Fighting Hearts

by Annabeth Saryu

  Behind me, the sound of footsteps gets faster and closer.

  With no one else around, I race out into the middle of the street. If I’m attacked, there’s a better chance of being seen, rather than being dragged behind a car or building. Besides, being attacked from behind is about the worse way it could happen.

  At the center of the intersection, I turn to face whoever’s there.

  A young guy in his twenties invades the glow of the street light on the corner. He’s wearing a gray hoodie, with red basketball shorts and high top sneakers. Tall and gangly, he slows down but doesn’t stop when our eyes meet.

  “Hey,” he tries to sound casual, like he’s just passing by, except he stops at the corner and watches me. After a few seconds, he decides to cross the street and walk toward me, like he just happened to be going that way.

  “What’s your problem, babe?” He looks me up and down. “Scared?” He smiles like he’s turned on.

  “Leave me the hell alone.” My voice resonates with stilted calm as my feet snap into a fighting stance.

  He snorts in disgust before he charges at me, grabbing my throat. I pin his wrist to my chest and hyper-extend his elbow with my left hand, forcing his head toward the ground. His head and neck get treated to several knee jabs, but my footing isn’t solid and my strikes lack their usual knock out force and precision.

  When the guy gets his hand between my knee and his jaw, it’s clear that knocking him out with a blow to the head isn’t going to work. Some people can take hits to their head and stay upright. It’s my bad luck I ran into one. He’ll be bruised tomorrow, but not knocked out tonight.

  I torque his hyperextended elbow, forcing him onto his knees, then deliver a solid kick to his ribs before running like hell for a block and a half. Thank God! A familiar building looms ahead, and only when I pass it do the physical effects of my adrenaline rush catch up with me.

  “Fuck.” I bend at the waist and take big controlled breaths. My heart races and ears ring from a massive headache. The stress of fight or flight leaves me gasping for air much more than any physical exertion.

  I’ve never been in a street fight before and the experience freaks me out. Pads, rules, and referees are just fine with me. I stand there, hunched over, gasping and praying something like this never happens to me again.

  “Goddamn.” I lean up against the brick façade of the familiar building to take off my heels. My calves are cramped, my arches are killing me, and the balls of my feet are covered with heat blisters.

  I collapse onto the concrete and stroke my feet, applying pressure to cramped tendons and muscles. Sensation stirs slowly back into lower limbs and ankles until they feel ready to function again. When I finally stand up, I feel more than see the full throttle charge that knocks me over onto the sidewalk. My body turns to minimize his target, but my head hits the concrete. Hard.

  It leaves me dazed and seeing stars.

  The hoodie-clad douche has caught up with me and he’s really pissed off. I’d assumed he’d given up for the evening, but a street fight isn’t over just because someone quits. Another hard lesson learned tonight.

  He sits on top of me, swearing and cursing while he punches my face and torso. He tags my mouth and chin pretty hard, and I’m startled by the sound of my own pain-laden scream. It sends a surge of adrenaline through me, igniting my survival instincts.

  I ball my fists hard and place them over my temples while protecting my face with locked forearms staggered at the elbows. My defensive posture prevents further damage, but I can’t stay here forever. The thing is, once you’re pinned on the ground, most fighting styles are pretty useless in circumstances like these.

  “You’ve got dangerous kicks. Seductive even. But if you run into someone who knows what they’re doing, they can hurt you, Sweet Lou.” Usalv’s words come back to haunt me.

  If you can’t move, you can’t fight. And right now I can’t do either.

  This is a bad place for me to be, and I’ve got to change it up fast. I jam my knee hard into his kidney and attempt to buck him off.

  “Damn bitch.” He growls in surprise and pain, then turns sideways to control my strikes to his back.

  That’s all it takes.

  As he leans forward to give himself room to turn around, I hook my ankle around his leg and buck again. This time, he loses his balance, landing a hand on the ground beside my head. I push his elbow out while my foot stays locked around his ankle, then buck for dear life one more time.

  He lands on his back next to me with a loud thud that forces the air from his lungs.

  I scramble to stand, and a wave of nausea hits me. Thankfully, I’m still barefoot, which makes it easier for me to keep upright. I’ve got a better chance now than I do on the ground, but my vision is blurry.

  We’re both breathing heavily as he stands up and squares off in front of me. He’s not speaking anymore, which makes him even harder to follow in the darkness. There isn’t much I can do except take a defensive posture and wait for him to come at me. Trying to attack someone you can’t see only works in the movies.

  What the hell?

  A dark blur streaks into the light of the street lamp. Its powerful arm wraps itself around my attacker’s throat before dragging him back into darkness.

  “Who’s there?” I ask.

  “It’s me, Louise,” Usalv replies. “Be careful!”

  You’re kidding right? I approach the blurry images and the sound of scraping shoes on pavement being drowned out by the grunts of men fighting.

  From behind, Usalv rips my attacker off the ground. He tries to fight back, gripping Usalv’s arm, punching over and behind his own head, trying in vain to dislodge two hundred fifty pounds of well-conditioned muscle coiled around him like a giant python.

  Usalv carries him like a spasming ragdoll to the side of the brick building. Then he slams the guy, hard, into the brick wall. One. Two. Three times. All with the ease of an angry child trying to break a plastic toy.

  The toy breaks, gasping and grunting in pain as its solid pieces shatter with a painful crunching sound.

  My attacker crumples to the ground like a wet, discarded blanket. His curses are replaced by moans of pain, and then silence, as Usalv stomps him with vicious body blows where he lies curled up on the ground. Only when the writhing stops does Usalv relent.

  When it’s over, Usalv turns to find me propped up against a street lamp, watching him.

  “Are you okay, Lou?” He asks between labored breaths.

  “I…don’t know.” It’s difficult to think and speak at the same rate everything is happening around me.

  Usalv looks down at my attacker and shakes the now still body with his foot. Satisfied that he’s down for a while, Usalv rushes toward me. As he does, I take a step toward him, then stumble to my knees.

  He says something in his native language before rushing toward me.

  “Louise? Louise?” Usalv kneels down and shakes my body, bringing on a vicious wave of nausea. “Are you hurt?”

  “Yeah,” The loud ringing in my ears makes it a struggle to hear him. “I think I am.”

  “Where?” He’s panicked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Hit my head. Ha-ard.” It’s difficult to speak. “Concussion, I-I think.”

  “I’m calling 9-1-1. Just hang on.” Usalv speaks into his phone, the conversation sounds distant, his words difficult to understand. While he speaks, the stars in the sky become indistinguishable from the random ones popping into my field of vision.

  “Usalv, Usalv!” My fear elicits a wave of panic. “I need you to keep me awake. As long as you can.”

  “Yeah, sure.” He’s calm again. “Are you cold?”

  “Very.” My body rests on the bare concrete. Neither one of us has jackets, so Usalv tries turning me to the side, close to him.

  I vomit all over his shoes, my hair, and the sidewalk.

  “Oh my God,” Usalv rasps.

  “Yeah. Don’t. Don’t do that.”<
br />
  “Stay with me, sweetheart.” Usalv rubs his hands down the length of my body, trying to keep me warm. “Talk to me.”

  “When…when, the ambulance gets here, make them take me to URMC.”

  “Tell them yourself.” He strokes my face, his tender touch a drastic contrast to the concern in his eyes. The sound of the ambulance gets closer, but it’s too far for me to do what he asks.

  “I can’t. Promise me.” I grasp his hand. “Promise.”

  “I promise.”

  “How did you find me?” My words tumble out. Until he answers, I didn’t realize that I’d spoken out loud.

  “Pure luck.” He strokes my hair. “When you left, it looked like you were heading off on our jogging route. I almost passed by you, but then I heard.” He gulps. “Fighting.”

  “Oh.” Why is that disappointing? “That’s not what I mean.”

  “Well, what do you mean, Sweet Lou?”

  “Why…why, why are you here? What made you look for me?”

  “You were gone a long time.” His voice is calm and certain. How nice. “When you didn’t come home, I got worried and called your phone. It rang in your bedroom.”

  “Oh.” The disappointment lingers. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, sweetheart.”

  “Do you remember what I said?”

  “When?” he asks.

  “In my room. I think.”

  He smiles a little sadly. “I remember.”

  “Good. I didn’t mean it when I said I didn’t mean it.” This is super important to me. “Please don’t forget.”

  “I won’t,” he promises.

  “Not ever,” I insist, feeling more agitated.

  “Not for the rest of my life.” He takes a deep breath. “I swear.”

  “Good.” Then my rush of words ceases and my world fades to black.

  30

  “Usalv?”

  I stop pacing across the back of the ICU visitor’s room. When others are here I sit quietly, but when the room is empty, I march like a sentry on duty.

  “Macy? How is she?” I fold my arms.

  “Still unconscious, but she’s stable.” Macy’s expression is puzzled. “Hasn’t anyone come to speak with you yet?”

  “No.” I don’t hide my irritation. “Someone from the ER let me know they were moving her up here. Then they told me they’d let me know when she was settled.”

  Macy glances at her smart watch. “We’re in the middle of shift change. I heard she was here just before the start of my shift. Come on.” She steers me by the elbow. “She’s settled in. I just saw her.”

  “Thanks, Macy.”

  “Sure.” She opens the door and we exit the patient waiting area.

  It’s pin-drop silent in here as we approach a cluster of desks where several men and women in sky blue scrubs congregate. A few make eye contact with Macy as we pass and nod wordlessly at her.

  “This way,” she whispers as we turn left down another corridor. As Macy slows in front of a door, the sound of medical equipment humming and buzzing becomes audible. She stops in front of the entrance and takes a deep breath.

  “Macy?” When I look down at her face, she wipes a tear away quickly.

  “This is might be a little…shocking for you.” Her voice is crisp. “Hell, it was for me, and this is my day job.”

  “Take your time.” I wrap an arm around her shoulders and hold my breath while she chokes back sobs. “And we’ll both get through this.”

  Macy takes a minute to collect herself, then goes rigid before speaking. “We will. And so will Lou.” She pauses again. “Her face is banged up. The right eye is swollen, and her mouth is bruised along the lower jaw. The bottom lip is split.”

  “From where he punched her?” My jaw clenches.

  “Mmm. They’ll probably have a facial plastic surgeon look at her, just to be safe.” Macy attempts to reassure me, “This is her department, you know. They’ll take good care of her.”

  “How is that son of a bitch?” Funny, I can’t remember his face, but the thought of him haunts me like a monster from a bad nightmare.

  “From what I hear, he’s messed up. Broken ribs, nose, cheek. Dislocated shoulder. Fractured tibia. He won’t be attacking anyone for a while.”

  “Well that’s good news, at least.”

  She grunts with contempt. “On behalf of women everywhere, thank you.” Then Macy wraps her arms around my waist and squeezes me. “And thank you for saving my friend.”

  “It was an act of selfish desperation.” I feel tears well up in my eyes. “I can’t imagine my world without her.”

  “Yeah.” Her voice wavers. “Ready?”

  Fear and anticipation churn in my stomach like a bad booze combination. “Yeah.”

  “Okay then. Here we go.” Macy slides a large glass door open and we enter a narrow, dimly lit room with a single patient bed.

  It freaks me out that the only thing I recognize about her is that curly caramel hair. It’s pulled away from her face with a fabric headband. My Sweet Lou sits up at an angle in her hospital bed. The purple swollen flesh around her mouth distorts the once delicate line of her jaw. Her round amber eyes are shut tight, and there’s something troubled about them. She doesn’t look like she’s sleeping, but the fact that she’s so still scares me.

  I study the tubes coming in and out of her body and listen to the beeps and whirrs of the machines attached to her.

  “Can you tell me anything?” My eyes never leave Sweet Lou’s face.

  “I’ll go find her ICU nurse. They can walk you through this.”

  “I’d rather hear it from you. Whatever you can tell me.”

  “She’s not an ER patient anymore.” The sound of her footsteps comes closer as she re-enters the room. “I can only tell you what I know from when she was there. Things might have changed. You must speak with the care team here.”

  “I promise. But it’s been one hell of a long night and I’d appreciate hearing something from someone.”

  “The ER sent her for an MRI. There’s no skull fracture, or bleeding in the brain. That’s really good news. She has a moderate head injury.”

  “What is that? Like a concussion?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ve had a concussion before. A few of them. But I’ve never passed out from one. Well, not for more than a few seconds anyway.” I swallow hard. “Why is she still out cold?”

  “Everybody’s different,” Macy explains. “And while she hasn’t woken up, she has displayed elevated responses to stimuli. They’re just not consistent. They’ll monitor those responses here in ICU to make sure they keep improving until she wakes up.”

  “When will that be?” I ask, knowing she probably can’t answer.

  Macy shakes her head. “No one knows. If you want a best guess, you should talk to the ICU medical staff. A nurse I know here said that Dr. Cooper was attending today. She’s top notch. Try and be here when she makes her rounds.”

  “When is that?”

  “I don’t know. This isn’t my department. I’ll ask Louise’s nurse to come down and speak with you on my way out.” Macy glances at her watch. “I should go. My shift started and a friend is covering for me. Be sure to ask about Dr. Cooper’s schedule.”

  “Can I talk to her?” I blurt before Macy leaves. “Can she hear me?”

  “It’s very likely.” Macy pauses next to me and looks down at Louise. “In the ER, she opened her eyes when our doctor said her name. But so far, only once. Louise also asked one of the ICU nurses treating her if she was there for change-of-shift report. When the nurse said no, that Louise was an ICU patient, she passed out again.”

  “And that’s good?” These stories scare the hell out of me.

  “Yes. It means she’s responding to external stimuli. On some level, she can probably hear you. Although I wouldn’t be shocked if she doesn’t remember your conversation, or if any response she gives is nonsensical. But talk to her. Reassure her. Ask her
to wake up. It’s the best non-medical thing you can do for her right now.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I reply. “And thanks, Macy. For everything.”

  “Right back at you, Usalv.”

  Macy pauses at the door and our eyes meet. Whatever bullshit we held against each other before this melts away in those few moments. She gives me a quick nod, then hurries down the corridor.

  31

  Oww. That…hurt.

  What’s her name again?

  She’s new and I’ve only worked with her a few times.

  Damn.

  Why can’t I remember her name?

  I’m usually good with names, especially at work.

  Oww! My eyes fly open.

  “Hey, rookie, watch the line would you please?” The sound of my own voice startles me. Not because I didn’t intend to speak, but because I haven’t heard it. Not in a very long time.

  “Louise?” What’s-her-name stops what she’s doing and turns toward me.

  “Your pen is catching on my IV line,” I complain. “You’re yanking on the needle every time you move.”

  “Sorry,” she mutters and dislodges her pen from my line. “Can you keep your eyes open while you speak? Can you stay awake?”

  “My eyes?” Why are they shut? I concentrate, hard, and open them. “Why is it so bright in here?”

  “Let me dim the lights,” what’s-her-name tells me. “Is that better?” she asks after a minute.

  “Ye-es.” My eyes open slowly, and I look around. I’m at the hospital, in my department, but I’m not working. “Why am I lying down? What’s happened?”

  “Take it easy, Louise. You’re in the ICU. You’ve had a concussion and you’re just coming out of it.”

  “A concussion?”

  “Yes, do you remember what happened?”

  “No.” Of this I’m certain. “Not a thing.”

  “That’s okay, Louise. It’s normal.” She consoles me with a gentle pat to my arm. The arm with the IV in it. “I’m going get your stats really quick and let one of the docs know you’re up.”