The Song of David (34 page)

When the fat desk clerk had finally come back to her post, she was shaking her head, and she kept looking at us like we’d escaped from a freak show. I’d been looked at that way a time or two, so I just stared back with all the insolence I felt, and Millie was obviously unaware that she was the focus of such suspicious attention. Henry was a jittery, trivia-spouting mess, but Millie just held his hand, stroked his hair, and commented on his inane trivia as if he was the smartest kid in the universe. Before long, he was eating peanut M&Ms and guzzling Sprite from the vending machines with relative calm, whispering a stat to himself every once in a while.

“He’s out of surgery. We were able to stop the bleed,” the doctor said solemnly. He looked from me to Millie. His eyes widened and he looked back at me again, obviously realizing that he could only make eye contact with one of us. To his credit, he went right on talking, hardly pausing.

“He’s unconscious, and we’d like to keep him that way at this point, but we think when the swelling eases in the next twelve hours or so, he’ll come around. We need to watch him over the next few days, but he should be fine. Brain activity looks good, vitals are good. I have consulted with Dr. Stein and Dr. Shumway at LDS hospital. Dr. Shumway performed the craniotomy on your friend, and I can’t tell you much more, but Mr. Taggert’s got some big decisions to make. I think having you here, having people call him on what he did, and on what he needs to do, is important. What he did tonight was incredibly foolish. He’s lucky to be alive.”

Moses

TAG WOKE UP just as the doctor predicted, but they didn’t let us see him until they moved him out of the ICU, which didn’t happen for a full twenty-four hours after he regained consciousness. We’d gone back and forth from the hospital to a nearby hotel, running on terror and little sleep, until, two days after we’d begun our vigil, we went back to the hotel to shower and change, and Henry climbed into bed and refused to get out again. Millie didn’t dare leave Henry alone at the hotel for hours on end, so she stayed behind and I went back to the hospital.

I was surprised to find Tag sitting up in his bed, his eyes heavily circled, his jaw rough with several days’ worth of beard, his shaggy hair hanging lank around his face. The bald patches and staple marks were extremely visible now, and he scratched at his skull as if the bare skin were driving him crazy.

“It’s been almost three weeks. It’s mostly healed, and it itches,” he complained with a smile, as if it were just road rash—nothing serious.

“I think I’ve convinced one of the nurses to help me shave it all off. We’ll be twins, Mo,” he said, referring to the fact that my hair had never been much longer than stubble.

I couldn’t respond. I didn’t do small talk and bullshit as well as Tag did. In fact, I didn’t really do it at all. I just stared at my friend and shoved my hands in my pockets to repress my urge to paint . . . or kill him.

“I think Millie will dig a smooth head—” He stopped abruptly and rubbed at his jaw, clearly agitated. “Is she here, Mo? With you?”

“She’s at the hotel with Henry. He was exhausted, and she didn’t dare leave him alone.”

Tag nodded and closed his eyes, as if he too were exhausted. “Good. That’s good.”

A nurse bustled in, saw me, and hesitated slightly. I almost laughed. She probably wanted Tag all to herself while she fussed over him. Typical female. He probably had the entire nursing staff at his beck and call. He’d be the most well-cared for patient in the history of the hospital.

I watched as she carefully covered him with a sheet and gently started removing his hair with an electric razor, one long clump at a time, until he sat before me, smooth-headed and scarred, looking so different and defeated, so changed, that I unclenched my hands, releasing some of my rage.

The nurse exclaimed that he “must feel so much better now,” and whisked away the shorn hair and the sheet that covered him. Then she helped him maneuver out of his hospital gown—avoiding his IV and the various monitors—and assisted him in donning a new one. I caught Tag’s eye as she carefully tied the strings at his back. I raised an eyebrow, and he gave me a smirk that let me know that he hadn’t changed all
that
much.

Still, when she left the room, he closed his eyes briefly, resting momentarily, and I felt the fear swell in my chest once more.

“You look like shit, Tag,” I said.

“So do you, Mo,” he shot back, not even opening his eyes.

“It’s your fault,” I said.

He sighed and then murmured, “I know.”

I didn’t comment, thinking he needed to sleep. But after several long breaths he opened his eyes again and met my gaze.

“I’m sorry, Moses.”

“You shouldn’t have left like that. You’ve put us all through hell.” I guess we were going to go there, after all.

“I didn’t see a better solution.”

“I can think of one,” I snapped, and when he didn’t respond immediately, I exhaled heavily and pressed my palms into my tired eyes.

“Sometimes I feel like death is the only thing I haven’t done,” he said eventually. “Hell, and I’ve even attempted
that
a couple of times. The problem with death is that it’s exclusive, like sex and child-birth. Once you’ve done it, there is no going back.”

His thoughts were clearly rhetorical, and I waited him out again.

“The thing is, Mo. I’m okay with it. If I’ve learned anything from being your best friend, from watching you commune with the dead, it’s that death isn’t anything I need to be afraid of. I’m not a perfect man. But I think I’m a good man. I’ve lived a hell of a life, even with all the heartache. Millie told me once that the ability to devastate is what makes a song beautiful. Maybe that’s what makes life beautiful too. The ability to devastate. Maybe that’s how we know we’ve lived. How we know we’ve truly loved.”

“The ability to devastate,” I repeated. And my voice broke. If that wasn’t a perfect description of the agony of love, I didn’t know what was. I had felt that devastation. I had survived it, but I didn’t want to survive it again.

“I love her so much, Mo. I love her so damn much. That’s the thing that sucks the most. I can deal with the cancer. I can deal with death. But I’m going to miss Millie. I miss her already.” He swallowed, his throat working overtime against the emotion that choked us both. “I would miss you too, Mo, but you can see dead people, so I can haunt you.”

I laughed, but it came out a groan, and I stood, needing to escape, hating the sorrow, raging against the futility of grief, yet feeling it anyway. Tag watched me pace and when I finally sat back down, indicating I was ready, he spoke again.

“I’m okay with death, Mo. I’m good with it,” Tag said quietly. “But dying . . . dying is different. I’m afraid of dying. I’m afraid of not being strong for the people who love me. I’m afraid of the suffering I will cause. I’m afraid of the helplessness I’ll feel when I can’t make it all better. I don’t want to sit in a hospital bed, day after day, dying. I don’t want Millie trying to take care of me. I don’t want Henry watching me fade from giant to shadow. Can you understand that, Mo?”

I nodded slowly, though doing so made me feel sick, like I was condoning what he’d done, leaving like he had.

“I laid in bed all night after they told me what I was facing. They gave me all the risks, the time frames, best case scenarios, worst case scenarios. By morning, I knew it wasn’t for me. I told my doctor, thank you very much, but I’m gonna go now.”

“And you weren’t going to tell anyone?”

“No.” Tag shook his head, his eyes on mine. “No.”

“But . . .” I didn’t understand. I wasn’t following.

“I got my affairs in order. I met with my attorney, got things figured out. Drew up the will, liquidated a bunch of stuff. The only thing that was bothering me was the money I still owed my dad. I could sell it all—the bar, the gym, the clothing line. If I did, I’d have more than enough, but I don’t want to sell. I want to leave the gym to the guys. I want to leave the bar to Millie and Henry so Millie can dance around that damn pole until she’s eighty-two and no one can tell her no, and so that Henry can have a place where he can talk sports and someone will listen. He loves the bar. I wanted to leave you something too, but I knew you would hate that.”

He got that right. He was messed up about everything else. But he got that right.

“But even with the sale of the apartments, the liquidation of everything but my truck, I still owe my dad fifty grand,” Tag continued.

“Wasn’t that an inheritance?”

“I didn’t want an inheritance. I wanted to build my own road,” Tag argued. “I told him I would pay it all back by the time I was thirty. Thirty ain’t gonna happen, Mo. So I needed to find a way to pay it back sooner.”

“The fight.”

“Yeah.” Tag nodded. “The fight. It just so happens I got offered a title fight that would pay me fifty Gs if I won. And I had absolutely nothing to lose.”

“And after the fight?”

“I was going to take a trip to Dallas, see my mom and my sisters and pay my dad back. I haven’t seen them in a while. Then . . . take a hike up into the hills above that overpass in Nephi.”

“The one where Molly was buried?”

“The one where Molly was buried,” he confirmed. “Hike up into the hills. Take a pill. Watch the sun-set as I went to sleep.”

“That’s it?” I asked, reining in my temper.

“That’s it,” he answered, with no temper at all.

I felt the rage surge in my chest and pop in my ears, but I kept my voice level. Apparently, he hadn’t thought he needed to say goodbye to me.

“So you left the tapes. Why?”

“It was my way of saying goodbye. I wanted Millie to know how I felt. Every step of the way. Falling in love with her. I never wanted her to have a reason to doubt me. I wanted her to know it was real, that is was perfect, that it was the best gift I’ve ever received.”

“And you repay her by taking that gift and tossing it?”

Tag was silent, staring at me, his face a study in compassion. Love lined his face and leaked from the corners of his eyes.

“I love you, Mo. You know that, don’t you?” he said gently. And I knew he did. I had no doubt whatsoever. But he had a hell of a way of showing it.

“Fuck you, Tag!” I hissed. “I know what you want from me. I know you want me to tell you I support your decision. But I’m not that selfless. I’m not that friend. I don’t want you to suffer. I really don’t. I would share that burden if I could. I’d spell you on the worst days if I could, because I know you’d do that for me in a heartbeat. But I’d rather see you suffer than say goodbye. Sorry. If that makes me an asshole, then I’ll change my name. Just put it on a nametag, and I’ll wear it. I don’t give a shit. When did you start being afraid of a little pain?”

“That’s not it, Mo.”

“Bull-shit!” I roared. “You owe it to the people who love you to battle. You owe us!”

“It’s not my pain I’m worried about, man,” he said it so softly I barely heard him.

“Where is your rage? Where is the green-eyed monster who wanted to kill me just for breathing his sister’s name? Where’s the guy that grabbed the bull by the horns in Spain just to see if he could? Where’s the guy who shot a man to protect me, who threw himself in the line of fire? Let me get this straight, Tag. You would die to save my life, but you won’t even fight to save your own?”

“Not if I have to put people through hell to do it.”

“Take off the cape, bro. Take it off! Or I’m going to beat the hell out of you, put you in a strait-jacket, and start pumping you full of chemo myself. You watch me.”

“I love you, Mo.”

“Stop saying that, Tag!”

“I love you, Mo.”

I felt a splintering sensation inside my chest, and I knew I had to get out before I lost it. I rarely cried, but I had a tendency to store up the grief, tucking it away in hidden compartments, boxing it up, building partitions. I hoarded my grief. But now I was bursting at the seams, unable to escape the towering feelings that had been threatening to bury me since Millie called and told me Tag was gone. I was falling apart. And I had to go.