Violet 24

by Baigh Queen

  “Yes I am damn sure I don’t want to go to the hospital!” I throw the blanket off my shoulders and hop down from the ambulance, landing on my left foot. I go to take a step towards him to prove I’m fine, but pain shoots through my ankle and into every other part of my body. My knee gives and I tumble forward, right into Bane’s arms. Hitting his chest almost feels like hitting a wall, and the air is knocked out of my lungs. “Just look him up,” I wheeze.

  Bane lifts me easily and puts me back on the back of the ambulance. “Who?” he asks.

  “The Roundabout Bomber.” I’m trying hard not to throw my hands in the air and call it a day; it’s unbelievably tempting. The thought of just going home and closing my eyes...no, I couldn’t. Not yet. Not until I knew the police were going to listen.

  “I’ll tell you what, I promise to look this guy up, if you promise to let your friend take you to the hospital and get checked for a concussion.” He arches his eyebrows. A genuine suggestion? From Bane?

  I squint at him. “What friend?”

  “I ask myself that sometimes, too,” he replies, losing the good-guy attitude. “Your friend from Starbucks.”

  It takes me a moment to remember Brett. Maybe because I’d never really considered us friends or maybe because I really did have a concussion. But as soon as Bane waves his hand at someone past the ambulance Brett is running up to me, all sweaty and out of breath.

  “Why are you breathing so heavy?” I ask. His chest is heaving but he straightens his back when he realizes it’s a cop that waved him over. Ever the Boy Scout.

  “He was turning blue arguing why he should be allowed in,” Bane reveals.

  “I was worried you were seriously hurt,” Brett tells me. “I thought you were dead or something.”

  “If I were dead I think the Sergeant here would be smiling a little wider.” I sigh. “Whatever. I’m fine though, really.”

  “Let the doctors decide that,” Bane suggests. He then calls, “Lily?”

  Lily’s ponytail swishes through the air as she pokes her head around the door of the ambulance. Brett jumps, eyeing her. I tried not to laugh at the thought of his rude, crude, tattooed self being scared of little Lily Harlow.

  “Get her checked out at the hospital,” Bane orders. “I’ll be in contact.”

  Lily does a small salute, pouting her lips in an attempt to either joke or be serious, I can’t tell. Either way she comes around the corner and waves me back into the van, and climbs in after me. She sits me on the little bench on the left, and when she jumps out Brett comes in. Instead of sitting beside me he takes a seat on the orange gurney right across from me. Normally I would side eye him for being so weird, but the lights in the back are too bright, even after coming from outside. It’s hard to believe it’s only been about an hour...or has it been more? Nervously I look out the back doors as Lily shuts them and find the sun is still shining, the wind still blowing, but now there’s a tinge of smoke in the air, and the birds have all gone away. It’s eerie, I realize, to not hear birds anymore. I shiver, hearing the lullaby again.

  “Here,” Brett says. He’s grabbed the scratchy blanket and throw it over my shoulders. There’s a wrinkle between his eyebrows that makes me sad, but I can’t place why.

  “I’m not dead,” I tell him.

  “Good, I was worried for a second that I was talking to a ghost.”

  “As if I would haunt your sorry ass when I’m dead.”

  “I don’t know, sometimes you give me a really scary glare when I cut you off at the store.”

  I snort a laugh. “Stop cutting me off then and you’ll be safe. Also, free cake pops.”

  Brett rolls his eyes and leans back a little, his shoulders relaxing. He pulls at the collar of his button down black shirt, letting two of the buttons pop undone. I almost laugh at the idea that a grown man is wearing a shirt with pop-off buttons, but it’s the most I’ve ever seen of his chest tattoo. It looks like the tip I’ve always seen is the end of a dagger, but there’s something off about the ink—it’s too bumpy, almost like—

  Brett notices where my eyes are and quickly covers the tattoo with one hand. He clears his throat as the ambulance starts and Lily looks back at us through the little window to my left.

  “You guys okay back there?”

  “All good,” Brett calls back. Lily pulls away, flashing the lights on top of the ambulance. I catch them reflect on the cracked windshield of a car on the street. I don’t remember seeing that happen, but the spider web twists across the glass in a random sort of beauty. Slowly I go over how everything happened.

  Walking through the park. Kids surrounding the bench.

  Lullaby.

  No, see hat and note, then lullaby. When did the kids start to run? How long did I stare at the note on the hat before the lullaby even started? I squeeze my eyes shut and lean my head on the side of the vehicle. The jostling from the road makes it hard to think clearly, and I’m starting to believe that I really did hit my head. Though I don’t remember it. I just remember the wall smashing down on my ankle, and the way the world felt like it was on fire.

  I close my eyes and try to focus harder when the pounding in my head starts. I furrow my brow, finding it impossible to think of anything other than the beating in my skull when Brett pats a hand on my knee.

  “Hey, keep your eyes open for me,” he says.

  I obey but send him a disapproving look. “You’re being awfully mom like right now considering our relationship consists of me getting coffee and you telling me to leave the store.”

  “That’s not true,” he denies, “sometimes I tell you to leave town.”

  I chuckle, making the beating in my head hurt more. I let out an involuntary groan and rub at my temple, sticking one hand through a small hole I’ve made in the blanket. The ambulance hits a particularly large bump and I jump an inch off the seat and land hard. Brett holds onto both my knees now to keep my in place.

  “Sorry!” Lily calls. “We’re just about there.”

  “Yippee,” I mutter. “Any chance I can just escape when we stop?”

  “No,” Brett says. “You need to get checked out.”

  “Okay, Mom.” I resist rolling my eyes again because I’m pretty sure it’ll hurt like hell if I do. When the ambulance stops Lily comes around and opens the back doors. Brett leaves first and offers me his hand—afraid that I’m going to fall again and this time land on the ground instead of someone’s chest I take it, and he wraps an arm around my waist.

  “Uh, we can use the gurney,” Lily suggests, pointing to the orange cushion on wheels.

  “Ugh, no,” I tell her. “I’m not rolling into the emergency room with that thing. I’ll walk.” I try to wiggle away from Brett but his grip is iron. I feel too hot next to him, and my head hurts too much when I think. So when Brett starts to guide me to the glass doors I let him, and Lily stays on my other side the entire time.

  The hospital is pretty small, and looks more like a school than a hospital. It’s a red brick building with an addition on the side working as the emergency room. The addition doesn’t match, it looks like white plaster with shiny sliding glass doors and a canopy overhead. But the town decided it needed one after there was a car accident just outside of town and too many cars had blocked the ambulances from getting in and out. Now we have a nearly unused eyesore sitting in the centre of town.

  Well, today’s it’s getting some use.

  There’s a woman sitting behind the counter looking down at something I can’t see. Based on how she’s tapping a pen to her lips she’s doing some kind of puzzle but she looks up at us as soon as we walk in. The glasses on her nose slide down a little and she uses her pinky finger to adjust them. Weirdly, I don’t recognize her.

  There’s only a handful of doctors in town, and not many more nurses than that. But this woman that sits before me with long brown hair and dark brown eyes isn’t any of the ones I know. And in Goderich, I thought I knew everyone.

  As if sensing my c
onfusion Lily says, “Gwen, this is Dr. Torres. Dr. Torres, here’s your first and probably only patient this afternoon, Gwen Weaver.”

  “Nice to meet you,” I say out of instinct. I give her a little wave. “I just have a sprained ankle so—”

  “We think she hit her head,” Brett interrupts. I shoot him a glare which he ignores. I want to try to wriggle free of his grip again but I’m finding my hands are starting to shake. In fact, my entire body is starting to tremble but I don’t know why. My heart rate is normal, and I’m not longer fearing for my life but I can’t make my hands stop. I wonder if Brett notices but he’s not saying anything.

  Dr. Torres stands and grabs a white lab coat from the back of her chair. She throws it on and quickly comes around the corner, not saying a word. She pulls out a small pen light from her pocket and flashes it in my eyes, grabbing at my eyelids and forcing them open wider. I try to jerk back but Brett keeps me in place. I feel his grip tighten, caught just as off guard by Dr. Torres as I am. Lily shrugs at me from behind the doctor.

  “Nausea?” Dr. Torres asks.

  “No,” I reply.

  “Dizziness or seeing stars?”

  “No.”

  Dr. Torres’s eyes go to Brett. “Slurring words?”

  “I don’t think so,” he replies. Dr. Torres’s face is still only inches from mine and I’ve never felt more under a microscope, not even when I broke my mother’s favourite lamp and tried to lie my way out of it.

  “You don’t appear dazed,” she muses. Her back straightens and she pockets the penlight. “Any ringing in the ears? Headache?”

  “Yes to the headache,” I tell her, “no more ringing.”

  “But there was ringing?”

  “Yeah, that’s what happens when a bomb goes off near you.”

  The perfectly groomed eyebrows on Dr. Torres’s head raise high at the mention of the bomb. Her hands are in her pockets as she says, “Perhaps we should get you a CT scan.”

  “Oh, there was a bomb,” Lily cuts in. Dr. Torres turns slightly to look at her. “Seriously.”

  “I hope I’m not expecting any clients downstairs,” the doctor says after a moment.

  “No, Gwen was the only one injured,” Lily says. Then she adds with a smile, “Thanks to her nobody else was hurt or…” Her smile falls as she thinks of the only alternative.

  All of us are quiet then, the weight of what just happened sinking in. I’m thinking about Anna and if she really will go to the Olympics one day, and all the other kids that nearly lost their lives if I hadn’t happened to walk by. No, the kids that were nearly murdered.

  I clench my jaw, heart rate picking up. I feel a fresh surge of adrenaline as I imagine the possible headlines that could have come from the disaster. I think of the ones that are still to come even though nobody was killed.

  Roundabout Bomber Back After 20 Years.

  Witness Says Roundabout Bomber Responsible for Park Explosion.

  Seven Nearly Killed in Planned Attack.

  The list goes on, but each one I think of makes me want to run back to the park and try to help. I’m not sure what I can do, but there has to be something. I could canvas the area, pick up pieces of the bomb, and research the entire history of the bomber.

  My limbs are heavy though, and I don’t think I’ll be able to anything with a twisted ankle and Bane blocked off the scene. I almost laugh at myself for thinking I could do anything.

  “I’ll keep you for observation for a couple hours.” Dr. Torres is first to break the silence. We all look to her, still calm and quiet, so assured. I don’t find comfort in it. I’ve never found comfort when people know what they’re doing; it only reminds me that when things go wrong it’s that much worse.

  I no longer fight staying at the hospital, but I make Dr. Torres promise not to call anyone. The last thing I need right now is my mother coming back early from her cruise just because I sprained an ankle.

  Besides, a town that was just bombed is the last place I want the people I care about.

  Chapter Two

  I’m losing so badly at Go Fish against Brett that I think I really do have brain damage. I’m not sure how but he’s managed to take a card from me every chance he gets, and I think he’s cheating. I just don’t know how someone can statistically get so many matches in a two person game; it doesn’t make sense. But Brett’s pile beats mine each round until I finally throw my cards down on the swinging tray in frustration.

  “I give up,” I announce, “there’s no beating you at this stupid game.”

  “It’s only stupid because you’re losing.”

  “I’ve lost,” I reply, “past tense.”

  Brett grins at me but nods. “We could try something different? Blackjack?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t even want to know how good you are at that.”

  Brett lets out a chuckle and it makes him seem older than he is. The way he’s sitting in the blank hospital room with me, hair a mess and sticking out all over the place, and the way the light shadows his face I feel like I’m seeing him for the first time. Not as the Brett I grew up with but as some other Brett--a way more appealing Brett.

  I cross my arms in an attempt to calm my heart. Every so often it feels as if it skips a beat, and brings me right back to when I was hiding behind the stone pillar waiting for an explosion. I have to keep reminding myself that I’m safe here in the hospital, with new Brett at my side. But when I look at his green apron I start to feel guilty. He probably ran over right from the store, maybe even ditched part of his shift.

  “You can leave if you want,” I tell him. I shrug. “You don’t have to babysit me. Dr. Torres is around and I don’t live too far from here.”

  “I want to stay,” he replies. My heart does that weird skip again, but this time I don’t flashback to the bombing. Instead I’m trapped in Brett’s gaze, and he’s not looking away from me so I can’t seem to look away either. The moment is ruined when Brett adds, “Someone has to keep you in check.”

  I let out a huff and fall back onto the pillows. They’re flat and small, and feel more like the mattress than what they really are but they’re enough to keep me partially upright. “Because I’m going to do what exactly?”

  “Well for one I thought you were going to take Jeremy’s head off back there.” Brett’s tone is light, playful, but I’m not feeling playful anymore. One can only lose so many times at a child’s game before they lose their playful attitude.

  “That might improve his policing,” I say. I raise my arms to place them under my head when someone in the doorway clears their throat. With most of the rooms around me empty I know it isn’t someone just passing by and I twist my neck to see Bane standing there. His shoulders take up most of the doorway, still in the shape of a linebacker just like in high school. Maybe he’s bigger now, I can’t quite tell.

  I sit up but don’t apologize. He’s heard me say much worse, I’m sure, and all he gives me is a pointed look.

  “Hey Sergeant,” Brett says casually. He drops his cards to the table and sits back as if they’re old buddies. But I don’t remember them ever interacting with each other; Brett was in art and music while Bane was...well, he preferred to use his fists to solve problems.

  “Brett,” Bane replies. His eyes fall on me but they aren’t the soft ones I saw before at the crime scene, now they’re hard, blocking me from really reading him.

  I ask, “What?”

  “I’ve got news about what’s happened,” he reveals, “thought you would wanna know.”

  I inch up further, readying myself for terrible news. The headlines that the bomber is back flood my mind again and I gulp down my fear. My palms are sweaty, and I’m glad that whatever Dr. Torres gave me has gotten rid of the pounding in my head.

  I nod for him to go on.

  Bane only takes another step into the room before he says, “I’ve talked to the kids about what happened and they aren’t ready to talk yet.”

  “Well they’re scare
d,” I say.

  “I know. We’re going to try talking to them later when they’ve calmed down.” Bane keeps his eyes trained on me, never one to look away. I want him to, if only to give the pressure on my shoulders a little ease. He doesn’t. “So why are you here then?”

  “When you were at the park do you remember seeing a barbecue near the bench?”

  I furrow my brow. “What does that matter?”

  “Try to remember.” He tilts his head down a bit.

  “I…” I think back, but I can’t remember anything other than the hat. I try to picture what was around the bench; the kids, the trees, anything, but it’s just the hat and the note. “I don’t remember.”

  I pull my bottom lip towards my teeth, oddly ashamed that I can’t remember something as simple as a barbecue. What does that matter though? I ask him.

  “From the evidence we’ve gathered so far it looks like a propane tank may have been the source of the explosion. Now we don’t know how just yet but--”

  “A propane tank?” I repeat. I move until I’m on my knees, getting as high as I can to meet his eyes. “You’re seriously telling me you think a propane tank exploded after I told you exactly what it was?”

  Bane wets his lips. “Weaver, we’re still investigating but there’s ample evidence saying that this was an accident. Now we’re lucky you happened to be walking by and scared the kids so bad they ran away but--”

  “What evidence?” I shout. “It wasn’t a damn accident Bane! It’s serious! This--”

  “I know it’s serious,” Bane interrupts. His voice is so commanding I almost shrink back, but I hold strong against him, mouth clamped shut. “There’s nothing definite yet, but for all we know the kids could have been playing with some fireworks when things went wrong.”

  “There were no fireworks there.” My teeth are grinding so hard they hurt.

  “There were,” Bane confirms. “Witnesses say they saw some going off not long before the explosion. Mrs. Molson said that her eldest son sometimes gives the girls sparklers to play with unsupervised.” His lips purse.