“You’re gonna be okay,” he said, his voice low. “I know, ’cause I can’t lose you. Can’t live without you.” He’d pressed his lips against her forehead, leaving them there when he whispered, “You’re the best thing to ever happen to me.”
He moved his lips from his wife’s head but didn’t sit up, instead resting his cheek against her chest. He had her hand in his, her skin moist with sweat, and he could hear the thud of her heartbeat. He concentrated on it, closing his eyes, letting the steady thud wash over him. Slowly, his body began to relax, his own heartrate matching hers, until finally he drifted off.
He woke when Parv moaned.
Angus bolted upright, reaching for her but not daring to touch her, his hands hovering an inch above her body. “Parv?”
Glassy eyes turned his way, her expression contorted in pain, her face beaded with sweat.
“What can I do?” he asked.
“It hurts so much.” She squeezed her eyes shut, licked her lips, opened them. “I don’t know if I can—”
Her expression twisted in pain, and she sucked in a deep breath but said nothing else.
Angus pushed his chair back. “I’ll get help.”
Parv reached for him, grabbing his hand to stop him from leaving. “No. Stay with me. Please. I don’t want to be alone.”
“Okay.” Angus lowered himself back to the chair, unsure what he should say or do.
“You saved me.” Parv tightened her grip on his hand. “I’m so sorry you had to do that, but I’m so thankful.”
“I couldn’t let you die. You gotta know that.”
“I will die eventually, Angus. You have to know I will. As much as I’ve tried to cling to hope, we both know it’s only a matter of time.” She gave him a shaky smile. “At least you gave me a little more time.”
Unable to respond over the emotion clogging his throat, Angus lifted her hand, pressing it to his lips.
Parv let out a long sigh and closed her eyes. Her expression remained tense, her skin paler than he’d ever seen it, her body covered in sweat. She was in so much pain, but there was nothing he could do to help.
He looked over his shoulder, wondering how long it had been since Annabel checked on them and where she was. She had a little apartment over the clinic, but it was the middle of the day and Angus wasn’t sure if she was up there or somewhere else. No one was in sight. Not even Vivian.
Parv didn’t open her eyes again for a long time, but she didn’t drift off again. She seemed to be in too much pain to sleep or talk, but she couldn’t hold still either, and she was constantly shifting, constantly trying to find a position that would give her some relief. No matter what she did, though, no matter how she moved or lay, the pain went on and on.
Angus tore his gaze from Parv’s face when the door opened, expecting it to be Vivian returning with a change of clothes, but to his relief, it was Annabel.
Her gaze went to Parv’s face. “She’s awake?”
“Been awake for a bit,” Angus replied.
“She’s in pain?” Annabel asked, although it should have been obvious.
Parv’s eyes fluttered open. She looked confused and maybe even a little feverish, but Angus wasn’t sure if it was from the pain, or if she had an infection.
“Please,” she whispered.
Annabel stopped beside the bed, the frown on her face as she looked Parv over telling Angus she was harboring the same concerns. “Sorry it took me so long. I was out getting something for the pain.” She held something up. It looked like a cookie. “Eat this. It will take a little bit to work its way through your bloodstream, but its more effective than smoking.”
Parv opened her mouth, allowing Annabel to feed the baked good into her mouth a little bit at a time. Just the simple act seemed to hurt, and seeing the pain twisting her expression made Angus ache. If only he could go back in time and fix things. Stop her from going into that tunnel, make her listen to him. He should have been more forceful.
It was like Axl all over again.
When she’d eaten it all, Parv closed her eyes again. She was breathing heavily, her entire body tense.
“How long?” Angus asked, not taking his eyes off his wife’s face.
“Thirty minutes or so.” When his gaze snapped to Annabel, she lifted her hands in surrender. “It’s the best I can do. I’m sorry. You know I wish I could do more.”
She wasn’t the only one.
Parv drifted in and out of consciousness once the cannabis had taken affect, and Angus never left her side. Even when Vivian arrived with a change of clothes, he refused to leave the room. She brought him food and water, insisting he keep up his energy, but he had little appetite. He couldn’t take his eyes off his wife. Even in sleep her expression never relaxed completely, and she thrashed non-stop. The bed beneath her was sweat-soaked, and her hair was plastered to her face. Her clothes, too, were damp. She seemed to grow paler with each passing hour, and even when she was conscious, she wasn’t always lucid. Sometimes she knew who he was, but other times she woke asking for her mother, or confused Angus with her first husband, Joshua. Those moments hurt more than he wanted to admit, because Angus had liked the doctor. He just didn’t like that his wife, the love of his life, didn’t know who he was, especially when she was so very clearly living out one of her final days.
When she did recognize him, she whispered words of love. She thanked him for giving her a little more time on this Earth, told him how much he meant to her, made him promise to never give up. She was burning with fever and in constant pain, and even though part of him hated himself for putting her through that, he couldn’t regret what he’d done. If he hadn’t amputated her arm, she would have died for sure. At least this way, she had a fighting chance.
For three days she suffered. The fever burning through her body, the pain making it impossible for her to rest even when she was unconscious, her moans keeping him awake. The doors and windows in the clinic had long ago been reinforced with metal sheets—a necessity at night—so staying there was the only option. Not that Angus would have tortured Parv by carrying her home. It would have hurt too much.
They hadn’t yet acknowledged to one another that time was running out, but she knew it as well as he did. He could see it in her eyes when she looked at him, the way her gaze swept over him, taking in his features like she wanted his face to be the last thing on her mind as she drifted off. He did the same with her even though it pained him. She was still beautiful in his eyes—nothing could have changed that—but the days of unrest had taken its toll on her. She’d lost weight and her cheeks looked sunken, her eyes unhealthy, her lips cracked. Her brown skin, normally so warm and fresh looking, had paled and taken on a yellowish tint, and the rosiness had disappeared from her cheeks. She didn’t look like his Parv anymore.
On the third day, Angus woke from a restless nap and looked up to find her staring at him. He’d fallen asleep in a chair, his head resting beside her on the bed, and his neck and back throbbed from the awkward position, but he barely registered the physical pain. The emotional pain stabbing through him when his gaze met Parv’s overshadowed it.
“I’m dying,” she said, voicing what they’d both refused to say before.
He sniffed back tears then shook his head. “I know. I’m sorry. I tried to save you. I thought—”
A sob shook his body, forcing its way out, and was followed by others. He didn’t try to hold them back, didn’t try to hide the tears that filled his eyes or even blink them away. He allowed them to fall, rolling down his cheeks as he pressed his lips against his wife’s hand. Her skin was so hot.
“Angus,” she whispered, “look at me.”
He blinked the tears away, allowing her face to come into focus.
“I love you so much. You did everything you could. This wasn’t your fault, so don’t ever blame yourself. Do you hear me?”
He nodded, too choked up to speak.
Gently, she pried her hand from his so she could rest it o
n his cheek. “You’re special, Angus, we all know that. I can’t imagine the things you’ve gone through, or what you still might face, but it was all for a reason. Believe that.”
“Don’t start spoutin’ off ’bout God and all that bullshit,” he’d mumbled, barely able to talk through the emotion clogging his throat. “You know I ain’t a believer. Hell, I don’t even believe in myself, which is damn ironic considerin’ the state of the world.”
She’d smiled then, a shaky and pained smile that had to force its way out of her because she’d been in so much pain. “I don’t know if God is real, my love, but I do know one thing for certain. I believe in you. All of this has to be for a reason, a purpose. Something bigger than us. Can’t you feel it? Can’t you see it?”
At the time, he’d thought she might have been delirious from the fever or pain, but he’d nodded anyway. “I can.”
Parv’s strained smile had stayed on her lips as she closed her eyes. “I’m so tired, Angus.”
“Sleep,” he’d said, taking her hand. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”
Her head bobbed slowly. Three times. Her smile had melted away, and she’d sucked in a deep breath. It had sounded like it hurt, and the tense expression on her face, the way her mouth scrunched up and her brows pulled together, only emphasized the impression. She inhaled again, blew it out, then her body relaxed, and her hand went slack.
Angus didn’t release Parv’s hand. He kept it in his as he rested his head on the bed at her side, his shoulders shaking as painful sobs ripped their way out of him. They came so fast he could hardly breathe, but he couldn’t stop them, couldn’t keep them in. He wailed, gasped for air, sobbed harder. It had felt like the pain was crushing him, like it was grinding his bones to dust, and he felt like he’d die, too. Part of him wanted to. There had been too much pain, too much death and loss, and he was tired of it all.
“Angus,” Vivian had whispered just then. He’d forgotten she was even in the room. “It’s going to be okay. Eventually. I promise.”
He wanted to yell at her, to tell her to shut up. To call her a fool. But even in his grief, he knew he couldn’t. She wasn’t just talking out of her ass, because she’d lost, too. A husband, three daughters, grandchildren. She’d experienced more loss than any one person should have to, and she was still on her feet. Still fighting. She was doing okay.
Knowing there was nothing she could say to really help, Vivian hadn’t said anything else. She’d simply stood at his side, her hand on his back, and let him cry.
It seemed to take hours for him to pull himself together, but once he had, Vivian was there to help. Not just that day, either. She stood by him as they buried Parv, made sure he got out of bed the next day even though he’d wanted to stay asleep forever. She’d forced him to eat, forced him to get dressed, and even forced him to leave the settlement to go hunting two weeks later. If not for her, Angus wasn’t sure he would have made it through, but Vivian had been there every step of the way.
Angus stopped talking, letting the story hang between him and Naya, filling the tiny space with sadness. He couldn’t see the girl through the thick darkness, but he could picture her thoughtful expression in the heavy silence that followed. There was so little space between them, and the air in the trunk was stifling, but he was almost comfortable because he wasn’t alone.
“I’m sorry you went through that,” Naya finally said, her voice soft. Quiet.
Outside, the howls of the creatures rang through the air, but they were distant. Moving farther away.
Even so, Angus kept his voice low when he said, “Least I got ten good years. That’s more than a lot of folks had.”
“True…” Naya let the word hang for a moment. “I hope I live long enough to have something like that. I know it’s not likely, but it would be nice to fall in love. Have a family again.”
Her words felt like a knife slicing out a chunk of his heart. It was so unfair that this girl had to worry about things like this. So unfair that she couldn’t look into the future and imagine something bright and happy.
“I’m gonna get you someplace safe,” he told her, his voice firm. Certain. “Promise.”
“Thanks.” She shifted in the darkness, but he didn’t know if she was shrugging or nodding, or even just getting more comfortable. “But even if we don’t find it, it’s not your fault. You take too much responsibility for things you have no control over. You’ve done your best, and that’s what counts.”
“Don’t feel like it’s enough.”
“It is,” she said.
Angus shifted so he was facing her even though he couldn’t see even her outline. “We should get some sleep.”
“Yeah,” she said, the word muffled by a yawn. “Goodnight, Angus.”
“Night,” he replied.
He closed his eyes, but it was a long time before he fell asleep. He was too surrounded by thoughts of Parv.
Chapter Twenty-One
Their travels were short the next day. Angus was stiff from sleeping in the trunk, and Naya’s limp seemed more pronounced than it had even the day before, so when they came upon an old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere, they decided to call it a day. He hunted while the girl rested her ankle, and that night they feasted on roast groundhog before locking themselves in a laundry room and calling it a night.
Things were a little better the next day, and even more so the day after that. The landscape turned browner and there was more space between the buildings they came upon. Fields and dusty brown landscape seemed to stretch on for miles, broken up by mountains dotted with huge boulders. It had warmed considerably as well, and Angus no longer needed to wear the jacket he’d taken from the cabin. On and on he and Naya walked, searching for any signs of human life, and over and over again they were disappointed.
They saw plenty of animals, though. Cattle with huge horns, prairie dogs that poked their heads from holes, watching Angus and Naya as they passed. Big jackrabbits, coyotes, armadillos, and even bison.
When they first spotted the large, brown animal in the distance, Naya had stopped walking and frowned. “What is that?”
“Buffalo,” Angus replied, the name popping into his head with little effort. “Long time ago, back when Indians was the only people livin’ here, there used to be lots of buffalo.”
“What happened to them?” she asked, her gaze still on the large animal like it was the most unusual thing she’d ever seen.
“The white man came. Nearly killed the buffalo off. The Indians, too.” He frowned, realizing the girl at his side was Indian. “Native Americans, I mean.”
She turned her gaze on him, tilting her head. “It’s okay if you call them Indians. I mean, I know my family came from India—Mom taught me about geography—but it doesn’t mean much to me. The idea of people being at odds over race seems…” She frowned. “Crazy. Who cares what color your skin is, you know? At least you’re alive.”
“Used to be a big deal.” Angus started walking again, waving for her to follow. “I know I thought so.”
“Really?” she asked, her gaze on him as she walked at his side.
“Yup.” He shot her a grin, followed by a wink. “Was an asshole, remember?”
“It’s easy to forget.”
His smile grew.
They walked a couple minutes in silence, Naya’s lips pressed together in she thought, then she said, “I thought your wife was Indian?”
“That she was,” he replied.
“But you used to think skin color was a big deal?”
He chuckled, the sound bouncing through the silence and making the nearby bison snort in annoyance. “Didn’t think much of her when we first met, to be honest. Not that I had a real reason other than her brown skin. Like I said, I was an asshole.”
“Huh,” Naya said, her frown growing more exaggerated.
She didn’t say anything else.
It was early evening, time to start thinking about finding a place for the night, but they were
literally in the middle of nowhere. A cluster of small mountains loomed in the distance to their right, but to their left and ahead of them was nothing but the occasional tree as far as the eye could see. On and on it seemed to go, endless in its barrenness and not the least bit promising.
Hoping the mountains might provide some cover if they couldn’t find a building, Angus veered to the right.
The rocky terrain grew closer as the sun moved across the sky, and soon Angus was able to get a decent look at the area. No buildings still, at least as far as he could see, but it looked like there might be a couple caves. While it wouldn’t be ideal since there was no way to barricade themselves in, the past two nights in this desolate area were quiet. The population had been low here, the people spread out, and there was a good chance very few creatures used this area as their hunting ground. At least that was what he hoped.
They paused when they finally reached the base of the mountain, and Angus lifted his gaze to the sky, frowning at how low the sun had gotten. They had less than two hours of sunlight left, and they’d need to find some food before settling in for the night.
“Think it’s safe?” Naya asked.
“Don’t think we got a lot of options.”
He was eyeing the rocky terrain in front of him, trying to figure out how they were going to reach the opening he’d spotted. It was ten, maybe fifteen feet up and would require them to do some climbing, and it wouldn’t be easy. The mountain was made up of huge boulders, most of them bigger than a man, and their surfaces were smooth. Not only that, but they were covered in sandy dirt, which would make getting traction difficult if not impossible.
Angus was still thinking it through when movement to his right caught his attention. He turned toward it on instinct, expecting to find an animal but totally unprepared for what he actually found. A lion. Not a mountain lion, but an actual adult lion with a full mane. It was halfway up the mountain, maybe only twenty feet of space separating them, and it was focused on them. Hunting them? Angus wasn’t sure.
Broken World | Novel | Angus Page 41