The End Of Desire argi-8

by M. R. Sellars

  However, at the same instant she was making the turn, a man was coming around the corner from the opposite direction. She slammed headlong into him, causing him to stumble back against the wall of the building as she tripped and rolled to the ground. I tried to yell to the man to hold her there, but I couldn’t catch enough breath to form the words.

  He was already helping her scramble up to her feet a second later when I made it to them. I reached out to grab her, and she quickly twisted away, once again screaming “RAPE” as loud as she could manage while doing so.

  The man immediately grabbed my arm and shouted, “HEY!”

  I tried to wrench away from him, but he had his fist twisted into the cloth of my jacket. Annalise didn’t wait around to see what was about to ensue; she immediately turned and bolted down the street into the French Quarter.

  I pulled hard, trying to break free of the man, but he appeared to be dead set on protecting her from me, shouting once again, “HEY! Whaddaya think you’re doin’?!” Then, with a sudden look of surprise in his face he added, “GAWD!”

  What the final exclamation was all about I didn’t know, but I decided his apparent shock might work to my advantage. I seized on the fact that he was pulling against me and that I could use the opposing force as additional leverage. Yanking back, I then suddenly pitched forward and launched myself into him. Taken completely by surprise, he slammed backwards against the wall. He was by no means incapacitated, but it jarred him enough that I was able to twist and pull free of his grasp. I started away before he could make another grab for me, but I still sucked in a quick breath and wheezed it back out at him as, “Cops…Call cops…”

  Huffing hard, I ran in the direction Annalise had taken, but by now she was completely out of sight. Fortunately, I didn’t hear any footsteps behind me, so when I reached the first cross street, I slowed before glancing first left then right, but I saw no sign of her. I thought about flipping a mental coin and heading one direction or the other, but something didn’t feel right about the tactic. Instead, I picked up my pace and decided to jog farther along Toulouse, heading deeper into The Quarter.

  Going ahead and crossing Burgundy Street, I entered the second block. It actually made sense that she would have continued along this path as it would afford the easiest way to disappear. The sidewalks were littered with debris that had been removed from hurricane-damaged buildings. There were even several refrigerators and other appliances blocking the walkways, many of them inscribed in indelible marker with what appeared to be derogatory statements about FEMA and the executive branch of the federal government. With delivery trucks and other vehicles on the road as well, it made for a maze in which hiding places were beyond plentiful.

  If the inanimate objects weren’t enough, the farther in I traveled, the more activity I encountered. There were people going about their daily routines, which now included a large amount of rehab. The majority of them were intent on their jobs hauling trash out of buildings, and paid me little to no attention, although I did get an odd glance or two. I guess they weren’t used to seeing people jog through The Quarter.

  My somewhat slower pace was actually allowing me to catch my breath, but the dizziness remained, and it was starting to make me nauseous. My throttled-back jog also wasn’t doing anything positive for my anxiety. As long as Annalise had been within my line of sight, I had felt like there was a chance to catch her. Now, I was beginning to wonder if I was simply wasting my time. Even if I was, I couldn’t give up quite yet. But, I also knew that running full out down the street wouldn’t allow me to see her if she was hiding just around a corner.

  In a way, this all should have been funny, but I definitely wasn’t laughing. It had barely been one day since I had told Ben that Annalise was his problem and not mine. I suppose when I said that, I had simply been spouting empty words because when it came right down to it, she was just as much my problem as anyone else’s. Maybe even more. While Miranda was definitely at the root of this evil, I knew all along I was dealing with both of them, and it was a no-win situation. I had to find Miranda to find Annalise, but I had to find Annalise before I could do anything about Miranda.

  I stopped in the middle of Dauphine as I crossed, glancing quickly up and down, but still saw no sign of my wife’s doppelganger. Continuing on across, I began running into more people, some of them possibly tourists from the way they were acting. However, instead of ignoring me as most of the workers had, the odd looks became far more frequent, and some of the individuals even made it a point to step out of my way.

  The dizziness had grown worse, and I could no longer maintain a jog. Now, I was merely plodding along while sending my barely focused gaze to search both sides of the street, not that it was doing any good. My head was pounding as the world tilted and spun, and I wasn’t sure any longer if I would even be able to pick her out of the crowd if I was staring directly into her face.

  An older couple darted out of my path as I began to stagger, their own faces stretching into horrified masks right before my eyes. I turned to look at them then stumbled and fell against the wall of the building next to me. I knew Bourbon Street couldn’t be much farther, but when I looked up, the signature light post at the corner seemed as though it was a mile away.

  I slumped against the bricks as pedestrians continued going out of their way to walk around me, even stepping out into the street to do so. I hung my head and closed my eyes, trying to breath deeply and force the nausea to pass, but I wasn’t having much luck. When my eyes fluttered open, I noticed a small splotch on the sidewalk. For no other reason than to try focusing my eyes, I stared at it. The edges of the blot began to sharpen, and a moment of clarity overtook my vision. In that second I noticed a droplet of red as it fell and struck the blotch with a wet splat. Directing my gaze toward the source, I noticed a ragged flap of flesh peeled back from the top of my wrist and a swath of the same crimson flowing across the back of my hand.

  I felt myself sinking as fatigue overwhelmed me, and I slid downward against the wall. Voices were echoing in my ears, and I struggled to understand them with little success. I tried to push myself back up to my feet but couldn’t seem to make my legs work.

  I rolled my head back and saw lights flashing. My mouth watered as a fresh round of nausea attacked my stomach. I could feel my lips moving as I tried desperately to ask for help but found myself unable to make the word come out.

  Everything began to spin and go dark.

  Trilling music began playing softly. I knew it was my cell phone demanding my attention once again, but I couldn’t make my hand move to retrieve it. It continued stepping up in volume but was suddenly drowned out by the sound of a car stopping nearby.

  The last thing I remember hearing was a rush of radio static followed by a voice echoing in my ears as it said, “I got ‘im. Corner a Too-Loose an’ Bourbon. Better send da’ paramedics.”

  CHAPTER 15:

  “Apparently kitten has claws,” Velvet said, giving me a once over as she walked in.

  “Isn’t that some kind of makeup or something?” I grunted. “I think my wife has some of it.”

  “I believe it might be a shade of nail polish,” she replied. “But, I was actually talking about your face.”

  I had to lift my head slightly to see her because at present I was lying back on a table in a treatment room of a hospital. Earlier, when a nurse had been asking me for insurance information, she mentioned that I was at Charity Campus or something of that sort. My brain had still been a bit muddled at the time, so I hadn’t really registered much. Not that I would have really known where it was to begin with. All I knew was that it seemed like I spent a lot of time in places like this whenever I got involved in an investigation. It was a wonder my insurance carrier hadn’t dropped me yet. If they didn’t this time, I was sure they would be raising my premiums. That was something they always did without fail.

  “Yeah, that,” I muttered, reaching up and brushing my fingers against the gauze band
age now covering the wounds. I felt a tug on the back of my hand and gave it a glance. I had pretty much forgotten about the IV line taped securely to it. I gave it a half-hearted wiggle to reposition the tubing then laid my hand back across my chest. “Teeth too.”

  “How is the arm, by the way?” she asked, nodding in the direction of the other appendage which was now wrapped in its own windings of sterile dressing.

  “Not bad right now. But, I can already tell the local is wearing off.”

  I had lost track of how long I had been here. I’d been drifting in and out for a while although I had officially regained consciousness at right about the moment they were preparing to slide me onto the treatment table upon arriving in the emergency room. Since my most recent memory at that point-other than the disembodied voice-had been that of chasing after Annalise, my body seemed to think it was something I needed to continue doing. I was told that it had taken both paramedics and a nurse to keep me from coming off the gurney at a dead run.

  “Do you know if they’ve found her yet?”

  “Not that I’ve heard, but I’m not really in the loop.”

  I shook my head as best I could since it was resting against the pillow, and with a full load of sarcasm muttered, “Fucking wonderful.”

  “Tough little bitch, isn’t she?” she stated as much as asked.

  “Reminds me of my wife,” I replied but didn’t expand further.

  “That’s some wife.”

  “You have no idea.” I sighed then tried to reposition myself a bit so that I wasn’t talking at the ceiling. “So, where did you go back at the cemetery? I looked up and you were just gone.”

  “I left my cell in my car. I ran back to call the police like you said.”

  “Oh.”

  “Feeling abandoned, were you?”

  “Maybe a little,” I admitted. “It’s not like we know each other all that well. A lot of folks wouldn’t have wanted to get involved…especially after listening to my outlandish story and then hearing her scream ‘rape.’”

  “I was already involved,” she told me. “I took you there, remember? Besides, I’m not like a lot of folks.”

  “I’m getting that impression… And, believe me, right now I appreciate that more than you know.”

  It grew quiet in the room except for the noises of the staff out in the hall. I rested my head back against the pillow and stared at the ceiling for a long while, contemplating the acoustic tiles as I tried to ignore the various aches that hadn’t benefited from a hypodermic full of local anesthetic. After a minute or two, a curious thought flitted through my brain, and I rolled my head to face Velvet once again.

  “How did you get in here anyway?” I asked. “I seem to recall a cop standing outside the door when the doctor left earlier. It looked like he was guarding it or something.”

  “I told him I was your wife,” she replied.

  “You did what?”

  She smiled. “Calm down, I’m only kidding.”

  “Okay…I just didn’t figure you for that sort of levity.”

  “I have my moments,” she replied. Then, she shrugged and continued, “Actually, it didn’t seem to be a problem. I just asked if I could check on you, and they let me right in. Maybe it was because I already gave a statement and…”

  She was interrupted by a quick knock then the door swinging open. A petite, dark-haired woman clad in scrubs came in then shut the barrier behind her.

  “Oh, hello,” she said, noticing Velvet. “I’m Doctor Miller… You are?”

  “Doctor Rieth,” Velvet replied, shaking her hand.

  Doctor Miller canted her head to the side and furrowed her brow.

  Before she could say anything else, Velvet offered, “I’m a different kind of doctor.” She nodded in my direction and added, “Actually, I’m only here because I’m a friend of Rowan’s. I was just keeping him company.”

  Doctor Miller gave her a quick smile, “I see. Well, I need to go over a few things with Mister Gant, so…”

  “Say no more,” she told her before she could finish the spiel. “I need to go get a cup of coffee anyway.” Glancing in my direction, she added. “I’ll see you in a little while.”

  “Yeah,” I returned. “Do me a favor and have a cup for me while you’re at it.”

  “Will do.”

  After Velvet left, the doctor turned her attention back to me.

  “So, how are you feeling, Mister Gant?”

  “Pretty much like I was run over by a truck,” I replied.

  “The way I understand it, you almost were.”

  “Yeah, there is that.”

  She opened a chart and scanned the papers inside. “I wanted to ask you something. You mentioned earlier that the only medication you had been taking lately is aspirin?”

  “That’s right.”

  “How often?”

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “A few times a day I guess.”

  “How many is a few?”

  “I don’t know… Six… Maybe eight.”

  She frowned. “What dosage?”

  “Just a handful.”

  She looked at me and frowned even harder, “Seriously?”

  “Well, not a big handful. I guess maybe six or seven. Or ten or twelve. Depends on when I was taking it and how bad I hurt.”

  “At a time?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Eighty-one or three hundred twenty-five milligram?”

  “Whatever regular old aspirin is. Three twenty-five I guess.”

  “Why?”

  “Chronic headache.”

  “Have you seen a doctor about it?”

  “Trust me, it’s not that kind of headache.”

  “Really. What kind of headache is it then?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I sighed.

  “So, you haven’t been taking the aspirin on doctor’s orders?”

  “Not unless I’m now a doctor.”

  “Honestly, I had you pegged as more intelligent than this, Mister Gant. You do realize that OTC meds are still drugs, don’t you? Self-medicating is extremely dangerous. Especially the way you were doing it.” She huffed out a disgusted breath before continuing, “Did you even bother to read the directions on the bottle?”

  “Of course. Take two, yadda, yadda…”

  “Mister Gant,” her tone remained serious. “Do I have to spell this out for you? The reason you collapsed is that you are severely dehydrated and have dangerously low blood pressure; both of which are symptoms of severe salicylate poisoning.”

  “So, what you’re saying is I overdosed on aspirin?”

  “To put it simply, yes. Given the amount you said you were taking, I’m surprised you aren’t in much worse shape.”

  I let my head fall back on the pillow. “Doc, you have no idea.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I lifted my head back up. “I mean I just let a killer get away because of a goddamned headache. You can’t imagine how that feels.”

  She thumbed through the papers in the file then looked back at me with a confused expression. “Are you a police officer?”

  “No,” a new voice answered for me. “But, he likes to pretend he is.”

  Doctor Miller turned and at the same time, I looked over toward the door. Neither of us had noticed the new arrival until now.

  “Detective Fairbanks,” I said with a dispirited sigh.

  “You done with him, Doctor?” he asked, flashing his ID.

  “Actually, I’d like to admit him for observation. Will that be a problem?”

  “If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not stay,” I interjected.

  “You shut up,” Fairbanks instructed, glancing at me. “Right now you’re in custody, and what you want doesn’t matter.” Looking back to Doctor Miller, he continued, “If you need to keep him, that’s no problem, as long as he doesn’t go anywhere. But, right now I do need to talk to him if you don’t mind.”

  “Be my guest,” she
replied. “I’ll go get the paperwork started.”

  The detective waited for her to leave then looked back at me with a stoic expression. After a moment of playing stare down, he said, “I thought we had an agreement. So I’m sure you can imagine my utter dismay at finding out you were still in town.”

  “You didn’t really expect me to leave, did you?”

  “Yes, actually I did.”

  “Well, sorry about that, but I wasn’t finished here yet.”

  “What? You just aren’t happy with your visit until you cause a multi-car pileup on one of the busiest streets in the city?”

  “That was unfortunate,” I replied.

  “Unfortunate?” he harrumphed. “I was thinking more like unconscionable. You’re just lucky no one got hurt. Although, I wouldn’t be surprised if you end up getting sued by a couple of people, and I wouldn’t blame them a bit if they do.”

  “I was chasing the killer,” I said.

  “That’s what your friend out there told us in her statement,” he agreed with a nod. “But, tell me this-how do you know you were chasing a killer and not just some frightened woman who thought you were going to rape her or something? We have at least two eyewitnesses who claim they saw her running from you screaming just exactly that.”

  “You wouldn’t…”

  He held up a hand to stop me. “Yeah, I know, I wouldn’t believe you if you told me. That seems to be your excuse for everything.”

  “It’s not an excuse, it’s the truth.”

  “Yeah, whatever. Sounds like an excuse to me.”

  “If I told you, you would think I’m insane.”

  “Hell, Gant, I already think you’re insane.”