Sidetracked: Part 1
Page 41
“I don’t know her last name, okay?” James says, his voice taut. “Just look at her! What does any of that matter right now?”
Oh. My name. Right.
My hand falls from where it held onto James’ jacket and reaches for my pocket. I feel for my wallet, but it slips from my fingers and lands on the tile floor at my feet. A few droplets of red follow the wallet, joining several others on the tile.
The contrast of bright red on stark white—
I gasp as tears spill from my eyes.
James tenses beside me. Someone kneels to pick up my wallet. I don’t see their face, but their voice is kind. They tell me to calm down and take deep breaths.
My chest heaves, and I cry harder.
James makes a sound, takes the wallet from whoever picked it up, and continues his conversation with the person behind the counter.
“Palmer, I guess,” he says. “Jayde Palmer. Here’s her ID.”
A woman in green rests her hand on my shoulder. She asks if I’d like to sit. She has a chair—a wheelchair—but I swat her hand away and turn to James. I grab ahold of his jacket. The scent of dust and rain and blood lingers on the fabric as my cheek brushes against it.
I feel his hand on my back. Warm. When I can no longer stand on my own, he picks me up.
Still crying, my vision blurry, I cling to James’ arm. He carries me down a hallway. We stop in a bright, square room with no windows. We’re not alone, and I listen to a conversation I can’t seem to comprehend.
Two people I don’t know ask me to lie down. When I don’t respond or comply, they try to pry me away from James.
He says it’s alright. I need to stay. I should go with them.
I protest vehemently, but no amount of shrieking or thrashing about stops the three of them from ushering me onto a crinkly bed.
“Sorry,” James says.
This is unacceptable.
Someone holds me down. I sob while my shirt is cut away with a pair of scissors. The three or four people in the room talk to each other in clear voices I still can’t make out.
Are they asking questions?
Why can’t I understand them?
Is James still here?
Something sticks into my arm—like a bee sting—and I stop struggling. I don’t know how long I lie there. People continue messing with me, but I stop fighting. Then the room falls quiet and dark, and time fades away.
fifty-five
A NOISE. AN UNNATURAL beeping.
It’s not loud, but it is annoying. I try to will the sound away, but nothing changes. The steady beep...beep...beeping continues.
It’s familiar somehow...
Have I heard it somewhere before?
On TV, maybe?
I feel weird too. Almost like...nothing.
Am I floating?
No, but I can’t feel my body.
No. That’s not it either.
I can feel my body. I can even move it. My fingers flex. My foot shifts. I’m numb and tired, and my head feels like it’s stuffed with cotton balls.
That beeping isn’t helping.
I open my eyes only to be blinded by bright overhead lights. I shield my face with my hands, sensing a strange resistance as I move. After what feels like a full minute of blinking, my vision finally clears.
My hands—
One is bandaged, covered in bright green medical wrap, with a plastic bracelet around the wrist. The other has a clip on the index finger. Past my hands, still partially shielding my eyes from the light—is a white, tiled ceiling.
Beep...beep...beep...beep...beep...
Oh.
I’m in the hospital.
Right.
Lowering my hands, I sit up. The bed’s papery sheet crinkles loudly with my every movement. I look around. The room is small and clean and smells of sanitizer—definitely a hospital room. The analog clock above the door reads 12:48, but I can’t tell whether it’s day or night. There are no windows leading outside.
And I’m alone.
Though, I quickly locate the source of the beeping: a portable heart monitor set up beside the bed. Thin cords snake from beneath the collar of my hospital gown and connect the silver stickers on my chest to the machine, where my heart rate is displayed on a screen.
My right hand and both forearms are neatly bandaged. One arm is hooked up to an IV. The liquid inside the bag is clear, but I can’t tell whether it’s saline or pain medication. Maybe both?
What did they give me? Is that why I feel so strange?
My fingers brush the collar of the cotton hospital gown. A line of raised skin on my chest beneath the thin fabric. Thick gauze on my right side.
I push the pale, blue blanket that covered me from the waist down onto the floor. My jeans and boots are missing, along with my shirt and bra. Some kind of dark grit forms a crust beneath my fingernails, and reddish brown flakes fall from my hair when I run a trembling hand through it.
Is this blood? Why is there so much?
How did I get to the hospital, again?
Why am I even in the hospital? Where did these injuries come from? Why did seeing them not surprise me?
A mess of vague memories swirl in the deepest recesses of my mind, but what little I glean from them feels distant and muddled and unreal—like something out of a movie.
Did I stop by Ice’s house? I’ve been staying there for a while. Since the Fourth of July, but... Where was I this morning?
Wait— I was at Ice’s house. Was that yesterday? I went out in the morning...and then... I remember James—
James.
It comes back to me in a torrent of dark memories. A series of seemingly impossible images and snippets of scenes straight out of a nightmare. Flashes of pain. Hot blood soaking my shirt, dripping from my fingers and the marbled blade of a knife. Cold blue eyes. Someone else’s racing heart.
That wasn’t a dream.
Is James here? If I find him, I need to tell him I’m okay. I need to apologize for getting him involved.
Please be one in the afternoon and not one in the morning...
I glance around the room again, and my focus eventually lands on an observation window looking out into a hallway.
The window was previously empty, but someone stands outside now. James. He’s with a doctor wearing a white coat. His face in profile is serious and anxious. He nods slowly as the doctor speaks to him. Then he nods with slightly more vigor, and they walk out of view toward the door.
A moment later, the door swings open.
James walks in after the doctor, and his eyes brighten when he sees me awake. He lets out a breath but says nothing and averts his eyes while the doctor acknowledges my consciousness with a short greeting. After a glance at the thick clipboard in his hand, he meets my gaze with a smile.
I manage to mirror it for a second—also relieved to be alive.
“Good news, Miss Palmer. You were a sight to behold when you arrived. We had to sedate you before we could clean your wounds and stitch you up, but all five lacerations were relatively superficial, and the blood loss wasn’t extreme. I’m confident you’ll make a full recovery, save for some minor scarring.”
Good news, right?
James watches him intently and quietly, so I try my best to do the same—though I’m sure I’d be more upset if his voice weren’t so disarmingly kind.
“Let’s see...” He flips through a few pages on his clipboard. “You can take any over-the-counter NSAID for pain management. We gave you a sedative and IV morphine upon arrival, so you should be good to go until we get you discharged.”
I make a soft noise in agreement.
“Though—” His eyes flick up to meet mine. “I do wonder how the two of you happened to meet.”
What?
I search his face for answers, and—
Oh. Of course.
The ER doctor is an immortal. A handsome, middle-aged man with dark blond hair, a neat beard, kind lavender eyes, and thick-rimmed glasses.<
br />
I look to James without answering, but he merely averts his eyes and stammers something unintelligible.
“You know better, James,” he says with a sigh. “Of course, I’m aware this isn’t your fault—let alone your doing. I know very well who Miss Palmer is.”
Does he, really?
At this point, even I’m not entirely sure who I am anymore.
James’ frown deepens, his eyes shadowed.
The doctor looks like he has more questions, but he leaves James alone and addresses me again, “As I said, none of your wounds were especially concerning, so you’re free to leave today if you feel up to it.”
When I nod, he removes a packet from his clipboard and goes over the discharge paperwork with me. A summary of my hospital visit. A page detailing proper wound care. A couple things I have to sign before I can go home.
It’s a lot of words.
“A nurse will be in soon to remove the IV catheter and electrodes,” he continues. “Let them know if you’re ready to leave, and, please, give us a call if you have any issues using your hand. The cut wasn’t deep, but there is some risk of lingering nerve damage.”
I nod again despite having blanked on half of what he said the moment he mentioned nerve damage. He wishes me a good day, pats James on the shoulder, and steps out of the room.
James stares at the closed door for a moment. Then he turns and, after hesitating, scrambles to my bedside, where he plants himself in a wireframe chair. The dark jacket he wore this morning is missing, and dark stains blot the hem of his t-shirt and the front of his jeans.
It was pretty bad, wasn’t it?
As his eyes soak in my current, less-than-ideal physical state, I can only hope I look better than I did when we first came in.
“How do you feel?” he asks. “Are you really okay?”
“I guess, but...I’m confused.”
His brows furrow, concern flashing in his amber eyes. “Do you remember what happened? Ice pulled a knife on you.”
“Yeah, um...” I massage my temple with my bandaged hand. “And you...saved me?”
“If you can call what I did saving you.”
What happened, exactly?
James drove me to Ice’s house. I drank chocolate milk. I was supposed to pick up my duffel bag and go home. I went inside the house. But I can’t remember what Ice said. He attacked me—that much is obvious, and I vaguely remember it—but we talked for a while first.
He pulled a knife on me. He...tried to kill me?
That doesn’t sound right.
What did he say?
I can’t remember.
When I glance up from my lap, James is still looking away. His clenched fists rest on the edge of the tall hospital bed. A fire burns in his eyes.
“I will never forgive him for this,” he says.
Oh—
I tap him on the arm. “Hey, I’ll be fine. You heard the doctor, right? My injuries weren’t serious.”
“I know, but—”
He meets my gaze with tired, glassy eyes.
“I am so sorry,” he says. “I never should’ve let you go in there alone. I should have realized something was wrong. I should have sucked it up and gone in with you. Or something. I can’t believe— I just—”
Without thinking, I place my bandaged hand over his fist. “No. I’m fine. Really. You couldn’t have possibly known he would do this.”
“Still... I should’ve...”
He glances away, his jaw set.
“It’s not your fault.” But my voice falters, and I return my hand to my lap. “I know you were scared, so... Thanks for trying to help. And thanks for bringing me here.”
“Yeah...”
The room falls relatively quiet. I listen to the electronic beep...beep...beeping... of the heart monitor, wishing a nurse would show up and free me from the sound already.
James’ eyes track the path of the thin electrode wires from the collar of my hospital gown to the digital display on the machine.
“Hey,” he says. “Something...bad might happen.”
“What do you mean?”
I try to meet his eyes, but he doesn’t look away from the heart monitor. The lines and numbers and symbols on the screen. After a beat of silence, unbroken only by the steady, electronic beeping, he looks to me again.
Nervous. Uncomfortable.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
He takes a deep breath. “Okay. Dr. Corel told me earlier—”
Before he has the chance to finish, the door swings open across the room. He falls silent but doesn’t turn to look as three men enter, accompanied by a member of hospital staff. The men wear dark blue uniforms with silver badges pinned to their collared shirts.
“James Reid,” one says. “You need to come with us. We have a warrant for your arrest.”
He flinches and lowers his head. “Damn it...”
What?
One officer says they need to bring him to the police station for questioning. Someone takes a step into the room—a heavy boot against tile—but my eyes remain fixed on James.
He glances over his shoulder. “Give me a second.”
They don’t come any further, even as James turns away from the door and leans closer to my bed with a grave expression. One eye is still bruised and bloodshot.
“Listen to me,” he says.
I glance between him and the officers near the door.
“Hey,” he breathes. “Don’t tell anyone what happened this morning. Nothing about Ice. Nothing about cats. Don’t tell these people anything. I know they’re cops, but—”
He grimaces, stealing another glance at the men, who appear to be growing impatient.
“They’re from RPD. Human police. Do you understand?”
I hear what he’s saying, sure, but I don’t understand what he means. Human police or not, what do they think he did? Why do they have a warrant for his arrest?
“Please,” he stresses, his voice still low. “Forget about me. Go home. But, for your own sake, don’t tell them anything.”
With that, he stands from the chair, the metal feet squeaking against the tile. I grab the hem of his shirt in a feeble attempt to stop him, and he hesitates.
Guilt flashes in his eyes as he looks down at me.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“Sorry.” He turns away with a strained smile. “I should have warned you, but I— I have to go. It’ll be fine.”
Fine?
My eyes water, but I force my fingers to release his shirt, and he crosses the room to meet up with the police officers at the door. They talk for a moment. I don’t listen. Then the men escort James out.
The young orderly who led them here offers me a bleak, apologetic smile before she closes the door on her way out. And I’m alone. Again. Staring at the door and listening to the heart monitor’s relentless beeping.
Do the police think James did this? Why?
No one asked me what happened. I was sedated. Asleep. No one talked to me about it at all. This is crazy. If anything, James is the reason I’m not still bleeding on the carpet in the hallway at Ice’s house.
So...how could this happen?
To be Continued in Borderline
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