by Urban, Tony
Her annoyance vanished, replaced with flustered shock.
“Did I run you from the loo?” He asked. “I apologize if I did.”
She shook her head. “No.” But what was she supposed to say she was doing? Trying to make herself look less deformed? That was the truth, but she wasn’t about to say it aloud. “I was just… reading.”
She prayed he didn’t ask her what it was that she was reading as her frazzled mind would have been unable to summon a lie. Much to her relief, he didn’t follow up on it.
Instead, he was kind and that was even worse. “Are you alright, Barbara?”
“Fine. I’m fine.”
“Forgive me for saying so but you don’t look it.”
She could only imagine how awful she looked. If a bag had been nearby, she’d have pulled it over her head. Instead the brief facade of having her shit together imploded. She sobbed openly as the culmination of everything and everyone she lost became too much to push deep inside and ignore.
“Do you want me to go?” But even as Richard asked the question, she felt his hands on her shoulders. They were firm, reassuring.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m such a fucking disaster.”
“I don’t believe that for a second.” His fingers massaged her shoulders. “Why don’t you sit down and as me mum always said, ‘Take a load off.’
Barbara sat on the edge of the bed. Richard didn’t join her, but he stayed close by, protective.
“You don’t have to stay,” she said.
“I know. But I want to. If you’ll have me.”
She couldn’t understand why he was being so nice to her. “Why would you want to be around some scarred-up hag like me?”
“Come now,” Richard said. “If you want to get me right mad, you’ll keep going on about yourself all negative like that.”
“It’s the truth.”
“So, you’ve got a nick on your face. What’s that matter in the grand plan of things?”
A nick, she thought. If it was only a nick, she could bear to look at herself. This was a deformity.
“It matters a lot.”
“So, says you. But I disagree and there’s nothing you can say that’ll change my mind.”
She realized he wasn’t just offering platitudes. That he really meant it. And that made her want to start crying all over again. “Can you really look at me and tell me I’m not hideous?”
Richard crouched down so they were at face level. “Barbara, you’re not hideous. There, I said it. And it’s the truth. Now can we move on?”
“I suppose.”
“Good.” He held up a bottle of wine he’d brought with him. “I thought maybe we could have a drink. It’s a full bodied petite sirah. And I’ll confess I have not a clue what that means but Myrtle told me it was quite tasty and, well, here I am.”
That made Barbara forget about her embarrassment and laugh. “Here you are.” She glanced around her room, which wasn’t exactly set up for guests. “I’d invite you to stay but…”
Richard shook his head. “There’s a mezzanine on the third floor. It doesn’t overlook much of anything but it’s private and I’ve always been fond of the night air. Won’t you join me?”
How could she resist?
Chapter 19
Night in the hermit’s guest house was dull and uneventful with the other soldiers ignoring Wyatt. Their attitudes hadn’t changed on the trek back to the casino with only Alexander bothering to make occasional small talk with him.
The rest of the men and women made no effort to hide the fact that they were done with Wyatt, for the time being. Maybe even forever. That was just as well because he too looked forward to a break. But first he needed to help Alexander take the wounded cannibal to the medical bay.
They tied the boy onto a wheeled office chair. The kid wavered between semi-conscious and delirious. He never spoke but an occasional groan slipped from his dry, cracked lips.
They took a back entrance, then traversed a series of industrial, barren hallways which had obviously been staff only areas before the world fell apart.
Things were silent for a while, but Wyatt eventually worked up the nerve to ask Alexander the question that had been gnawing away at him for the past day. “Am I going to be punished?”
Alexander gave him a sideways glance. “Why would you think that?”
“Why don’t you answer my question?”
Alexander flashed a brief grin, but it was enough to allay some of Wyatt’s nerves. “I didn’t intend to be cryptic. I just thought you understood this place better than that. We don’t punish people. You aren’t going to get detention or send to your room with no supper.”
He meant supper as in the meal, but the word made Wyatt wonder how his dog was doing. He missed that mutt. “Okay. Thanks.”
“No need to thank me. I told you before, we’re good people. That means we’re fair.”
“I know. I didn’t mean it like I was doubting you. I guess, when you yelled at me, I just got a little worried that I ruined everything.”
“No. Most of that was the heat of the battle. You know, endorphins and adrenaline and that crap. I was harder than I meant to be.” He winked. “But don’t disobey me again.”
Wyatt grinned. “I don’t plan too.”
“Good.”
They came to a door with a cross painted in white. Alexander pulled a ring of keys from his waistband and unlocked it, then pushed the chair holding the cannibal into a large room that contained nothing but empty gurneys and beds.
Alexander pushed a button on the inside of the doorway and waited.
“You guys even have a doctor?” Wyatt asked.
“Sort of. She was a veterinarian. I’m not saying I’d trust her with major surgery, but she’s pretty great.”
Wyatt was impressed. This place really did have everything.
Footfalls clicked against the tile floor, approaching them, and a moment later Ramona Sidaris came into the room. She wore a lab coat over scrubs, a small pair of spectacles, and had long gray hair which was pulled into a ponytail. Wyatt thought she was at least sixty.
“What mess did you bring me this time, Alexander?” Her tone was husky, a smoker’s voice.
“Oh, little of this. Little of that.”
When Ramona got close enough to see the cannibal tied to the chair, Wyatt expected surprise or horror on her face, but if she felt either she hid it well. “This isn’t one of ours.”
Alexander shook his head. “Nope. He was a stray and Wyatt decided to bring him home.”
Ramona looked at Wyatt and raised an eyebrow. “I take it you’re Wyatt?”
He nodded.
“Not too bright, are you?”
Wyatt was unsure whether she expected an answer or if it was sarcasm and decided to stay quiet.
Ramona squatted down in front of the cannibal and peeled back the bandage. The gunshot wound was red and oozed a milky, yellow pus. Wyatt was three feet away but could smell it.
“And who put this boy in such a miserable condition?” Ramona stood.
Alexander tipped his head toward Wyatt.
“Next time you shoot someone, make it a kill shot. It’s kinder, I assure you.”
Wyatt felt his stomach tighten. “Is he going to die?”
The woman looked down on the boy and her mouth twisted sideways as she considered it. “Too soon to tell. I’m a doctor, not a psychic.”
She turned away from them, heading back the way she came.
“Wyatt also needs a tetanus shot,” Alexander called to her.
“They still have those?” Wyatt asked.
Alexander shrugged. “That’s what she says it is. Burns like hell. For all I really know she injects you with rubbing alcohol, but whatever it is, it seems to work.”
Wyatt remembered his last tetanus shot. His arm was so sore he missed two days of school. The thought or getting another didn’t thrill him but he wasn’t about to admit that to Alexander.
“I need to go tell
Franklin and Papa about the men we lost. And your little hero move,” Alexander said.
Wyatt cringed.
“Think you can stay out of trouble?”
“I’ll try.”
“There’s a thought.”
Alexander left and Wyatt heard the door lock behind him. He waited, shifting back and forth on his tired feet for what felt like an eternity. With nothing to do, boredom and curiosity got the better of him and he began wandering around the room, which carried the pungent aroma of antiseptic.
On the counters were the expected first aid products. Bandages, gauze, tongue depressors, gloves. Nothing unique enough to hold his interest. He moved on to metal cabinets which lined the opposite wall. He tried the latch on the first, only to find it locked. Tried the second with the same lack of results.
Already exhausted from the trek back to the casino, he considered sprawling on one of the beds and catching a few winks until the doctor returned, but before Wyatt could put his ass on the mattress the cannibal spoke.
“You got a name?”
Wyatt spun so fast he almost lost his balance. The boy’s eyes were red and wild, but he was alert for the first time since Wyatt shot him. “I’m Wyatt.”
“Where the hell am I?” He shifted as much as the ropes would allow, which wasn’t much at all. Movement caused his face to contort into a grimace.
“Somewhere safe,” Wyatt said as he moved to him.
“I doubt that.”
“Why?”
“I was free in the desert. Now I’m tied up like a calf getting hauled to the slaughterhouse.”
“You’re fine,” Wyatt said. “The rope’s for our safety.”
“Fuck man, you shot me. How am I the dangerous one?”
It annoyed Wyatt that the boy thought he could get away with playing the victim. “Your asshole people killed my friends.”
Friends were an exaggeration. He still hadn’t bothered to learn the names of the fallen, but the point was still true.
“And how many of mine did you kill?”
Rather than continue the debate, Wyatt decided to end the conversation. “It doesn’t matter. I made sure you stayed alive. And we brought you back here to get fixed up.”
The fight seemed to have left the boy too. He slumped back in the chair, the motion causing so much pain tears leaked from his eyes.
Wyatt wanted to do something to ease his misery, then remembered that he was in the medical bay. There must be painkillers somewhere, even if it was just aspirin. Anything would be better than nothing.
Until he could find something, he tried to distract the kid. “I told you my name, but you didn’t reciprocate.”
Wyatt tried an Army green metal cabinet. It was locked. Tried another. Also locked.
“Vern,” he said. “What did you say yours was?”
Wyatt looked back at the boy who was fading fast. “Wyatt.”
“That’s right.” He moaned. “You gonna kill me, Wyatt?”
“No.”
“You sure?”
“I am. The doc here is going to make you good as new. Except you’ll have a nasty scar and a cool story to tell for the rest of your life.”
Vern half-smiled at that. “That’s good. I think I’m thirteen but might’ve lost count. I want to see what it’s like to get old.” His eyelids fell shut and the last words came out in a mumble, “Never thought I’d have that chance...”
Wyatt fiddled with a lock, spinning the dial to and fro as if he had the world’s best luck and would stumble across the combination when--
“Is there a reason you’re trying to break into the supply closet?”
He spun around and found Ramona Sidaris staring at him from across the room. He looked to Vern who had slipped back into unconsciousness.
“Um… No?”
She moved toward him, and he saw the syringe in her hand. Instinctively he stepped away from the door, closer to one of the hospital beds, and eased onto it.
“Why’s it locked?” He asked.
Ramona surprised him by smiling. Her teeth were stained nicotine beige, but she appeared sincere. “To keep people from stealing our limited supplies.”
To prove her point, she opened the lock, removed it, then pulled the door open. Inside were dozens of small vials, all organized in perfect rows.
“Are vaccines a hot ticket on the black market or something?” He asked. “I mean, if it was like morphine or something I could understand, but are people really breaking down doors to make sure they don’t get polio?”
“You’re kind of special, aren’t you?” she asked. Wyatt knew she was being polite and not calling him a dumbass straight to his face.
“That’s what my mom says,” he said, offering an apologetic grin.
“Well, Wyatt, since you need things spelled out. No. I don’t suspect our people would be apt to raid my meager supplies. But if less savory characters should ever gain entry.” She looked to the cannibal. “Let’s just say I prefer to be safe than sorry.”
He really was an idiot and felt the blood flood his cheeks in embarrassment. “I’m usually not so paranoid. But I guess I saw everything locked and then that door and...”
Ramona took a vial, then closed the door and padlocked it. “And you assumed that something sinister was going on. Because of a locked door. Remind me to never take a shit around you unless I want you to burst inside and verify that I’m doing nothing more harmful than wiping my own ass.”
Wyatt knew he was only digging himself a deeper hole and annoying yet another person who wielded some semblance of power here. He stood up. “You know, I think I’ll just grab a band aid and leave you alone.”
“Wait,” Ramona said with an exasperated exhale. “Why does Alexander think you need a tetanus shot anyway?”
He held his hand out. She grabbed it and removed the blood-soaked and dirt-covered handkerchief it was wrapped in. “Cut it on a rusty wheelbarrow.”
“That’ll do it,” she said. “Drop your drawers and bend over.”
Wyatt froze.
“It’s okay. I’m a doctor.”
“Can’t you give it to me in my arm?”
Ramona smirked. “I’m an old woman, Wyatt. The pleasures I get in life these days are small. And the last time I saw an ass as firm as yours appears to be was ages ago. Humor me. Please.”
He sighed and unbuckled his belt.
Chapter 20
Wyatt hoped to return to his room and get cleaned up without seeing anyone else. He needed time to prepare his story, to figure out what he was going to say to the others. And besides that, his ass hurt.
He would have stayed in the medical bay longer, but Ramona made it clear he was fine to leave and assured him she would take care of the cannibal aka Vern. So, rather than linger and continue making a fool of himself, he left staying close to the walls his head bowed. All the while he kept an eye out for his mother as the last thing he wanted was her to making a big fuss about why he was limping, where he’d gone, and what happened.
The closer he got to his room, the more optimistic he felt. Right now, there was nothing better than having alone time to process his thoughts and heal. He dug through his pockets for the room key when--
“Wyatt?”
His shoulders slumped, but he didn’t turn around. If he was quick enough maybe he could make a clean getaway. He found the key was in a back pocket, pulled it out, and swiped it against the lock.
“Wyatt, don’t you hear me?”
Yes, he thought, but I don’t want to do this yet.
Then Allie was at his side. He could breathe in her delicate, floral scent and as much as he wanted - needed - to be alone, her very presence was intoxicating. As much as he wanted to take her in his arms, to take her to bed, that would cause more problems than it would solve.
He pushed the door and held it open, still not responding to her. It was a dick move and he knew that but what was he supposed to say?
“What’s wrong?” She followed him i
nto the room, circling around and forcing him to make eye contact. He wasn’t trying to ignore her; he just couldn’t find a way to tell the story that wouldn’t bring about unneeded drama.
“Just got a tetanus shot.”
“A tetanus shot?” She asked. “Why?”
He limped towards the bed and eased on the edge. It felt like he was sitting atop a flaming baseball and he did his best to hide his discomfort.
“While we were out. I cut my hand. On a wheelbarrow.”
Allie blinked fast in confusion. “I have too many questions.”
Wyatt sighed. “We went to see a man who gave us fresh food. It was all in a wheelbarrow. There was a sharp bit of metal, the rusty kind of course and...” He showed her the freshly dressed wound. “I ended up with a shot in my butt.”
“Jesus.” Allie whispered and moved to him. She enveloped his injured hand with her own.
Wyatt let her examine it. She looked up at him, but his eyes had found another spot on the ground to stare at.
“And what else? You’re hiding something.”
He could feel her heartbeat speeding up in her fingertips. She was onto him and there was no sense holding back further. Time to dive into the deep end.
“When we were on the way there, we lost three guys. Some cannibals started shooting at us--”
“Shooting?” Allie exclaimed.
“Well, not shooting. They were throwing spears. Came out of nowhere.” He felt her squeeze his bandaged hand tighter. “We shot back. It was chaos. And I shot a guy. They-- Alexander wanted me to kill him, but I... I said we should bring him back instead; in case he has information we could use. So, he’s here.”
Wyatt said the last sentence barely above a whisper. Everything came out all at once, and yet, there was so much more he wanted to say. How he’d disappointed Alexander and felt like he failed some test of courage. Of loyalty. How the others all hated him.
“So, the cannibals that killed some of Alexander’s men. The cannibals who were trying to kill you. You saved one of them? And brought him here?” Allie’s shoulders dropped and disapproval clouded her face, but she didn’t let his hand go.
“He’s in the medical bay. Barely conscious. I think he’s more scared of us than we are of--”