Shine (17 page)

But when I got there, the nurse turned me away. “Sorry, hon,” she said. “Family only.”

I stared at her. “But . . . he doesn’t have any family.”

The nurse, who was young and probably straight out of nursing school, regarded me sympathetically. “I’m sorry. It’s the rules. But he’ll be allowed to have visitors if he comes to, so keep checking on him, ’kay?”

“
If
he comes to?” I said. I felt wobbly.

“When he comes to,” the nurse said fast. Her name tag said
KELLY
. She took my hand and squeezed it. “Just pray for him. It’s in the Lord’s hands now.”

I nodded, but I was in a daze, and I walked off in the completely wrong direction. I didn’t come out of my fog until I heard someone else asking about Patrick at the nurses’ station. A guy.

“So, uh, can I see him?” I heard him say.

The back of my neck prickled, and I turned around as Kelly, the nurse, explained the “not unless you’re family” rule. The guy was lean and well built, and his khakis fit him just like khakis should. His shirt was a striped oxford, nice enough for church.

It was the guy from the public library, here to see Patrick. Why?!

Well, march over and ask him
, I told myself.
There is no reason on God’s green earth for him to be here, and you need to find out what the heck is going
on.

So I did, doing my best to ignore the tree frogs jumping around in my stomach. I walked up behind him and said,
“Hey
,” so loud it made
him
jump.

He whipped around. “How . . . why . . .” He blinked. “What are
you
doing here?”

“Wrong,” I said. I was vaguely aware of Kelly behind us, her sweet face concerned. “The question is, what are
you
doing here?”

He didn’t reply, and my brain started working overtime trying to supply answers. Did Patrick know this guy? Were they friends? If so . . .
why
, given that he was such a jerk?

Except I knew the answer to that one. Patrick was friends with Tommy, after all. That’s just how Patrick was. Accepting.

But any thought I had was pure speculation, which meant I was wasting my time, since what I needed were answers. Plus, the look library guy was giving me made me uncomfortable. It wasn’t that he seemed pissed or wanted to throttle me or anything. He looked . . . well . . . remorseful.

I didn’t want to talk in front of Kelly, so I strode away from the nurses’ station and motioned for him to follow. There was a red vinyl sofa next to the hospital elevator, and I dropped down into it, leaving plenty of room for him. He sat. He was very obedient. Or maybe just in shock.

I was certainly in shock. I never expected to see him again, and now here he was.

I gave my head a good hard shake. “So. You know Patrick?”

“Yeah,” he answered cautiously.

“Are you friends with him?”

He started to speak, but hesitated.

And then, finally, it dawned on me. When we first met, I hadn’t gotten the vibe that he was gay. But that was at the library, and now here he was at the hospital, asking to see Patrick.

“Are the two of you, um, together?” I said.

“Are we . . . what?
No
.”

I didn’t believe him. I didn’t not believe him, but I didn’t believe him.

He raked his hand through his hair, which was long enough to fall in his eyes, and said, “Two things.”

“Okay.”

“One, Patrick already has a boyfriend. And two, I’m not gay.”

“You aren’t?” I said. And then, “He
does
?”

“Uh, yeah, and I’d think if
you
were his friend, you’d know that.” His eyes narrowed. “So are you?”

“Am I what?”

“His
friend
.”

“Yes
,” I said. “Are you? Because in all your counting, you never said.”

He fell silent, and I felt like a fool. Given his low opinion of people who lived in backwoods towns like Black Creek, of course he wasn’t Patrick’s friend.

In that case, what did his visit mean? Did he come to the hospital to mess with Patrick some more? To admire his handiwork? To finish what he’d started?

“Tell me how you know him,” I demanded.

“Tell me how
you
know him,” he said.

“I go to school with him. We live in the same town.” Feeling a need to defend myself, I added, “And obviously, I know he’s got a boyfriend. I just haven’t met him yet.”

He slumped back on the hospital sofa.

“He wouldn’t tell you, either, huh?” Under his breath, he muttered, “God, I’m such a dumb shit.”

I was confused.

“I want to talk to the guy, that’s all,” he said.

“To who? Patrick? You can’t, because he’s in a coma.”

“No, I want to talk to his boyfriend. His
undercover lover
.” He didn’t use air quotes, but his intonation achieved the same effect. “If I could find him, I could see if he knew anything.”

Undercover lover
, I repeated silently. I could imagine Patrick referring to a mysterious boyfriend like that. He would have liked the cheesiness of it, the delicious rhyme of the words.

“Maybe he knows something, but he’s scared to come forward,” the guy from the library went on. He pressed the back of his head into the cushion behind him.
“Fuck
.”

A lump formed in my throat. He was a jerk, but he
did
care about Patrick. Any idiot could see that.

I thought about what was best for Patrick, what was best for getting to the bottom of things. I swallowed my pride and said, “Then we need to find him.”

“‘
We
’?” he said.

“Fine,
I
need to find him,” I said, my face heating up. I stood, went to the elevator, and jabbed the button.

“Wait,” he said.

The elevator doors opened. I stepped inside, and he leaped forward to join me.

“What I said at the library . . .” he said. “The name I called you . . .”

I stared at the indicator lights for the different floors. There were only three of them.
Come on, come on
, I silently chanted.
“I owe you an apology,” he said stiffly. “Great,” I said. It didn’t escape me that an
actual
apology failed to come.

“Look, here’s my number and my email addy,” he said, fumbling in his pocket. He pulled out a pen and a crumpled receipt and started scribbling. “I’ll tell you if I find out anything, and you can do the same.” He gave me the scrap of paper.

I stared at it. His name was Jason. Jason Connor.

“Now you,” he said, and I glanced up to see him holding his phone, ready to punch in my info.

I folded the scrap of paper and shoved it into my pocket. “Don’t have a cell. Sorry.”

“You’re shitting me.”

“Nope. No cell.”

“How can you not have a cell phone? Everyone has a—“He broke off, and I saw that he’d figured it out. White trash kids don’t get the same toys as rich kids.

“Yup,” I said, adopting Daddy’s countriest twang. “It’s a dang shame, but all my money goes to moonshine and dirt.”

The elevator doors slid open, and I quick-walked out, my heart beating fast.

“Wait,” he called. “I don’t even know your name!”

“Bye, Jason,” I said, tossing the words over my shoulder. “Have a nice life.”

AUNTY TILDY HAD MY FAVORITE MEAL WAITING for me when I got home: chicken and dumplings. She knew I’d gone to the hospital, and I guess she was worried I’d be upset when I got back home. I would have found more comfort in a hug, or a few simple questions about how the visit had gone, but no. That was what the chicken and dumplings were for.

Though I didn’t have much of an appetite, I cleaned my plate to please her. I sensed Christian watching me as I ate. I kept my eyes cast down.

I was frustrated, because I seemed to be gaining more questions than answers. Who was Patrick’s boyfriend? How on earth did Patrick get to be friends with a Toomsboro snob like Jason? And on a whole different level, the Wally/meth mess,
with Beef, Dupree, and Tommy mixed smack up in it. Tommy and Dupree, I could buy. But Beef? I couldn’t wrap my head around it, even though he admitted he used to be involved. Even though I’d seen the possibility of continued involvement in his eyes.

I hadn’t learned much from Wally other than that he’d trapped poor Ridings McAllister in his spiderweb. Tommy was the only one of “Wally’s boys” I hadn’t spoken to, aside from our brief exchange at church. But I couldn’t face him. Not yet. That left the one tagalong member of the redneck posse: Beef’s girlfriend, Bailee-Ann.

After dinner, I dragged a brush through my hair, pulled it into a ponytail, and headed out of the house. Bailee-Ann and I used to be tight. Patrick was my true best friend—my kindred spirit—but Bailee-Ann was my best female friend.

Our friendship fizzled out in high school, just another smoldering by-product of my amazing disappearing girl act. But Bailee-Ann never treated me with spite, because she wasn’t like that. She was more . . . more like a fawn, with creamy, freckled skin and big brown eyes and a gentleness that made people not want to hurt her.

Well, made
me
not want to hurt her. Sometimes I worried about Bailee-Ann, because what one person saw as tenderness, another might perceive as an opportunity to get in and do some damage. But with Beef looking after her, Bailee-Ann would be okay. I wondered if she knew that Beef had worked for Wally? I’d have to talk carefully, in case she
didn’t. But maybe I could get her to tell me what happened the night of Patrick’s attack.

Twilight had come and gone by the time I grabbed my bike from the side of the house. The stars weren’t out yet, but the sky was bluish-purple. It would be dark soon.

When Christian saw me throw my leg over my bike, he called out, “Hey, where do you think you’re going?”

Aunt Tildy followed him out on the porch, and he turned to her. “I don’t want her going out again.”

“Well, too bad you don’t have any say in it,” I said.

“You two, stop fussing,” Aunt Tildy said.

“She’s been out too much already,” Christian insisted. “She needs to stay put.”

“Needs to stay put
?” I echoed. “What am I, a dog?”

“It’s late. You shouldn’t be out when it’s dark.”

Christian had been a warm body to stand by at Wally’s, and I appreciated it. But this big brother protective act of his was making me nervous. It opened up old wounds.

I rolled my eyes and said, “It’s hardly late. I’ll be back in, like, an hour. All right, Aunt Tildy?”

“I already said
no
,” Christian said.

“And just when did you become the boss of me?”

“You’re sticking your nose where it don’t belong,” he accused.

“Sticking my . . . ?” I gave Aunt Tildy a baffled look. “I just want to go to Bailee-Ann’s. It’s Saturday night, and I thought it would be nice to see her.” I shrugged. “I miss her.”

“Bullshit,” Christian said, making Aunt Tildy inhale. I glanced at her with wide eyes to say I didn’t know what had gotten into him, either.

Christian’s nostrils flared. “It’s because of Patrick. She’s going around asking questions about Patrick, and she needs to stop.”

“I don’t know what he’s talking about,” I told Aunt Tildy.

I turned to my brother. “Honestly, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I kept my tone the same, but the look Christian got said,
If you’d answer my questions yourself, I wouldn’t have to
.

A flush worked its way up his face.

“Anyway, you go to your friends’ houses all the time, so why can’t I?” I said.

“Because you don’t have any friends, that’s why!”

Aunt Tildy whapped him with her dishcloth.

“Ow
,” he complained.

“That’s enough,” Aunt Tildy said. “Now, Cat. There is no reason for you to be”—she pursed her lips—“getting involved with what happened to Patrick.”

I pulled my eyebrows together. “But, Aunt Tildy—“

“
However
, I know you’re smarter than that, and I’m glad to see you getting back with sweet Bailee-Ann. You been keeping to yourself for too long. So yes, you may go to her house.”

It was Christian’s turn to protest. “But, Aunt
Tildy
—“

Aunt Tildy whapped him again. “
Nossir
. You leave your sister alone.”

“Yeah,” I said. I smirked, as smirking felt called for, but in truth my emotions were more complicated. I felt choked by them, as if someone’s thumb was pressing into the hollow of my throat.

Maybe he’s changed
, I thought.
Maybe he’s stronger now. Maybe he
will
be there if I need him
.

But what a dangerous game to play. He would always be my big brother. I would always be his little sister. There would always be a part of me that ached to believe in him the way I used to . . . but it was a temptation I couldn’t afford to give in to.

So I biked along the dirt road to Bailee-Ann’s house, which was closer to town and nicer than ours. It wasn’t fancy, but her daddy kept it up as best he could, with a fresh paint job and a newly mown lawn and a split-rail fence around his wife’s flower garden. Wildflowers were what Bailee-Ann’s mom liked: larkspur and violets and lady’s slippers, which Mama Sweetie called moccasin flowers.