I knew I should have said something, moved, done anything other than look at him blankly, but I was almost too scared to breathe with the unnerving noises that were coming from all around us. A total collapse wasn’t a possibility, it was inevitable. I only hoped that we were on the other side of the hole when that happened.
“You guys okay in there?” the man said to me, not bothering to identify himself.
“Yeah,” I said. My voice was raspy from crud. I coughed a few times, trying to clear my lungs .
“Good. Now I need you to help me here Ransom… it’s Ransom right?” he said. His voice was calm and reassuring. I clung to it with every bit of my being.
“Yeah, it’s Ransom and this is Gabriel,” I said as if the man had no idea who we were. I knew I sounded stupid, but I was doing everything I could to stay cool, even though I felt like a guillotine was balanced by a thread above our heads.
I stared down at Gab. He had closed his eyes, and from what I could see had lost consciousness. If it was even possible, my heart beat faster. We were running out of time. If Gab didn’t get help soon he wasn’t going to make it.
“Ransom, I’m Ted, I’m a paramedic and I’m going to help your brother but it’s too hard for me to get in there so I’m going to have to depend on you to get your brother to this opening. Do you think you can do that?” he asked.
I nodded ascent.
“Yeah,” I said, realizing he probably couldn’t see me well enough to know that I had agreed. Ted’s face was grim, yet determined. It gave me the molecule of hope I needed to snap into action.
“What do you want me to do?” I said.
“Okay we’re going to push a backboard through the hole. I’m going to need you to put Gabriel onto the board, then strap him in. There’s a rope attached to the end so you won’t have to do much work, just guide it as we slowly pull it out.”
“Yeah, I can do that,” I said.
Moments later a wooden backboard cleared the hole and edged closer to me. Since it wasn’t far enough in, I was forced to release my hold on Gab to retrieve it. Letting go of Gabriel, even for a few seconds felt like the toughest thing I ever had to do. A few feet later my hand made purchase with the cut out at the top of the board. I tugged it toward me. The space was cramped and it was difficult to pull the backboard through the debris, but I managed to get it next to Gab. I released a relieved sigh, satisfied that I seemed to have gotten it right.
“Hang on Gabriel, it won’t be long now,” I said.
He didn’t respond and was so still, that for a moment I was unable to move. Another loud groan from the stage and a cloud of dust, dumped pure adrenalin into my blood and shoved me back into action.
I gazed down at Gabriel. I had carried him more times than I could count, but right then I was terrified to touch him. A million reasons why I shouldn’t move him formed in my mind. What if his leg was broken, or maybe even his spine? What if moving him left him paralyzed?
The platform gave another shudder, silencing all my concerns. Whether I liked it or not I didn’t have a choice. I either moved him or waited for everything to fall in around us. I shook my head derisively. The tight space drew in even closer. Panic niggled at the back of my brain then a voice reminded me that I hadn’t been able to save Ma. Now history was going to repeat itself.
I positioned Gabriel’s arms across his chest, I hated how limp they were, and how even when I had adjusted him he showed no signs of life.
“Fuck,” I breathed. “I’m going to move you now Gabriel,” I said.
His blue eyes popped wide suddenly. I drew in a stilted breath of relief. I swallowed a few times, ignoring the wave of emotions that threatened to unhinge me. The absolute trust in Gabriel’s gaze was all I needed to continue; I prayed I didn’t mess him up forever.
“It’s okay Ransom,” he said in a soft whisper.
I pulled my eyes away from his, just long enough to unbuckle the black cloth straps that secured two grey woolen blankets to the backboard. I tucked one around Gab and used the other to line the backboard, then draped the straps to the sides.
“You’re going to want to keep his spine as straight as possible then roll him like a log toward you. Make sure his head is facing this way,” Ted piped in.
His voice startled me because I had been so focused on the task at hand that I had all but forgotten him. He locked me in the beams of light from the flashlight.
As gently as I could, I slipped my hands under Gabriel’s head and torso, I lifted him, tilting him as straight as possible toward my chest. I supported his neck as much as I could, then reached for the backboard that was just within my grasp. Gabriel groaned ever so slightly, a sound that would have meant little if it had come from anyone other than him. He’d had more than his share of pain and suffering over the years so a whimper for him was equivalent to a scream from a regular person.
Sweat trailed down my forehead and temples, and every muscle in my body felt like it was stretched taut, like the over-tightened strings of a guitar. Still crouched, I slowly rotated his body until his head was facing the exit. Now more than ever I was thankful that Gabriel was such a lightweight. Positioned as Ted had instructed, I eased Gab’s back against the hard surface. He winced when his form came to rest on it, yet he didn’t utter a syllable of complaint; his quiet acceptance hurt me more than if he had cried out.
I gulped air, attempting to hold back the tears that threatened to ruin me. My fingers felt numb as I fumbled to secure the buckles over the grey blanket that covered his body. In the dim light Gabriel seemed even paler, his skin taking on a translucent, bloodless appearance. When his thin hand found mine and squeezed, I saw in his eyes that his suffering was more than I had first thought. Witnessing his absolute distress scraped another gouge in my already raw heart. Silent prayers to anyone who was listening raced through my muddled mind.
I laid a hand on Gabriel’s cheek. His skin was smooth with a fine skim of peach fuzz. I couldn’t help but wonder if he would ever get the chance to move past puberty into manhood, or if this horrible accident would rip him away from me.
“You’re going to be all right now Gab. They’re going to fix you,” I said.
I tried to smile down at him, but it felt stiff and forced. I didn’t believe my own words, so why should he.
“He’s all strapped in,” I said to Ted, who was still hovering around the opening. His flashlight stayed trained on us.
“Good Ransom, that’s very good,” he said. “Now this part might be a little tough, but I’m going to need you to do the best you can. We’re going to start pulling the backboard out. I need you to be our eyes and help guide him out safely.”
“I can do that,” I said, though I wasn’t quite sure how I could. I could barely move in the rubble. I wasn’t sure how I would manage to keep hold of the backboard, and maneuver it around the obstacles in my path at the same time.
“You can do this Ransom. Just yell for us to stop if you need to,” Ted said as if he had read my thoughts. I was surprised how much his words of encouragement meant to me.
“Yeah, I can do this,” I repeated. “Go ahead,” I said with more confidence than I felt.
The rope tied to the backboard went taut, and then they started dragging it toward the hole. The path was just over ten feet, but seemed like a hundred miles. Gab hadn’t moved more than a foot when the backboard pushed up against a piece of jagged wood and caught.
“Stop,” I yelled.
I scrambled to clear the path. My mind ordered me to hurry up, but I knew that I needed to be careful, especially now when Gabriel was so close to getting the help he needed. When I glanced down, I noticed that he had slipped back into unconsciousness. His absolute stillness did nothing to steady my already frayed nerves.
“Okay, it’s good to go,” I yelled.
The backboard lurched to life. It got wedged a few more times yet it still gained headway, until Gab was almost within reach of his rescuers. When Ted’s hand made contact
with the handle I released a breath that I hadn’t known I’d been holding. As Gabriel disappeared from my view, memories of the night they had taken Ma away in the ambulance, flashed through my mind. It had been the last time I had seen her alive.
With Gabriel safe I made my way to the hole. The man who had used the power saw to form an exit from our prison, reached for me. When I clasped his hand, warm and powerful, I almost collapsed with overwhelming relief. Gabriel was in good hands, and I was seconds away from being pulled from what felt like a dark dungeon. The man half-pulled, half-dragged me through the opening, a testament to his strength since I was no Gabriel.
As soon as I was out, I sucked in as much clean air as my lungs could hold. The atmosphere that had less than an hour before had seemed thick and humid, tasted clean and fresh. I felt like a scuba diver who had finally surfaced and could toss away my canned oxygen. Though we hadn’t been trapped for very long, somehow the colors that surrounded me were more vibrant and alive.
I collapsed to the ground as if someone had cut my legs at the knees. Everything, including the man, blurred around me, as I allowed the panic that had hovered at the edge of my psyche wash over and away from me. I covered my head with my hands, bobbing up and down, trying not to go back, but also knowing that I no longer had a choice. Sometimes memories of the past were stronger than any mental block you could impose on your mind.
I remembered hearing the screams and wanting to help Ma, but I had been useless, locked away in the closet like so many times before. This time I had made the mistake of running my mouth off at Pa and it had cost me dearly. Just being alone in the pitch black closet was almost too much for me to take, but when I had heard Ma screaming I thought my heart would jump out of my chest. Then Pa’s voice cut razor sharp through Ma’s shrieking. There had been another voice too, unfamiliar and male. Terror swept through me. I pounded on the rough wood of the door, desperate to be set free.
No one came.
I continued pummeling the door until I was too exhausted to stand, then I had huddled on the floor, broken. Instinctively my hands pressed together as I tried to remember the prayers Ma had recited to me every night before I had gone to bed. No one answered my trembling pleas.
I hadn’t known how long I had been trapped in the closet, only that at some point my eight-year-old bladder had emptied its contents into my underpants, and I was soaked and cold. When the door to the closet finally opened, a police officer stood framed in the doorway. His expression had been stony cold. I was sure that he had smelled the stale urine and was disgusted by my mess, much like Pa had always been when I’d had an accident. The cop’s flinty demeanor had frightened me so much that I had fixed my eyes on the leaf green carpet of the family room, hoping to find comfort in the familiar.
“Come on now sonny it’s all over,” he said in what I knew was supposed to have been a kindly voice. It sounded more rehearsed than genuine. Before I could protest, he had taken my hand in his, and was leading me forward. Though I hadn’t wanted to go with him, I hadn’t had a choice. No one else had stepped forward to claim me. As we strode across the living room, the need to find Ma and Gabriel, just a baby at the time, had left me feeling panicked.
We continued to move forward, our feet soundless on the carpet. I refused to look up from my white-socked feet that had holes in both big toes. A few steps later I spotted the dark stains on the carpet. The police officer diverted our path, but it wasn’t far enough away from me not to have the hot stench of old pennies assault my senses. I knew it wasn’t the smell of money.
I brought my eyes up then, like rubbernecking at an accident on the road side, I needed to see everything. There had been so much blood, spatters of red on the periwinkle blue-flowered wallpaper. On a patch of carpet near the dark wood coffee table, where I had eaten cinnamon toast and watched cartoons, a butcher knife glinted. Its blade looked like a Halloween toy, splattered with thick crimson blood. I knew it wasn’t a toy. It was the knife Ma had used to cut potatoes and vegetables and…
“Ma,” I had hollered before I had known that my mouth was even opened. Then the policeman’s arms banded around me. Holding me still as I thrashed to be free.
“Ransom.”
I snapped my head up to see Dave. He gripped my arm in a vise hold and was unsuccessfully trying to pull me to my feet. I had no idea how much time had passed, only that Gabriel was nowhere in sight.
“We need to get away from the platform, it’s going to come down,” Dave said.
“Okay,” I said robotically.
I got to my feet, using Dave’s thin frame to support me. As we rushed away from the stage, hope blossomed in my chest, like a seedling sprouting in a barren field. Despite what had happened, Gabriel was going to be all right and everything would go back to normal, eventually. For so many years I wished for something different from what I had, now I wished for everything that I had grown to count on to come back.
An ear-splitting cracking noise, like the sound of a mammoth tree falling, split the air. The wide open space only served to amplify the reverberation that shook the ground beneath our feet. Dave and I bolted away, not chancing to stop, or even look back until we were well clear of the stage. When I finally glanced back all that was left was a massive pile of boards, steel poles and a mushroom cloud of dust, swirling in the afternoon air. Spotlights shone in all different directions, having fallen from their perch. The microphone gave one last high-pitched peal then went silent. Eerily as if it had been the plan the whole time, Amazing Grace drifted melodiously from the speakers, as if it was a message assuring me that everything was going to be okay.
“Oh no,” Dave said, shaking his head.
His face went sheet white and there was anguish in his eyes. I had never seen him look that way before and it chilled me.
“What?” I said, following the line of his vision. It didn’t take long to understand his words.
Ted and a few other paramedics were crowded around Gabriel. Paddles that started hearts flashed, blood speckled gloves snapped caps off bottles then tore wrappers off bags of fluid. A loud screech of a portable monitor alarm rang through the stillness that seemed to have dropped down around Dave and I.
I didn’t need a psychic to know that things were going very badly. In a moment of absolute clarity, I realized that even though Gabriel had survived so far, he wasn’t out of danger yet.
Even as I watched everything happen Gabriel’s words rang clear in my mind.
“You know Ransom, fate has a way of working through your life, with or without your permission.”
11. LEXIE
Cramped muscles didn’t even begin to describe the aches and pains that plagued me after we hit the second day on the road. In theory, having the back seat to myself seemed like a perfect proposition, but not so much in practice. Yet now that we were only a few hours away from the small town where Gabriel Sanders was scheduled to do his last show of the season, I no longer cared.
I had spent more than my fair share of the trip pondering what I would find when we finally did see him. From what I had read on the internet, he wasn’t just a healer, but was also a gifted medium. Whether the articles that chronicled his life were true or not, I would soon find out for myself. Just the idea that I was mere hours away from talking to Mom again, made my heart skitter in my chest. I had a million things I wanted to say to her, but first would be how much I loved her.
Trinity flipped on the radio, rap music filled the air. I leaned back against the cracked leather seat, listening to a tune by Drake, that repeated the same lyrics over and again. Trinity had been noticeably silent for most of the morning. Driving for so long had taken the shine off her personality, leaving her quiet and sullen. The feeling was mutual. After nearly two days on the road my mindless banter had dried up, and I had resorted to monosyllabic responses to questions. I felt bad for being the reason that she and Aiden were tired, especially since I wasn’t covered under the insurance plan and couldn’t share the driving. Though
I would never have mentioned it out loud, elation tempered my guilt.
Shortly after the song ended, a news cast droned across the airwaves. Aiden, who was driving, was just about to change the channel when I heard something that made me sit straight up in my seat.
“Turn it up,” I ordered.
Trinity shot me a glazed expression, clearly too beat to be affronted by my abrupt tone. She did as I asked.
“Faith healer and medium Gabriel Sanders is in critical but stable condition at the Smith Memorial hospital, following a stage collapse that injured five people including Mr. Sanders.”
My mind went blank as soon as I had heard the news. Numbness, like I felt when the police officer had told me about Mom, hardened around me. All I could think was that I must have heard wrong. Surely they hadn’t said that Gabriel Sanders, the boy who was supposed to have been my savior, had been hurt. I was sure that I had heard wrong because what were the chances of him having an unspeakable accident when we were just hours away. But as the news feed continued, I had to concede that I had heard it correctly.
“No,” I yelled, unable to moderate my voice.
Both Trinity and Aiden jumped at my sudden outburst.
“This isn’t happening, none of this is happening,” I said, on the verge of hysteria. “Maybe I heard it wrong…” I shook my head until my neck hurt. Seeing Gabriel Sanders had been the only thought in my mind from the moment that Gingerella had handed me the flyer with his name on it.
“I’m sorry Lexie, I…” Trinity started to say. She reached around and squeezed my hand, her expression was one of deep regret. I snatched my hand away as if repelled by her touch.
“Don’t be sorry because I’m going to fix this, I’m going to…”
My words trailed off and I cast my eyes outside, frantic to come up with some way to salvage my plans. I didn’t care how it happened, but I was determined to see Gabriel Sanders, no one and nothing was going to prevent that from happening. I knew I was being callus and insensitive, but I didn’t care if he was in the hospital or on deaths doorknob, I was going to see him and get the answers I needed.
Ransom (Holding Ransom # 1) Page 12