Hank finished replacing his items into the backpack and setting the scene. He wiped down the items he had touched to remove any fingerprints, then pressed them into Carl’s hands so that they would not be mysteriously devoid of any fingerprints at all. He made sure the placement of Carl’s unconscious body, the paper, the spilled bottle of Jack Daniel’s, and the cigarette all made sense relative to the mechanism of the disaster. He poked his head out the front door to make sure that there was no visible or audible indication of an approaching car on the farm-to-market road running in front of the two properties. He then used his own lighter to light the paper on fire, replaced the lighter in his pocket, and got the hell out of there.
Within two minutes, he was a half mile away, cruising down the ditch on his way back to the gravel pit. Once safely away from the scene, he stopped and looked back over his shoulder. There was a satisfying black plume of smoke rising from Carl’s trailer house, so he resumed his drive to the pit. Fortunately, he passed no vehicles on the way back to his truck, which was still the only vehicle present at the makeshift ATV park. He loaded up the four-wheeler and returned home, where he changed back into his scrubs and hospital clogs, jumped into his Mustang, and headed for the Sprint store to get himself the newest version of the iPhone.
*****
When Hank ended his story with the detail about his replacement phone, I sat for a minute and waited for the details that I felt he still owed me.
“Well?” I finally said.
“Well, what?” he asked, with a confused look on his face.
“Well, you know, did the motherfucker burn? He is dead, right?”
“Oh, yeah. Of course! Dude, did I ever mention that I’m a fucking Recon Marine? You don’t think there was any chance I was going to fuck up such a simple mission, do you? Jesus, man, what do you take me for?” he berated me.
“Well, I guess I take you for an Angel of Death. Hopefully, a retired Angel of Death. I understand why you did what you did, but I hope you understand that you can’t let yourself get pulled into something like this again. We still have our pact regarding taking care of our own kids, but I need you to understand that there are limitless victims out there in need of a hero and you can’t save all of them. You’ll eventually be the victim of some unforeseen circumstance and you will get busted. Remember how we both decided that life in prison, if need be, was a price we were willing to pay to protect our daughters. Neither of us can justify taking those kinds of risks for someone who isn’t flesh and blood, right?”
“I’m not so sure anymore, dude. All I can tell you is that nothing I’ve ever done has been more satisfying to me than ridding the world of those two pieces of shit,” he replied. “Nothing has even come close. Talk about a fucking rush, man!”
That was the moment that I knew I had a big problem and had no idea what the hell I was going to do about it. If I was reading the cards right, Hank would find another villain to vanquish, and I would be, at a minimum, complicit with his vigilante activities. I had become seriously concerned, for myself as well as for Hank. However, had I truly been able to detect the monster that was growing inside of my best friend, I would have been terrified. Before long, I would have known that my bosom buddy would suddenly and irrevocable transform into my worst enemy.
Section Ten:
A Good Man Dies
Chapter 46
“Look at that piece of shit, Hank said, as we pulled up to the liquor store.
“Who?” I asked.
Hank and I had been sent to pick up some margarita mix and another bottle of tequila by Mandy and Jodi, who were back at Hank’s place preparing all of the fixin’s for the fajitas we’d be having for dinner. I’m not much of a margarita man, but I was trying to go along with the group and help sustain the Tex-Mex theme of our meal.
“The owner—the guy at the register,” he answered. “That creepy, greasy, bald-ass motherfucker right there,” he said, as he pointed a finger at the apparent proprietor of the establishment.
I followed his gaze and checked out the dude standing behind the counter, which was stacked with merchandise meant to tempt anyone preparing to check out into dropping a few additional bucks on some impulse purchases. Well, I’ve got my twelve pack of Bud Light and my fifth of Wild Turkey, I guess I’ll check out. Well, wait a second, check out this shiny, gold finish, blow torch cigarette lighter and this neon green multi-device charger. Oh, and I’ve looked all over for a switchblade style buck knife like that one in this display. Hell, I can’t afford not to by this cool shit!
The counter itself was made of a piece of thick of clear plexi-glass which looked down into a large glass case containing assorted lottery tickets, novelty liquor bottles, beer salt, gum, and, of course, bottles full of magical liquid which promised to cure hangovers.
“Did he rip you off before, or what?” I asked, wondering what made this particular liquor store owner a ‘piece of shit’ in Hank’s eyes.
“No, he didn’t rip me off! He abuses his daughter!” He spat out his reply as if the words themselves were foul tasting.
“Oh shit,” I said. “How do you know? Did he smack her right in front of you, or what?”
As Hank began to tell me his story, I could see the middle aged, balding store owner with a bushy black mustache keeping his eyes on us through the glass door, screened only by the printed hours of operation of the store and a black, plastic sign stating ‘Come in, we’re open.’ He was probably wondering if we were there to load up on booze or rob him at gunpoint. I was sure that he was generally always aware of any suspicious behavior outside his shop that might indicate that he was about to be ripped off, and that he typically maintained a position behind his counter that would facilitate access to a weapon that he had stashed within arm’s reach.
“So, we had an eight-year-old, mentally retarded girl named Suzie come in through the Emergency Department last week with severe vulvar and vaginal lacerations,” Hank began. She’s a Lebanese girl, so her name isn’t really Suzie. It’s something like Sujatharin, or Sujathoriza. Anyway, she goes by Suzie. She was super sweet and pretty much broke everyone’s heart. Supposedly, she’d been outside playing in their yard and had fallen backwards onto an impulse lawn sprinkler. She had been wearing a thin, cotton dress at the time, so there was little protection. When she got to the ER, pretty much all of the fabric of the dress below her waist was soaked with blood.”
He went on to tell me about the poor little girl who had been seen in the ER, and then by the on-call gynecologist. Because the injuries, if treated non-surgically, would be potentially disfiguring and because the lacerations were actively bleeding, she was taken directly to the operating room. As the anesthesiologist on call, it was Hank’s responsibility to provide the anesthetic, so he had first-hand knowledge of the case.
As per usual, Hank was responsible for obtaining a medical history prior to administering any anesthetic agents. Because of Suzie’s age and her mental disability, he had to obtain this information from her mother, a timid woman wearing Middle Eastern attire with limited English-speaking skills. The father, according to Hank, seemed upset, and was obviously concerned about his daughter, but was reluctant to provide much assistance despite the fact that his English was much better than that of his wife. He seemed extremely uncomfortable with the part of the discussion that specifically involved references to Suzie’s genital injuries. Hank and others in the surgical department team struggled to get the information they needed, but just chalked the experience up to cultural differences and the language barrier.
It wasn’t until the surgical crew began wheeling Suzie back to the operating room, that Hank and his colleagues began wondering whether or not they should take the family’s story at face value. As Hank and the circulating nurse were pushing her gurney down the long corridor leading to the surgery suite, they tried to comfort the sweet girl, who was continually crying and moaning. Hank was talking in a soothing tone to her and telling her that she was going to feel bett
er soon. He struggled with the knowledge that he had little ability to comfort her due to her cognitive limitations, and he wanted to hurry and get her to sleep so at least her suffering would be abated, at least temporarily. In order to facilitate the initiation of anesthesia, he administered a small dose of Versed—a potent injectable benzodiazepine medication which typically relaxes and partially sedates a patient receiving it. It is also, however, known to induce a dissociative state, during which many patients will begin speaking in a disinhibited way, sometimes revealing information they would typically keep hidden.
It was at this point that Suzie began saying things that were extremely disturbing to the surgery crew.
“Daddy hut me!” she cried out. “Daddy bad, hut Suthie!”
As she cried out, she seemed to be becoming detached and unaware of her surroundings. The surgical crew had all witnessed similar reactions on countless patients. Some seemed to hallucinate and speak to people who were not present. Others became eroticized and often made suggestive remarks to the O.R. staff. On this particular day, Hank and the circulating nurse perceived that she was staring right through them as she relived the traumatic events which had led to her injuries. She began to thrash about and scream as they hurried to get her to O.R. table, where they could begin the process of inducing relaxation, and eventually sleep, with the injectable and gaseous agents available there.
“No Daddy! Stay away Daddy. You dote hut Suthie!” she yelled over and over.
Although it seemed to take forever, they were finally able to get her into the O.R. suite, onto the table, and ‘gassed down’ with an inhalation anesthetic utilizing a mixture of nitrous oxide (laughing gas) and oxygen, followed by Sevoflurane, a newer generation agent that is particularly safe for pediatric patients and readily reversible. As Suzie breathed in the potent mixture of sleep- inducing gasses, she quickly became less agitated, allowing Hank and his crew to relax their restraining embraces and take a few seconds to try to shake off their own agitation.
Of course, their work was just beginning. After the poor girl was fully unconscious, Hank administered the paralytic drug that would enable him to pass the tip of the endotracheal tube between her vocal cords and down into her trachea, as well as cause her skeletal muscles to go limp. The paralysis of her skeletal muscles would facilitate positioning her with her hips flexed in order to provide access to her mutilated vulva, so the gynecologic surgeon could do his best to repair the damage.
Once she had been ‘prepped and draped’ for surgery, Hank left his post at the head of the bed to join Dr. Johnson, the GYN surgeon, at the operative site. Because Suzie had been so agitated in the ER, and since there had been a tremendous amount of blood and clotting covering her wounds, it was just at this point that they were able to completely survey the full extent of her injuries.
“Holy shit,” Dr. Johnson said. “We may need to get a urologist in here as well. We’re looking at three lacerations. One starts to the right of the urethral meatus and tears through into the vagina proper and up the right vaginal wall. Another starts to the left here,” as he pointed out the course of the laceration, “and then comes behind the urethra and up the left vaginal wall. I’m not sure how far it goes, because her introitus is small and it’s hard to visualize. The problem is that it may involve the urethra and I’d need a urologist to fix that in order to minimize the chances of her forming a fistula between the urethra and the vagina. We don’t want her peeing out of her vagina for the rest of her life. The other laceration starts just behind the vagina and extends up the posterior vaginal wall. Because she is so small, I’m going to have to open up the perineum and explore the rectovaginal space in order to see how close the damage comes to the rectum.”
“Is she going to be okay?” the circulating nurse, Darla, asked. “That seems like a lot of problems.”
“I think I can repair it completely,” Dr. Johnson said. “Like I said though, we may need a urologist. Who’s on call, anyway?”
“Dr. May. I already checked,” Hank said. “Should Darla give him a call?”
“Not yet, let’s see just what we’ve got here,” Dr. Johnson replied. “What I don’t understand is how a sprinkler caused all this damage. This is, pardon my French, fucked up pretty badly. It looks to me like a baby came out of her vagina and she had extensive obstetric lacerations. I suppose the opposite could be true as well. It could be that something large was forcefully introduced into the vagina, which caused stretching of the adjacent tissues leading to these lacerations. I suppose a sprinkler head could have caused these injuries, but it’s a low probability mechanism of injury, in my opinion.”
“So, you think someone shoved something large up her vagina?” Hank asked. “You think that’s what caused this mess?”
“Not sure,” the gynecologist said in reply. “Let’s just get to work on this. She’s still bleeding, for Christ’s sake. I’m no forensic specialist, I’ll readily admit. It just seems a bit fishy to say the least!”
“Would you think it was fishier if you knew that she was saying things like, ‘No Daddy! Daddy don’t hurt Suzie! or Daddy, stay away!’ while we were starting to initiate her anesthetic,” Hank inquired.
“What do you mean?” Dr. Johnson asked.
“Well doc, that’s what she was saying after I gave her some Versed while we were bringing her into the O.R.,” Hank said. “Don’t you think that’s a little bit suspicious?”
“More than a little!” the surgeon replied. “Seriously though, let me get my head in the game. I’ve got my work cut out for me here. I would like to talk to you more about this later, Hank. Let’s get together and review this in the morning. For now, though, I don’t want to be thinking about some son of a bitch who might have willingly done such a thing to this poor little girl. I need to focus on the task at hand.”
“Enough said, doc,” Hank replied, “Let’s get this taken care of and we’ll figure out if and when we’ll report what she said to the authorities. Just understand, though, if her family is involved in some kind of abuse, they will be going down for this.”
“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Dr. Johnson concluded.
Chapter 47
Suzie made it through the surgery fine. Thank God that the human vagina is built to take a beating, which it certainly does on many occasions throughout a woman’s life.
But Hank and the O.R. crew were not able to bounce back as quickly as poor little Suzie. They all agreed that Suzie’s statements under partial anesthesia indicated that her injury was not the result of a backyard accident. They were all convinced that her ‘Daddy’ was the culprit and that she was the victim of a sick and twisted assault on her genitals, perpetrated by her own father. They all remembered, for instance, how uncomfortable he had seemed as they prepared to take her from the E.R. exam room to the Surgical Department. They also agreed that her injuries had indicated that someone had purposefully assaulted her by violently forcing something into her vagina.
As Suzie recovered in the pediatric wing of the hospital, Hank, Dr. Johnson, and the O.R. crew who participated in her surgery, met with the hospital Social Work staff, who coordinated with Child Protective Services. An official inquiry was made into the incident, but the results of the investigation had not been made known to Hank or any of his colleagues by the time that Hank relayed the story to me. It had been less than a month since the injury had occurred, so the proverbial jury was still out.
Hank was left to come to his own conclusions regarding the matter. That was why he and I, weeks later, ended up observing Suzie’s father through the front window of his liquor store. More specifically, that was the reason that Hank was pointing out to me that the guy behind the counter at the store was a ‘piece of shit.’
“That motherfucker has to pay for what he did!” Hank exclaimed. The intensity with which he hated Suzie’s father was evidenced by the way the veins bulged from the sides of his neck. “CPS isn’t doing shit! They’re just another bureaucratic governme
nt agency more interested in making posters and putting up billboards about child abuse than they are in actually intervening on behalf of children. It’s up to us, the citizens, to deal with child molesters and neglectful, drugged out parents!”
“Spoken like a total vigilante anarchist, which I’m starting to believe you’ve become, dude,” I said. “Listen to yourself. You are saying that it’s up to regular citizens to, what? Investigate families? Pass judgement on people who’ve been accused of hurting or neglecting their kids? Fucking lynch all the ‘bad’ parents? You’re going over the edge, here. I know what happened to that poor girl was awful, but you don’t know what caused her injuries.”
“The fuck I don’t!” Hank broke in. “Johnson said he didn’t see how a sprinkler could have done that to her, man. Also, Suzie basically pointed the finger right at her father, with all of the ‘No, Daddy’ talk. How else can you explain that?”
“First off,” I replied, “you don’t know what she was reliving in her mind as she was saying all of that. She could have been talking about any of a number of traumatic experiences. Secondly, Johnson doesn’t know dick—no pun intended—about what type of object would or could cause labial lacerations. Trust me, I have been doing gynecology for a lot longer than him and the honest truth is that I am great at fixing obstetric injuries like third and fourth degree lacerations, but I have no expertise in what to look for to determine what type of object or how, exactly, it was used in a sexual abuse setting. There are people who are specifically trained in forensic gynecology and this is the kind of situation that warrants the existence of such a field. My bet is that CPS is working on getting Suzie examined by one of those guys. It’s not as if the city of Paris is going to have trained forensic gynecology experts on hand. They’re going to have to get her to Dallas or Houston. You know what that means. It means that if Suzie’s family is not seeking this kind of care for her—and why would they if they aren’t doubting how she was injured—it’s going to take a hearing and a court order to get her there. And that shit takes time. Besides, no one even knows the results of the CPS inquiry. They may have found no basis for suspecting abuse.”
Fatal Flaws Page 29