by Lydia Reeves
Chapter 13
MARIAN
The first thing I heard when I opened the door was the beeping sound of a heart monitor, and for a moment I was terrified of what I was going to find. What if he looked nothing like the man I’d come to know? What if he was small and fragile in the hospital bed, tubes and wires sticking out of him, a shadow of the man that just last night had pulled me across his lap and dragged his mouth across mine in a way that made me feel special and cherished and desired?
“Calm down,” Geoff told me, squeezing the arm he had slung around my shoulders. “Stop freaking out. I can hear you overthinking from here.”
I took a deep breath.
“I already told you, it was a clean shot, he did fine in surgery, and he’s going to be okay,” Bria, Geoff’s girlfriend, informed me. “He’s awake now.”
“Just go in and talk to him,” Geoff said. He removed his arm from my shoulder, gave me a nudge forward, then stepped back and let Bria lead him down the hallway. I forced another breath through my tight throat, then stepped cautiously all the way into the room.
I needn’t have worried. Levi may have been lying in a hospital bed, and he might have tubes leading from the back of his hand up to a bag suspended above the bed, but frail was not a word I would use to describe him. He looked too big for the room, shifting with restless energy and seemingly barely hampered by—or even aware of—the thick wrapping of gauze that wound around his left shoulder. He looked tired and his eyes were glassy, and the scowl that creased his brow was so familiar I nearly laughed with relief.
He turned to face me as he became aware of my presence, and his scowl seemed to soften, but only marginally. He glanced me over, head to foot as if checking to be sure I had come to no harm, but then his scowl hardened again, and he looked away from me toward the far wall.
“Levi,” I breathed, approaching the bed. I twisted my hands together in front of me, unsure what to do with them. I wanted to reach for him. I wanted to check his wounds and be sure he was really okay, brush his hair off his forehead, climb into his lap and make new memories to erase the sound of gunfire and the sight of him crumpling to the pavement. Erase the feel of my pounding heartbeat and the scream I couldn’t suppress. Erase the sight of Gary—Gary?—tearing down the sidewalk out of sight, even as blood pooled under Levi’s motionless body.
But instead I stood there, feeling awkward and out of place as he glared sightlessly at the far wall and refused to meet my eyes. It was as if all the progress we’d made over the past weeks had been erased. As if I was still afraid of him and he still communicated in monosyllabic grunts and he’d never held my hand or clutched my face and kissed me as if he were drowning.
“Gary’s in custody,” Levi finally said, wrenching his gaze off the wall with an effort to meet my eyes. His were dull and glassy, unfocused, and I wondered just how many painkillers were in his system right now. The surgery on his shoulder had taken hours, and I’d felt small and uncomfortable in the waiting room, like I had no right to be there as strangers came and went. Other police officers in uniform, talking quietly with the doctors, then a tall lady with wide, tear-filled eyes and an even taller man whose appearance indicated he couldn’t be anyone other than Levi’s brother. The pair of them sat together on the opposite side of the room, and I’d watched them with fascination, feeling torn between the idea that I should go introduce myself, and the thought of how ridiculous and inappropriate it would be if I did.
Bria came to check on me and bring me coffee, and I asked myself a hundred times why I was there at all, until finally, finally, the doctor came out and I listened as he told Levi’s mother that he was out of surgery, everything had been successful, and she would be able to come see him as soon as he woke up and got settled in his own room.
Half an hour later, a nurse called them back and Levi’s mother and brother disappeared through the doors, and still I sat, unsure if I should leave or stay or attempt to sink through the floor. Why was I even there?
I watched as the two uniformed officers from earlier returned and disappeared down the hall, then another one I hadn’t seen yet, then finally a couple of guys in plain clothes I thought I recognized from Levi’s jiu jitsu class. And when they’d all left, still I sat, wallowing in embarrassment and indecision until Geoff had shown up and grabbed my hand, manually hoisting me out of my chair and propelling me down the hallway to Levi’s room. Where I now stood, still not sure I should be here at all.
“Officer Jansen found him a couple of hours ago at his apartment,” Levi went on, pulling me back to the present. “He hadn’t tried to flee or anything,” he scoffed, then muttered as if to himself, “I told you he wouldn’t have any brain cells left.”
I looked at him in confusion. “How did you know? Who he was, I mean.”
“Gary Hensley.” He spit out the name as if it were rotten. “He used to be a friend of my dad’s. Gambling. Alcohol. Drugs.” His eyes lost focus again. “I don’t know why he came back. Must’ve been in debt again. God, I’m tired.”
He let his head fall back against the pillow, but his eyes didn’t close, just swiveled to look at me under heavy lids. “You’re safe now,” he mumbled. “We’re all safe.”
I shifted my weight. I wasn’t sure how to reconcile my image of Gary, the sweet man in the bookstore who was clearly short a few marbles but seemed harmless enough, with the man who had run from the scene with a gun, the drug dealing criminal who had been terrorizing our town for weeks now.
And I wasn’t sure what to do now. Should I stay and try to talk to Levi? Should I go and let him sleep? I was terrified that if I left, now that this was over, that would be it between us as well. What if he really had just been trying to protect me, and we’d just gotten carried away? We’d have no reason to sit in the hallway together now, no reason to see each other at all.
I couldn’t let that happen.
I pushed down the doubt, trying to gather my confidence.
“Levi,” I started, then trailed off. His eyes had closed, and his hand had relaxed where it lay on the blanket, slipping to hang off the edge of the bed. I moved forward and picked up his hand, letting myself feel the solid warm weight of it in mine for a moment as I slid it back onto the bed at his side. He jerked slightly and his eyes opened into narrow, unfocused slits.
“Marian? You can go away now.” His voice was slurred, heavy with sleep. “The case is over; you don’t need me anymore.”
“What? That’s not true, I—”
His eyes opened all the way and looked directly at me, the blue cold as ice. “Don’t you see?”
He growled and struggled to sit up, hissing as he wrenched his shoulder. I dropped his hand and stepped back, alarmed. “Stop, you’ll pull your—”
“You know you’re an addict, too,” he said, effectively cutting me off. “Just like my dad, and Gary.”
I froze in place.
“I’ve been in your apartment, remember? Maybe it’s not gambling, or drugs—hell, I don’t know, maybe it is—but it’s there, in bags piled to your ceiling.”
I was too shocked to react, and he pulled his eyes away and looked up at the ceiling, slouching back down onto the bed. “I can’t do this with you. You won’t let me in.”
I realized he wasn’t talking about my apartment. Tears burned the backs of my eyes, but I couldn’t move. It was like my feet were encased in ice.
His eyes drifted closed again. “You see how that turns out, right?” he said, his voice thick with the sleep he was failing to fight. “It’ll swallow you alive. You’ll end up just like them.”
The ice around my feet shattered and solidified around my heart instead, and as his breathing evened out, I turned and quietly left the room.
* * *
With Levi’s words playing ceaselessly in my mind—you know you’re an addict too…you’ll end up just like them—my apartment was the last place I wanted to go.
I felt numb inside—hurt, confused, offended. How could he thi
nk I was a drug addict? I wasn’t anything like his father. Or Gary.
But how could he know that? You’ve told him nothing about yourself.
I found myself strangely hesitant to leave the hospital, feeling like if I left, it’d all become real. Whatever short-lived happiness I’d found would be over. But if I stayed…somehow I could fix this. He’d just been through surgery, anyway. He’d been shot. He was on serious painkillers and who knew if he’d even remember what he’d said. Maybe he didn’t mean it.
Except that he’s right.
I shoved down the tiny voice inside me and tried not to think. Not to feel. Just let myself wander the halls, directionless.
I wondered how Geoff was, after the excitement this morning. I wondered about Levi’s mother and brother, how scared they must have felt when they’d heard what happened. I thought about Sam, down an employee after I’d called off to spend the day sitting pointlessly in the hospital. I thought about Sherry—
Sherry!
Her surgery was—I wracked my brain, trying to straighten out the days that had all been running together. Two days ago. She might still be here.
It didn’t take long to find her. She was in a small but brightly lit room on the fourth floor, with windows lining one wall. A large vase overflowing with flowers sat on one of the windowsills, and a couple of cards surrounded it. I felt bad that I hadn’t thought to send her anything yesterday, and tears pricked my eyes, my emotions running close to the surface.
I blinked them back and turned to take in my friend. She was sitting up in the hospital bed, and while she looked tired, her eyes were bright, and her lined face split into a wide smile at the sight of me.
“Marian! It’s so lovely to see you, darling.”
I opened my mouth to respond…and burst into tears.
“My goodness, I don’t look that bad, do I? I know hospital gowns aren’t the most flattering, but—”
I snorted through my tears, and she took pity on me.
“Good lord, girl, come here.” She guided me around the bed to her right side and pulled me into a tight hug. I wrapped my arms around her, mindful of her stitches, and relaxed into her embrace. A minute later, I got myself under control and she released me. I retrieved a chair from the corner and pulled it up close to her bedside, sinking down into it.
“Now tell me,” she instructed, “what’s got you all worked up?”
“I’m here to see you, not burden you with my silly problems,” I protested. “How are you?”
“Yes, yes,” she said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “The surgery went well, I’ve got a brand-new bionic hip—I’m practically half-robot now, you know—they’ve got me up walking around the hallways every few hours, and I can go home tomorrow. Now tell me what’s happened.”
I hesitated. I really didn’t want to burden her with my issues. “Well, they caught the man that robbed the craft store,” I told her after a moment, realizing that news wouldn’t be out just yet. “And the bank and all those other places.”
Her gaze sharpened. “Oh, did they now? Well that’s good. Though I’m thinking that’s not what has you worked up.”
“Levi chased the guy down. And got shot,” I mumbled. She didn’t say anything, but a silver eyebrow climbed up toward her unruly gray hair. My voice dropped to a whisper and I looked down at the floor. “And he thinks I’m more trouble than I’m worth. He said…” My voice caught and I trailed off.
“Ah, now we’re getting to it.” Her lined face softened. “Come on, I’m stuck in here for another day. You might as well tell me everything.”
Haltingly, painfully, I did.
Sherry didn’t interrupt, just sat patiently as I told her about the break-in to my own apartment a couple of weeks back, Levi’s heroic response and my own reaction to scream and kick him out. About our meetings in the hallway. About what really happened two years ago when we’d first met, and how I’d come to see who he really was, a far cry from who I’d thought he was, and how much I’d grown to like that person. And I told her about the events of the morning, and ended with his harsh words from just now in the hospital.
“And the problem is,” I ended, my voice scratchy, “he’s right, I know I’m a mess, and if I was anyone else and I saw my apartment, I’d run screaming, too.” My voice broke again, and I struggled to hold back a fresh wave of tears. “I have so many problems, Sherry, I’m—” I choked on the words, but forced them out anyway—“a hoarder. And he’s right, it’s an addiction. And I don’t let people in. And I worry all the time. And I’m afraid of change. And—”
“Alright. That’s enough.” Sherry’s voice was sharp, but her eyes were kind. “That’s enough beating yourself up. You don’t have a million problems, Marian, you just have one.”
“I know I’m a hoarder, I just—”
“That’s not it,” she informed me.
I blinked, looking out the window to avoid her eyes. “It’s worse than you think,” I said quietly. “I haven’t let anyone into my apartment in five years, not even maintenance.”
“I know, honey,” Sherry said gently, pulling my gaze back to hers. “I’ve known you for years, Marian. I know how often you come into the store, and I know what you buy. Unless you have a side business marking up craft supplies and reselling them on eBay, I can imagine what your apartment looks like.”
My lip pulled up in the ghost of a smile.
“But that’s not it,” she went on, her voice firm. “Everything you listed is just a symptom. The real problem is that you need to learn how to be a little kinder to yourself. You spend all your time and energy worrying about everyone’s happiness…except your own.”
She reached across and caught my hand, squeezing it gently, her skin dry and papery thin against mine. She didn’t let go as she spoke again, her voice soft.
“I know you buy crafts because it makes you feel closer to your mom. I know you lost her young, and I’m so sorry you had to go through that. But you know this won’t bring her back. It’s not doing anything but hurting you more.”
I could barely swallow around the lump in my throat. I could feel her eyes on me, but I stared down at the floor, unable to meet them. Sherry was one of the only people I’d ever even mentioned my mom to, and even she didn’t know the whole story.
“Marian,” she said gently. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“You don’t understand,” I choked out, feeling like a dam was breaking inside me. I yanked my hand out of her grasp, bringing it up to cover my face. “She killed herself, and I didn’t even know anything was wrong.”
I hunched forward, the tears falling freely now, and buried my face in both hands, choking on the bitter taste of the words I’d never spoken aloud. “I found her after school, lying on her bed. She’d overdosed on sleeping pills. I thought it was an accident until I found her note. I remember seeing her lying there, looking like she was sleeping, and I thought, shouldn’t I be thinking how peaceful she looks now? Like if life was so terrible and she was so tormented, she should look peaceful and relaxed now that it’s all over. But she looked the same as she always did! She always smiled and laughed. How did I not know something was wrong? How could she keep that from me?”
I felt the soft pressure of Sherry’s hand on my head, but I couldn’t hold back the wracking sobs. “And then she left me all that money, and my whole childhood, I’d thought we were poor. It’s like I didn’t even know her at all! Like everything I’d ever known was a lie.”
I trailed off, and just let it pour out, wrapping my arms tight around myself. Sherry’s hand was gentle on my hair, stroking and soothing, and eventually my sobs turned into sniffles, then finally ceased. A few long minutes later, I raised my head.
Tear tracks were drying on Sherry’s cheeks as well, and I felt suddenly embarrassed. This was years ago, nearly a decade, and I’d had plenty of time to come to terms with my mother’s death. I hadn’t meant to let those feelings bubble up and spill all over Sherry.
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “I didn’t mean to unload all of that on you. I know it wasn’t my fault, I really do. It wasn’t about me at all.”
“Oh honey, don’t apologize. I’m so sorry. But you see now, don’t you?” She reached across and took my hand again, holding it tightly. “It’s so true, what I said before. You worry so much about other people. You worry about your friend Geoff at his new bakery. You worry about your boss and how he’ll deal with losing an employee. You worry about me, and about your neighbors, and even about strangers in the street.”
She paused for a breath, looking at me sadly. “But honey, it’s not your job to keep everyone happy all the time. You put everyone before yourself because you’re afraid they might struggle, and you might miss it. You’re so hard on yourself.”
She pulled me forward, until our foreheads were nearly touching, and put her warm hands on both of my cheeks.
“You say you know it’s not your fault. But until you act like it, until you really forgive yourself and stop trying to fill the hole inside you with craft supplies and other people’s happiness, you’ll never be happy yourself.”
She pressed a kiss to my forehead as another tear trickled unbidden out of the corner of my eye, then released me. “You’re a wonderful girl, Marian. Let yourself be happy.”
* * *
It was dark by the time I left the hospital. I’d stayed with Sherry for hours, and we’d foregone the hospital food to order pizza, which we ate together while watching home improvement shows on the tiny television set high in the wall opposite the bed. We made fun of home buyers together and she introduced me to her daughter and granddaughter when they stopped by to check on her.
And by the time I gave her another hug and a whispered thank you and finally departed, the moon was a sliver rising in the sky and the sound of frogs from the woods behind the hospital was an echoing chorus in the night.
I felt calm—or calmer, anyway. Even though nothing had really changed, just the act of actually confiding in someone for the first time had been a release I hadn’t known I’d needed, and Sherry’s words echoed in my head in time with the bright sound of the frogs.
