Fatal

by S. T. Hill

  It was just that the rest of me flew into the panic at the thought of being left alone in there until that cop decided to make another, more thorough pass of the floor.

  I slammed against the door, which battered against its frame. The deadbolt clicked back, and I wrenched the door open, sending a wave of air through the room that made my coat rustle on my shoulders.

  Vick was two steps down the hall, looking over his shoulder. When he saw me, he came back and I found myself held in his arms, my face pressed against the sweater he had on under his black winter coat. His heart thumped against my cheek, the beat of it strong and sure and real.

  "It's okay. I found you, see?"

  If he found me, so could Unit Four. I pushed away from him, looking down the hall.

  "Oh, don't worry about that police officer. He left looking pretty pissed. I passed him on my way in."

  "So... We can get out of here?"

  The student center felt wrong when it wasn't thrumming with classes, people filling the cafeteria clamoring in line, and the rush of bodies through the halls on their way to one appointment or another. It was like their ghosts were still there, their phantoms.

  "Yeah, we can try. I've got a truck outside... I'm sure we can use it to get you back to your dorm."

  He started to move past me, going for the doors to the stairs. My hand trailed along the smooth material of his coat until my fingers tightened around his wrist.

  There was something I had to get through to him. Something I knew I'd never be able to make him understand if we went back out into that blizzard and he drove me back to my dorm. I knew it my bones that if I let that happen, I'd never see him again. He'd complete his ceremony, become a full-fledged member of his family, and Adam would be dead.

  When he felt the resistance, he turned and looked at me.

  "What is it?" he asked.

  "The ceremony..." I said.

  "Stephanie, I told you this on the phone! Adam is a monster, and I'm going to make sure he never gets the chance to hurt anyone. Even if he hasn't hurt anyone yet. He will."

  I let his hand drop. "You don't know that."

  He threw his hands up in exasperation. "No, I don't. But in my experience... in my family's experience, I do know what he is, and what that means he's going to do eventually."

  "He hasn't done anything so far. He doesn't want to do anything like that... Vick..."

  I grabbed his hands in mine. He wasn't wearing any gloves, not that he needed them. His hands were big, and they were hot, his skin burning against mine.

  They trembled, too.

  I knew this argument. It was a familiar one. Very similar to the one the first few doctors gave to my mom. The cancer is inoperable. You're going to die. You have no say in it.

  Three months they gave her. Then six. Then we got rid of those doctors when we realized that there really was a chance with the research being done by the pharmaceutical company.

  "Vick... There's always a way. Just because you believe something is going to happen doesn't mean that it will. Adam is a man, able to make his own choices and help himself. You're taking his free will away by doing this, making that choice for him."

  He squeezed my hands almost to the point of pain, then fixed me with a stare.

  "You don't understand. Adam wants to die. I've looked into his eyes, he's told me..."

  "He doesn't know he didn't kill Jenn! See what just the thought of it's done to him? Can you honestly tell me right now that you think he won't take every precaution possible in the future to make sure there isn't even the slightest risk of him hurting a person when he changes?"

  Vick pulled away from me, then. He clasped his hands behind his head, the frustration plain on his face. I could feel the battle going on inside him.

  To do what I was asking meant disavowing his family and their traditions, going back however many generations. He wanted so badly to be a part of them. But it was obvious that he agreed with me. He just wouldn't let himself come to grips with it.

  He studied the cinderblock wall, painted white along the top half with a red band below that, followed by more white.

  "No!" he said, slapping both hands so hard against that wall that it sounded like a gunshot.

  "They're your family. I know that. But you know this is wrong, and we both know you can't kill Adam."

  He leaned against the wall, then slowly let himself sink down to the floor. He buried his face in his hands, rubbing vigorously at his cheeks and pushing against his eyes.

  "I told myself it was all right. You know what? Part of me wanted to do it just to get him out of the way..."

  I sat down beside him, putting my arm over those broad shoulders and pulling him close. The wall and the floor with hard, cold, and uncomfortable, especially after my episode in the bathroom, but I made myself sit down there with him, like I wished he'd been there with me.

  "Out of the way for what?" I said.

  "For you, Stephanie..." he looked at me then, his eyes clear and his face intense. Those eyes of his glanced down to my lips, then back up.

  A familiar, buzzing heat started inside me.

  He leaned in to kiss me, his lips parting slightly even as his eyes closed. For a bit there, I really wanted to just let it happen. But I couldn't. There was Adam, wherever Vick and his family held him, being prepared for death.

  I turned my face so that his kiss landed on my cheek. There was a little bit of stubble on his face, and it scratched at my skin for a moment before he realized what I'd done.

  "You know how I feel about Adam," I said.

  He nodded. There was defeat in his eyes. But for what? Not getting me? Disobeying his family? Obeying them?

  "I know... As soon as the snow lets up, we'll go."

  "Where?" I said, still worried that he might just drop me at my dorm and wash his hands of the whole thing.

  "We're going to go force my family to set Adam free and leave him alone."

  I pulled him close to me, letting his head rest on my shoulder. His forehead was crinkled with concern and frustration still. I kissed those wrinkles.

  "It's the right thing to do," I said.

  "Sometimes, the right thing and the best thing aren't the same..." he said.

  Chapter 41

  We spent the night in a small study lounge. It had a few tables with plain office chairs set around them, a small white projection screen against one wall (the projector itself hanging from the ceiling) and two ugly grey sofas.

  They didn't look like they were comfortable, and maybe they weren't. But compared to the cold, hard bathroom floor they were heaven.

  "You get some sleep. I'll keep checking," Vick said.

  I had my coat thrown over my legs as a blanket. The armrest had a little bit of padding, but I chose to rest my head right on the cushion itself.

  "Are you sure?" I said, fighting against my eyelids as they threatened to close out the waking world from my sight.

  "Yeah, don't worry about it. As soon as it lets up, we'll go grab my truck. In fact, I'll go check right now. Here, I won't be needing this for now."

  I protested, but Vick rolled up his winter coat and practically forced it under my head. My protests stopped when I put my head on it. My hair rustled a little against it, but it was soft, and warm from his body.

  "You need some sleep, too," I said around a yawn. My eyes shut, and I couldn't force them back open.

  I felt him brush some hair out of my face. He was kneeling beside me, I could feel.

  "I'll be fine. Shh. Go to sleep; this thing's like a wedding: they can't go through with it without me!"

  I smiled and tried to laugh, but it just came out as a contented sigh as my overworked muscles began relaxing.

  When I woke up, I didn't know what time it was. I sat up, wincing as a knot worked itself loose in my back. My mouth had dried as well. The lights were still on in this lounge, but that meant nothing.

  It was an interior room. No windows.

  Vick was gone,
too. As soon as I noticed, a cold loneliness blanketed me. I kicked my coat off my legs and got up, digging in my pocket for my cell.

  It was almost seven thirty in the morning. I'd slept almost the whole night.

  My fingers frantic, I texted Vick.

  "Where are you? Just woke up."

  My phone buzzed a few moments later. A message from him.

  "Omw now," it said.

  His coat was still rolled up in a ball on my couch. The other couch didn't look as though it had been used. Had Vick slept at all, last night?

  The door opened and I jumped involuntarily at the noise. Vick emerged bearing one of those recycled cardboard trays. It had a white doggie bag and two steaming cups.

  "Breakfast?" he said, laying the tray down on the table and pulling the chair he'd been in before out so he could sit.

  The smell of Egg McMuffins (or the cafeteria version of them, at least) and right away I found my dry mouth cured as saliva bathed my tongue and the inside of my cheeks.

  For about two minutes, the only sounds in the room were the crumple of wrappers being pulled open followed by chewing. One moment, the breakfast sandwich was in my hands. The next, it wasn't. Vick smiled from across the table, eating his more slowly. When I saw his look, I blushed. Trying to cover my embarrassment for eating like I pig, I took a gulp of the coffee. It was too hot, and I nearly spat it out.

  "Easy, there," Vick said.

  He didn't stop smiling. I tried kicking him under the table, but his legs were too far away.

  This just elicited an even bigger smile and a shake of his head as he started in on his sandwich.

  Eager to find some way to even the score, I looked at his balled coat and then back to him.

  "Whatever happened to leaving as soon as the weather lifted?" I said, eyeing his sandwich. After being practically starving for the last twenty four hours, it might just have been the most delicious thing I ever tasted.

  Vick held up one finger while he chewed. It was a slow, methodic chew. After swallowing, he wiped at his lips with a napkin and then set the rest of the sandwich back down.

  "That's the thing. It didn't let up. I checked every half hour. Storm just broke when I went down to the cafeteria to grab us some breakfast..." he looked down at the grease-stained back that had only minutes before contained my sandwich, "You're welcome, by the way."

  "Thanks. For this, and everything else..."

  Vick just smiled, nodded, and worked on the rest of his breakfast. I knew this wasn't the thanks he really wanted. That, he'd showed me last night. It was something I could never give him, and we both knew that. No matter how much either of us wanted it.

  Thinking about that put a damper on my pleasant mood. Why did he have to eat so slowly? A big guy like him you'd think would be a human vacuum, needing all those calories for all those muscles.

  It was training, probably. Chew your food slowly and surely to avoid indigestion in the heat of combat or something. Kind of like not swimming for half an hour after eating, I guess.

  Whatever it was, it made me impatient. I tapped my foot on the floor, drummed my fingers on the table, crinkled my napkin and the paper bag together into a rough ball. I even managed to finish my coffee. The caffeine really began kicking in; I could feel the remaining haze of sleep lifting from my eyes and mind.

  "Ready yet?"

  He'd just swallowed the last bite of his sandwich, and was busy cleaning his lips with the napkin. This, he folded neatly and put back on the tray. He eyed the compressed ball of greasy paper and dirty napkin I'd made.

  "Relax. Like I said last night, they can't do this without me. In fact, I have several messages and texts on my phone to that effect right now."

  "Won't they suspect something?"

  He gathered up all the trash and put it on the tray, giving my ball another disapproving look as he picked it up.

  "Maybe. Though they might just put it down to nerves. I did run away into a blizzard last night."

  We both stood up from the table. Grabbing his coat from the couch, I tossed it to him. I pulled my own back on, leaving it undone.

  "Let's go," I said.

  I knew that we didn't really have to rush. Vick sounded certain they wouldn't kill Adam without him around to do it. But that still left Adam God knew where, probably miserable and suffering.

  Vick pulled his coat on and opened the door for me, waving me through. Out in the hall, he dumped the tray full of trash into a garbage bin near the door to the stairs.

  A few of the office doors were open, and I thought I heard echoed footsteps from the stairwell. The campus was waking up. Classes would be starting soon. Out here, I could see the sunlight coming in through the windows at the end of the hall.

  The storm blew itself out, apparently.

  "Why'd you do it?" Vick said as we started down the stairs.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Why'd you come here?"

  It was a fair question. Last night, sitting in my dorm room, I'd just felt so damn powerless. It had seemed like a good idea, a good risk, at the time.

  We walked through the concourse. A few other tired-looking students lugging backpacks or messenger bags shuffled through, and the lights were on in the bookstore.

  Sunlight came in through the windows there, too. The entire world had turned white overnight, apparently. Big drifts of snow rested against the student center, coming right up to the glass. Something rumbled by outside. A snow plow, I figured.

  "I couldn't sit there and do nothing, anymore. I felt helpless. So I decided to call the cops on Eric, and I didn't want to use my cell. So I came here. It was stupid of me, I admit."

  Vick was silent for a while.

  We passed into the main lobby, walking by the bank of phones.

  "Don't beat yourself up. Look, if you hadn't come here last night and called me, we wouldn't be on the way to save Adam. So your plan worked... sort of."

  "Yeah," I said, feeling a bit better.

  It really was amazing how getting a little outside perspective on a matter could make you see it differently.

  We stepped outside. The warm sunlight streaming in through the windows had me thinking it wasn't going to be that cold out.

  I was wrong.

  I zipped my coat up as the cold air clawed at me. The snow had to be two feet deep or more. Snow plows and shovels had carved out paths through it.

  And it was so bright. I came from California, where it was sunny out most of the year, and I could hardly believe the brightness. The sun reflected off the white sheets of snow covering the ground, almost blinding me. I threw my hand up over my eyes as my pupils constricted, trying to compensate.

  "A winter wonderland," Vick said, chuckling at my discomfort.

  When I looked at him, he had a pair of reflective sunglasses on.

  "Whatever. Let's get to your truck. Lead the way."

  Vick started down the path and I followed him. The snow crunched beneath my boots. It was powdery stuff, with an awful texture to it. No good for snowmen, or snowball fights, or snow angels. Any of those fun things you might do with the cold stuff.

  The janitors and plows had also thrown down a lot of dirt on the paths they'd cleared, leaving my boots caked in brown sludge when we turned off the walkway to the student center.

  Vick led me down the way a bit, both of us stepping to the side as other students came down the path.

  We stopped at the curve of the road. On our right was a big brown residence building, across the street on our left a broad, empty field covered in pristine snow. I shielded my eyes and looked around. I hoped we got to his truck soon. The air was so dry, and the bit of wind was already making my lips start to crack.

  "Why are we stopped?" I said.

  "My truck's gone," Vick replied. He spun in a slow circle, frowning as he examined the area.

  Chapter 42

  "You had it parked here?" I said.

  Just up the sidewalk was a "No Parking" sign, its steel pole buried
about halfway up in snow, with little black arrows on both sides to tell any drivers you couldn't park anywhere along here at any time.

  "Yeah... I didn't want to waste time finding a lot. I wanted to find you right away."

  "And now you got your truck towed," I said. I wasn't going to let him blame this on me. Even though, technically, I guess it was. I got angry.

  I mean, come on! He couldn't have gone down the road to one of the visitor lots around the student center? Men could be so shortsighted, sometimes.

  I calmed myself down with the reminder that they couldn't continue the ceremony without him. We just wouldn't be getting there, wherever they had him, as soon as I'd thought.

  "What now?" I said.

  "I don't suppose you know where the impound lot is?"

  I shook my head and he sighed. He took off his glasses and squeezed at the bridge of his nose, squinted around in the brightness.

  Neither of us really knowing what to do, we went back to the student center. Foot traffic was picking up pretty steadily, now. The monotony of white snow was now broken by the variety of winter coats and boots people wore, adding splashes of color.

  I sighed, trying to ignore the scratch in my throat as my breath plumed out in front of me.

  "I'll figure something out..." Vick said.

  A maroon pickup truck with a big plow attached to the front pulled up by the side of the road, "Jim's Snow Removal," stenciled across the door in white letters.

  A guy, Jim I guessed, got out of the truck, pushing the brim of his baseball cap up. He rushed past us, muttering something about having to take the piss of his life.

  In his haste, he'd left the truck running. Its engine growled under the hood as its tailpipe spewed a constant stream of steamy white exhaust. It was a pungent smell.

  I watched as Jim speed-walked awkwardly to the front doors of the student center, his legs oddly stiff. He went inside.

  "Vick..." I said, nudging him as he rubbed his chin.

  "Yeah?"

  I nodded at the truck. He caught my drift right away.

  "We'll just borrow it," he said.

  "Get in," I said.

  I'd never stolen anything before in my life. Early in high school, it was all the rage to go into Wal-Mart, Target, places like that, or really any store at the Galleria, and shoplift. The girls all said it was an incredible rush. But I'd refused. I wanted my record, and my conscience, clean.