaned in close. “Healers tend to be eccentric. They all have their quirks. Elaine is a bit of a technophobe.”
Fabulous. All the more reason she wouldn’t come to the hospital, what with all the beeping machines and computers and more phones than you could count in a lifetime.
“You’ll have to visit her in person,” Mom added.
“Me? You know her. She’d be more likely to help if you asked.”
She laughed and bowed her head. “Not a chance. She doesn’t particularly like me.”
“I thought you said she was a friend.”
“Family friend. Not my friend.”
“What’s the problem between you two?”
She still had her gaze down as if had she suddenly decided that ham sandwich in her lap looked good enough to eat. But I could see her wry smile. She wasn’t looking at her lap. She was looking into her past.
“I’m the one who broke her and Sly up.”
Chapter Four
Mom gave me the short version of the story behind how she had wrecked Sly’s relationship with Elaine. She hadn’t believed that Sly really loved Elaine, but that he stayed with her because he was afraid of hurting her. She and Sly also apparently argued all the time, mostly about the alchemical trade. They had very strong and opposite views on some technical aspect of the craft.
It seemed like a petty difference to me, but I didn’t know anything about alchemy or healing. Maybe their disagreement was deeper than a simple tastes-great/less-filling debate. The more important takeaway to my mind was Sly’s continued devotion despite his own needs. That sounded a lot like the Sly I knew. His loyalty had saved my ass more than once.
In any case, Mom forced a breakup by giving Sly a sit down and grilling him until he admitted what she’d suspected. Once the truth was out in the air, he couldn’t ignore the right thing to do. So he broke it off.
And Elaine had blamed my mom ever since.
“So I shouldn’t even mention your name?” I had asked before leaving for my Mission: Impossible.
“She’ll know you’re my son, of course. So you won’t need to mention my name. But hopefully she can see past all of that. You’ll have an uphill battle, though. No doubt.”
Those not so comforting words ran through my head as I knocked on Elaine Voyle’s door.
She lived in Warren, not far from where the magical entrance to the Switch used to be—before the vampires killed the owner and the place shut down. As the only bar around Detroit that catered to those in the supernatural world, the Switch had been one of my best sources of information for the goings-on of Detroit’s paranormal community.
Those fucking vampires ruined all the good stuff.
Elaine’s house, judging from the outside, couldn’t have been more than seven-hundred square feet. The wood siding looked termite-ridden and needed a fresh coat of paint—preferably something other than the faded puke green on it now.
It was the middle of winter, but her aluminum storm door only had a screen, no glass. The inside door looked sturdy enough. But it, too, needed a paint job. I couldn’t tell if it was coral or just a really faded pink.
I recognized her the moment she opened the door and peered at me through the screen. She had a wide, full face with deep-set, bright blue eyes, like a set of crystals embedded in dough. Her skin had a freckled red tint, strongest around her cheeks. Her hair was a deep burgundy. And her body filled the entire doorway.
She wasn’t overweight, but the
term “big boned” was made for women like her. She looked like she could lay me flat with a single punch from her thick-knuckled fist.
She studied me for a moment, eyes squinted.
I waited to see if she recognized me. I wanted to keep from announcing my surname in case it triggered any sour memories of my mom.
While she scrutinized me, I caught a whiff of what smelled like rich beef stew. My stomach forgot all about the ham sandwich I’d already eaten and demanded some stew like right now.
Elaine’s thin lips quirked up on one corner of her mouth. “Smells good, don’t it?”
I wondered how she knew what I was thinking. Was I drooling? I casually brushed a finger across my chin to check. Came away dry, thank goodness.
“You wouldn’t wanna eat it, love. T’aint whatcha think it is.”
Her accent puzzled me. Mom had said Elaine was Welsh, but her accent sounded like a cross between old English and a Southern drawl. Weird, right?
“It’s a potion,” I said.
“Indeedy.”
Wow. Her stuff smelled a hell of a lot better than any of Sly’s mixtures. Maybe that was the thing they had always argued about.
“So, whatcha need, Sebastian?”
I raised an eyebrow. “So you do recognize me.”
“When ya seen a man as bloody as you was, you tend to recall.” Then she surprised me by pushing open the storm door and inviting me in.
I stepped into a most glorious warmth. I hadn’t realized how cold it was outside until I came into Elaine’s house. It was nothing like the dry heat in the hospital waiting room. This had just the right bit of moisture without making me all sweaty. Between the comforting temperature and the wonderful smell coming from the back of the house, I felt like I could stay here forever. If I couldn’t convince her to come with me to the hospital, maybe she would agree to let me move in with her.
Elaine closed the door and looked me up and down with a small smile. “You’re feeling the effects, am I right?”
I stammered, not sure what she meant.
She pointed down a short hall that led into a kitchen. I could see a simmering pot on the stove and assumed that’s where the beefy smell came from.
“It’s the mixture. I’m testing it, see? Supposed to ease a troubled soul so he don’t feel a thang when ya cut into him.” She exploded into deep, full, and contagious laughter. I couldn’t have kept myself from laughing along no matter what was going on with Sly. She could have chopped off my arm, and I still would have laughed. Which explained exactly what she meant about her concoction.
She waved me close. “Tell me, love. What’re you smelling?”
“Beef stew,” I said slowly.
She slapped me on the shoulder so hard I staggered sideways. “What a good one. A fine one.”
“Why? What’s it smell like to you?”
“Ginger snaps,” she said and snapped her fingers, too.
Which, of course, I found hilarious and tore off on another laughing fit.
Her smiled faded, and she gave me a hard look, her hands on her wide hips. “Maybe I need to tone it down some.”
I pressed a fist against my mouth to stifle my laughing, ended up snorting through my nose instead.
She fluttered a hand toward a leather two-seater with a couple tears in it. It sat across from another couch the same size, but with a floral upholstery so gaudy it hurt my eyes. “Go and have a sit, love. I’ll take it off the stove.”
I sat. She hurried down the hall. A minute or two passed, and the smell began to dissipate. I was sorry for it to go, but at least I didn’t feel like I’d overdosed on nitrous oxide anymore.
I glanced around the living room. I’d seen bigger walk-in closets on HGTV. The walls were covered with paintings and embroidery with no discernible pattern. Landscapes, horses, wolves, Native Americans: all were portrayed in the paintings. The embroideries mostly consisted of religious symbols from faiths across the globe.
No shelves. No knickknacks. Not an end table or coffee table in sight. They would have overcrowded the space anyway. Once the beef stew smell cleared out, I caught a whiff of cat dander and a litter box somewhere in the house. I don’t hate cats, but I sure couldn’t imagine having one in the house. No matter what you did, you could always smell them. I supposed you’d get used to it after a while. Or maybe I was too sensitive to their particular scent. In any case, I would have made a terrible witch with a cat for a familiar.
Elaine came back, brushing her hands together as if shaking off dust. She eased down onto the couch across from me with a strained sigh. The couch springs spoinged under her weight. “So tell me, now.”
I assumed she meant me to tell her why I’d come. So I led with, “I’m in desperate need of a healer.”
She scrunched up her face. “To the hells with that. Of course ye are. That’s not what I’m askin’.”
I waited for more.
She rolled her eyes and slapped her hands onto her lap. “Sylvester. The Sly pup. How’s he behaving?”
I cringed. I didn’t want to answer. All at once, I wanted to get out of there. I didn’t want this extremely friendly woman—contrary to Mom’s description—to hear the bad news about a man she had loved. My hesitation said enough, though.
Elaine’s lips puckered. Her eyebrows drew together. “Oh, heavens. Not my Sly.”
I swallowed, nodded. “That’s why I’m here.”
She rocked forward and back, then forward once more, using momentum to help her up off the cough, grunting on the way up. She flapped her hands at me impatiently. “Let’s get on, then. Take me to him.”
I tensed. This was the tricky part. Would she agree to see him at the hospital? So far, she hadn’t lived up to Mom’s concerns. She didn’t have any issue inviting me into her home despite who my mother was. And while I didn’t see a TV anywhere—a technophobe’s worst nightmare next to the Internet, I’d guess—she did have a battery-operated clock on one wall, nearly lost among the decorations. How averse to technology could she really be?
I stood. “He’s at Royal Oak General,” I said as casually as possible. “He’s in—”
Elaine trudged across the small space between us and smacked me upside the head. “What the heavens did ye take him there for?”
She hit me pretty hard. I waited a second for the stars across my vision to twinkle out. “He was coughing up blood, barely conscious. I didn’t know what else to do.”
“You come an’ get me’s what.” She wrung her hands and paced away from me. She made a guttural groan that undulated in tone and volume. It almost sounding like a wordless chant. Then she spun around. “Can’t do it, love. They’ll kill me.”
“No one’s going to kill you. This is Sly we’re talking about. The doctors have no idea what’s wrong with him. They keep babbling about exactly nothing. But I don’t think he’s going to last long.”
She puckered her mouth so tightly her lips went white. Her nostrils flared. Her crystal eyes glared at me from their doughy caverns. “I should kill ya, love. But you don’t punish ignorance.” She looked up and laced her hands together against her heavy breast. She whispered something. A prayer or incantation maybe.
“Please,” I said.
“Hush, you,” she snapped then went back to her soft muttering. The second hand on the clock ticked fifteen times before she fell silent, unfolded her hands, and lowered her gaze to me. “He’s in the ICU?”
I nodded.
“Piss on an ant.” She pointed at me. “You’ll know better the next time.”
I held up a hand. “Scout’s honor.”
She snorted. “You ain’t nothing like a scout, my dear. But you sure are a simpleton.”
Well, that wasn’t very nice. But I took it without protest. “So you’ll come with me to the hospital?”
She squeezed her eyes shut, and a matching pair of tears rolled down each ruddy cheek. “You ain’t offered me much of a choice.”
Chapter Five
Elaine made me hold her hand from the moment we entered the hospital to the last possible second when we arrived at Sly’s room in the ICU. Any time a doctor or nurse brushed too close, Elaine would shove herself up against me, nearly knocking me over. She jumped at every bleat and beep. But, worst of all, whenever she heard a phone ring, she whined low in her throat like an injured puppy.
By the time we got to Sly, I couldn’t feel my hand, and my right foot ached from her stepping on it so many times.
But when she saw him lying in the bed with a respirator down his throat and taped to his mouth, when she looked at the digital display on the heart monitor and heard its steady but slow ping, everything else melted away from her attention.
She didn’t even seem bothered by the plastic, disinfectant, and piss smell that permeated the whole floor.
She waddled to his bedside and looked down at him, the history of her love for him written all over her face. She traced the stubble along his chin with a fingertip. She stroked his long, unkempt hair, wild across his pillow without his usual hair band holding it back away from his face.
“Oh, Sly pup.”
They had the lights dimmed in his room, but the wall the room shared with the hallway was glass all the way across, and enough of the fluorescent glare made the tears in Elaine’s eyes shimmer.
I felt a pinch in my chest. If I’d known her better, I would have gone over and given her a hug. Part of me still wanted to. At the same point, I couldn’t interrupt her moment with Sly. Sometimes you had to feel the pain alone.
I had called Mom on the way to the hospital to let her know we were coming. She had arrived first and sat in a chair tucked in a back corner. She and Elaine hadn’t so much as shared a glance. I wasn’t sure Elaine had seen Mom at all when she came in. I could read Mom’s expression, saw the same ache that I felt. None of her history with Elaine mattered right then.
After a couple minutes, Elaine took her gaze away from Sly and moved it to me. “Keep one eye at the door. I’ll be doing some things that would look a mite strange to passersby. Especially one of those white coat devils.”
