The Stage

by Catherine Russell

  Oh my God, what the hell? Crap! It even hurt to think. My tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth, and there was something blocking my nose. The air was too… pure, and the surface beneath me was too stiff and uncomfortable to be anything other than a hospital bed. I tried to clear my throat, reaching up to my nose to push away whatever it was, but a cool hand caught mine.

  Opening my eyes was more difficult than breathing; my lids felt swollen and stiff. I quickly pulled my hand away. I didn’t know these people and I was in no position to discover a way out.

  “Is she all right?” he asked.

  “Yes, for the umpteenth time! She’s stable, no broken bones, just banged up pretty bad. The CT scan came back normal, just like I told you it would. She’s lucky she landed on top of that guy.”

  I heard footsteps pacing back and forth on a linoleum floor. From the sound of it, the man had a long stride… which meant he was at least six feet tall. The woman’s voice seemed closer to my level, so she was either sitting next to me or she was short as me.

  “Shh… she’s waking,” the woman said. “Come on, we should leave before…” Her voice drifted off, and even in my scattered state of mind it was obvious that there were words left unsaid.

  “But—”

  “No.” Her word was absolute… but then I heard the strangest thing. It sounded like a sigh, followed by the words, Is she strong enough? But I wasn’t hearing the words with my ears; they were coming from within my mind.

  WTF? Great—now I get to add crazy to my FB status! Those pain meds that didn’t feel like they were working must be potent, because now I was hallucinating.

  There was slight movement in the air; I could feel it across the hair on my arm and then… silence. Well, almost. I could clearly hear the tick-tock of the wall clock along with my raspy breathing and the frequent monitor tones and beeps that reminded me of R2-D2 from Star Wars.

  God, I hated hospitals with a passion! It all stemmed from my mother and the step-jerk. Her frequent visits to the ER taught me way more than any child should ever know about injuries. Shortly after their quickie wedding, his knight-in-shining-armor act wore off and his true colors showed through. Some of his better traits included belittling, verbal abuse mixed with an unhealthy dose of physical abuse, and let’s not forget the ever-popular and frequently overused passive-aggressive personality. He had been a major-league jackass—but he was gone now—more accurately, dead.

  That was a set of memories for a different time… Where was I? Oh yeah… a hospital. Yuck!

  Then a voice I knew very well made me smile. Ashleigh Dior—not related to the perfume empire, but still wealthy—was barking orders out in the hallway. She was my closest friend—well, actually, my only true friend. I could hear her stilettos clicking on the industrial linoleum.

  “Where is she? Don’t you know who I am? I’m the closest thing to family she’s got. Well, don’t just stand there. Fine! I’ll find her on my own.”

  I braced for the onslaught of light as I forced my eyes open. Oh, my Lord! That hurts! I had about three seconds before the diva would walk in, so I tried to push myself up into a sitting position as best I could.

  “There you are! Oh my God, Megan!” She came rushing in at full tilt, followed by a nurse, and stopped just before trying to crush me in a hug. Ash’s hands fluttered all around my body, she was trying to figure out how to hug me—which apparently wasn’t going to happen. Finally, she settled for gently patting me on the top of my head; surprisingly, it didn’t hurt. She gave my cheeks a quick air kiss.

  “Hi, Ash,” I croaked, my voice dry and raspy.

  “What the hell happened? Are you okay?”

  “Uh, nothing’s broken that I know of. I’m just sore as hell.” I winced as the nurse adjusted my IV, then watched her march out with my chart in her hands, scribbling something. “There was a gas explosion at The Q—at least, that’s what I remember.” The memories were hazy at best.

  “Well, I always said that place was a dump, just waiting to catch fire,” she mumbled, pressing my fingers with their short, broken nails into her perfectly manicured hands. I tried to reach up to clear my hair out of my eyes, but it hurt too much to raise my arms. Carefully, she tucked the loose strands behind my ear—an old habit; we’d known each other since elementary school.

  Just then someone knocked on the door.

  “Who could that be? You’re already here.” I painfully cleared my throat while trying to sip some room-temp water. It soothed the dry cracks in my mouth.

  “Haven’t a clue. Want me to send them away?” she quickly offered. I could tell her protective side was in full force. She was basically the big sister I never had.

  “No, it’s cool. Maybe it’s someone from the restaurant.”

  Before a second knock she pulled open the door, startling a mess of blond hair. Great, Chase found me.

  “Hey, Chase,” I whispered loudly, making a halfhearted attempt to straighten my hair, which I quickly gave up on. Moving caused my stomach to knot up and my head to spin.

  “Who are you?” she demanded, stepping in front of him assertively—all five foot-ten-inches perched on her trademark heels. It was at times like this that she could be very intimidating.

  “Uh… I’m just the guy she landed on in the parking lot of The Q, outside in the rain.” As he spoke, the stranger’s voices came back to me. With a look of surprise, I’m sure, I stared at him.

  “Oh my, a knight in shining armor!” she said with a smile as she grabbed his hand and shook it. “I’m Ashleigh Dior, Megan’s BFF.” She guided him to the chair next to the bed as she gently sat down next to me.

  “How’re ya feeling?” he asked, while awkwardly extending a small bouquet of flowers from behind his back.

  “Thanks, that’s sweet of you. Um, I’m fine… I think. I don’t remember much. I’m sore as all get out.” Then it dawned on me. “How did you get out?” I asked as the monitors started to beep and blip faster as I struggled to speak.

  Ash seemed just as curious to his answer. His face went blank, then he looked at me quickly and then stared at the floor. Then I realized that I didn’t have my tinted glasses on, and it was probably the first time he’d seen my true eye color—which isn’t quite normal. I have one dark blue eye and the other eye is dark green. I automatically reached for the side table, where my glasses would usually be if I were at home, but the spot was vacant and I felt a bit exposed. Right on queue, though, Ash reached into her Prada bag and pulled my extra pair out.

  “Thought you might need them,” she said as I breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Thanks,” I said, putting them on as I turned back to Chase, waiting for his answer.

  “I was coming out of the bathroom when the explosion hit,” he said while fidgeting with the zipper on his hoodie. The bathrooms in The Q were on the other side of the restaurant, away from where I was thrown out. I knew he was hiding something, but before I could say anything, Ash interrupted.

  “Speaking of explosions… since The Q is out of business now, you don’t have a choice anymore, Megan. I’m hiring you—and I won’t take no for an answer.”

  Ash was grinning triumphantly, and I didn’t have the strength to argue. “I

  surrender to the Queen,” I said, leaning my head back on the stiff, paper-covered pillow. It was useless to fight her.

  “Hire her?” Chase asked.

  “Yes, I’m opening up a brand-new, fabulous dance club up on Capitol Hill.” Her Chanel perfume seemed to waft through the sterile room in time to her words. “Next week is the grand opening, and I’ve been wanting to add Megan to my crew, but she’s been a bit stubborn.”

  “What’s the name?”

  Great. He was probably going to follow me. Well, at least I’d know someone…

  “The Stage,” she said, beaming. She loved talking about her “baby.” Since comi
ng home from New York, after her off-Broadway debut tanked, she was determined to become part of the solution to the problem by giving local artists a destination to shine in.

  “I thought you were having contractor issues?” I whispered, opening my eyes.

  “Where there’s a will, I have my way,” she said with a wink of her insanely long eyelashes.

  I glanced over at Chase and noticed that he really did seem sore, barely moving. He tried to stand up. “I guess I have you to thank for being this sore,” I tried to joke.

  “And I’d gladly do it again,” he said, flashing that cheesy grin of his—but as he smiled his eyes weirded out, changing color, from blue to green and back again.

  Okay, I’m officially loosing it. I rubbed my eyes. “I must be really messed up. Your eyes just did the weirdest thing… and speaking of weird, did either of you see two people leave my room right before you came in? I wasn’t quite awake, but I swear I heard them talking about me—and I don’t think they were doctors.”

  They both looked at me, then each other, shaking their heads—no doubt questioning my sanity. Then Ash winked at me, and then Chase. Good God, can she seriously be doing what I think she is? Actually knowing her, that was exactly what she was doing. She never gives up on hopeless cases, especially me. Her phone chimed and she looked annoyed, stepping out the door to take the call.

  “I suppose I owe you that night out now?” I said begrudgingly.

  “Well, not if you don’t want to. I won’t rub it in that I possibly saved your life.” He stood up, holding onto the bed railing, much closer than he ever had been before.

  “No guilt in that statement,” I said with a chuckle, then winced. That hurt! “Fine, I’ll go out with you. I just hope you don’t have high expectations. I’m not exactly a catch.”

  “Nope, none at all.” His small grin extended across his boyish features. “Besides, just friends.” He extended his hand.

  “Deal,” I said, and we shook on it as Ash came back in.

  She saw our hands and raised her perfect eyebrows in question. “Did I miss something?”

  “Oh no,” Chase said. “We’re just—”

  “Good. My turn. I’m sorry, cutie, but I have to run. My partner wants to meet about the opening next week. You’ve got to meet him; he’s to die for!”

  Leave it to Ash to send me from one guy to the next in a blink of an eye.

  Chapter 3

  Ashleigh drove me back to my place from the hospital. I guess technically it’s not really my place since she sublets it to me. I had been staying at her parent’s guest house after my mother died, and when she got a condo in Belltown three years ago, I decided that it was time to get a place of my own, too. Ash insisted that I stay at her old apartment until the lease was up, and frankly I couldn’t pass up the cheap rent. I wasn’t one for handouts, though, and since my minimum-wage job would cover the utilities at least, we reached a compromise. I was able to swing the full rent before the lease expired, and she extended the lease so I could continue living there with the rock-bottom rent.

  After driving through the twilight drizzle and evening traffic, we pulled up to the curb. “Thanks for the ride, Ash. I appreciate it.”

  “Did you honestly think I’d let you walk home from Harborview ER? Seriously? Are you sure you didn’t hit your head harder than you thought?”

  “Well, I don’t assume anything. You of all people know that. Besides, what does assume spell?” I winked at her as we both grinned and repeated the phrase together.

  “Assume… makes an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me’!”

  “But seriously, how’s the hand?” she asked as we walked off the elevator and headed toward the last door in the hallway while I fumbled with my keys.

  “Hurts like a son-of-a-bitch, actually.” When I first woke up in the hospital, my left hand had already been numbed and sutured with several stitches so I hadn’t noticed it. Now, however, was a different story since the lidocaine had worn off. It throbbed as I flopped into my secondhand store overstuffed side chair. Still, it felt good to be home; it gave me a sense of calm that my frayed nerves needed.

  She rifled through my cupboards to get a glass of water and handed me two pain pills from the ER doc’s prescription. “Here, take these. At least follow these instructions since you left against the doc’s orders.”

  Her voice had that hint of disappointment to it. I squashed that one. “Hey, there was no need for me to stay. I know all the closed-head injury protocol by heart… remember? Been there, done that,” I said as I chugged down the pills. My gag reflex didn’t help any. I disliked taking anything, let alone something that could make me loopy. I hated the feeling of a fuzzy brain; it left me feeling vulnerable.

  “Yes, well, that was different. You’re here, and now those visits are long gone.” Her voice trailed off just as mine would have. We both remembered my many visits with my mom to the ER. I didn’t feel like reminiscing right now, so I slammed the memory drawer shut and hoped for a change of subject. Luckily, her phone rang.

  “Be right back, darling. It’s my partner—whom you still haven’t met.” She winked as she strolled out onto my four-by-five-foot concrete balcony. It was small, but it was all mine.

  I reached into my tattered backpack and dug around for my own phone. Oddly enough, the one night I didn’t carry it on the floor with me was the one night I really needed it. Of course it was dead from having been left on since the accident. As soon as I plugged it into the docking station, the text messages began to blow up.

  There was a “KING 5 Breaking News” alert reporting the explosion, then there were at least five from Ashleigh, several numbers I didn’t recognize, plus good ol’ Chase touching base. He was such a dweeb… but in a good way.

  Then I noticed an unlisted private number, right at the bottom, which meant it had actually been the first message in the stream. I couldn’t trace it. The time stamp was only a moment before the explosion hit. The message had only two words—words that sent a chill up my spine.

  Get out!

  Why would someone I didn’t know—with a private number, no less—text me that? Who were they? How’d they get my number? I suddenly felt claustrophobic… like I was being watched. Memories of the unknown voices in the ER came back to me, adding another level of creepiness to my increasing anxiety. I needed to get out… move somewhere else.

  I jumped up and wrenched open the sliding glass door. Ash whipped around, her eyes as big as saucers. “Meg, what’s wrong?”

  I’d lost my voice so I showed her my cell screen.

  “Um… I’ll call you back,” she said and hung up, clearly seeing what the text said.

  “What’s this?” she asked as I breathed in the cool air, trying to push the closed-in feelings away.

  “I don’t know, and I don’t know who sent it, either.” She scrolled through the other texts, then she did something very uncharacteristic for her: she wrapped her arms around me, and we stood for a long moment in the slow drizzle coming down. I was too shaken to take the surprise in real time.

  “Well, whoever it is, they’re gone. They can’t hurt you. You’re here… safe. Do you hear me?” Her gentle words were enough to keep me from leaping off my cliff of panic. I closed my eyes, squashing the hopeless feelings away… and I heard that voice again.

  “Is she strong enough?”

  The question seemed to hang in the air around me, because it was only speaking in my mind. Okay, I’ve officially gone nuts, I thought with a shudder.

  “You all right?” she asked as we stepped inside.

  I did what comes naturally in this situation; I lied. “Yeah, I think so. I just want to rest.” I headed toward my bed, wishing for solace.

  “Do you want me to stay?” she asked, even though I knew her Prada purse was already slung over her silk-covered shoulder, and she was ready to leave.
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  “No, I’m fine. Really.” She gave me an air kiss as I hugged her carefully to avoid staining her blouse with tears.

  “You speed dial me for anything, you understand?”

  “Yes!” I snarled, knowing my trick would work. “Now go before you get a grey hair from worrying.”

  She gasped at the thought and winked on her way out the door.

  Silence, that’s all I want from the rest of the day, I thought as I laid down. But my rest was far from peaceful as I was tormented by the unknown text and the ER voices—and let’s not forget hearing that voice in my head. So I kept to myself for the next two days, not daring to leave my postage-stamp-sized ­apartment. My own four walls gave me comfort that no one could give me. Ash continued to call and invited me to stay with her, but I’m pretty talented at wiggling out of situations.

  The sun was actually shining on the third day and I felt like myself again. I just imagined the voices, I convinced myself. It’s just a simple head injury…

  There was a knock at the door, a sound I knew all too well. It had a ring of dweebiness; in other words, it was Chase. “Coming…” I said. I had finally—reluctantly—accepted his offer to go out for coffee, just as friends.

  He looked like a puppy with a new toy; all lit up inside, smiling that goofy grin of his. “These are for you,” he said as he swept another small bouquet of flowers from behind his back, a repeat of his gesture in the hospital.

  I did my best to be nice. “They’re very pretty, thank you.” I said as he stepped in. I searched for a vase and came up short, so I dug out a tall glass and filled it with water and the flowers.

  “You look nice,” he said.

  I did a double take, thinking I had some stain or my clothes were on inside out. Accepting compliments was a challenge for me. So I settled on a simple reply. “Thank you.” I grabbed my small purse from the bottom of my closet and swapped it out with my backpack. “Shall we?” The short sentences had awkwardness written all over them. Oh well… he’s nice. I could at least give him that. He did basically save me.