by JG Alva
No one but Sutton was watching.
It wasn’t anger that drove him to try and hold her, but some vestige of love.
As if she could ever love him back. As if she knew how.
Sutton stood on the pavement and waited.
He didn’t call an ambulance.
She didn’t deserve one.
Not that it would have helped.
Distantly, he heard the sound of police sirens drawing closer.
It took them two minutes and twenty seconds to arrive, but when they did, she was already dead.
*
CHAPTER 19
On a crisp day in the middle of October, the landing alarm rang out unexpectedly.
Sutton waited, but there was a knock on the door almost immediately. He moved to the peephole and looked through, and the tall, lean figure of Daniel was revealed, distorted in that fish eye lens.
Sutton felt a mild dart of worry pass through him. Daniel wouldn’t be here if he didn’t have to be.
He opened the door.
Daniel’s face looked pinched.
“Daniel Douglas,” Sutton said.
“Yes. Sutton Mills.”
“To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Can I come in?”
Sutton debated…but in the end there really was no debate. He wanted to know what Daniel had come to say, and he’d be less inclined to divulge it without some effort of civility on Sutton’s part.
So he bade him enter.
He watched Daniel: he looked around the room but didn’t see any of it; he made no remark on the plethora of pictures, the vivacity of the view, the rapaciousness of the room’s dimensions. Instead, he circled once until he faced Sutton again, and then got straight down to business.
“Have you heard?”
Sutton thought that Daniel was being overly dramatic. Something had happened, but Daniel was holding it to his bosom in anticipation of Sutton’s reaction.
But he didn’t want to play that game. He didn’t want to play any game. He was too tired.
“What do you want, Daniel?”
Daniel stared at him.
“No,” he said, making his own judgements. “You haven’t heard.”
He was beginning to annoy Sutton. He had no right to be this superior, not with all that had happened.
He sighed.
“Why are you here, Daniel?” He asked, in a tired voice.
“When was the last time you spoke to Angela?”
“Why?”
“A week?”
Sutton didn’t answer. He didn’t want to talk about Angela, especially not with Daniel.
“Two weeks?” Daniel ventured.
It was actually closer to three.
Three weeks since they had mutually agreed that Sutton wouldn’t come to visit anymore. Sutton hadn’t understood it; he still didn’t. There seemed like a problem to be dealt with – a metaphorical fence that had to be climbed over – but Angela had been overwhelmed by it.
It was her face.
After that terrible night, Sutton had returned to the hospital. Angela had still been in a coma. He had begged the nurses to let him stay with her, citing that he was the only person she had left. He thought they let him stay not out of any sense of decency, but just for an easy life: he would not pester them anymore if they acquiesced to his wishes. He slept on a small cot they wheeled in for him. He left very rarely, and then only on quick trips home to shower and change, before returning to the hospital. Nurses came in every hour to begin with, and then every two hours, and then sporadically, to no particular timetable. He took this to be a good sign. Angela was wheeled out for nameless tests and was sometimes not returned for anything up to six hours. In those moments, Sutton fretted. There was a bruise on her brain. A consequence of the blunt force trauma to her head and neck. A couple of times they were on the verge of cutting into her skull again to relieve the pressure…but in all cases the swelling seemed to ease on its own. They had no idea when she would wake up, and no idea what state she would be in when she did. There was damage to her brain but it was healing. The signs were hopeful…but they couldn’t guarantee anything. It was a waiting game. He helped where he could, lifting her when her sheets had to be changed, rolling her – gently – when muscles had to be massaged to prevent cramping, or when salve had to be applied to prevent bedsores. He got to know the names of the nurses, got to know their personalities, their lives, their stories.
It took Angela five weeks to wake up.
On the morning it happened, Sutton had been sketching. He was drawing a portrait of one of the nurse’s nieces from a photograph she had given him. It was to be a birthday present. It was nothing special, but it would do. He glanced at Angela’s sleeping face – as he had done almost every couple of minutes since he had been with her – and she was as she had been for the last five weeks: motionless, inert, unconscious, her eyes closed. A couple of minutes passed and he glanced up again…
And her eyes were open.
He was stupefied with shock for almost three seconds.
He dropped the drawing and the photograph on the floor.
He got up and stood by the bed.
“Angela?” He whispered.
Her eyes moved to his face.
He thought he saw recognition in them, but he didn’t know if that was just wishful thinking. He called loudly for the nurse on duty – “Sarah!” – and then waited as Sarah came in, saw that the patient was conscious, checked her vitals, and then rushed off to get the doctor. Ten minutes later, the simple but unpleasant extraction of the breathing tube from the patient’s throat was attempted, and Angela came spluttering back into her life.
“Angela?” The doctor said, steadying her head with his hands and checking her pupils. “I’m Dr Rush. Do you know where you are?”
Angela nodded.
She looked at Sutton but said, “hospital.”
Her voice was dry, barely louder than a croak.
“And the year?”
She gave the correct one.
“Good.” Dr Rush stepped back, satisfied, and then turned to Sutton. He smiled. “The best outcome we could have hoped for. I think she’s fine.”
Sutton hadn’t been aware of the pressure he’d been under. In that moment, he thought he might collapse; he could hardly feel his legs; it was as if he was suddenly unplugged from everything.
“Sutton,” Sarah said, worried. She put a hand on his arm to steady him. “Are you alright? You look white as a sheet.”
Sutton nodded and then pointed to Angela.
“She’s the patient,” he said.
Sarah said, “right now, she looks better than you do.”
Angela tried to smile.
“Water,” she croaked, gesturing at her throat.
Water was fetched, and Angela drank, greedily.
It was perhaps five minutes before she asked after her mother. Sutton tried to break the news to her as gently as he could. She cried, but it was a terrible, dry, creaking affair; her muscles were weak from disuse, and her body too tired for such trauma.
After the crying eased, she laid back down on the bed and fell immediately to sleep. This time, she only slept for two hours, before she awoke once again. She was lucid, she knew that her mother was dead.
It was thirty minutes later that she came to realise there was something wrong with her face. She asked Sutton for a mirror. He had been dreading this moment, would have done anything to forestall it, but now that it was here, he was left only with the task at hand. He opened the drawer beside the bed and retrieved a small hand mirror. It had a blue handle. He held on to it for a moment.
“You’ve got to prepare yourself,” Sutton said.
“Why?” Angela’s eyes went wide with fear. “Is it…that bad?”
“No. Of course not. But it’s going to be a shock. Just remember, it’s not totally healed yet. The swelling still hasn’t completely gone
down.”
“Swelling? Oh God.”
“Some of the wounds got infected. They were very deep. So they had to treat some of the cuts with strong antibiotics. And they had to go in and remove some of the infected tissue.”
“Sutton, you’re scaring me.”
“I’m preparing you –“
“No. You’re not. You’re stalling me. Just give me the mirror.”
“Angela –“
“Sutton. Please.”
She held her hand out.
Her passed it to her.
She took one look in it…
And screamed.
There were three long cuts diagonally across her face: one started at her temple and travelled across her forehead in a more or less straight line; the second one started just below her left eye, ran across her cheek and then over the bridge of her nose; the third started only a centimetre below the second cut, but had sliced downward, bisecting the edge of her mouth. When he had found her, her mouth had been ripped open, so that it seemed like he was looking at a skull with a Halloween mask pulled over it.
It was easy enough to deduce what had happened. Suzanne, energised by righteous anger, had knocked Angela to the floor, and then with some heavy object – most likely the green lamp from the bedside table – she had taken three heavy swings at Angela’s face. She had cut the flesh to the bone. The doctors had done the best they could. Sutton didn’t care. But at the end of the day there was no use denying that the scarring was severe, and shocking in its severity. At first glance you could be mistaken for thinking she was a burn victim. The cuts had been stitched as delicately and as accurately as they possibly could, but they had just been too deep for the skin to ever return to its former unblemished state.
After that, Angela dropped into a depressive spiral. And because he was so attached, Sutton went down into it with her. The strength that he had commented on – that he had admired – now worked against her, as no amount of argument or discussion could persuade her from the certainty that she was hideous, and always would be.
But Sutton tried.
“You can’t say that,” he told her, trying to keep his voice quiet so that the nurses didn’t have to endure another shouting match. “You don’t know what technologies they’re developing, what innovations they’re coming up with –“
“Innovations?” She said, her teeth bared, the white scarring at the edges of her mouth puckering up. “What innovations? What innovations can possibly fix this?”
“Angela, you are not the first person –“
“I need a face transplant,” she said brightly. “That’s what I need. I need somebody else’s face put over this…this thing. And then I’ll be a whole new person.”
“Angela, this talk isn’t helping –“
“It’s helping me. And that’s what’s important, right? Not to upset the mutant.”
“Jesus Christ, Angela –“
“I don’t even think Jesus Christ could fix this one. Not even with a full-on God miracle happening.”
“I keep telling you, it’s not that bad –“
“Not that bad? Not that bad.” She was silent with fury for a moment. “I look like I tried to head-butt a pipe bomb!”
“Okay. Let’s just talk. Okay? Nobody has to start shouting –“
“I want to shout! It makes me feel good to shout! If you don’t like it you can go. In fact, it’s better if you go. I don’t want you looking at me. I don’t want anyone looking at me. Especially not you. You most of all.”
She was allowed to go home, but this only gave her more opportunity to do what she had been trying to do since he had handed her that mirror: retreat from the world. He was adamant that he wouldn’t let it happen. Retreating was giving up, and she couldn’t do that. He visited her every day. Some days were okay; some days were not. Some days she yearned to be held, and whispered things in his ears about how grateful she was that he was there, about how much she loved him; some days she was venomous, unapproachable, angry at the world and everyone in it.
Until that last night, almost three weeks ago.
They both sat on the old brown and green patterned sofa. Sutton had pleasant associations with this sofa; it was an old friend. There was to be a “discussion”. Angela had that look in her eyes; there was something dire that she had to impart to him, some solemn revelation. In truth, he didn’t want to hear it. She was not well, not in her head, and it was getting worse. And worse still, he didn’t know how to help her. All his attempts were met with the full strength of her resistance…as if she didn’t want to be helped. And maybe that was the real problem. How to help someone when they didn’t want it, when they wouldn’t accept it? Then there was nothing you could do. She took both of his hands in hers. She had swept her hair forward to cover most of her face, but he could still see the scars, the misshapen flesh around them, the way they distorted the entire shape of her face.
But he didn’t care what she looked like.
Couldn’t she see that?
She said, “I don’t want you to visit me anymore.”
For a moment, Sutton didn’t know what to say. His feelings shorted out the logical parts of his brain.
He cleared his throat.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said. “You shouldn’t be alone right now. It’s not good for you.”
She nodded, but she was unmoved. He could tell that. He knew her well enough to know when he was getting through to her…or when he wasn’t.
“I don’t want you to see me like this,” she said. “I wanted to be whole for you. Do you remember? Do you remember me telling you that?”
Dumbly, he nodded.
She said, “I wanted to be whole, and strong, and successful…but now look at me.”
The silence was so thick it was choking him.
“If you love me, you’ll leave me alone.”
“I can’t,” he said, pained.
“I’m hideous.”
“No. You’re not.”
“You’re sweet…but I am. And I feel it most when you’re around. I feel like I’m…like I’m forcing this on you. Me. This face. This situation. That you’re duty bound by some kind of outmoded chivalry to come visit me because of what you promised.”
“That’s not it at all.”
“I know,” she said. “But it feels like that. Do you understand?”
“No.”
She didn’t speak for a moment.
“You’re the best man, Sutton,” she said. “You’re the best man I’ve ever met. You’re so much more than anyone…and I wanted to keep up. And I could have. Before…before this happened to me, I could have kept up fine. But now I can’t. You have to run on without me.”
“No,” he repeated.
“I have to deal with this on my own. Okay? Come to terms with it somehow. I can’t do that with you around.”
She squeezed his hands then.
As if she were offering him comfort.
Quietly, she said, “my heart is breaking. Please don’t argue with me. For my sake. I couldn’t stand it. Please just leave.” She squeezed his hands again. “Please.”
What could he do?
He nodded.
He stood up.
He felt wooden.
He walked to the door.
He looked back.
Her face was in shadow.
She didn’t move, didn’t speak, didn’t cry, didn’t try and call him back.
He nodded, and then opened the door and walked out into the night.
“Two weeks?” Daniel said again.
“It’s none of your business, Daniel.”
Daniel stared at him, seeking something in his face.
He said, “she’s been attacked.”
Sutton didn’t believe him.
“What?”
“It’s true. Last week. On Monday night. Someone tried to mug her. Outside of her flat. They hit he
r over the head with something, knocked her down. She’s alright, but…it shook her up.”
“And she told you,” he said.
“I went around to see her. I pop in every now and then. To talk about…what happened. She didn’t want me to know. She didn’t want anybody to know.”
Sutton tried to pull himself together.
“I’ve got to go round there,” he said. His voice sounded distant to his own ears.
“Wait,” Daniel said, his hand up. “Just wait.”
Sutton stared at him.
“What?”
Daniel shook his head, but came to a decision.
“I don’t think it was a random attack,” he said.
Sutton frowned.
“What…what makes you say that?”
Daniel shook his head again. He looked bitter.
“Green Light,” he said.
“What about Green Light?”
“Angela won’t sell it to them. She’s told me that. What if they’re trying to force her?” Daniel shook his head again. “Sutton, what if they’re responsible for Angela’s attack?”
“Who? The consortium?”
“Yes.”
“Daniel, they’re just a bunch of businessmen. They’re not criminals.”
“No. But look how far they’ve gone to get what they want. See how much influence they’ve used on the people involved. And if they are responsible for Angela’s attack, then maybe they were responsible for Maggie’s too. You thought – we thought – that Suzanne just went crazy. Fine. Okay. It’s possible. But what if they were putting pressure on her too? What if they somehow forced her to come up with a resolution on this deal. She was nuts, she did what she thought was right, but if she was the bullet, then they pulled the trigger.”
Sutton didn’t answer.
Daniel continued, “it doesn’t for one minute absolve her from what she did – nothing will – and it doesn’t absolve me from not seeing it and stopping her, but it makes sense. In a weird way.”
Sutton turned to look at him.
“So what do you want from me?”