by Shelly Crane
I absentmindedly stroke her hair back from her face. She still hasn’t stirred awake yet. I rub my thumb over the bruises on her neck, fingerprints.
More of Phillips fingerprints.
My blood begins to boil but I stave it off and pray that she stays asleep while Miguel sets her break. I see him return with an armload of stuff that is anything but medical supplies.
He produces a light wooden shelf board to stint her leg from underneath and the attached 90 degree wall brace for her foot, a roll of duct tape, and an ace bandage to wrap around to keep it in place. Surprisingly, it looks sturdy enough and it just may work. We don’t have much of a choice at this point.
My mind drifts to when Orville Wright broke his leg. Him and his dang flyer. Always persistent and never cautious enough. A recipe for stupidity and brilliance and discovery. Reminds me of someone else I know.
As I look back down to her I can see the faint purple marks under her eyes from the cold and sleepless night I’m sure she endured. She can’t stand the cold or the dark and she gets cold so easily. I don’t know what Cain did but I’ll have to thank him for taking care of her and bringing her back to me.
“Hold her down, Merrick,” Miguel breaks my thoughts with a command and I comply, as unwilling as I may be.
I envision Danny running in here in a matter of seconds once he hears Sherry’s inevitable screams when Miguel sets her leg. I shut my eyes and place my forehead on hers. Just like the last time we purposely tortured her after the Markers scratch, where we had to hold her down and burn her to stop the poison. I can’t watch anymore than she could.
This isn’t the first time I’m intentionally inflicting pain on her. Even though I have her interest at heart, it kills me to know that fact.
I brace myself, wrapping an arm over Sherry’s stomach and arms and apply enough force to keep her still. I hear the crunch of bones as they grind and snap back to where they should be.
The high pitched scream is piercing but she doesn’t wake. She just screams and sobs. Then she calls my name, not an accusation but a plea. Over and over. I whisper that I’m here, she’s safe, that I’m sorry. She can’t hear me nor understand through her sobbing and crying out.
Miguel wraps it quickly and shoves me some pills he grabbed and insists I make her take them. She is somehow still asleep but whimpering and her face is a dictionary illustration of painful confusion.
She has started shaking again. I still think it’s better this way that her being awake though I can’t imagine the kind of dream she is having.
Danny does run in as does Ryan and Celeste. Miguel ushers them out, explaining that he had to set her broken leg. Danny and Miguel yell and go back and forth in the hall as to why Danny wasn’t told beforehand that Sherry was hurt, Miguel explaining it was better for him not to see it and he needed the room to work. At this show, a few others start yelling at each other as well.
“Oi! We can’t just scream and fight at each other. That’ll get us nowhere fast. We gotta stop blaming each other and focus on what’s gotta be done now,” Miguel barks to get his point across.
Celeste starts to cry and Kay drags her off somewhere out of sight. I block them all out and lay next to Sherry, kicking the room door closed with my foot. I hope that she isn’t having a nightmare. I hope she knows what’s happening to her and that I’m here.
Later after her heart settles down and she starts to breathe more evenly I slip out and join the others. No one has brought up Lily and Calvin yet, assuming they are being cared for elsewhere. My heart aches and pounds as does the blood rushing in my ears. I have to say the words but I just don’t want to. The upset this will cause is worse than some stitches to the head.
Calvin has been a staple member of our core group and a jovial reprise for all of us. He has become quite the helper. And Lily is sweeter than pie. Everyone is so attached to and protective of her. This will make them want to hunt. This will make them all want to kill.
Maybe this is what we need but I have a feeling that Sherry will blame herself for all this. I can already hear her argument in my head of how she caused all this. I know her completely.
I take hesitant steps to the kitchen to grab a bottle of water. Gulp down half the bottle in one pull. Then prepare to speak the dreaded words that will mean war. First, since I know our conscience doesn’t work the same on earth, I know Ryan doesn’t know yet about Calvin, I have to tell him. And I dread telling him, but here goes.
Ryan.
He looks at me and I grimace with what I have to do. I imagine someone telling me this about Danny and how I’d feel. It’s not fair how our conscience works on earth. It only buzzes if our human body feels anxious about it. It doesn’t alert us to danger, like it used to.
I’m sorry. I promise you we’ll do everything to get him back but...they took Calvin.
I hear him gasp in my mind. His face pales under his tan and he sits down on the couch slowly as I proceed.
“They took Calvin and Lily,” I say out loud.
My voice doesn’t sound like my own. It feels like I barely breathed the words but somehow everyone heard and is now masking my face of horror and disbelief. And then an explosion of angry rants and questions and rambling ideas.
“Oh no!”
“We have to get them back!”
“We have to go after them!”
“What?! How could they do this?”
“How?! Why?!”
“How do you know that?”
“What do they want with them?”
“They can’t get away with this!”
Then one statement stopped them all in their tracks.
“Oh no! Sherry.”
Everyone turned to see Sherry leaning on the wall, on one foot, pale faced and broken looking. Not just her body, but her spirit. The bruises are already very evident around her neck and jaw, and her eyes are red from the strain and crying.
How she got up off our pallet with that thing on her leg by herself I’ll never know. I didn’t hear her make a sound but I guess I wouldn’t have over all the racket. Her face tells me she heard that the children are missing.
I see her chest start to heave with her silent sobs and her eyes close. I go to her, pushing a few people out of the way to get to her. I grab her around the waist just as she starts to slump over and hold her to me.
She’s completely given up. She refuses to try to stand on her good leg, refuses to hold up her head, refuses to open her eyes. Just sobs silently, limp and uncaring of anything. Not like Sherry. My bashful Sherry who doesn’t want anyone to see her weak. This scares me more than anything. Her letting loose right in front of all these people and not caring.
I pick her up in my arms, cradling her to me, trying to be careful not to swing her leg too much, but she doesn’t care about that either. Doesn’t make a sound other than her steady deep soft sobs.
Danny comes up beside me. He wipes a tear from her face with his thumb and she looks up at him. But before he can speak she does. In a raspy barely audible voice.
“It’s my fault. He got them because of me.”
I can’t tell if she’s passed out again or just closing in on herself but her eyes shut and she doesn’t respond to anything or anyone after that. Not Danny or Trudy, not Celeste, not Jeff. Not even me.
Jeff comes up and speaks to everyone else, who is still stunned silent.
“This is no one’s fault but the Lighters. I’m sure there is a good explanation. Cain. Why don’t you tell us what happened. What were you two doing out there last night?” Jess asked but was anything but accusatory.
Cain calls out from the back, near the stairs. The people part a way so everyone can see him speak.
“We were in the kitchen late, getting a snack. Couldn’t sleep. We heard someone yelling for help outside. So we ran to see who it was thinking it was someone who saw the flyer maybe. When we got outside there were Markers everywhere and two Lighters. I shot them but we couldn’t turn back and make it and Sh
erry was screaming because of her arm, the Markers mark. Also her leg, the Lighter hit us with a stone or something. So I picked her up and ran with her to the cave out past the field.”
“Cain,” I said, stunned. “That cave is almost half a mile away. How did you carry her all that way with Markers and Lighters out there with you?”
“I don’t know. I just did. She was freezing and her leg was...” He rubbed his eyes and sighed. “I don’t even know how she survived the night.”
Cain sounds nothing like his normal cocky self. He’s just as beaten and somber as Sherry but all I can think about is that he saved her life. While I slept in my warm room, he carried her through Lighters and Markers, bandaged her leg and kept her alive during the freezing pitch black night in an old cave.
“Cain,” I start but feel a familiar choke come to my throat and have to pause to let it pass. The one I felt the night that Phillip tried to...hurt Sherry. “Thank you.”
“Don’t, Merrick. Don’t thank me. I should never have let her follow me out there,” his voice cracks when he says ‘never’.
“This is Sherry we’re talking about, Cain. She’s stubborn and doesn’t always follow orders very well,” I say lightly and try for a weak smile.
Sherry has stopped heaving and is quiet and still so I assume she’s fallen back asleep in my arms. I’d hate for her to hear us talking about her like she’s not here, but I continue.
“She does what she thinks she needs to do no matter the cost to herself, especially when it comes to these people. Someone was yelling for help and any one of us that had been in that kitchen would have ran to help them too. It’s not your fault and it’s not Sherry’s. I think ya’ll have been through enough to atone for it anyway.”
I can’t ever repay you enough. Thank you. You don’t know what she means to me. She’s...everything...
He nods solemnly and I get a few echoes of my out loud sentiment to Cain. He gets a few pats on the back and ‘well done’s. Simon beside him puts a hand on his shoulder.
Cain still has blood running down his neck and forehead. His arm is bleeding too. A quick look around shows me he’s not the only one who took a beating along with Sherry.
There isn’t anyone that is clean and spot free. For the most part it’s all minor cuts and scrapes, bruises and I can’t help but notice one thing. One major thing.
“We didn’t lose anyone. Everyone made it. We’re alive.”
Best Laid Plans
Chapter 4
I feel Merrick laying me down in our pallet. I still refuse to open my eyes. Carefully, he shifts me and is so gentle with my leg. He thought I was asleep while they were talking out there. I might as well have been, I couldn’t open my eyes and face them. The shame is still too raw. My body just shut itself down and refused to let me participate.
This wonderful group of people who would never blame me or Cain even when we so deserved it. It’s my fault more than anyone. I’m weak and had no business going out in the dark to help anyone when I can’t even help myself.
Stupid.
And people paid the price for my ignorance.
Calvin. Just the name makes me choke. And Lily.
I know they all said we’d get them back but how? Where? When? How could I let them down like this?
Merrick leaves briefly then returns. I can feel him climb in beside me and he rubs my shoulder lightly.
“Sherry, I brought you some tea. You need to get something in you.”
I open my eyes and look up at him leaning over me. There’s a flashlight in the corner, pointed to the ceiling to illuminate the room. He’s holding a glass of sweet tea and a napkin with a few slices of cheese and rolled ham on it. There is no blame in his eyes. Nothing but concern and love.
“Merrick. This is all my fault. I know you’ll say that it’s not, but it is. I was so stupid. I was so-” a sob chokes my plea.
“Stop, Sherry.” He frames my face, forcing me to look at him. “Don’t do this to yourself, sweetheart. No one blames you because it’s not your fault. You tried to help someone. Who could blame you for that? If that were the case then I’d be to blame for what Phillip did to you, the first time.”
“What?! No! How?”
“Well, he told me how he felt and I gave him the benefit of the doubt. If I hadn’t done that and made sure to-”
“That’s not the same thing, Merrick.”
“Isn’t it?”
“Merrick.”
“Sherry,” he breathes, ordering and begging me to understand and let it drop.
“What do we do now?” I say, my voice cracking.
“You eat and tell me how the heck you survived the night. I stay here with you and keep you warm until you fall asleep. Then tonight, we kill some Lighters and get back our kids.”
I have never been more proud of him. My heart wants to burst from my chest and the annoying tears come again. He wraps his arms around me, lying us back on our backs. I nibble my cheese and drink my tea through the straw, as ordered.
I tell him the whole story. About the Lighter tricking us and then the next one with his filthy talk, about Phillip. Not even leaving out the part where Cain and I had to lay wrapped around each other to keep warm. I know he won’t be jealous of that and I want to be completely honest with him.
Always.
So I even spurt out about how Cain kissed me in the coffee shop that day, to save me from being discovered and questioned.
“Cain has apologized to me for it so many times,” I explain. “I just want to be completely honest with you. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before. It was wrong of me to keep it from you.”
“Sherry, the man saved your life. Twice, now it seems. I can’t be mad at him. Or you. I owe him everything.”
He tells me how lucky I am. How dumb I was for thinking I could handle things on my own, without him and he hopes I’ve learned my lesson this time, that we’re a team. Always. Then he whispers that everything will be fine, he’s happy I’m ok, he was so worried about me, he loves me. I drift off to sleep somehow at more peace than I ever would have thought imaginable.
We will get them back. We will.
After what I can guess is a couple hours I wake up and Merrick is looking at my leg, rewrapping it with care and looks up to see me watching him. He finishes quickly and comes to lay on his side beside me, leaning on his elbow.
“How do you feel?” he asks.
“I’ll feel better when we get on with the plan to get the kids back.”
At first I thought he’d argue with me about the word ‘we’, me implying I’m going too. He doesn’t, in fact, he reacts as though that’s the best news yet.
“Great. Let’s go warrior,” he says smiling and lifts me up in his arms.
He doesn’t carry me but sets me down to my good foot, letting me lean on him. What’s up with him? I thought for sure I’d have to fight him to let me keep my dignity and hobble myself in there to meet the others. I look at him questioningly.
I know you don’t want me to carry you out there in front of all of them, do you?
He smiles a knowing smile with a raised eyebrow as he speaks. A smug he knows me smile.
Cute.
I realize what he’s doing. He’s letting me get some of my dignity back from my breakdown earlier. He knew I wouldn’t want him to carry me like some broken rag doll. He’s already done that more than enough lately when I had no other choice.
Now I do.
Just when you think you can’t love someone more. When you think they can’t possibly know you more than they already do...
“Nope.” I smile back and we leave our room, hobbling.
Everyone is already there, either in the kitchen door way or stacked in the commons room. Everyone looks eager and anxious. Some have coffee in hand, others have biscuits or crackers. Some have all three.
No one seems to be particularly interested in me but Danny, Ryan, Cain, Miguel and even Josh who are watching me the whole time with anxious
eyes. Well, I guess that is a lot.
Everyone else is glued to Jeff, who is giving what I can only describe as a battle decree.
“Thank you. I know how bad you want to pick me up and carry me,” I whisper to Merrick as he navigates through scattered people sitting cross legged on the floor.
Yes. I do. And it’s killing me watching you struggle needlessly, but I know you need this. Even if you are just being stubborn. He cuts his eyes sideways to peek at me and smiles. I’m gonna go get you some breakfast. Sit here.
He brings me beside Danny who takes my hand to settle me beside him on the couch. Ryan gets up to take the chair arm instead so I can have his seat. Danny pats my leg and gives me a look, like ‘how can you keep doing this to me’, then props my leg up on his knee and I’m shocked to see how blue and black my foot is sticking out through the end. Swollen too.
I hear Danny suck in his breath and Celeste gasp beside him. But I wave off their concern and try to focus on what Jeff is saying but I can’t. My eyes skim the sea of faces. Battered and bruised and stitched and bandaged. The wave of guilt comes rolling back to me, crashing over me.
Then I see Lana. Refusing to meet anyone’s eyes. Staring at the wall. I continue to look at her. Willing her to look at me. When she finally does I immediately regret it. The pain and confusion in her eyes is too much to look at without wincing.
I sign ‘I’m sorry’, placing my right hand over my heart in a fist in a circular motion while still mouthing ‘sorry’. She nods and wipes tears but turns back to the wall again. She’s lost the only person in the world she can talk to. Literally.
Merrick promptly returns with coffee and a cereal bar for me. The brown brew is the perfect balance of sweet and cream.