The Lifetime of A Second

by Jennifer Millikin

  If Brynn needs to go, I’ll let her, but I don’t think she does. Daisy left once, when her low was so low she couldn’t look herself in the mirror any longer. She needed to get away from our house, our things, even me. What she really wanted was a new body, one that could do what her heart longed for. She ran because the pain was too great, the need to punish herself too strong. I let her go because sometimes a person needs to run away. Left in a confined space, they might explode. Out in the open, their pain might leak out and have room to spread, thinning and eventually evaporating.

  The difference between Daisy and Brynn is that Daisy wanted to leave. Brynn’s departure feels forced.

  And that Mercedes on the street made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Something isn’t right.

  I can’t call the police because I don’t like a car on my street. Poorly concealed laughter is all I would get from a phone call like that. I freaked out once, albeit in a pretty bad way, and I became infamous. I don’t mind the whispers too much. Besides, it’s a hell of a lot easier to growl at people and keep them away.

  Except for Brynn. She wouldn’t let me shun her.

  I slide my foot into my second shoe and stand. “You can stop pacing now,” I tell the boy. I know he has a name, but I rarely call him by it. Keeps him wary of me, and that’s a good thing when he’s dating the young lady I care about.

  I grab a flashlight on the way out the door. My knee has been giving me trouble lately, and my back too, but right now I can’t feel the pain as acutely. Adrenaline, I guess. Not that anything is actually wrong. Brynn is probably going to answer the door and laugh at the two of us.

  Brynn’s house isn’t far, but I’m damn proud of myself for keeping pace with the boy. He falters when we get there. I stop, irritated. “What?”

  He points at her living room window, where the drawn curtains are backlit. “A light is on.”

  “So?”

  “I guess she’s home after all.” The boy sounds like someone took his favorite toy away.

  “So?” I repeat, hoping to get a real explanation this time.

  “She didn’t come tonight. To my opening. She chose not to come.” He looks back at his truck. “I’m going to leave. I can’t do this anymore. If she wants to leave without saying goodbye, then fine. I won’t make her do something she doesn’t want to do.”

  I don’t know what this talk of an opening is, but I do know when I see a man with his heart on the outside of his body. The boy loves Brynn. He also understands that sometimes letting people go is the best way to love them.

  I nod. The boy claps me on the back a few times.

  “Maybe one day you and I can get together for a beer, and I can get to know you a little better. You must not be that bad if Brynn managed to crack you.” He grins at his joke.

  “Brynn is like a ninja. She slips in before you notice her, and later realize you never gave her permission.”

  The boy chuckles and backs away. He tucks his hands in his pockets, and for a few moments, I watch him. Part of me wants to ask him to fight for her, and the other part of me wants to commend him for allowing Brynn the space she needs. I have all the channels on my TV, I see all the reality shows with the so-called men stomping around acting impulsive and selfish. The boy is not like that. Maybe I’ll start calling him Connor.

  I walk up the driveway and to the house, pausing on the landing. In front of my house, Connor steps up to get in his truck and pauses too, sending me a wave. I wave once and knock.

  The door opens halfway, enough for me to walk in.

  Odd.

  I step in, my gaze going straight ahead to the kitchen. “Brynn,” I call.

  The door closes behind me at the same time I hear her say in a defeated voice, “I’m right here.”

  The overhead light picks up the tears tumbling down her cheeks, makes them glisten. First I see the zip-ties on her ankles and wrists, and then the wetness on the front of her jeans.

  Something round and cold touches the base of my skull.

  “You’ll do,” a man’s voice says from behind. With a hand on my lower back, he gives me a small shove toward the couch. “Sit down.”

  At this point, I’m thinking it would’ve been nice if Brynn would’ve told me her real name and what happened to her in Phoenix during a good dinner of crab cakes and French fries. That would’ve been much more pleasant.

  Instead, I’m finding everything out with a gun pointed at my head.

  “What do you think of your friend now?” the guy asks after he finishes telling me about Brynn. Or, Elizabeth, I guess. That’s what he calls her. He’s standing at the far end of the couch, a spot where he can make Brynn or me his target with a swing of his gun.

  He doesn’t look like a killer. Not that they all have the same look, but he doesn’t strike me as evil, and I’ve seen evil. He looks anguished. His eyes are lifeless. He’s obviously vengeful, but to me, it’s an act of desperation, not a true desire to do harm. Instead of grieving, he has channeled his devastation into anger and focused it on the person he believes is to blame.

  Brynn is innocent. I read all those articles. Not just the slapdash, sensational headlines a simpleton teenager could’ve written. I read the meat of the story. It fascinated me. How could one woman erase from the world what my wife and I agonized over?

  “Eric, please,” Brynn pleads, shifting. She winces and looks down at her bindings.

  Rage fills my vision, tinging it scarlet. The first thing I noticed about Eric is that he doesn’t know what to do with a gun. The only advantage he has is that he has possession of it. The second thing I noticed is that he looks like a Mercedes driver. His appearance is rumpled right now, but the sheep embroidered on his polo tells me he isn’t a thug. On a normal day, in a normal life, this behavior wouldn’t come from him, and that is where I have the advantage.

  “Eric, I’m Walt. I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but at this exact moment, meeting you isn’t so great. You understand.” He eyes me, suspicion in his gaze, but I continue. “I’m very sorry about your wife and child. I read about it. Devastating.” I shake my head. “My wife and I suffered a miscarriage once. It broke our hearts.”

  “Not the same thing,” Eric grits through clenched teeth.

  I raise my hands in front of me. “No, of course not. What you experienced was worse.”

  He swings the gun over to Brynn. She covers her face with her bound hands. “Clearly,” Eric says. “I’m going to have to kill you both. My plan, as Elizabeth already knows, was to torture her by killing you in front of her, and that’s still my plan.” He glances down at me. His eyes are wild. “But you did surprise me. I thought someone else would be standing at the door.” He looks at Brynn. “I guess your boyfriend doesn’t care about you after all. Can’t say I blame him. You’re an alcoholic whore baby-killer.”

  Brynn doesn’t even flinch. If his words hurt, she doesn’t show it.

  I’m angry enough for the both of us. I take my eighty-two years, my bad knee and back, and combine it with my red-hot fury. Before that little prick knows what’s going on, I’ve stood up and grabbed ahold of the front of his shirt. He raises the gun above us, and I reach for it too. I have a hand on it, and I’m trying to take it without accidentally getting off a shot. His finger’s on the trigger, which is another example of how untrained he is. I have only one idea, and it’s something I’ve never done. Not to any man, ever.

  I lift my knee and drive it right between his legs.

  He grunts, automatically grabbing himself with two hands. I reach for the gun, but Eric keeps it against his body. I’m trying my damnedest to keep it pointed away from Brynn, and me, but the guy’s staggering and he’s so inexperienced that the hand holding the gun flops around like a fish.

  A crack of thunder fills the air. An explosive blast bounces around the room, ringing and buzzing fills my ears. My hands are wet and red.

  Suddenly I’m exhausted. I slump, falling into the couch.

  Scre
aming. I think it’s Brynn.

  My name, over and over. Who’s saying it now? Connor?

  Sirens wailing.

  I’m so tired.

  29

  Brynn

  “Ma’am, do you know this man?”

  “How long were you tied up?”

  “When did he arrive?”

  “Is the gun his or yours?”

  “Are you hurt in any other places?”

  Two police officers ask me these questions. Responses fumble around my mouth. I think I answer, but it’s hard to know if the voice I hear is my own. One of the policemen walks me to an ambulance and helps me climb inside.

  Red and blue lights flicker around me. Other ambulances. First responders, trying to gauge the situation. More policemen and women arrive, descending, digging, determining fault. The sky is dark, not light, but I’m transported back to that morning anyway. You need to come with us, they said.

  Not tonight. Tonight I’m clearly the victim.

  “Where’s Walt?” I ask the paramedic moving around in the ambulance behind me. I’m sitting at the end of the bay, the hard floor beneath me. If I had a blanket draped around my shoulders, I would look like a scene from a movie. Reality is alarmingly different.

  The paramedic comes up beside me and steps down off the truck. She stands in front of me and asks for my wrists. “Who’s Walt?” she asks. I watch her turn my wrists over, and examine them. Her name is printed beneath an emblem on her shirt. Lori Turner.

  “The old man. He was in the house with me.” I look at my house. Ginger’s house. The place that was supposed to be a safe haven for me.

  She swipes a wet cloth over my wrists. “He’s being examined in another truck. No obvious injuries, just typical stuff that goes along with advanced age.”

  I nod. Such a simple response that understates the swell of relief inside me.

  Lori glides ointment over the abrasions on my wrist. She kneels and starts on my ankles.

  “And the… other man?”

  Lori looks up at me. “You mean the shooter?”

  Another nod from me.

  “They took him away already. He’ll likely need surgery.”

  Eric Prince. Deranged. Despondent. Grieving. He needs help.

  Lori finishes and stands. “You’re good to go. The abrasions on your wrists and ankles will heal. You’ll need to follow-up with your doctor, and tell them if any new symptoms arise. Take it easy for the rest of the weekend. The first few days following a traumatic event are difficult.”

  In my case, it has really been the first twelve months.

  Lori reaches for my shoulder to help me stand. She keeps a hand on me while I get my bearings. My legs are weak, I think more from shock than muscle failure.

  “Thank you,” I tell her, stepping out from the protection of the partially open back doors of the ambulance.

  Like Lori said, Walt sits in the back of an ambulance to my right. A paramedic listens to his heart. Walt spots me over the paramedic’s shoulder. His eyes close and his chin dips. It’s a gentleman-like nod, and it brings tears to my eyes. Growling, grumbling, junk-hoarding Walt wrestled a gun from someone’s hands. For me.

  The paramedic starts talking, and Walt turns his attention to him.

  “Brynn.”

  A strangled voice reaches me. Soaked in fear. Dripping with relief. How can one word, my name, convey both those emotions? I turn, and the sight of him rips through everything I felt tonight. Suddenly I’m sobbing, and then I’m in his arms, burying my face in his chest.

  “Connor,” I cry.

  He brushes a hand over my hair. I look up at him. His eyes tell me the story of the terror he experienced tonight too. He cradles my cheek, his lower lip trembling. “I can’t believe… Tonight… That guy…” He shakes his head and doesn’t say anything else.

  “I know. I know.”

  Connor presses his lips to mine. It’s raw, a kiss between the wounded, the battered, the injured.

  “All right, break it up.”

  I pull away, very nearly smiling. I’ve never been so happy to hear someone’s voice. Stepping out of Connor’s arms, I step right into Walt’s. I hug him gently, even though I want to squeeze him tight.

  “Thank you,” I whisper.

  “You’re worth it,” he whispers back.

  I’m crying again, and just when I think Walt’s going to tell me to quit blubbering, he extends a hand. I step back but keep an arm around Walt’s shoulders.

  “Connor,” he says. “I’m glad you didn’t listen to me.”

  Connor shakes Walt’s hand and grins. “Just because you’re old doesn’t mean you’re wise all the time.”

  Walt wheezes a laugh. “Only most of the time.” He looks down the street to his house. “This old man needs his bed. Going to take a while to recover from tonight’s excitement.”

  “We’ll walk you home and help you,” I say, adjusting my arm so that I have a hold of his elbow.

  He sends me a playfully derisive look. “Brynn, I just beat up a guy half my age. I don’t need help getting into bed.” I let my raised eyebrows do the responding. Walt sighs. “Fine,” he grumbles. Connor waves a hand at a police officer standing in the open door of his car.

  “Is it okay if we take him home?” He points at Walt. “Do you need anything more from us?”

  The police officer walks over. I don’t recognize him, but I don’t think I’d recognize anybody from those first few moments after they burst into the house, guns drawn.

  “You all are free to go. We may have more questions tomorrow, but we’ll call it a wrap tonight.” He hands me my purse. “This yours?” He nods at Connor. “He thought you might want it.”

  I thank him and take it. A thought occurs to me. “In Phoenix, there’s a detective who worked with me about Eric. The, um…” I pause, not sure what to call him. Lori called him the shooter, but I can’t bring myself to say that. “Eric Prince.”

  “You told us already, ma’am. It was one of the first things you said. You were actually quite helpful.”

  “Oh.” I don’t remember any of that.

  “Don’t worry. It’s normal not to recall what you said. Over the next few days, some things will come back to you.” He hands me a card. “If there’s anything you think of and you’re not certain you told us, give me a call.” He passes out cards to Walt and Connor. “You guys too,” he says, backing up. “Try to get some rest. Sleep will come easier than you think.”

  “Let’s go tuck you in, Walt.” Connor starts down the sidewalk.

  “Sounds good, Connie,” Walt fires back, tucking an arm through mine.

  Connor’s shoulders shake with laughter while we follow him down the street, and into Walt’s house.

  At the entrance to his room, Walt stops us. “I’ll take it from here.” He kisses my cheek and says goodbye to Connor. “Brynn, there’s an extra house key on top of the fridge. Take it and lock up behind yourself. I don’t want the key back.”

  I smile. “Okay.”

  I follow his instructions, tucking the key into my back pocket alongside the officer’s card.

  Connor wraps his hand tightly around mine as we walk down Walt’s front steps. The ambulances are gone, the police car has driven off, and the street is quiet again. The neighbors who poured from their homes with the commotion of the night have gone back inside. Vaguely, I see Cassidy’s face in my memory. Perhaps things will come back to me as the seconds continue to tick past.

  Suddenly I remember something. “Did you get a message from my phone? Is that why you came?”

  Connor looks at me, his eyes illuminated by a streetlight we’re passing under. “I was just about to drive away from Walt’s house and looked at my phone. I saw your message and knew it wasn’t from you. It didn’t sound like you.”

  “So you walked over—”

  “Ran,” he corrects. “I was coming up your steps when I heard the shot.” He shakes his head. “Worst moment of my whole life. Not knowing.�
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  “Everything is okay now,” I remind him, even though my wrists and ankles burn with the memory.

  We reach my house and he pulls me into his chest. “Stay the night with me,” he murmurs into my hair.

  “Only if you promise not to let me go.”

  He pulls back, looking down at me. “I’m never letting you go, Brynn.”

  I’ve never really been in love, but I always imagined it feeling like floating. I was wrong. My heart, my core, my soul, my essence, has been connected to the earth, to the solid and stable surface it needs, to Connor, the man who would have let me go to keep me safe.

  My hands wind around his neck. “I hope you mean that. I don’t want any more question marks between us. We have a period at the end of our sentence now.”

  He answers me with a scorching and needy kiss. It takes my breath away, and almost my mind too. Luckily I remember I need to change my clothes. It’s embarrassing, but I tell Connor what happened.

  “If it makes you feel better I will pee right here, right now.” He points at the yard. “On the grass, I mean.”

  I laugh. “That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

  “You can shower at my house. I have an oversized t-shirt with your name on it. You left some clothes at my place, too. I found them yesterday and had no intention of giving them back to you.” He grins impishly.

  Connor takes my keys and locks the front door. He slips a hand in mine and leads me to his truck in front of Walt’s house.

  Oh no. The car service for tomorrow morning. While Connor drives I type out a quick message to the guy who’s supposed to pick me up.

  In the morning I’ll deal with canceling my flight. For now, I want to close my eyes and forget tonight happened.

  “It doesn’t look the same without your paintings.” Connor’s living room is barren without the canvases, drab without the addition of their color. The empty easels are skeletons. I stop in the center of the room and turn back to him. His t-shirt hangs down to mid-thigh on me, but it’s soft, and clean, and I feel a little better now that I’ve showered.