by Kim Cormack
Her eyes focused on Kevin. Kevin? He looks different and older. What is going on? Her eyesight was still as foggy as her mind.
“Please just wait until the doctor gets here. You need to calm down,” Kevin said assertively.
He held her close and stroked the side of her face so gently and with so much adoration she could feel it right to her core. “What’s going on, Kevin? What happened to you?” Kayn tried to say, but her voice only crackled on the first attempt to speak.
She could see the obvious changes in Kevin. He looked grown up, muscular and attractive. Kayn looked around the room. It was a hospital room filled with flowers. Into the door rushed a pile of smiling nurses and doctors. They stood at the foot of her bed in awe of her. All except for one doctor who was looking at her charts with a smile just under the surface as he tried desperately to look serious.
“Do you know your name?” the exuberant doctor asked Kayn.
“If you’re my doctor shouldn’t you know my name already?” Kayn answered in a half whispering, yet somehow still sarcastic tone. Her voice had come out. She had spoken.
Kevin laughed out loud. He covered his mouth to stop himself from laughing. “Just a few questions and I’ll be happy,” the doctor with the silver speckled hair repeated.
“Kayn Brighton, “she replied and gave him a strange look.
The doctor asked, “What is the last thing you remember. “
Kayn attempted to wrap her mind around the question the doctor had just asked. A few flashes of running on the track in the sun glinted across her mind. There came a quick flash of dinner at Kevin’s house. Megan fox with a moustache? It didn’t make much sense to her at the moment.
She croaked out the only thing that did, “I was running.”
The vibe in the room became very strained all of a sudden.
“Where were you running?” the doctor asked.
“The track … I was on the track,” Kayn stated what should have been obvious. She took note of the instant relief that had crossed the expressions of everyone standing in the room.
She said, “What happened?” She met Kevin’s eyes again. Her best friend was visibly disturbed. He looked afraid. His eyes were full of fear. What was he afraid of?
The doctor put his arm on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze, and with a giant grin he said, “Welcome back, sleeping beauty. I’m glad you’re awake.”
Kayn whispered, “Back from where?” It was then that she noticed the absence of her family. Where is my mom? Where’s my family? If I got hurt they would be here … Where are they? Why aren’t they here?A nurse said, “Do you want to have a sip of water? How does your throat feel? You haven’t spoken in a long time sleeping beauty.”
Kayn nodded yes to the nurse but found that she was suddenly exhausted. She felt like she needed to have a nap.
The nurse corrected herself and said, “You have been asleep for quite a while sweet pea. You have been in a coma. I should probably start calling you, Kayn.”
She heard Kevin say, “I’ll be right back.” Kayn followed his departure with her eyes. She could see police standing outside her door. Why were the police outside her door? She could hear Kevin talking to them outside of her room. He seemed angry. She heard him explain, “It is wrong on so many levels to try and question her now. She has been awake all of forty-five damn minutes.” She was watching Kevin argue with the police officers outside of her room, but her eyelids were so heavy. She was exhausted for some reason. She drifted off to sleep.
When she awoke, Kevin was sitting on the edge of her bed. He touched her face softly.
Kayn brushed his hand away with an uncoordinated movement and whispered, “Dude, all this mushy stuff is beginning to creep me right out.” Kayn couldn’t take her eyes off Kevin though. How much time had passed? Her awkward Kevin was smoking hot now. She stared at him with a strange mix of confusion and attraction. She felt it swelling up inside her stomach.
“Do you remember what happened after you left my house?” Kevin asked cautiously. He gave her a moment to scroll back, in her mind.
She had gone for a run, and then she had stomach cramps. She remembered that much. It popped into her head. She had gone to his place for dinner. She remembered that now. She saw him waving from his bedroom window and then nothing. Had they gotten into a car accident on the way home?
Kayn whispered, “I remember leaving your house. I saw you wave from your window. Did we get in an accident?”
Kevin leaned across the bed and hugged her.
What in the hell is with all of this hugging? He pulled away from her and she looked at him quizzically and said, “You look different. You’re a lot bigger.”
“You’ve been in a coma, Kayn, for almost seven months,” Kevin stated.
Kayn smiled and shook her head in disbelief. Seven months that’s ridiculous. There was a noise outside of her door. She looked up and saw the police were still out there. She recognized Jenkins and smiled at him. He appeared to be involved in a heated discussion. “Seven months,” Kayn repeated as though she were trying to process it.
Her mind was starting to spin through fragments of memories. She was trying to remember why without saying the words again. Kayn felt the absence of her family members. She knew instinctively that there would be a great deal of regret involved in asking the question that simmered on the tip of her tongue. “How come my parents aren’t here?” Kayn asked, ignoring her own sense of self-preservation. A voice in her head whispered, you don’t really want to know.
One of the officers came through the threshold. He pushed past the doctor who was attempting to block his entrance to her room. He was now standing assertively in front of her bed.
The physician said in a disapproving tone, “I’m going on record as saying this is not the appropriate time to talk to my patient.”
One of the officers said firmly, “Kayn’s security is the issue at hand. We need to have this conversation immediately. Once it hits the newspapers that she’s conscious, Miss Brighton’s safety may be compromised.”
Kayn turned to look at Kevin ignoring everyone else in her room. She restated her question, “How come my parents aren’t here?”
Her mind was traveling through what she could recall of her life, and it was mostly images of Chloe.
“Where’s Chloe? Where’s my sister?” Kayn began to try to pull the adhesive monitors off her chest.
Her fine motor skills were not cooperating. She had to get out of here now—right this second.
Kevin leaned in close and said, “Honey, you probably can’t walk yet. You need to be calm, please. I can’t lose you again.” His eyes pleaded with her as he spoke. He whispered to her, “I wish there were some way to keep you from knowing all of this but there isn’t.”
“What happened?” Kayn whispered back, knowing she wasn’t anywhere near strong enough to get out of bed.
Kevin whispered against her hair, “This is going to be hard to hear. Prepare yourself. I’m not going anywhere tonight. I promise that I will be right outside your door. I will be here when you’re ready to talk about it.”
Kevin stood up and looked at the officers and nodded at them. Kevin turned to look behind him as he was gently ushered out of the room. He met Kayn’s eyes again and his began to tear up. This was not a good sign. Her eyes began to tear up in preparation for what was to come. Kevin was looking at her through the window. The look in his eyes had said everything she needed to know. This was going to be bad. She felt like she wanted to find a way to sink into her mattress and disappear. She imagined that willing her hospital bed to become quicksand would be pointless. She suspected that this conversation could not be avoided.
She could not tear her eyes away from Kevin, he was her anchor. She knew him so well she understood what each of his expressions meant. He was afraid for her. He was not just a tiny bit frightened. He was scared to death. She silently prepared herself for the worst. She looked down, wondering if she didn’t look up if they wo
uld not be able to say the words. The words she knew were coming.
An officer that she had never met introduced himself to her as Officer James Brandon. She took in his name. Her heart began to palpitate with a wildly erratic rhythm. Don’t say the words. Don’t you say them.
Kayn took a deep breath and raised her gaze to meet the officer’s eyes. Officer Brandon began to inform her of her family’s ruthless demise. She felt her attempt at managing to appear as though she had a tough exterior begin to crumble. Kayn was as fragile as an old vase. Her spirit shattered into a million misshapen shards of glass. She began to tremble and her eyes rolled to the back of her head and she passed out cold. She had managed to find a way to disappear, if only for a little while.
~
The doctor assured the group of Kayn’s loved ones that had accumulated outside of her room that she was okay. It was just too much for her to handle. He smiled kindly at the Smith family as he passed by them and continued to make his way down the hall towards the whole police station that seemed to be accumulating near the nurses’ station.
They had all been at the Brighton house that horrible night and it had changed the whole way of life in this town. They had all assumed they were safe here. This had been a town where locking doors was not common practice. They had all come to check in on Kayn on a regular basis since she had returned to town. If Kayn survived, then maybe, just maybe some peace of mind would come back—some happiness at the end of a long dark tunnel filled with air that was frigid and thick with fear of the unknown.
As word spread that Kayn had awakened from her slumber, a new fear arose that as it hit the papers, Kayn’s awakening would bring the person responsible for the massacre back to town. Perhaps he had been a drifter passing through town, or maybe a resident whose evil had lain dormant all these months. The fear of Kayn identifying him could ignite a fire within him and there could be more death.
While Kayn Brighton lay healing. The small town that she had grown up in succumbed to the chaos that the slaughter of the Brighton family had caused. Each and every resident of the small town had falsely believed their town a safe place to reside. This false sense of security had now been exposed as nothing more than a mirage. Everyone needed the murderer to be captured. They needed that feeling of security again.
Anyone that could not account for a chunk of time became suspect. Women had practically lined up to turn in their cheating husbands during the months that followed the mass murder at the Brighton house, worried that the secrets their husbands had been hiding were filled with dark acts. They feared being the last to know that a spouse had been hiding a secret life as a serial killer. Most of the men when checked out had secretly desired the company of other women or other men. The town had gone a little nutty for a while, turning on friends and family in a desperate attempt to have the person responsible captured.
Kevin’s mother said, “They are afraid the killer will try again now that she is awake … aren’t they?”
“She can identify him. I’m staying here tonight. Don’t even try to stop me,” Kevin stated firmly.
“We wouldn’t dare,” his father replied.
“Kayn is lucky to have you here looking out for her,” Kevin’s mother whispered and winked.
At the end of the hallway Matt came out of the elevator with a smile spread across his face so animated and joyous that it made the group immediately smile back. He walked right up and hugged Kevin without a second thought about being cool or manly. Matt had been through some changes, too, in the last seven months.
“I bet she’s sleeping now, isn’t she?” Matt said as he gazed both directions in the darkened hall.” My roommate’s here with me. He’s waiting in the lobby. They wouldn’t allow him up here. It’s past visiting hours.” Matt noticed the police officer sitting outside Kayn’s door, pointed, and said, “What’s that about?”
Kevin answered back, “Police protection. The fact that Kayn’s awake will hit the papers tomorrow morning.”
The smile on Matt’s face was replaced with a sudden look of fear that jolted everyone’s heart.
“They think there’s something to worry about then,” Matt stated in a concerned tone.
They looked at Jenkins. He had been there guarding Kayn’s room with every, extra, second in the day that he had, since that fateful night. He had been guarding Kayn Brighton in honor of her parents.
Jenkins noticed that they were all staring at him and said, “Nobody really knows, but it’s better safe than sorry. If the person who killed your family thinks Kayn knows who he is, she could be in a lot of danger.”
“I’m going down to the lobby to give Ryan the keys to the house so he has somewhere to stay tonight. I want to be here when Kayn wakes up,” Matt said.
He turned and walked back down the hallway toward the elevators. The dark hallway was peaceful and quiet with some buzzing and muffled voices. Nothing seemed ominous or dangerous. Every single one of them had been dreaming about Kayn waking up for so long that they had never considered how much safer she was asleep.
Kayn awoke the next morning to find her brother and Kevin sleeping in chairs by her bed. She watched them sleeping for a moment. She was in a state of comfortably numb. She wasn’t sure she was ready to talk about anything. She decided to let them know she was awake.
“Morning, Matty,” Kayn said in a raspy voice.
Kayn and Chloe had called him Matty from the time they could speak. Matt woke up with a start, obviously forgetting where he was for a second. Kayn wanted to laugh as he broke into a giant grin.
He said, “Hey, Candy Kayn you’re awake.” Matt jumped up with sleepy Jell-O legs and hugged her tightly. “You have no idea how incredible it feels to have you back.”
Kayn said, “Ouch, ouch, you’re hurting me, Matty.” She pretended to be hurt, holding her chest.
“Oh God, I’m so sorry, kid, are you okay?” Matt jumped back.
Kayn laughed, “I’m kidding. I’m fine.”
Kevin woke up and grumbled, “Yes, she’s all good Matt and as you can tell still completely full of shit.”
Matt shook his head and hugged her again and asked cautiously, “You know about Mom, Dad, and Chloe?”
She answered quietly, almost mechanically, “Yes, I know. I need to see where they are buried.”
She was building a wall around her heart on the topic of her family. She looked at Matt and she could tell that he had built one as well. It was a matter of compartmentalization. She couldn’t process all of the information she had been forced to swallow. She had to try to shut her emotions down. She had to try to pretend that they had been gone for a long time. She was actively trying to hold back the tears. She knew it would ache every single time they crossed her mind for a very long time.
Kayn noticed Jenkins outside of her room. He wasn’t buff or intimidating looking, but he reminded her of her Dad. He had an aura of peacefulness that made everyone feel at ease. Jenkins waved hello through the window and Kayn smiled. Yes, she felt better with him sitting there.
“I don’t think you’re getting out of here for a while, Kayn. You have quite a lot of rehabilitation to do. Well and there’s that whole pesky obvious security issue.” Kevin stated and waved to Jenkins who waved and smiled back.
“Which one of you two is going to fill me in on the dirty little details? I need to know what happened to me. Do I look the same?”
Kayn felt her face thoroughly. “Can one of you get me a mirror?” she directed the last question at Kevin.
“Kayn, you look beautiful. You don’t even have any noticeable scars on your face,” Matt said.
Kayn wanted to see her reflection so she could pretend it was Chloe. She wasn’t being vain. She needed to see her twin even if it wasn’t real. She had lost her twin and it felt as though she had lost a limb. It was a continuous sense that something was missing.
Chapter 9
Learning to Listen
The doctor knocked on her door and stuck his head
to say, “Good morning Sleeping Beauty.
He asked the boys to leave so he could check her out. They didn’t want to leave because they knew she wanted to know what had happened to her. The doctor pulled the curtains shut around her for privacy.
“Let’s get this catheter out and try and get you standing up today.” The doctor pressed the buzzer and called a nurse in to help him.
“It’s okay,” she said as she passed the boys on her way into the room. “It’s just normal medical stuff to do—nothing new.”
The doctor opened the front of her gown. She looked down at her chest; he ran his fingers over several very slight yet still visible ridged scars on her stomach and one on her chest.
Kayn said,” I need you to tell me what happened to me.”
Her eyes pleaded with him to be straight with her. He began to tell her every last gruesome detail. The nurse glared at him with questioning eyes and covered her mouth.
“You were found in the trails behind your house. You had been stabbed twelve times. You were beaten and your jaw and nose were both broken. You almost lost one of your eyes; it’s a miracle they managed to save it. You were found naked, but there was no evidence of rape. You have a symbol of some sort carved on your chest and on your hip. We have researched it thoroughly to see if it was a clue as to who had written it. The symbols on your chest and on your hip have almost healed completely. You had seven separate surgeries; reconstructive and reparative. You are alive and healing at an amazing rate.”
His hand covered his mouth. He was in obvious shock over what he had told her. The nurse stood in utter shock over his robotically blunt description of what had happened to his patient. The doctor leaned against the side of the bed for a second. He looked dizzy and then regained his composure.
The nurse, silently watching, mouth agape, now said in a sweet calming voice, “Most of your scars should disappear altogether, except for the ones hidden inside of you. Those scars you can wear like a badge. You can let them overcome all that is good in your life or you can overcome them. I have faith that you are strong enough to do that, Kayn.”