Bound by Affliction

by Ryan Michele

  “Last time the package was torn up on both ends and practically destroyed,” I mumble into the phone. “I wouldn’t want that to happen again.”

  Tug gives a cough into the phone, “We’ll take care of the packages and make sure they’re processed and delivered personally.”

  “Good.” I swipe the phone off and go back to my post, the lonely chair in the far corner where no one bothers me, but I have a view of everyone coming and going. It smells like alcohol and Pinesol mixed with sick people in here. It’s almost choking, so damn uninviting. I’m surprised the Devil himself isn’t picking people to take with him. I fucking hate waiting rooms.

  Wait.

  That is a special kind of hell to simply wait.

  The only update I’ve had is she needed emergency surgery. I don’t even know why or what they’re doing. Since I’m not the next of kin, they can’t tell me much anyway, I imagine.

  Helpless. That’s what this is. A helpless kind of hell.

  I stroll up to the nurses’ station. “Sir, she’s still back in surgery,” the gangly nurse with blonde hair tells me for the millionth time before I’m able to say a word. It’s been two and a half hours, and I need something here; there’s only so much a man can take.

  “Still? How much stitching up did they have to do?”

  She gives me the look, that one where she’s not coming right out and accusing me of doing this to Leah, but it’s what she wants to say. Fucking bitch. I’d never touch Leah like that, let alone hurt a fucking hair on her head. I’m not stupid. I know what this shit looks like, and I’m expecting cops at any time to question me.

  When I talked to Cruz, the game plan was that Leah called me crying, and I raced over there finding her like that. We are saying some assholes broke into her home, tied her up to the bed, and attacked her. She was covered in blood when I got there and then passed out. We’re keeping the names of the three men from the cops because jail time won’t be enough for them. No, more like acid in their cuts from ragged, jagged knives that can sheer flesh. The tricky part is talking to Leah before the cops do, but I can’t worry about that until I know she’s alright.

  “I’ll let you know as soon as the doctors contact us,” she dismisses, turning her attention to the computer in front of her.

  Not letting it go, because fuck that, I challenge, “I didn’t fuckin’ touch her, but thanks for the stereotypical looks just because I have a cut on my back and tattoos on my arms.” On that, I turn and go back to my spot, my foot bouncing wildly. Much longer and I’m calling Buzz to hack into the hospital system to get me some damn information.

  “We’re here for Leah Donaldson.” Her name has my head popping up, zeroing in on an older man and woman. From the back, the woman has Leah’s silky brown hair, cut short, but still identical. Her parents. I surge up and move to them.

  “Sir, Ma’am, I’m Green.”

  Recognition flashes in their eyes. Thank Christ Leah talked about me. “Hello,” the mother says, going back to the nurse, not dismissively like the bitch behind the counter, but more of an I have to find out what’s wrong with my daughter. That one I can hack because I want to know too.

  My attention goes to her father saying, “They keep telling me she’s in surgery.” His eyes are red-rimmed and puffy, which is to be expected.

  “What happened?”

  Fuck. Not the question I want to answer, but do anyway running my fingers through my hair and remembering everything that Cruz said. Keeping my tone level and fear in check, I speak, “I got a call from her crying, and I raced there.” I look at him to see if he can hack it, and when it looks like he can I continue as the mother talks to the nurse, getting the same response from the witch. At least I know she’s not lying anymore. Fuck, it kills me to have to tell them this shit. I haven’t been this scared since…

  I shake my head, clearing those thoughts. “Some assholes broke into your home, tied her up to the bed, and cut her several times. She was covered in blood when I got there and then passed out.”

  “Cut her?” Pain creases his face, twisting it in anger. “Why was she there?”

  “I don’t know and yes, with a knife it looked like. She had burns on her wrists and ankles as well from the ropes.” Wish I could slice them up like they did her. Fuck!

  He steps closer and lowers his voice, “Did they…?”

  Sucking in a deep breath, the anger mixes with the pain. “I don’t know.” Stone had no clue when we left, and the only one who can answer the question is Leah. Fuck, if those fuckers forced themselves on her I’ll dig them up myself and mutilate them. It’s bad enough seeing the cuts and black and blueness around her swollen face from obvious blows to it; my mind can’t go there to think of that violation too. It wouldn’t surprise me though. Those fuckers were in it and going all the way.

  “They won’t tell me anything. Did they tell you?” her mother, Stella, says next to us, grabbing our attention and breaking those thoughts for the moment. Leah is very close with her parents; in fact, she said sometimes they are a little too overprotective.

  Her husband breaks the news to her as she sobs and starts to fall to the ground, her legs giving out. He catches her and holds her in his arms, whispering something to her and kissing the top of her head as he moves over to the chair to support her. I feel like motherfucking shit delivering those blows to her folks.

  The wait is tedious and never-ending.

  “Brother.” I look up seeing Cruz, our president, and GT, our vice president, stroll into the room, noting all the looks they receive, which is completely normal. They are each a powerhouse; together—watch the fuck out.

  Meeting them in the middle, each gives me a one-handed hug and slap on the back, letting me know that they, along with the brothers, are beside me. Lifting my chin to the door, they move with me, following, not wanting to go far but needing some answers.

  Our voices are in low, hushed tones, noting no one is around, but one never knows if there are eyes in the sky watching.

  “Guys are cleanin’ it up. We made it hurt.”

  Nodding, I let out a deep breath, my shoulders rising and falling with it. Not exactly relief considering Leah is still fighting for her life, but glad that those assholes will never hurt Leah again. Ever. “Right, thanks.”

  “What’s goin’ on with your girl?” GT asks, his hands resting on his hips.

  My gut twists, my hand going to the back of my neck and giving a squeeze that does nothing for the tension building. “Not good. She was torn up by those fuckers, cuts everywhere and bruises to her face. I don’t know anything though. This fuckin’ waiting is killin’ me. How’s Bristyl?”

  Cruz blows out a deep breath. “She’s good. Got some action, but her, her father, and Cooper are all safe. Regg got the worst of it, and she’s with him. Far as I know, she doesn’t know anything about your girl.” Part of the knot that formed in my shoulders relaxes hearing this.

  “Glad she’s okay, but shouldn’t she know about Leah?”

  GT shrugs. “Coop thinks it’s best to keep it low right now.”

  Cruz slaps a meaty hand on my shoulder. “Come on, brother, let’s wait with ya.” Moving back into the waiting room, it feels damn good to have my brothers at my back. Cruz eventually calls Buzz, but he gets nowhere because none of her charts have been updated.

  When the doctor comes out a long time later, with blood all over his scrubs and asking for Leah’s family, I just about lose my shit thinking the absolute worst. Leah already lost a lot of blood and judging from his scrubs, she lost a lot more. The three of us huddle around him, while Cruz, GT and some of the other guys who showed up around the third hour, hang back.

  “Leah came in with multiple stab wounds to her body. Some of those cuts were deep, puncturing several of her organs.” My heart stops beating and air leaves my body. He continues, “But she was lucky in that the blade only hit her kidney full on. With that comes a whole other realm of issues, but this is good for her, considering what
it could be. We were able to stop the bleeding and stitch up most of the lacerations. She also lost a lot of blood; therefore, we are giving her transfusions, and we don’t know how many she’ll need before her supply levels are steady. She has two broken ribs and one that’s cracked, but not fully broken. Leah has bruises everywhere on her body, but we’ve checked and nothing else looks broken; however her jaw is damaged. Her hair was pulled from her scalp in clumps. Luckily, when that happened, her scalp didn’t come with it. We were able to treat the sections of her scalp, but we’ll have to wait to see if her hair will grow back in those places. We didn’t note any nerve damage, and that’s the best thing.”

  The doctor looks at me suspiciously, and he’s damn fucking lucky he’s telling me about Leah or he’d be in a hospital bed next to her with that look. He clears his throat, switching to her parents.

  “We have yet to determine the state of her eyes.”

  Stella gasps, covering her mouth as silent tears stream down her cheeks, and her husband holds her tightly.

  “Right now, all we can determine is that they’re bruised, swelled shut, and have some cuts on the exterior. As far as it looks, she’ll be okay, but we won’t know until she comes to. She’s going to be in extreme pain while her body tries to heal itself. We have her on Fentanyl to help ease it, should she happen to wake up and come out of the sedative. But we don’t believe that will happen; it’s just a precaution. Right now, the best thing for her is to rest and allow her body time to heal. We’re going to keep her sedated to help with that, but we want her to come out of it as well, so we’ll be monitoring her around the clock so we keep the balance. It’s a fine line we’re walking on, but we want her to feel comfortable. She will be in ICU.”

  The pit of my stomach falls to the floor.

  “She’s going to heal, right?” Leah’s father asks.

  The doctor puts his hands in the pockets of his scrubs. “As of this moment, we need to wait at least twenty-four hours to see if she has anymore internal bleeding. We repaired everything that we saw, but that doesn’t mean that one of the punctures can’t open back up. The body is a tricky thing, and we have no guarantees. She is in critical care right now and will be for the foreseeable future.”

  My hand digs into my hair, pulling it tight. Flashes of my mother enter my head, of the last time I was in a hospital. A tube was stuck down her throat to breathe for her with IVs and cords coming out of everywhere. She looked as if she would wake up at any time, but the doctors said she would never come out of her coma. That her body was only alive because of the machines.

  The choice I had to make was excruciating, one no child should have to do. With me being her only kid, it fell upon me to decide if the machines should be cut off. That decision gutted me, destroyed me, and ate at me for years. With this, it’s all coming back in a rush. Those feelings and that loss gutted me.

  “Take her off,” were the last words to the doctors as every machine was turned off and my mother lay there gasping for air; all the while, all I could do was sit there and wait until she took her last gasping breath. My heart squeezes in pain remembering sitting next to her bed, listening as the life drained from her body. Crying isn’t something I’m accustomed to, but that day, I cried for a long damn time.

  Now, it’s Leah, and I can’t lose her.

  4

  Green

  Two days, I’ve been in this room laying in this hard as fuck chair, just watching Leah looking exactly like my mother did years ago. My mother, it’s a punch to the gut. The giver of life was taken from me all too soon. Each second that ticks by is one more that I lose with Leah. Her body is clean of the blood, her head is bandaged up completely. Leah does nothing but lay there. No movements. No twitches of her eyes. Nothing. Helpless, except for the machines doing all the work her body is unable to do.

  After the twenty-four-hour watch period and no more internal bleeding occurred, the doctor decided to put her into a medically-induced coma, stating it was the best thing for her body to heal. Rest, she needs; that’s all they say over and over. While I know in my mind she needs to build up her strength again, I can’t shake the feeling in the pit of my stomach. My biggest fear is that she might not ever wake up. That once they put her in this state, her mind will shut off and she won’t come back to me.

  The doctors have made no absolutes or guarantees, and it kills me. Every moment here kills me because it’s a moment that she’s leaving me for good.

  It also reminds me of my mother who went into the hospital and never came back out. I can’t go through that again. Leah and I were just starting something deep between us.

  The cops came and I answered everything they asked, giving them exactly what I gave Leah’s mom and dad, who backed me up even with weary eyes from the cops. With that bit of reassurance from the police, the suits left and said they would be back once she has woken up. If she will wake up. Dammit. I don’t deal with unknowns. I don’t deal with waiting games. I simply don’t deal. Yet, here I sit, and it’s all crashing around me without a single option to change the situation.

  “Son, we’re going out for a bit.” Aaron, Leah’s father, says, standing next to the chair I’m sitting in beside Leah’s bed. I’ve tried not to be a selfish bastard and give them their time in here too, but it kills me not being near her. They’ve gotten used to me and haven’t said a word.

  “Okay.” Reaching up I stretch, my bones cracking and aches pouncing all over my body. It’s nothing compared to what Leah is going through, and if I could switch places with her, I’d do it in a second.

  Thirty minutes later, my sleep, for lack of a better word, is interrupted by the nurse who needs to check over Leah. I do my bit and move out of the way, using the bathroom and not daring to look at myself in the mirror. Guilt is a tough pill to swallow, and I feel it tenfold. I let her down. Splashing some cool water on my face, the nurse administers some meds and then leaves, clicking the door closed behind her.

  The staff has been great not giving us any shit for not leaving. My guess is it’s because of Leah’s condition and they don’t know what day will be her last. I hope to Christ that isn’t it, but fuck if it doesn’t feel like it.

  My cell vibrates in my pocket, and I see it’s Cooper. “Green,” I answer.

  “How’s she doin’?”

  Looking over at the bed, she hasn’t moved an inch and the noises from the machines are the only thing heard in the room. “Coma. Doctor says she needs it to heal.”

  “Fuck,” he grumbles.

  “How’s Bristyl?”

  There’s movement on the other end. “Takin’ care of her dad right now. I sure as shit don’t want to tell her about your girl.”

  “Brother…”

  “I know. Keep your head in the game. Just remember she’s not your mother. She doesn’t have the same fate as her. Don’t let those thoughts cloud you right now.”

  He’s right, but I needed to hear them from him. Cooper and I have been friends since we were kids in elementary school. Him and Jacks. We’ve been through the ups and downs of life together, and Cooper has had my back for as long as I can remember.

  Cooper was the first to join Ravage of the three of us. Both Jacks and I knew he would because it’s in his blood, not to mention it was all he talked about growing up. So much so, Jacks and I knew we wanted to be a part of the Ravage MC family and make it our blood as well.

  Because that’s what Ravage is. Some assholes try to label us as a gang and other stupid shit, but it’s further from the truth. It’s the main reason I wanted to be in the Ravage MC. After losing my mom, I had no one—nothing except for Cooper and Jacks. I had no direction. No ambition. Nothing. I was fucking lost for a while.

  That is until Cooper and Jacks helped put some sense into me. It’s devastating when the only parent you have leaves you, and I got sucked into that, horribly. Prospecting for the club made everything in my life fall into place. It gave me purpose and the stability I needed to pull my head out of my a
ss.

  After joining, I still missed her, of course, but it didn’t eat me alive. Now, they’ve got my back and I’ve got theirs, always.

  “Know, man. I know.”

  “Rock solid,” he tells me, and I remember back in time when he told me those exact words. We were on a run together, and some tough decisions had to be made. I made them, and afterward he told me I was rock solid. Of course, I gave him shit for weeks about it, but him saying it now helps.

  “Take care of your woman,” I tell him, not touching that memory with him.

  “You too.” He clicks off, and I slip the phone into my pocket.

  Grabbing my cut off the other chair in the room, I pull out the folded papers I carry around with me everywhere I go and sit back down on my perch.

  Even through all the tubes, cords, bruises, cuts, stitches and bandages, she’s absolutely beautiful. Clutching the papers, I speak, “The doctors told me I should talk to you. That you might be able to hear me. Personally, I think it’s a bunch of bullshit because you’re out cold, but since there is a chance, I’m talkin’.”

  Bringing my hands together in front of me, papers still there, I stare down at her body. No way am I talking about what happened to her. Fuck that, she needs her memory wiped of all of that forever. Instead, I unravel the papers, pulling out the first one.

  “You know, when I got this in the mail, I didn’t have a fuckin’ clue who it was from considering you didn’t put a return address on the envelope. Cruz thought we should get it tested for anthrax.” I chuckle at the thought because he was damn serious. “It wasn’t until I held it up to my nose that I smelled you and had the biggest fuckin’ goofy grin, as the guys said.”

  She doesn’t move or twitch, but I keep going. It’s all I have right now, and I’m not letting go.