Brother's Keeper (27 page)

That’s just what I need. But it brings up an interesting question. What the hell happened to my father? The last I saw of him, he was quite intent on killing me, yet somehow I’m alive. While I ponder this, Dr. Ahmari fills me in on the police action in the hospital, which revolves around me, of course. She wants to know if I’m up for speaking with them yet. I can’t see any reason to delay the inevitable, so bring on the cops. This should be fun.

Sara rushes in as soon as the doctor leaves and pulls me into a painful but welcome hug. She starts crying yet again, and I wonder how much she’s been doing this over the past couple of days. But before I have time to ask, two detectives enter the room and ask Sara politely to leave.

“Oh, come on! Seriously?” She’s miffed, and with a reluctant and very annoyed look, she turns around and leaves the room again.

The detectives are patient as I recount the events of two days ago. They record my statement and take notes endlessly while I talk, interrupting only occasionally with questions.

When I’m finished, they have more questions: “How many times has he been violent with me, what other injuries have I sustained, why didn’t I tell anyone, how did I avoid this happening more often than it had?” My answers are simple and straightforward. “He’s been violent more times than I can recall, and I’ve sustained plenty of injuries but never to this extent. I didn’t tell anyone because, at first, I was too young to know what to do, and when I was older I didn’t want anyone to know, and I avoided him by disappearing when I needed to thanks to good friends who were always happy to have my company.” I can’t help but sardonically think that Logan would somehow find himself responsible for every single one of their questions—amazing how he can hold himself so responsible for me.

The detectives are nice enough to fill in the blanks of my memory. Apparently my father had lost his job that morning, which is likely the cause of his little tirade. And he did not give up trying to kill me. Instead, he heard nearby sirens, and assumed, incorrectly, that they were for him. He fled the house at some point and ran into a tree two blocks away. He was arrested and booked for a few different charges, not the least of which was drunk driving. When I didn’t return to the apartment where Sara was waiting to drag me to a movie, she started trying to call me. When she couldn’t reach me, she came to find me. And she did find me—lying in my father’s kitchen, unconscious, barely breathing, and with my hair shorn off. She called 911, and I was in surgery within the hour. The police suspected my father immediately, given his past record and the fact the attack happened in our house. They figured out that they already had him in custody pretty quick, and my statement is what’s going to keep him there.

The detectives assure me they’ll stay in touch before finally leaving and letting Sara back in the room. She comes bursting in again, and now it’s my turn to cry. I owe her a debt of gratitude I can’t even conceive of and I certainly can never repay. God, I love my best friend. This is the first time since I woke that we’ve had a chance to actually talk for longer than thirty seconds. It’s mid-afternoon, and I’ve only been awake for a couple of hours, but I’m already exhausted. Sara is in no mood to keep quiet any longer, though, and she’s bursting at the seams to talk my ear off. She tells me all about the day she found me—every last excruciating detail. She’s choked up and emotional, and it’s hard to listen to her talk about how painful it was to see me that way and waiting during my surgery. We both cry as she tells me how upset her family has been the past two days, and then she mentions Logan’s name.

My gaze snaps up to hers, my eyes wide and begging to take in more information. He arrived last night. He was in here with me for more than two hours while I was sleeping. He left the room in tears, according to Sara, the first time she ever recalls seeing him cry. New tears are pricking my eyes, and I have to fight to breathe as my chest tightens. I croak out the only question I want an answer to, hoping I don’t sound too obvious or desperate. “Where is he?”

“Oh, he left early this morning. He said he had to go talk to the DA he used to work for. He called a while ago and said he was on his way to Detroit on business but would be back when he could be. I think he left Denver in a bit of rush, so maybe he’s trying to make up for lost time? I don’t know,” she says with a shrug.

Sara seems oblivious to my torment, and I try again to act normal.
Holy shit! He saw me like this?
I cringe at the thought of what I must look like, and while I’m almost terrified to look, I ask Sara if she can find me a mirror. Now it’s her turn to cringe as her mouth screws up in a half smile, half horrified grimace that says,
Are you sure you want to see this?
But I have to know just how bad it is, and I nod my head at her questioning look. She rifles around in her purse, comes up with a compact, and hands it to me—again very reluctantly.
Oh, holy shit!
I look worse than bad. I look dead. I look like a Halloween costume gone bad. I look like a child who’s gotten hold of the scissors before anyone could stop her. I look freaking ridiculous!

Sara offers the kind of support only she can get away with. “I’m not gonna lie. It’s perhaps not your best haircut, and you could definitely do with a bit of makeup…” She flashes a sarcastic smile.

I can’t help but laugh. Oh, were it not for Logan having seen me this way, I probably would be amused right now along with her, but the idea of Logan spending two hours with me looking like this: swollen face, freak show haircut, carpet burn on the cheek, and my neck black and blue, is horrifying. No wonder he was in tears when he left. Did anyone actually check to see if they were tears of laughter? How could they not be? I’m atrocious. Sara quickly reassures me Ronnie’s stylist has agreed to pay me a visit the next day to do what she can with my hair. The rest will just have to heal on its own apparently.

Sara stays as long as she can before the nurses usher her out so I can get some rest, but I’m not tired. Suddenly, I’m wide awake and the last thing I want to do is sleep. A nurse comes in asking how I’m feeling, and I have to admit the pain has been building slowly since all the chaos of the day died down, and I’m relieved when I feel the soothing effects of the morphine drip. That’s nice. Maybe I’ll actually be able to do something normal, like watch TV or read or daydream about Logan with the soreness kept at bay, and then … I’m asleep. Good drugs.

* * * *

When I wake the next morning, it is to see Dr. Ahmari waiting for me to rouse. She examines me, and when she's removing the bandage on my upper abdominal area, I get the first glimpse of my stomach. I’m one gigantic bruise. Dark purple and blue bruising covers nearly every inch of my stomach. The sutures are actually staples and one incision sits a couple of inches below my left breast, while the other is situated above and to the left of my belly button. The incisions are both many inches wide. They apparently had to open a considerable area to locate and stop all the bleeding. And it looks exactly as you would expect. The skin is puckered and bunched under the staples and is scabbed over in places. It just adds to the horrific sight of my body. I choke back the tears at the sight of myself, thinking my body suddenly looks foreign to me. I don’t recognize any part of my torso at the moment. The cracked ribs are throbbing, and with every breath I take it feels as though the ribs are being pushed outward and trying to force their way out of my chest. The pain is bad. But Dr. Ahmari has scaled back the morphine. She wants to move me over to prescription pills I’ll be able to take home with me when I’m released. Release? Now she has my attention.

“So when will I be released?” I ask hopefully. And while Dr. Ahmari doesn’t tell me the answer I want to hear, which is right now, she does make me happy when she says tomorrow.

Ronnie’s hairdresser shows up about noon that day and does a remarkably good job. I end up with a short pixie cut somewhere along the lines of the classic Audrey Hepburn look, but I’m no Audrey. Given what she had to work with, I’ve decided she’s a genius. I look normal, facial swelling, bruising, and abrasions notwithstanding. But it is unarguably the first time in a few days I’ve felt some semblance of normalcy. If I can just stay away from a mirror!

Every time the door opens, I expect to see Logan come in, and I’m both ridiculously nervous and eager to see him. I know it will only reignite my pain for him, and it will hurt all the more when he returns to Colorado, but after the last few days I just want him near me—even if only for a minute. I know I’ll regret it later, but I just need one more minute of his time now. But he doesn’t show, and come evening when the Harringtons finally go home for the first time in a long time, I give up thinking I’ll see him. I know I could ask, but of course I can’t do that without sounding too overly interested in him.

A nurse comes in shortly later and takes my vitals. She starts going through all the things I need to accomplish before I can be discharged. Apparently you have to graduate from patient to normal person in order to get out of a hospital. And apparently that means I have to go poop on command like a dog, which I don’t want to do. I also have to walk to the end of the hall without assistance, which I again don’t want to do. I’ve been out of bed since that morning, taking myself to the bathroom to pee, but the end of the hall is a long way away … I think. I haven’t actually been out of my room since waking up in it two days before, but still, I bet it’s a long ways away. And then going to the bathroom… It just doesn’t sound like a whole lot of fun right now, so I think I’ll take a pass. But the nurse isn’t buying it.

She insists that I have to have a bowel movement before they’ll let me leave. Pooping on command has never really been my thing, and the idea of using my tummy muscles, or any muscle in my torso at all right now, is very unpleasant. The few times I’ve had to cough have been agony, and I can’t imagine going to the bathroom is any better. But short of busting myself out of this joint, I’m going to have to break down and make this happen. I think I hate nurses. And by the end of the night, I’ve dubbed mine the poop nurse. She’s incessant. She wants me to go home. I get it. And I’m sure it’s all for my own good, blah blah blah. But I hate her all the same. After much soul searching, a laxative, and a malicious silent curse at my poop nurse, I’m finally a good little hospital patient, and she signs off on my discharge requirements, but I still hate her. We’re not going to be friends. But I get to go home tomorrow, or more accurately, to the Harringtons’.

They’ve asked me to stay at their home for a couple of weeks while I recover so Ronnie can keep an eye on me. I’m relieved. Not that Sara would make a bad caretaker, but I’ve avoided spending more time than I have to at Logan’s apartment. I live there, but it is so filled with memories of him, and I escape as often as I can. Fortunately for me, I’ve been working lots of hours and have kept somewhat busy with Sara. But being laid up in bed for the next week or so at his apartment would be hard.

I drift off to sleep that night wondering what it will be like to see Logan again. It is the most confusing feeling in the world. I want to see him so much that I ache for him, but at the same time I know it will bring me nothing but pain. Who knows, maybe he’s had to return to Denver already and isn’t coming back to Grand Rapids. I have no way to know, and I’m frenzied just thinking about him.

Chapter 28

I sit silently in the chair, waiting for her to wake. I’ve been anxious to see her again for the many days that I’ve been in Detroit, and I’ve been craving this moment like no other in my life. Restraint will be difficult, impossible perhaps, but I have to be near her now.

I arrived back from Detroit just this morning, and Rowan has been at my parents for two days now. They have Rowan in Sara’s old bedroom, and she is sleeping soundly on the bed. Sara and my mother are out shopping, and my father is at the office. I assured Mom that I’d look out for Rowan while they were away, and I couldn’t disguise the frenzied, anxious look on my face as they left. My mother’s leer tells me she’s noticed my odd behavior, but I’ve given up caring about that anymore.

When her eyes open, and I see her beautiful gaze on mine, I melt. It has been far too long since I’ve seen her amazing round blue eyes. I’ve forgotten just how blue they are, and I instantly sigh as though I’ve been holding my breath for the last long months apart. She gasps as she registers my presence and tries to sit up quickly before she winces and drops her back to her pillow. The pain on her face has me up and moving to her side instantly, and I climb to the bed sitting next to her. I’m afraid to touch her, afraid to kiss her, afraid even to move, lest the mattress should shift and cause her more pain. She’s always been delicate to me, and now in her injured state she is like a crumbling fall leaf I’m so desperately trying to save.

She reaches over for my hand and clasps it as tears flood her eyes. I can’t tell if it’s happiness or sadness or full-on despair. And I’m instantly fighting back my own tears with a clenched jaw. After long moments of this struggle against my emotions, and when I finally feel like I’m in control enough to speak without crying, I ask the only question I can think to say, regretting its stupidity immediately. “Are you okay?” Duh.

“I am. I’m sorry. I’m just really emotional, and I … didn’t know if I’d see you before you went back to Denver, and I just … um … I’m sorry. I’ve just missed you.”

She’s practically stuttering in her unease, and I understand exactly how she feels. I lean gently to her mouth and kiss her warm lips, unsure if she’ll accept my mouth. But she doesn’t stop me, and as her lips part in acceptance of me I slip my tongue just slightly past her lips, tasting her mouth cautiously before withdrawing. The paleness of her skin shows her blushing cheeks all the more noticeably. I sit back, watching her, unsure how she’s feeling. Her eyes are wide, and I can’t get a grasp on what she’s feeling. She seems stunned, nervous even.

When she speaks again, she surprises me once more. “Do you regret me?”