“I heard they’re letting you go,” he finally states.
I smile briefly and nod.
“Ahm… I brought your journals. I thought you might want them. They’re all there.” He gestures to the bag.
I clear my throat. “Thank you.” I don’t know if I even care about them. They’re just words on paper. Sad words on crumpled paper. I know what they say. I was there.
“You… You should find someone to talk to. You’ve been through a lot.”
I scoff bitterly. Maybe Chloe, maybe not. There’s nothing I can tell anyone.
“So… where are you going to go, Miss Jackson?”
I look out the window, at the falling snow; the dusky day is grey, sad and suddenly I long intensely for warm yellow sand and bright days by the sea. “I hate the cold,” I whisper.
“I’m sorry?”
Startled to find I still have a visitor, I realize he asked me a question. I look back out again. “Home,” I croak.
Then I clear my throat.
“Home. We’re going home.”
Chapter 11
Middlebro
Christian
My lungs fill with ice cold water as I hit my head on a sharp rock. I twirl and tumble, not even knowing what’s up and down. Sky flickers by, then dark water, sky again, but through a mass of water.
Cold. It’s so cold. Numbing, shattering cold penetrates my every cell and I’m losing control of my limbs.
I got her. I know I got her, just as she stuck on a ledge. I managed to hold on for one tiny moment and threw her back up. That move is what will kill me, because that was when I lost the grip myself.
Did Kerry get her? Did they fall? Are they alive? Please live. Please don’t let my life and my inevitable death have been for nothing.
I have no air left.
Who the fuck said drowning is peaceful? I’ll find the fucker and pull him under water. He’ll die slowly and painfully. It’s a panic-inducing-aching-I’m losing contact with my body and mind-nightmare.
Suddenly I’m tossed against an unyielding object and throw my arms around it, clinging to something. The whirling force around me tears at my clothes, but my head is above the surface and the riverbank is an arm’s length away. I cough up water, inhale and literally feel how I pull water deeper into my lungs to get some fucking leverage to draw the next breath. My head spins as I fight my cramped arms, forcing them to let go of the rock and push my body toward the side, where the water is calmer, and I can get hold of solid ground.
I don’t feel my fingers. I have no idea if they grip for something to hold on to, or if they’re just lying on the ground like dead matter protruding out of my hands. I’m too weak, too numb, and I slip and slide. Something pulls me back and panic surges through my body, but then it’s as if I’m lifted, thrown halfway up on the river-bank. Not even the fucking water wants me, but I’ll take it.
Coughing weakly, my legs still move back and forth in the stream, I’m too tired to move any further. I fight to stay awake. If I let darkness claim me, I’m dead. I won’t wake again.
Cecilia. I want to live for Cecilia. And for Kerry. I never knew love, but I know this is it, that the swell in my heart, knowing these two exist in the world, is love. Will I ever get the chance to prove to them that I’m worthy?
Christian Russo, you fucker, get up!
I pull for all I’m worth, my fingers getting bloody, my hands covered in lacerations and bone deep wounds. When I feel solid ground under my thighs, I begin to crawl, inch by painful inch, forcing my knees up, right, left, right again. I cough up water, empty my stomach of foul-tasting liquids, inhaling it when I can’t spit it out fast enough. Panic seizes me over and over as air just won’t seem to fill my lungs. Finally, no water swirls around my feet, and I’m up. I’m out of the river, alive, which is unbelievable. I have no energy to even lift my head. With my cheek resting on the cold mud, I look around me. I don’t recognize the terrain at all, and the pale sun comes from another direction. It took me far, the lethal water. A little further downstream the river flattens into a lake that I only see the beginning of, most of the view covered by a thick nest of trees and bushes, looking wild and untouched.
Deep tremors run through me. I’m definitely hypothermic. My teeth chatter uncontrollably and I barely feel my body.
I have to get up, I have to do everything in my power to find a warm, dry place, or I’ll die out here.
Mobilizing my experiences from a life of pain, of surviving street fights, being shot- once in my early twenties, once by Kerry, stabbed, fighting darkness, and blood loss, I scream at my legs to obey me. My roar echoes through the silent forest, bouncing off the distant mountains, or so it seems in my over sensitized mind.
I force one single image into my mind, Kerry sitting cross legged on the floor, next to Cecilia trying to assemble big Lego blocks, a ray of light playing across our daughter’s hair, showing a little red in her dark brown locks.
One step. My legs tremble. One more step. I look around me. I have no idea where to go. Wrapping my arms around me, I stop, indecisive. If I walk in the wrong direction, I’m fucked. If there even is a right direction.
Where is Middlebro? Which direction were we heading? Where was the sun? It was a little to our right. How much time has passed? I haven’t been unconscious. I don’t think it’s been more than thirty or forty minutes since I slammed against the rock and started fighting my way out of the water. That puts the sun just slightly more to the right, probably at my two. I have washed up on the right side of the river. At least that’s some kind of luck.
I take the first step, then I fall on hands and knees and cough up more water. I wipe my ice-cold face with a hand I barely feel, get up again and take the next step. To where, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll just die out here anyway, but I’m no man if I don’t try.
I don’t know how long I’ve walked. I’ve never felt so ill in my life. I tremble from bone-deep exhaustion, shivering uncontrollably. I can’t stop my teeth from chattering. It’s as if someone has ripped the skin off my body. I’m raw, as if my flesh is falling off my bones.
Through a haze in the increasing dusk, my vision blurry, I see a squared shape that doesn’t look like everything else. It’s not a tree, or a rock, or a hill. My heart speeds up as my brain tries to connect the dots.
Is it a house? Is it a fucking house?
I stagger closer, every breath burning and wheezing. Finally I fall to my knees on the ungiving cold stone steps before an ill-maintained door, the dark blue paint flaking, leaving the wood unprotected.
“Hello,” I rasp and slam my fist on the door. I slam against it again and try to speak, but no more sounds escape me.
It’s as if I’m shutting down. Right here and now. I curl up into a little ball and gasp for air, then I reach out once more and grasp for the handle, getting a temporary burst of hope when it obediently swings open.
I roar in agony as I force my body to move, getting up on my knees, crawling the last few feet into a dark hallway. Pushing the door shut with my foot, I gasp and curl up again, hugging my chest, trying to find an ounce of body warmth.
It takes me a long while, getting a feel for my surroundings. It’s inhabited. There’s no movement, no sounds, but there’s a faint smell of greasy food coming from somewhere, and it’s not cold. I’m unable to tell if it’s warm, but I know it’s not cold.
“Hello?” I rasp. I try to find my core, some part of my body that isn’t shutting down, and that can help me live.
There’s no answer.
I force myself up on my knees, numb fingers clutch for the buttons in the icy overcoat. I know I have to get this shit off me. When the buttons finally come undone, I shed the coat, dropping it where I stand. I try to toe off my shoes, but I can’t feel my feet and can’t coordinate my limbs, so instead I pull off the sweater and the shirt, the checkered shirt that used to be Kerry’s dad’s. I’ve never seen my skin so pale. Next to me hangs outdoor clothes and thick sweaters.
There are gloves and knitted ski caps.
I reach for one of the sweaters and pull it on with jerky moves, almost weeping from the effort, then I stagger deeper into the house.
Someone lives here, and I should worry about who. I can’t go to a local hospital. I can’t be caught by the cops. We have no leverage in Canada, no contacts. I could go away for real if they find out who I am and what I’ve done. I feel for the gun in my pocket, it’s still there and I fumble forever to pull it up. It’s useless in its soaked state, but whoever I meet won’t know that.
The sound of a TV blaring some commercial gets louder as I investigate the deeper recesses of the ill-maintained house, the rooms small and dusky, every curtain pulled closed over the windows.
My heart pounds as I enter the little living room. A chair stands with its back to me. A tuft of gray hair and a foot is all I see of the person sitting there. From the TV comes fake laughter from some breakfast cereal commercial.
“Hello?”
The person moves, and an old woman peeks around the side of the backrest. Her face is void of all emotions and she has almost no wrinkles despite her apparent old age. It’s obvious the horses aren’t in the stable anymore. She’s probably far gone in Alzheimer’s or some other dementia. Her empty eyes have an eerie light blue color.
“Ray?” says a thin voice.
My frozen mind kicks into action, a series of images flipping through my mind. Ray. Ray in the grocery store. Ray in the hotel. Ray at Kerry’s house.
Ray is dead.
“Mom?” I say tentatively, and put the gun back in the pocket. “I’m a bit cold.”
Kerry
My fingers tremble when I dial the well-known number.
Mom.
I haven’t talked to her in probably six months, and before that… that was before I left Chicago. I haven’t told her anything. I haven’t dared, afraid she’d get pulled into my nightmare, that they’d come after her too. She knows nothing of my life. I never let her come visit me in Chicago. She has never met Cecilia. She doesn’t know I’m in Canada. She doesn’t know of Christian.
“Yes?” Hearing the warm, slightly husky voice nearly brings me to my knees in relief, and in profound pain knowing how much I’ve hurt her.
“Mom?” My voice quakes pathetically.
“Kerry? Oh my God! Where are you? Are you in trouble?”
“I’m coming home, Mom. I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.” I swallow hard, terrified she’ll reject me, lash out. “I’ve missed you,” I whisper.
“I’m— You are? When?”
The hope in her voice makes my chest tighten. “Soon. Really soon. A few days.”
“Are you okay? Is Cecilia okay?”
I look over at my daughter. We’re being released from care. Finally. She’s fine. Maybe a little pale, but it’s also winter. Neither of us have seen the sun. She’s playing on the floor by my feet with toys we’ve borrowed from the children’s ward. Outside snowflakes whirl past the window. I shudder. I’m not fine. I still have a horrible cough, and I tire easily, even from walking a mere few steps, but they say I’m recovering.
“We’re good. How… are you?” My heart feels as if it shatters from having left her right when Dad had just died. I had good reasons, but still. I should have talked to her. Regret has consumed me these last few days when the thought of home has set root.
“It’s… Sometimes up, sometimes down. It’s getting better. I miss him…”
“I know. I do too.”
“Do you want me to do something? Do you need to be picked up somewhere? Do you need money?”
“Mom… I can’t get hold of Chloe. My house…”
“I think your friend left town. She left it to me, saying she was leaving for a while. Or well, she sent me a letter in a box with the key.”
“Oh…” A stab of disappointment hits me, a feeling of betrayal, which is ridiculous. I haven’t kept in touch. She isn’t obliged to put her life on hold for an old friend who completely disappeared on her. “My hous—”
“It’s still there, hon. I haven’t had the heart to sell it. I kept seeing you in it, and Cecilia… her little legs running on the lawn, chasing butterflies—” Her voice chokes up and tears well up in my eyes at the imagery.
“Mom… I’ve been the worst daughter.”
“Well, I’m sure there are worse, but… I have missed you. When are you coming home? Please let me know if I can do something. Can I reach you on this number?”
Mrs. Anderson gave me an old phone. Her husband and a couple of men from town cleared the road and packed up my house. I don’t need much. I only asked for my wallet, laptop and our clothes, and Dad’s clothes. They’re giving away the rest.
“Yeah. I don’t even know the number myself yet, but this is my new phone. I’ll be home in a few days.” An urge to cough rises in my chest, and I fight it down. “I’ll call you,” I choke out, “gotta go.”
I disconnect before she can object, then I can’t hold it back anymore and an exhausting series of coughs erupt, feeling as if they’ll tear my chest apart.
“Mommy?”
Cece looks at me with dark, worried eyes.
“Mommy’s okay,” I grit out between the violent fits. “I’m okay.”
When I’m done, sweaty and spent, I stare emptily in front of me. I wonder how he died. Was he in pain? I just can’t see this magnificent, larger-than-life, human being dead. I press my fists to my chest to quell the ache, the never-ending pain. I wish I could have thanked him for our lives.
I wish I had let him in that last night, when he touched me, showed his passion for me, made me feel again.
I wish he was here.
Elisabeth Anderson picks us up. Together with her husband Stephan she’s the owner of Pond’s motel. A kind-hearted born and bred Middlebro resident who has done everything for me since I arrived. Now she’s also the new owner of the little grocery store.
Mrs. Anderson rolls us out of the hospital in a wheelchair, Cecilia sitting in my lap, gawking at everything we pass. I can definitely walk and it’s beyond embarrassing to be wheeled out.
She has found an old, stained child car seat and I buckle up my tired little daughter, panting from the exertion.
“Do you want me to do it, hon?”
I shake my head. “No. I’m okay,” I rasp.
“Just let me know what you need.”
I smile weakly. I just want out of here. I want to go home. I want my mom, my friends. “Let’s just go, please.”
She gives me a half smile as she puts the key in ignition. “Tired of hospitals?”
I glance at the large, modern building to my left, glass and concrete, connected to an older red brick building that lies partly hidden behind a large park, everything covered in a growing layer of snow.
“I just wanna go home.”
“I hear you.”
We make it in time to our appointment at the police station to get temporary passports sorted, then Mrs. Anderson maneuvers us through the dense traffic, leaving the city behind us onto smaller roads until we reach Pond’s motel in Middlebro. We’ll stay here two nights and catch our breaths. Recuperate a little. The day after tomorrow we’re taking a flight to San Francisco. Mom will pick us up and take us home.
That night, with Cece sleeping on a couch next to me in the otherwise empty bar at Pond’s, I nurture a whisky, grimacing as it burns hot in my chest. I sit with my laptop, looking over my finances, and weep. It’s not that I don’t have money. I have embarrassingly too much money. Evan has kept paying, and I have barely used anything for the last year. I cry for the loss of my life. I cry when I look at Cecilia, because she will never know her father. I cry because we will go home, build a life again, and a part will always be missing. Always. She looks so much like him, like Christian Russo, and I will be reminded of that for as long as I live.
“Will you be aw’rite, love?”
Stephan Anderson has driven us all the way back to Winnipeg, even though
I tried to insist that we could take a taxi. None of the Andersons were having it. Elisabeth has packed us sandwiches and little cartons of juice, trying to wipe the tears out of the corners of her eyes without me noticing.
I want to say that I’ll miss them, because they have been nothing but amazing, the townspeople, all of them, but Middlebro will forever be too connected with pain.
I have two suitcases containing everything I own. Watching as they roll out of my sight at check-in, I hold Cece in one hand and give Mr. Anderson a one-armed hug with the other. We’re standing in the middle of the bright departures’ hall, people rushing by.
“I’m so sorry I couldn’t be there for Ray’s funeral.”
Stephan’s face falls a little. “I knew ‘im since he was a kid. He’ll be missed.”
Making a non-committal noise, I shift and take a step back. Suddenly my skin crawls and I can’t wait to get on that plane. All I see before me is my house, the steep slopes of San Francisco, hear the squeaking noises from the cable cars, smell exhaust and the salty sea air, the bridge. I fiddle with the passports and glance around me, looking for the security checkpoint.
“We should be on our way.”
“Of course. It’s been an honor knowing you,” he crouches before Cecilia who slides halfway behind my leg, clutching her arms around my knee, “and you, little one.”
“Thank you for everything, Mr. Anderson. You’ve been very kind and I can never hope to repay—”
“Don’t you worry about that too, now. Go on home. You’re finally free of that bastard. Go start the life you were meant to live. You and the little doll.”
As the plane starts moving across the tarmac, I throw a quick text to Mom as Stephan’s words burn in me. Free? I’ll never be free of Christian Russo.
Part II
Beginning
Chapter 12
Russo Saga Collection Page 94
