Scarred

by Joanne Macgregor

  “Or maybe …” says L.J. He is looking now at Juliet, as if considering her potential.

  Oh no, you don’t. I will not allow this to happen to Luke again. He will not lose another person that he cares for if I can help it. Besides, I have no great confidence in Juliet’s intelligence. She’s likely to do something stupid and send L.J. off the rails. But I reckon I might just be able to keep him calm. I take a step to the side to block her from L.J.’s approach.

  “No, trust me, you don’t want her.”

  “Why not? She’s prettier than you, too.”

  I curse violently.

  “What is it with you and pretty? Pretty little blonde girls are a dime a dozen. What you want is something – someone – who stands out. Someone that people will remember years from now because of how distinctive she looked. Besides, her blubbering would drive you crazy. You’d kill her just to shut her up before you even reached the main doors.”

  Conveniently, Juliet whimpers just then. I can tell L.J. is considering this, wavering.

  The tinny, bullhorn sound of the officer’s voice comes through the windows again. “This is Lieutenant Bedley of the West Lake police department. I am speaking to the person inside the building. Drop your weapons and come out the front door with your hands behind your head. If you want to speak to me directly, call me now.” She repeats the telephone number.

  L.J. twitches a shoulder in annoyance. His eyes flicker from the sniffling Juliet, to Luke straining against the handcuffs, to me. I force myself to step right up to L.J. We are so close that our chests are almost touching. I move in, close the distance.

  “And L.J.,” I say softly, looking right into his manic eyes, “you know that – with me – you can have a lot more … fun.”

  L.J. grins. Luke goes ape, wrenching and bucking against the cuffs. Blood smears his wrists where the metal cuts into his flesh.

  L.J.’s smile widens. He grabs me, spins me around so that my back is pressed up against him and I’m facing Luke. While Luke pulls and jerks against the cuffs and shouts threats, L.J. strokes his free hand over my hair and then runs it down the side of my neck, and lower, over my breast.

  Bile rises in my throat, but I remember Sienna talking about guilt – about settling your debts and making amends – and I swallow it down.

  “This is fun and all,” says L.J., “but it can wait until later. Right now, we have to go.”

  “No!” Luke screams. “Leave her! You can shoot these cuffs off the pipe and take me. Sloane – please!”

  “Luke, shhh.” I say softly, reaching out a hand to touch his wild face, lay a finger on his lips. “It’s okay, really. It’s better this way.”

  He jerks his head back, begs me, “Please don’t do this. Sloane!”

  “I owe you, Luke. Let me pay off my debt.”

  “That’s crazy! There is no debt. There’s nothing to forgive – it was an accident! I shouldn’t have blamed you. The past is the past. Sloane, please – your dying won’t bring back my brother!” he shouts, sagging against the cuffs.

  That’s when my eyes fill with tears. That’s when I almost lose control. Oh, the difference those words would have made if they’d come sooner. How different everything would have been if he’d had that realization a few months, or even weeks, ago. It has come too late.

  Still, the words feel like sweet forgiveness, and I take them and hold them close against my heart.

  L.J. twists my arm behind my back and steers me in front of him, like a shield. He pushes me ahead of him, out of the room.

  “Okay, okay, I’m moving. No need to break my arm,” I tell him.

  Behind me, Luke is still shouting, begging L.J. to let me go, to come back and take him instead.

  “Shut up!” L.J. yells over his shoulder.

  “I’ll get free, L.J. I will. And if you hurt her, I’ll kill you! So help me, I will.”

  “I said,” says L.J., leaning back into the classroom and raising the rifle in one hand, “… Shut. Up.”

  And then he fires.

  43

  Frantic

  “Did you shoot him? Did you shoot him?” I yell, wrenching my arm almost out of its socket as I buck back against L.J. who is pushing me in front of him down the hallway.

  “Shut up!”

  “Did you shoot him?” I scream, frantically struggling to get back to Luke.

  “No I didn’t. It was just a warning shot, Okay? Chill.”

  “It didn’t hit him?”

  “No. I probably couldn’t have hit him even if I was trying. According to my stepfather, I’m useless at everything in my life and worse than useless at hitting a target – and that’s when I’m shooting using two hands. So no, my shot didn’t hit him.” He shoves me forward a few more paces.

  Please let that be true. Please.

  “Are you telling the truth?”

  “I don’t lie.” That’s true. He tells it like it is even when it lands him in trouble.

  “Do you promise, L.J.?” I twist around, trying to see his face, trying to decide if he’s telling the truth.

  “You’re pissing me off now. Do you want me to go back and send a round through his pretty face? Because I have no problem with aim when the muzzle is actually touching the target, like it’s touching you now,” he says, poking me with the rifle.

  “Do you promise?”

  “Yes! Now shut up.” He shoves me forward a few more paces and keeps pushing until I’m walking in front of him.

  I think I believe him. L.J. wants to be taken seriously, but I don’t think he really wants to hurt me, or anyone, come to that. I think he hates himself more than he hates anyone else. Still, he’s carrying a loaded weapon. And I’m between him and the mass of armed cops outside.

  He still has my arm twisted up behind my back, but he’s finding it awkward to hold onto it while also keeping the end of the long barrel pressed against my side. I store this observation in my head. It might yet come in useful.

  Back in the frantic chaos of the classroom, I would willingly have taken a bullet to save Luke. But now that Luke is trapped –safely, I hope – and out of danger, my mind is revving up again, trying to come up with some way to escape. Nothing brilliant occurs to me as we walk along the eerily empty hallways toward the front doors of the school. Everyone in these classrooms must be on lockdown. The doors are closed and it’s quiet and still except for a strip of fluorescent lighting which buzzes and flickers overhead. I’ll just have to wing it.

  I’m guessing there will also be a throng of news media waiting beyond the perimeter, and I’m hoping like heck that they will make the cops more cautious, because I’m going to be in the dead center of any shootout.

  L.J. must also have been expecting everyone to be waiting outside, because just as we edge around the corner that will take us into the main hall leading to the entrance, he curses in surprise and jerks us both back.

  “They’re already inside,” L.J. says – unnecessarily, because I saw them, too. Half-a-dozen black-suited figures carrying weapons and wearing Kevlar vests, shiny black helmets, goggles and gas masks.

  44

  Luke

  Sloane, my Sloane, is a hostage. I can’t get my head around that. She’s a hostage to a madman.

  L.J. has a rifle and he’s taken Sloane away. He has a rifle and he’s shot with it. Shot at Perkel and Tyrone and me. What’s to stop him shooting her?

  I have to get to her.

  I jerk and twist my hand in the cuff, try to squeeze it through the opening, but it won’t come free. Maybe I could wrench the pipe loose. I yank at it as hard as I can with my other hand. But it’s old plumbing, made to last, and it doesn’t budge an inch.

  I wish Juliet would stop sobbing and moaning so I could just think of a plan to get free.

  I need something, a stick or metal bar of some kind that I could try wedge under the pipe to jimmy it away from the wall. I look around the room. There are books and folders and bags and coats that the other students
left behind, but nothing that would serve as a lever.

  I must get free. I’ve got to get to her.

  “Juliet, will you please just be quiet for a few minutes. I can’t think straight with you howling like that.”

  “But you … you …” she sobs, pointing a shaking finger at my chest.

  I look down. And see that I am bleeding.

  45

  Tears

  “Throw down your weapons and release your hostage!” The words are slightly muffled by the SWAT team member’s gasmask, but still clearly distinguishable.

  “Hey L.J., maybe –” I begin.

  “I am not surrendering to those pigs!” says L.J. We’re backing up through the hall, his hand clamped painfully on my shoulder, and I’m still between him and the SWAT team. “We are going to get out of this – or, at least, I am.”

  “Gee, thanks,” I mutter.

  “Shut up. Let me think.”

  “The back exit – at the cafeteria,” I suggest.

  “Do you think I’m stupid?” He shakes me so hard my teeth rattle. “They’ll have both exits covered. They’re probably already inside the cafeteria.”

  He’s starting to panic. I can hear it in his voice, which has become tight and high. We come to an intersection of hallways in the center of the school, and he looks from one to another of them frantically.

  “There’s another exit,” I say, trying to keep him calm by offering him another option. “If we can get to the gymnasium, then into the locker rooms – they have an exit to the pool. Then from the pool building, there’s a door which leads directly onto the parking lot. And there’s another door – an emergency exit – at the back. I think it opens out behind the pool pumps and water heaters.”

  Will he go for it? As he considers, my heart pounds in my chest, too big to fit beneath my ribs.

  There is the sound of many feet moving in unison from somewhere behind us, then the dull thunk of something landing on the floor, followed by a soft pop. Within seconds, a cloud of white smoke is moving towards us. Suddenly, my eyes are burning and a sharp stinging in my throat makes me choke and gasp.

  “Which way? Which way to the pool?” L.J. says hoarsely. He has let go of my shoulder, but the rifle is still pressed into my spine.

  I walk ahead of him, moving quickly, and we disappear down the hall that leads to the gymnasium and cafeteria. I pull my t-shirt up over my nose and try to catch my breath. Tears are streaming from my burning eyes. Behind me, L.J. is coughing and cursing. The hallway stretches on endlessly, lined on either side with lockers and bulletin boards sporting posters of Thanksgiving events, football games, invitations to try out for cheerleading squads, and advertisements of items for sale. They are like the remnants of another, lost world. We pass Mrs. Copeman’s room. Her door, like all the others, is closed. Have they somehow managed to evacuate, or are she and her students hidden somewhere inside?

  Finally we reach the gymnasium. I push the doors open and L.J. slams them behind us, pulling the handles down to bolt them closed. My nose and throat still burn like I’ve swallowed fire, but I gulp down great lungful’s of the clean, cool air and wipe my eyes on my sleeves.

  L.J. shoves the rifle into my back.

  “Quit doing that, will you?” I say.

  He scowls at me, points to the locker rooms at the back of the massive space, and I move. Time is running out. In spite of what I told L.J., I’m sure that the cops will have a map of the school in their possession by now, and will have all the entrances and exits, including the emergency ones, covered. I’m not even sure that the emergency door in the pool building opens. I only ever remember seeing it closed, with a chain of some sort around its handle. If I’m going to do something, I think, as we pass the benches and lockers and showers in the boys’ locker room, I’m going to have to do it soon. The beat of blood bangs in my ears, my heart hammers, my breaths are shallow. Think!

  There might be a chance for me to make a run for it when we hit the wet area access passage. I could double-back and run into the girls’ locker room. Perhaps try to hide in a locker, or the equipment cage – under the jumble of the life-saving mannequins, buoys, kickboards and pool nets, long-handled cleaning brushes and lost property. I doubt I could make it if I tried to run back across the clear, unprotected expanse of the gym floor. I wouldn’t be able to get to the doors and open them in time.

  L.J. would be able to follow me and if he wanted, he’d be able to get me for sure. Would he follow me, though? If I were him, I’d let me go – not waste any time chasing, but just run to the exit and try to escape.

  But I’m not him, and I can’t be sure that he’s thinking clearly or predictably. It will be a gamble, no doubt about it, but my chances aren’t too great if I cooperate and go with him quietly anyway. And I’m not dying today, not if I can help it. Luke said there was nothing to forgive. I want to get back to him. I steel myself, take a deep breath.

  I need to make my move … now!

  46

  Split second decision

  L.J. must feel me tensing and bracing for the run, because he wrenches me back tight against him, crushes his big left arm around my middle.

  “Don’t even think about it,” he warns.

  He shuffles me out of the locker room, through the wet area access passage, and we emerge into the back end of the rectangular pool enclosure. It, too, is deserted. The surface of the water is mirror-smooth. The steam rising off the heated water is the only movement in the room.

  “There,” I point to the door, topped by a red EXIT sign, at the very back of the room, on the other side of the pool.

  We lumber, like one clumsy four-footed creature, along the strip of paving between the starting blocks at the head of the pool which are to my right, and the wall of the locker rooms, to my left. If L.J. were on my right, I could try to bump him into the pool, but he stays just to the left and behind of me. There is no way I’m strong enough to pull free from the arm clamped around my middle. Even if I could, I would be the one to fall into the pool, and he could just shoot me like a fish in a barrel.

  We reach the corner of the pool and in the fraction of a second as I turn diagonally to go left to the exit, I realize he is momentarily behind me – between me and the pool. I pull forward against his arm, moving him just off-balance, and then with all my 5 foot 8 of height and weight and might, I throw myself back against him, and we both topple backwards into the pool, me on top of him.

  We sink into the deep water. L.J. is pulled down by his heavy boots, thick clothes and the weight of his vest. I bring my feet up and then thrust them back down against his body, pushing him further down and giving me purchase to propel myself upwards into the air and light. I surface not far from the edge of the pool and, though my clothes make me heavy and cumbersome in the water, I make short work of swimming to the side.

  Gasping and clutching the steel bar of the nearest starting block, I look around. Nothing. L.J. must still be under the water. I submerge my face and peer around down into the blue with eyes stinging from teargas and chlorine. About a dozen feet away from me, L.J. is sitting, his legs loosely crossed, on the floor of the pool. His eyes are open and he stares, unmoving, at me. A thin line of bubbles emerges from his mouth and beads upwards, like a string of pearls. The rifle has drifted away from him and lies precisely aligned, as if it had been carefully placed there, on the black strip of a lane marker.

  I’m out of air. I lift my face out of the water to take a deep breath. What is he doing? What the hell is he doing? L.J. is making no attempt to push off from the bottom of the pool or to swim to safety. He appears to have come to a decision. I take another quick breath and look under the water. A few – a very few – tiny bubbles escape from the corner of his mouth, and then the only air bubbles are those that still cling to his hair and clothes and the hands lying loosely on his legs. His eyes close and his body tilts backwards.

  I lift my head, fill my lungs with a deep breath, and dive down. What the
hell am I doing? I have no idea. I only know that it feels like one thing to be prepared to hurt someone in the heat of the moment, and like quite another to calmly sit back and watch them drown themselves. L.J. will not be entering the “bliss of non-existence” if I can help it.

  I swim down behind L.J., slip my left arm under his left armpit and across his chest, and try to tow him up. He’s a dead weight and I don’t budge him by much. I brace my feet against the floor of the pool and thrust up hard, pushing water down with my free hand. We start moving up. It’s too slow, it’s taking too long. I have no more air. I need to breathe. Now. Just when I’ll have to let him go, we break the surface.

  I suck in quick, loud breaths. L.J. gasps. Then he starts struggling. I thought that he had lost consciousness, but he’s alert now. He fights me – pushing me off him and trying to get away. This is dangerous – we could both drown – but “Rescuing the struggling drowner” was a module covered in all three of my life-saving courses. I know what to do, and it will be an absolute pleasure to do it. I pull back my right arm and drive a fist hard and true into L.J.’s eye. He slumps back. This time he is out cold. Immediately he begins to sink again.

  Pain cripples my hand and shoots up my arm. It’s all I can do to hook my elbow under L.J.’s armpit and pull him into a floating position on his back, on top of me. I’m so tired, I’m ready to sink down into the water myself, but I force myself to kick my legs and to scull water with my uninjured hand. We edge slowly to the side of the pool. When we get there, I hang onto the wall. The muscles of my arms twitch and tremble, and my hand throbs painfully, but I keep it under L.J.’s arm and wedge it into the crook of his throat, keeping his head from falling forwards into the water. I can tell he’s breathing, and that’s a good thing, because no way would I be able to haul him out of the water. And I’m too angry to want to give him CPR.

  There’s a banging of doors and a stampede of feet. Woohoo, I think feebly, the marines have arrived.