With a job to do, and without Meg seizing her, the nurse became more talkative, less fearful.
She appeared to be checking his pulse, just by feel. “My watch is dead,” she said, over her shoulder. “But his pulse feels low anyway. I don’t need a watch.... it’s very low.... you were in a car crash?”
“Yeah ... on the way to his dialysis.”
The nurse was working away. She had crawled into the driver’s seat in order to access Meg’s father. Meg stood outside on the ground, only able to see the nurse’s butt and back as she worked.
She could see that the nurse had produced a small flashlight and was apparently holding it between her teeth as she worked, because the beam danced here and there through the truck cabin.
“You want me to turn the lights on?”
“I doubt they’ll work,” she said, apparently taking the light out of her mouth.
To prove her point, the nurse reached up and hit the Toyota’s cabin light.
Nothing happened.
Then she hit the other one.
Nothing happened with that one either.
That was weird.
“That’s weird. It should work. You sure you hit it?”
“I’m sure,” said the nurse distractedly, obviously still working on her dad.
“But it’s never gone out before. It’s a reliable truck.”
“You didn’t hear?”
“Hear? Hear about what?”
“The EMP. You didn’t hear? It’s all anyone’s been talking about. It’s why the hospital’s such a shitshow.”
“The EMP?”
The letters rang a bell. But it was somewhere distant.
Had her dad been talking to her about it at some point? On some drive a couple weeks back on the way to dialysis? Maybe.
“How’s he doing?”
“Not good,” came the answer, and Meg felt her heart sinking.
Suddenly, a gunshot rang out. Another one. Loud. Close enough to send her ears ringing.
Someone shouted. The noise was muffled.
Someone else shouted.
More noise. Indescribable shuffling and screaming from the crowd nearby.
Shit.
Meg glanced behind her and in front of her. She was hemmed in on all sides. Cars and vehicles and people every which way.
The nurse turned around, her eyes frantic in the dim light of her penlight.
The crowd was moving.
Another gunshot.
Someone barking orders loudly into the night.
What the hell was going on?
Had the world gone mad?
6
James
James had just seen his English professor get decked by a stranger.
He had two choices.
One: lock the door and drive away. Two: get out. Get his professor to safety. Possibly fight.
The assailant had ducked down and now appeared to be whaling on his professor on the ground.
That wasn’t cool.
It was appealing in some ways. He’d save his own skin. If he was lucky, his professor wouldn’t remember anything and wouldn’t be able to blame James for leaving him there.
But that wasn’t James’s style.
Even if he could get away with something, that didn’t mean he was going to do it.
He just didn’t see any other way.
Cursing state laws, regretting his lack of a firearm, James swiftly ducked down and reached under the passenger seat, where he kept a large black Maglite.
Not bothering to switch it on, he gripped it like a club, holding it high.
His professor was still on the ground.
James hit the handle with his hand, then punched the door hard with his body weight, slamming himself against it.
The door flew open, making a popping sound as it caught on its hinge. Unfortunately, the door didn’t smack into the assailant’s head as he’d hoped. It didn’t hit him at all.
James hesitated for just a moment. It wasn’t that he was weak or afraid. No, he was strong and he knew it. He did heavy compound lifts three times a week for forty minutes a session and he had for the last five years. And he wasn’t afraid in the normal sense.
But he did know what real pain felt like. He actually knew what it was like to get his ass handed to him, to get beaten to a pulp. He knew from firsthand experience, down in Florida, where people actually still fought on occasion in high school when trying to resolve their differences. Sure, there were fights here in the Northeast, but it wasn’t the same. The way it had been explained to James, if you got into a fight in high school here, you were likely to get suspended or even expelled. Students limited their fights to verbal insults and the occasional shove. Everyone was so afraid of losing their chance to go to college, to make something of themselves. Afraid not to move forward in life. Afraid to be left behind, like the flotsam and jetsam on the barnacle-covered wooden docks of Boston.
James’s hesitation didn’t last long.
He jumped down, landing hard on his feet. His truck cab was quite high.
James felt the cold air first.
Next, before he could do anything, he felt something hit his calf. Hard.
He went down fast, headed toward the pavement.
The fight had already started. He’d thought he was been ready, but he wasn’t.
James managed to partially break his fall with one palm. But, unwilling to let go of his single weapon, his flashlight, he only managed to plant his elbow down on the pavement instead of his other hand.
His shoulder hit the pavement hard and he tried to roll with it, but it didn’t work and next thing he knew, his head was scraping along the pavement, his face included.
Half of his face, around his left cheek, was burning. Probably a good scratch-and-burn situation.
“You want a piece of me too, buddy?”
He got a glimpse of the assailant in some dim light from somewhere. A mean face. A classic old school New England face. High testosterone, hearty meals, lots of coffee and manual labor. Not to mention decades of freezing cold and no sun. It made for tough people. And mean ones.
James managed to swing with the flashlight.
But not fast enough.
The punch caught him in the stomach before his swing connected.
He felt the air rushing out of his lungs. He felt the pain.
But he managed to keep the swing going.
But the flashlight never connected the way it should have.
The guy was fast. And strong. Somehow, he reached out and caught the flashlight before it hit him. Incredible grip strength.
“Don’t bring a flashlight to a man’s fight. And don’t enter a fight you don’t want to lose,” growled the man.
Matt the professor was still on the ground, moaning softly in pain.
Shit. Shit. That was the only thing James could think.
James had never thought of himself as overly tough, but he’d known that he could hold his own in most situations, whether social, academic, athletic, mechanical, or even in fights. He’d never been the skittish type, preferring instead to tackle problems head on, no matter what they were.
He’d lost his share of fights, but he’d won his share too.
He’d never fought anyone in New England. All his fights had been in Florida, in his hometown. Usually he’d been fighting people he’d gone to grade school with, people he’d known practically since he could walk.
He was surprised by this New Englander’s strength and determination. James was no wimp. He was well muscled. He was strong. He’d swung the flashlight fast and hard.
James took another punch, this time to the solar plexus.
He went down in spite of himself.
“Thanks, buddy. Nice warmup.... now let’s move on.”
James was on the ground in the fetal position, feeling the pain. More pain than he’d felt in a long time.
Had he gone soft? What was wrong with him? Maybe this college life had conditioned him
the wrong way. Maybe it had made him weak. He’d never gone down like this in a fight before. He’d barely held his own, if you could even call it that.
Matt the professor was getting beaten to a pulp. The man was standing above him, raining kicks into Matt’s stomach.
Matt was crying. Blubbering. Sobbing. Yelping in pain. Clearly he’d never been in a fight.
James wasn’t going to let this be his legacy.
In some ways, James was an old-fashioned man. A man’s man, in a way. And he wasn’t going to let this go on his “record,” even if there was no one around to see it.
Pulling himself up, he wasted no time. He leapt forward, closing the distance with a single long powerful stride, rotating his hips at the same time, letting the punch come from his hips, the fist traveling the complete distance.... no half measures here.
James’s fist connected hard with the man’s jaw.
He went down.
Simply crumpled to the ground like a rag doll.
And that was it.
He was out.
“Easy enough,” muttered James, peering down at his professor on the ground. “How you doing, Professor?”
James was breathing hard from the fight.
No answer from his professor. Just moans.
“What the hell was that guy’s problem with you? He attacked you out of nowhere?”
“Neighbors...” moaned his English professor. “Help ... me.”
James, the flush of success doing a lot to keep away the pain he would otherwise be feeling, reached down, seized his professor’s hand, and pulled him up to his feet.
Matt swayed a little and James had to practically hold him in place.
“Guess New Englanders aren’t that tough after all,” said James, feeling himself get perhaps a little cocky, prodding the unconscious man at his feet.
“He’s my ... neighbor,” said Matt.
“Hell of a neighbor. I thought neighbors were supposed to like each other?”
“Not ... here.”
“You have some problem with him or something?”
“I don’t know. He’s never liked ... me.”
It was hard for James to fathom. If it had been his first day in New England, it would have been impossible to understand why neighbors would suddenly fight each other with apparently no cause. But, after spending a semester here, it made sense. It would never have happened in Florida. But, here, animosity and resentment seemed to breed so easily between neighbors.
The man that James had felled was beginning to moan and move around.
“Come on,” said James. “We’d better get out of here. Why’d you come running back, anyway? What’s wrong with your house?”
“Couldn’t ... get ... inside.”
“Why not?”
James had to help his professor get into the passenger seat.
James retrieved the Maglite from the ground and stashed it under the driver’s seat this time.
“There’s always more where that came from, buddy,” he muttered to the man on the ground, pulling his door shut behind him as he slid into the driver’s seat.
“I hope he ... doesn’t press charges.” said Matt.
Matt seemed to be getting back his ability to speak. He was whimpering a little less from the beating he’d received.
“Press charges? What are you talking about?”
“Maybe your Floridian legal system doesn’t accommodate for personal attacks, but up here that could easily qualify as an assault, which I believe that even a Floridian like yourself should know constitutes...”
“Wait a second,” said James, cutting him off. “Are you saying that I committed assault or that he did by assaulting you?”
“In the eyes of the law, I’m afraid both of you are guilty as charged. Or would be likely found guilty.”
“Look here, Professor,” said James, doing his best to contain his anger. “I just saved your ass.... who knows what that guy would have done to you if I hadn’t stepped in.... now don’t start telling me I should be locked up and that I’m some idiotic southerner.... I put up with a lot of shit in your class, but there’s a line in that sand ... and if there wasn’t one, I’m drawing one now.”
It felt good to finally get that off his chest, even if it hadn’t come out exactly the way he would have liked. Still, he’d managed to get his point across.
“While your actions were useful, it doesn’t mean that I can condone that sort of violence.... if that had happened on school grounds, I’d have no choice but to file an official report.”
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” said James, stopping the truck. “You know well and good what just happened ... and here you are saying you would have reported me. You’ve got some nerve ... now I’ve held my tongue for long enough ... and even now I’m trying to be polite ... but this is ridiculous ... as we say in the South, sometimes politeness can be taken too far.
“I’m just saying what is right. If you’d learned anything from my course this semester it was that...”
“All right,” said James. “I’ve had enough. I don’t know why you’re talking like a jerk again, like some highfalutin professor ... you were talking more normally when I first picked you up from campus.... I guess you’re just trying to compensate for getting your ass handed to you by your neighbor...”
His professor began to protest, but James had had enough.
“Out of my truck,” he said.
Matt began hemming and hawing, making weird noises as if he were clearing his throat, as he tried to protest. “But my house.... I can’t get in ... the keyless electronic entry ... it’s not working ... without my phone ... I’ll be out here in the cold ... what am I supposed to do?”
“I gave you a ride. That’s an extra hour of driving. I got into a fight for you.... I’ve had enough. You’re on your own.... now out of my truck.”
“Now listen here, James…”
“I’ve had enough,” repeated James. “And don’t try to tell me you’re going to take punitive measures or whatever against my grade ... if you do, I’m reporting you to the dean of students. This is getting ridiculous.”
James’s truck was just sitting in the middle of the suburb street, on the block crowded with houses with no power.
The street ended at an intersection not far from them, where another street crossed over.
A vehicle drove by, moving quickly.
The side of the vehicle was caught in James’s truck’s headlights.
It looked like a cop car.
But he wasn’t sure. He’d only caught a glimpse of it. But he’d been pretty sure that he’d seen the black and white lettering on the side.
But what did the police cars look like here in Holyoke? In Northampton, they were those sleek newish-looking SUVs. But this car looked like a large sedan, like the old school cop cars.
Shit.
The cops.
James didn’t want to deal with them. He wanted to get the hell out of here before he had to be interviewed and interrogated about why there was a guy lying on the pavement.
And it seemed as if his professor, still sitting beside him, wouldn’t hesitate to give him up.
“Was that a cop car?”
“A police vehicle? What are you talking about? There weren’t any lights.”
“Lights?”
“You know, police lights.”
“Why would they turn on their lights? They drive around all the time without their lights on.”
“Whatever,” said James. “I’m getting out of here. Now out of my truck.”
“This is preposterous, James. Come on now, be reasonable.”
“You’re the one who’s acting crazy,” said James. “I gave you a ride home. I defended you from getting beaten to a pulp. And you threaten to turn me in. What more do you want from me? Take me to your date?”
“Come to think of it, that’s not a half-bad idea.”
There was only one way to deal with this. James knew he wasn’t b
eing unreasonable or cruel. And this was his truck. His property. He had a right to say who was in it and who was outside it.
Suddenly, the potential cop car appeared again at the intersection. It had gone in reverse, and now it sat there, still.
It was a cop car.
Its markings were clearly visible in the headlights now.
It sat there and James could feel his heart thumping wildly.
Shit.
He didn’t need legal trouble.
He didn’t want to go down for keeping his professor from getting beaten up.
Well, maybe the cop would keep moving on. Maybe they wouldn’t come for him.
Was that neighbor still on the ground, from when James had decked him? Maybe he’d gotten up and left. Or maybe that was just stupid, wishful thinking.
There were long, tense moments, while James waited. He held his breath. He didn’t dare to move a muscle.
He tried to talk himself out of it. After all, he’d been defending someone. It wasn’t like he’d been out there on the prowl, punching strangers at random.
Still, he knew how the law could be sometimes. And he knew that, as an out-of-stater, and a Southerner, he might have a harder time than most.
The cop car moved, backing up, turning, and came at them head on.
The siren wasn’t on.
The lights weren’t flashing.
But the cop car was driving right at James’s truck. Head on, as if it were going to collide with him.
The cop slammed on the brakes. The car screeched to a stop.
The door opened.
A tall officer stepped out. Brim on his hat. Wide shoulders. Slim waist.
He looked like he meant business.
His hand brushed against a holster at his side.
He began walking toward James’s truck. Long, purposeful strides.
“You’d better play ball with me on this one, professor,” whispered James.
“Don’t expect me to let you off the hook, James. We do things differently up here in the north. This isn’t Florida, corrupt and polluted...”
“You don't know anything about Florida,” hissed James. His blood was boiling.
Constant Danger (Book 1): Fight The Darkness Page 5