by Cheree Alsop
Hands touched my shoulders and arm. “It’s not your fault,” Mom said. “You couldn’t have known.”
“I was supposed to protect her,” I replied. “I was supposed to keep her safe from him and I failed.” I opened my eyes and she stepped back. Tears flowed down my cheeks, but whether from pain, emotional agony, or sheer exhaustion, I didn’t know. “I love her and I couldn’t keep her safe, even as the Black Rider.”
The silence that answered my words was different this time. I stared at the ceiling, hoping to be swallowed up by the floor and never returned. I should have died so many times. I protected strangers from robbers and gangs, yet I couldn’t save my loved ones.
A voice in the back of my mind argued that I had saved them at the fair, but I wasn’t in the mood to listen to reason. The floor wasn’t complying with my need to disappear. I wondered how many pain pills Dr. Carrison had left. The same voice maliciously said that maybe he had forgotten to leave any. It would serve me right.
“You love her?” Cassidy asked.
My gaze shifted to my cousin. She crossed the floor, leaned her elbows against the back of the couch, and looked down at me. Her eyes were alight and there was a tender smile on her face. “You care about her that much?”
When I nodded again, Mom’s hand touched my cheek, wiping away the tears. “You can’t protect those you care about from everything,” she said. “You just have to do your best and hope you can live the full measure of your lives together. It’s not easy.” Her voice held aching experience.
I lifted a hand and covered her fingers with my own. “No, it’s not.”
She gave me a small, faltering smile. When I returned it, her expression touched her eyes. For a moment, I saw Zoey looking back at me the way she used to, pride and happiness making her blue eyes dance. “I’m okay.” I repeated the words she had said to me long ago. I didn’t know if I had heard the words the night she died, or if they had come later as I attempted to cope, but for the moment, they were right.
“You’re sure?” Mom asked.
I nodded. “I’ll be okay.” I looked at the faces around me. Everyone looked extremely weary. I fought back a chuckle because I knew it would hurt. “You guys need some sleep.”
Magnum let out a frustrated breath. “We’ve been waiting to see if you were going to die or not.”
I smiled at him. “Thanks for the concern. I think I’ll survive.”
He surprised me by squeezing my shoulder hard. “Glad to hear it.”
He headed for the back door and Cassidy ran to follow him. Uncle Rick stared hard after them for a moment, then turned back to me. “You need to take it easy for a while.”
“I plan on it,” I said honestly. “Think Barbecue will miss me?”
He snorted, holding back a laugh. “She won’t know who to kick come milking time.”
“She’ll probably be happy,” Cole said from the kitchen door.
“How long have you been standing there?” Aunt Lauren demanded with her hands on her hips.
He munched on a chocolate-chip cookie and smiled without answering.
“You’re supposed to be in bed. It’s way past your bedtime.” She motioned toward Jaren. “You, too.”
He nodded. “I’ll be right there.”
Cole grabbed two more cookies before Aunt Lauren could stop him, then ran down the hallway. Aunt Lauren trailed behind.
Jaren crossed to the couch and gave me one of his serious looks. “I almost saw you die tonight.”
Guilt flooded through me and I nodded. “Sorry about that.” From the corner of my eye, I could see Uncle Rick and Mom watching us quietly.
“Were you scared?” the twelve-year-old asked.
His question caught me by surprise, but it was the same thing he had asked after the barn fire. He deserved an honest answer. I thought back to the fight and the ride home afterwards. There was pain and exhaustion along with the echoing beat of my heart, and worry about Madelyn and everything she had gone through. The red light filled my memory, guiding me to safety.
I shook my head. “I wasn’t.”
He thought about that for a moment, then nodded. “Sleep well, Kel,” he said. He left the room quietly without giving any insight into his thoughts.
I let out a slow breath. “I don’t know if that was the right thing to say.”
“If it’s honest, it’s right,” Uncle Rick replied, surprising me. “The one thing I’ve learned about kids is that they always know if you’re lying.” He sat down near the fireplace and leaned his elbows on his knees. “That was brave of you to take the rap for Madelyn.”
Mom took the armchair near him. I could tell by her expression that she wasn’t so sure.
“She’s had a rough life. I didn’t want a black mark on her record to hinder her future. And the reporters here are ruthless, trust me,” I told them. Exhaustion made me close my eyes. I used the strength I had left to open them again. I met Uncle Rick’s gaze. “I don’t want it to affect your family.”
He shrugged. “We’ll deal with it if it comes to that.” He rose with a groan of protest. “These old bones aren’t used to staying up so late. I’m going to hit the hay.”
He ruffled my hair when he went past. I refrained from telling him I wasn’t a puppy. He left down the hallway and I listened to the bedroom door open and close.
Mom waited in silence for a few minutes. My eyes closed, but I forced them open again. She was staring at the fire with an intense expression on her face. She didn’t look at me when she asked, “Could you have avoided that knife?”
Her question caught me by surprise. I took a moment to think about it. I reviewed the fight in my mind, seeing it blow by blow. There had been two of them attacking me. I turned from the man with the knife to block a punch from the other one, then the first one sliced my side. I frowned and thought it through again. I knew better than to turn my back on the one who was armed. I had trained against weapons and taught others the same tactics. My mistake was a stupid one that almost cost my life.
I didn’t know what to tell Mom. If she guessed the truth, she could force me to seek psychiatric help or make me take medication to address a supposed death wish. I refused to do either. I met her gaze and said with as much conviction as I could muster, “He was faster than me.”
She studied my expression for a minute. The firelight danced against the side of her face, highlighting her right side and leaving the left in shadow. It gave me a skewed impression of her thoughts. She nodded, but I couldn’t tell if she accepted the lie. “Good night, Kelson. Holler if you need anything.”
Aunt Lauren despised hollering. She said it was an act of laziness and rewarded anyone who did it with extra chores. I wondered if mine could wait until I was feeling better. “I will,” I told her with a weary smile.
She paused with her hand on my shoulder. “Does it hurt?”
“Nope,” I lied with another smile.
She smiled back, turned the lamp off, and left through the door. I listened to her walk to Cassidy’s room that had become her bedroom while she stayed at the Ashbys’.
As soon as her footsteps faded down the hall, I fumbled on the end table for the cell phone. The movement sent a wave of agony through my side so sharp, my breath caught in my throat. I leaned just a bit further, afraid I would tear my stitches, and touched the phone. I grabbed it with a jerk and pulled it back, unplugging the charging cable so I could lie down.
I hit Maddy’s number on the speed dial and listened to it ring. When her voice came on asking me to leave a message, I listened to it three times just to hear her voice. I couldn’t think of what to say through the fog in my brain, so I finally gave up.
I let my head fall back against the pillow and allowed one tear to squeeze through my tightly shut eyelids. My side burned as if fire ate at it from the inside. I knew I should probably take the pain meds that sat in a little cup on the end table near my head, but deep down, I felt like I deserved the pain. I gritted my teeth and re
fused to make a sound.
MONDAY CREPT BY. I was supposed to stay in bed, but I had never been able to do nothing. Thoughts about Madelyn haunted me. I missed her terribly and wished she would call. I tried her number four more times, and listened to the message over and over again just to remember the way her voice made me feel real. As soon as I was able to sit on the four-wheeler, I planned to visit her father despite his hatred for me. I needed to make sure she was all right.
Mom worked at the grocery store. She was going to take the day off, but I told her I was feeling okay and wouldn’t be doing anything besides sleeping anyway. It was nice to see how much she liked her job. She used to work in an office building where her job was to sort mail and fax papers. She hated it, but it paid the bills. Now, though, she actually smiled when she got ready, and she kissed me on the head when she went out the door. Moving to Sparrow had definitely been good for her.
In my current state, I couldn’t argue that the same applied to me, but at least I was making a difference. I shook my head at my thoughts and pushed up gingerly from the cot. I could only review my actions so many times without the mistakes I had made driving me crazy.
My vision swam for a minute and I closed my eyes against the lightheaded rush. When I opened them again, I felt somewhat more in control. I took a drink from the cup on the end table and ignored the pain pills beside it. I tried to fish a pair of pants from my clothes bag with my foot.
Someone had taken off my blood-soaked riding pants and jacket before I was stitched up. I knew they were worried about the risk of an infection, but public exposure wasn’t one of my goals. There wasn’t anyone I felt comfortable with doing such a thing, and so I decided it was better not to dwell on the fact that it had been done.
I managed to catch the drawstring on a pair of loose gray sweat pants. Bruises covered the side of my left leg where the motorcycle had fallen on it, and some mild road rash scraped along the outside. The doctor had put some sort of salve on it and it was feeling fairly pain free. I hoped the motorcycle had fared as well.
I pulled the pants on while trying to avoid leaning over. If anyone had seen me, they would have laughed hysterically as I tried to slip my foot in the hole and pull up one leg, then the other, without bending at the waist. I was grinning at my own stupidity by the time I was done.
I debated whether to put on a shirt, but the thought of trying to find one in the bag was too much. I rose and steadied myself against the mantle above the fireplace. The fire had burned to coals and the heat of it felt good against my shins. I wondered if I had a slight fever.
I kept one hand on the wall and made my way slowly toward the bathroom in the hall. Every time I put weight on my right leg, it sent pain through my side, forcing me to limp and slide my foot along as though I was a lame duck. I was glad nobody could see the Black Rider in my state; they definitely would lose all respect.
I reached the bathroom and gave a little pathetic cheer of triumph. I was far from jumping through windows, but I was making baby steps even though the voice in the back of my mind said that a baby would have made it to the bathroom faster.
I wanted to take a shower. Dr. Carrison had cleaned the blood from my side, but I felt hot and gross after spending the morning in bed. I knew I should leave the gauze and bandages on for another day at least, so I settled for wiping my skin down with a rag and told myself I felt refreshed. I then forced myself to look in the mirror.
I stared at the stranger I had become. Hollow circles surrounded my eyes. My hair stood up in more cowlicks than usual and the right side was plastered to my face. My chest was a mess. Small circular bruises still remained from the impact of the bullets. They had turned a sickly green that faded to yellow around the edges. The bullet wound Dr. Carrison had stitched along the top of my shoulder had healed to look like a centipede sat there. I couldn’t remember when he had removed the stitches.
More bruises covered my ribs and sides from the fights I had been in. I realized then why Mom had asked if I could have avoided the knife. Even as captain of the Mixed Martial Arts Club at my school in California, I had never come home with bruises like these. I debated whether I was careless or had truly let my skills slide so badly. I made a mental note to train Magnum so he could be a sparring partner. I could definitely use a refresher.
I clenched my jaw and turned around, then reluctantly looked at my back using Aunt Lauren’s small hand mirror from the counter. A diagonal row of scars showed where the beam had fallen on me in the warehouse fire. I had tried to get Zoey out, but I was trapped under the beam until the firemen came. My shirt was burned through and had to be cut away; the rest was an agonizing recovery.
A memory surfaced of Jaren under a beam in the barn. He had almost suffered a similar fate.
I wondered what Madelyn saw in me. Thoughts of her made my body ache with a different kind of pain. I longed to hold her and know that she was okay. I missed her with every fiber of my being. It felt like my heart only beat at half strength when she was gone. I wondered if she felt the same way or if she had forgotten me in the chaos that had swallowed her life. She needed stability, and I wanted to give that to her so badly. The inability I had to reach her was infuriating.
I regretted not pulling on a shirt, but refused to go back to the cot. I needed to stand in sunshine before I succumbed to cabin fever and destroyed the place. I was sure Uncle Rick would be a little concerned about such thoughts.
A tin of fresh muffins sat near the oven. I grabbed one and limped painfully toward the back door. I debated pulling on some shoes, then decided it would be more agonizing than it was worth and made my way outside.
The moment I stepped past the screen door, Jake came running up to me. The black-and-white dog sniffed my hands, my sweat pants, my bare feet, and snorted at the scent of the bandages along my side.
“Thank you,” I told him. “I’m sure that’s sanitary.” I tossed the dog a piece of muffin.
He followed me across the lawn to the wooden chair swing that sat in the shade of an ancient oak tree. I eased gingerly down onto it. Lying down, I was comfortable if I stuck one leg through the arm rest and let the other dangle so my toes touched the cool grass. I let out a breath of relief.
After a while, Jake looked up from his place curled on the grass beneath me. I opened my eyes at the sound of his dog tags jingling and found Uncle Rick watching me with an approving expression on his face.
“If I didn’t have work to do, I’d be right where you are,” he said. He pushed his hat back and wiped the sweat from his forehead with his handkerchief before shoving it back into his pocket.
“It’s quite comfortable,” I replied.
His eyes creased with humor. “Lauren and Sarah will probably kill you if they see you out here instead of restin’ inside.”
I shrugged. “I’m feeling about half dead. They could finish the job.”
An interested expression touched his gaze. “Did you take the pain meds the doc left?”
I was tempted to lie, but he only had to go inside and look to know the truth. A part of me wondered where the inclination to lie was coming from. I had too many secrets in my life. “No.”
When I didn’t expound, he nodded. “I’ve never been one to take meds either. It always seemed like the easy way out.”
That brought a small smile to my face. “Why take the easy way out?”
“Exactly,” Uncle Rick replied. He gave me a good-humored smile. “But if you need them, nobody will think less of you, especially me.”
He left me to think about that. I did for about two minutes until the warmth of the day and the loss of blood from my wound swept me away into a deep sleep.
“YOU LIVE A HARD life.”
I opened my eyes at the sound of Magnum’s voice.
He stood where his body blocked out the sun. It was setting gracefully behind the western mountains, bathing the rectangle of grass that made up the Ashbys’ backyard in autumn hues despite the fact that it was the begi
nning of summer. The young aspens that marked the edge of the yard rustled peacefully in the evening breeze. A few crickets chirruped near the railroad tie garden, but it was still a bit early for most of them to start singing.
“What time is it?” I croaked out the question, then tried to swallow. My mouth was as dry as a desert.
Magnum picked up a cup someone had left on a small fold-out television tray and handed it to me. I downed it in two big gulps.
“Want more?” he asked with one eyebrow lifted.
The water hit my empty stomach and made me feel nauseated. I shook my head. “That might have been too much.”
“You could have taken your time,” he said, rolling his eyes.
I eased up slowly and slouched against the chair so my legs hanging down wouldn’t pull against my stitches. Magnum took the seat next to me without asking. When I looked at him, I found him watching me.
“What?” I asked warily.
He grinned. “Why do you sound like I’m about to push you from this swing or something?”
I shrugged. “I can’t quite remember all the details from yesterday. I seem to think you were upset at me.”
He nodded. “I was. You were going to wuss out on catching the robbers.”
“I had a good reason.”
“Which you failed to tell me until after I got into trouble,” he replied.
I glanced at him. “Sorry about that.”
He grinned. “Hey, man, you saved my life. I can’t exactly be mad at you after that.”
“I saved your life at the fair,” I pointed out. “But you were mad at me yesterday.”
His eyebrows lowered. “How long you gonna hold that one against me?”
I laughed, then held my side when it gave a sharp jab of protest. “The fair? Another week, I think.”
A smile broke across his face. He slouched next to me and stared at the orange-and-rose-painted horizon. The mountains caught the last of the sunlight in their dark purple embrace, throwing the world around us in golden light and soft shadow.