Acoustic Shadows

by Patrick Kendrick

  Dunham looked out the window of the diner, his eyes wet.

  ‘What do you think about the slow response time from the Sheriff’s Office? How is it you could beat them there when their station is just a few blocks away?’

  Dunham turned his focus back to Thiery. ‘Don’t know. I’ve heard their response times have been getting slower. I try not to stick my nose into everyone’s business here, but I’ve also heard some of the guys saying they are trying to get more money for more men and equipment.’

  Whispering, Thiery asked, ‘are you saying you believe the Sheriff would deliberately slow his department’s responses to increase his budget?’

  Dunham looked back out the window and cleared his throat. ‘I’m saying I’m a Police Chief in a small town, and I don’t know everything, but I get wondering at times. There’s a saying my daddy used to have about big government: “When elephants fight, the only thing that gets hurt is the grass”.’

  Thiery made a mental note to look into it, but, for now, he had more pressing issues. He grabbed his wallet and said, ‘Let’s head over to the hospital. I’ve got the tab. The state picks up my expenses when I travel. I’ll let the governor buy us breakfast today, okay?’

  Dunham nodded and wiped his eyes as subtly as he could with his napkin.

  ‘You can follow me over. I better bring my car in case I get a call.’

  In the parking lot, both men hesitated before climbing into their respective cars; Dunham seemed to have something else he wanted to say.

  ‘When I talked to the hospital, they said the other lady was waking up,’ said Dunham. ‘You know, the receptionist?’

  ‘Yeah? That’s good to hear,’ said Thiery. ‘Maybe she can tell us something about this Weisz woman.’ He stood for a moment, considering. ‘Besides the teacher missing, you know what else is strange?’

  Dunham shrugged.

  ‘The age difference in the shooters. I mean, typically, if there’s two shooters, like at Columbine, they’re about the same age. Maybe went to the same school they attacked, shared the same vendetta. But, Coody is nineteen, and Shadtz was forty-one. What could they possibly have in common?’

  Dunham looked at the pavement a moment before answering. ‘They both liked to kill people?’

  Moral saw the news as soon as he landed at Orlando airport. It was on the huge flat screen TVs that greeted him as he stepped off the plane.

  ‘This just in,’ reported THN’s Gail Summer. ‘One of the survivors of yesterday’s shooting has disappeared.’ Over her shoulder, a picture of Erica Weisz popped up. ‘Erica Weisz, the teacher we now know used her own gun to shoot the intruders at Travis Hanks Elementary School yesterday, has vanished. Hospital staff stated she did not check out officially, and her absence was not reported immediately as staff spent several hours looking for her in the building and around the facility. When Ms Weisz did not return to her room after almost two full hours, the Calusa County Sheriff’s Office deputy assigned to watch her room reported her as missing. The officer said he never saw her leave, and does not understand how she could have left with such critical wounds.

  ‘In the meantime, to report on this unusual set of circumstances, we go back to Dave Gruber who has been standing watch at the hospital since yesterday’s tragic shooting in which a dozen persons died. Dave?’

  Gruber was rested now, his eyes bright, eager for breaking news, his blond hair perfect, immovable as a plastic helmet in the light breeze moving through the parking lot in front of the Emergency Room doors.

  ‘Yes, good morning, Gail, and you said it right. This is an unusual set of circumstances, particularly when we consider Erica Weisz’s injuries. With me now is Dr Harold Marsh, a trauma surgeon here at Lakeland Regional Hospital.’ The camera panned and zoomed out, revealing a short middle-aged man in a white lab coat. ‘Dr Marsh,’ the reporter addressed the man, ‘what can you tell us about Erica Weisz’s injuries, and where do you think she might have gone?’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ the doctor began, clearing his throat, ‘I can only say that Miss Weisz’s wounds were initially life threatening. HIPAA law prevents medical professionals from discussing, specifically, a patient’s medical history,’ he continued, his comb-over hair catching the wind and flapping like a tattered brown flag, ‘but I believe it is now common knowledge that her injuries were significant.’

  Gruber persisted. ‘Can you be more specific, Dr Marsh? We’ve learned she has a rather devastating abdominal wound. Can you confirm that?’

  Dr Marsh blinked nervously, but felt he had to respond in some professional manner. ‘I can confirm,’ he began, ‘Ms Weisz underwent a complicated surgery performed here at the trauma centre, which, at the time, stabilized her condition. I can also add that she should never have left our facilities, as her condition is still what we’d call critical. She needs additional care and follow-up treatment.’

  ‘And can you speculate on where she might have gone, or why?’ Gruber pressed on.

  ‘No,’ said Marsh. ‘I cannot speculate other than to say it could not have been far. She is considered to be in a very vulnerable state and needs to return to the hospital as soon as possible. As for why she would leave the hospital, it is anyone’s guess. We occasionally have these things happen, but not with one of our more critically injured patients.’

  ‘Thank you, Dr Marsh,’ said Gruber, returning his attention to the camera. ‘There you have it, Gail. One of Erica Weisz’s surgeons telling us she is in critical condition and should not have left the hospital. Now, we’re polling people in the community this morning, and this is what some people are saying … ’

  The image on TV shifted to an overweight, whiskered man standing outside a feed store in front of a faded blue Ford pickup truck with a large bale of hay in the back. His southern accent was so thick they had to put subtitles in the banner below the shot.

  ‘Uh, what some peoples are sayin’ is dat dis teacher lady is a-scared she gonna get in trouble wit’ da law, cuz she ’ez carryin’ a gun. But, I can tell you, dat don’t mean nothin’ to anyone ’round here. Most of us in dis town believe we should have da right to own and carry a gun, an’ we look at Missus Weisz as a hee-ro. If she hadn’t a had dat gun, we mighta had a whole lot more of our chil’ren shot up an’ dead. You ax anyone ’round here and dey’ll tell ya, iffen we see her, we’re a gonna shake her hand and give her a place to stay, iffen dat’s what she need.’

  A shot of another woman outside of a grocery store, her hair in curlers covered by a see- through polyester scarf. ‘Well, I can’t say why she left the hospital, but I hope she is okay. We all owe that young lady the lives of our children. I’ve heard some people wondering why she had a gun in the first place, because maybe it put the children in danger, but I say the proof is in the pudding. There were two gunmen that went into that school yesterday to kill our children, and now they are dead, or dying, but none of our kids is. How can you argue with that?’

  Gruber was framed back on the screen, his mouth a firm line, his eyes smiling; this stuff was just too good. ‘And there you have it,’ he concluded. ‘We have heard that some people in the community are not pleased that Erica Weisz was carrying a gun. There are a lot of questions about why she did and what kind of legal trouble she could find herself in for having that gun on school property, but most of the people we’ve talked to believe she did what was right. Now, we have also talked to the office of the superintendent of the school system here in Calusa County and they had a different reaction. They would not appear on camera, but they made this statement …’ Gruber read from a sheet of computer paper. ‘The Calusa County School Board is aware that Erica Weisz probably saved dozens of lives at Travis Hanks Elementary yesterday. However, it is not the school’s policy to allow teachers to carry guns, and this is a clear violation of our policies and of federal law. If, or when, she returns, she will be placed on administrative duty, pending an investigation of the circumstances.’ Gruber looked at the camera as if he’d just read something
as significant as the Gettysburg Address. ‘Back to you, Gail.’

  ‘Thanks, Dave. This just in: In Inverness, Florida, last night, a fifteen-year-old boy was shot to death by an unauthorized neighbourhood watchman … ’

  Moral stuck a cigarette in his mouth, then remembered he was in an airport where smoking was prohibited. He kept it in his mouth, but put the lighter back in his pocket. Why is she calling so much attention to herself? he wondered. It was only going to make things worse, if not for her, definitely for him. He had to find her before the police, or the media, did. Of course, if the Esperanzas found her first, it might not look good for him at work, but it would certainly take care of his problems. He wondered if the Esperanzas were upset with him right now. They shouldn’t be; he had done what he said he would. But, would that suffice? These guys did not think like most people. These guys were monsters.

  NINE

  The sound of bells woke her. Erica’s eyes fluttered open, but she couldn’t remember where she was. Then, it came back to her. She was in Lake Wales at the safe haven ‘B’ house. The bells were from the Bok Tower, heralding the bright, sunny day.

  She was even sorer than she had been the night before. She tried to sit up, but it was too difficult. She had to roll out of bed, get her feet under her, and try to stand. Her efforts were feeble. Her skin was the colour of washed-out butterscotch pudding. Each step took effort on legs that felt like wobbly stilts.

  There was nothing in the refrigerator, but, when she had first relocated to the area, one of her first responsibilities was to visit the ‘B’ haven and stock it with some dry provisions. There was coffee and cooking oil and powdered cocoa and eggs in the kitchen. A week’s worth of MREs from a camping store in the cabinet over the stove. There were extra clothes, including another pair of Nike shoes in the bedroom closet. The bathroom was fully stocked with TP, toothpaste, hydrogen peroxide and, most importantly, several shades of hair dye. She would get to that later. Right now, she wanted to see how dehydrated she was. She sat on the toilet – her trembling legs gratefully giving up her weight – but she could not urinate when she tried. That answered her question.

  Making it back into the kitchen, she started a pot of coffee, then retrieved the bag she’d brought with her from the hospital. She located a bag of normal saline, spiked it with the IV tubing, and tied a tourniquet around her bicep. She squeezed her fist several times, brought up a weak, thin vein, and stuck an eighteen gauge needle in. Dark blood crept into the plastic catheter, slowly, as though there wasn’t much in her. She hooked up the tubing to the IV hub and opened it up all the way, then whipped off the tourniquet. She could feel the cool fluid filling her veins and giving her back some blood pressure. She poured herself a cup of black coffee, and sat at the kitchen table, having her liquid breakfast, until the IV bag and coffee pot were empty. She left the IV hub in her wrist with a preloaded heparin lock. Now, when she went to the bathroom, she managed to pee a couple of drops and was relieved her kidneys were beginning to work again.

  Her hunger was kicking in. Before she made herself something to eat, she went to the bedroom and opened the closet. She pulled back the carpet, and found the floor safe. It had an entry system that looked like an old push-button phone, with several letters on each number. Erica typed the word ‘MAGIC’. The safe opened with a mechanical whirr. Inside were new credentials, an encrypted satellite phone, the usual ten thousand dollars of ‘escape’ money, and another gun. This one was another automatic, but with a little more stopping power: a Springfield XD-S 9 mm, with a fourteen-round clip. It was heavier than the .380, but she might need the extra firepower. After she test-fired it without bullets, she loaded the clip and placed both it and the money in her purse.

  The powdered eggs were fine, even without salt, and she made herself a second helping after she’d finished the first. The last time she’d eaten was yesterday morning, before the shooting at the school, and she’d only had time to have an apple on the way in. She was ravenous and thought about a third helping, but decided she’d better not overeat until she knew what condition her insides were in.

  She took the bag of stolen medical supplies with her into the bathroom. She lifted her shirt and pulled the top of her panties down. A huge bandage covered the left side of her abdomen, from just below her rib cage down to just above her pubic area. Pulling at the edges of the sticky adhesive, she managed to remove the dressing. It was ugly. A giant swatch of dried orange Betadine coated her stomach. Inside this swatch was a grotesque three-inch line of stitches that looked like a hairy, black caterpillar on her upper left quadrant. She had hoped they would’ve been able to do a laparoscopic procedure if the splenectomy was partial, but it looked as if they had to do the full tilt boogey. She wondered how much they took because, depending on the answer to that question, she could approximate how long it would take her to get her red blood cell count back up. She was naturally anaemic; this wouldn’t help.

  The ugly orange swatch also contained over a dozen small incisions puckered up with one or two stitches in each where surgeons had removed the buckshot that had felled her at the school. Anger built up inside her as she thought about it. She wished she’d had a shoulder-held rocket launcher to blow those motherfuckers away. Recalling the little girl who had been grazed by one of the bullets made her blood boil and brought back unpleasant memories of another time, one in which she wished she could have made a difference.

  Standing nude in the tub and using the peroxide, Erica scrubbed as gingerly as she could to clean the wound. Still weak, she showered quickly then dab-dried the area with some four by four gauze pads, let it air-dry, and covered it with fresh bandages. She used some cling film wrapped around her torso, rather than go back to the adhesive tape that had pulled off her skin when she had removed it. Her injuries and muscles were sore after she’d finished, but it felt good to be clean and have fresh dressings. She knew she’d have to keep up this routine if she wanted to escape infection.

  One thing she had going for her was her physical condition. She’d been doing her own CrossFit programme of sprint running, burpees, mountain climbing, jump rope, and several hundred crunches, sit-ups, and other abdominal strengthening exercises almost every day for the past couple of years. She hoped that conditioning would help her heal quicker.

  Filling a syringe with some of the Amoxicillin she’d stolen, she gave herself a dose using the IV hub she still had in place, pushing the drug in slowly over several minutes. Had she been thinking more clearly, she could’ve just included it in the IV bag, initially, but she forgave herself for that minor exclusion. She’d been through a lot in the past twenty-four hours or so.

  Just the drive over from Lakeland was taxing. It wasn’t that far, but it seemed to take forever, and she’d passed at least a dozen cop cars, worrying that each one might pull her over looking for the stolen car. At times, she had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from passing out.

  When she’d arrived at the tiny, turquoise-coloured cinder-block house, she’d almost passed it by. It was in a remote area in the eastern boundaries of Lake Wales. Like so many homes in Florida, its yard was overgrown; a US bank foreclosure sign barely visible among the knee-high weeds.

  This was the prototypical house used as a secondary safe house, in case the primary location had to be vacated quickly. It was not intended to be used for a long period of time. Once an area is compromised, the target becomes vulnerable and has to be relocated, usually to a vastly different place in the US. Still, a secondary safe haven within an hour’s drive was essential. If one had to flee the primary residence, they might well be doing so with little time or resources to take them further away.

  This wasn’t her first flight. The quick exit from Washington was not as traumatic, but it was no less fearful. The Washington house was a ‘B’ haven, too. She fled from Richmond and, before that, her first safe haven in Cleveland, after being whisked away from Vegas. Had it already been three years? She suspected she’d been compromised in
all of those places, too, but she didn’t have proof.

  The image of the gunman asking her name flashed back. She closed her eyes, recalling his face, his murderous intensity, and it became clear to her: he had come to the school, not as some crazed young man looking to bury his angst; he had come looking to kill her.

  While she waited for her strength to return, she anxiously turned on the TV. The morning news shows – if you could call what they offered ‘news’ – were still on. She skipped past the pseudo-jubilant network hosts, their smiles wide and artificial as they moved from a brief summary of news to a new recipe everyone had to try. She came across the THN News programme that seemed to be doing a 24—7 cover on the story.

  The anchor quickly went to an update of the school shooting. A grainy picture of her face, underlined with the words ‘Hero Teacher Missing’ accompanied the monotone monologue. The picture was soon replaced with one of the redheaded young man she had shot in the hall at the school. The photo revealed the pimple-riddled face of a troubled young man, though not as malevolent in appearance as when she had seen him venting his rage on the school. Under his picture were the words ‘Shooter David Edward Coody Paralyzed.’ This led into a story in which the reporter, Dave Gruber, stood in front of the home of Ellis Coody, the boy’s father, and let him have his say.

  With teary eyes, Coody Sr drawled, ‘well, ain’t none of us knowed what happened in that school, do we? We don’t know what David was doin’ there. Maybe he was tryin’ to he’p those kids. I mean, most of them are poor black kids and Guatemalans whose parents are migrant workers in the fields around here, but I know he musta been tryin’ to he’p out.’ Coody, Sr looked back at the ramshackle home he and his son shared and rubbed his eyes, trying not to show his emotions. ‘Yeah, he has guns and goes shooting and hunting, so that’s why he had some with him. But, you tell me why a teacher in a public school had a gun. That’s against the law, for sure. Maybe she endangered those kids having it. Either way, she’s crippled my boy, and she needs to answer for it. If she wasn’t guilty, why she run off? That’s all I got to say.’