by Kay Hadashi
“Uh oh.”
Chapter Sixteen
Maile looked at two stories of scaffolding that had been constructed against the back wall of the building. Simple platforms allowed painters to walk back and forth, making repairs and preparing to spray-paint the wall. All the dumpsters had been pulled away, and the ground was wet where the wall and asphalt had been pressure washed. One man was filling cracks with plaster to repair the stucco, while another pounded nails into something.
Her eyes naturally went to where she had hidden the box that was wrapped in the scarf. The rain gutter and downspout had been pulled off the building. The niche where she’d put the box was hollow.
“No no no…”
A workman walked past her carrying a bucket of paint. “Look, lady. If you’re gonna watch, you gotta stay outta the way, got it?”
“Sure, but what’s going on?”
“Duh! We’re getting ready to paint the place.”
“Yeah, but what happened to…everything? The downspouts and all that?”
He jammed his thumb over his shoulder. “In the construction waste dumpster. Whole building’s gettin’ a facelift. Why, you collect downspouts?”
He laughed at his own joke, but Maile wasn’t humored. “I had…there was something…you guys got rid of everything?”
“Downspouts, bent flashing, dead rats, all gone in that big dumpster.”
She looked at the giant construction waste bin, with bent metal and old lumber sticking out of it. “Something of mine might be in there. Okay if I look?”
The guy shrugged. “Help yourself. If you want to climb in there and look for a memento, fine by me.”
Maile wasn’t sure of dumpster-diving protocol, but she went to the bin, set her bag aside, kicked off her clogs, and climbed to the top. Wearing a skirt that day wasn’t helping with modesty. There was a lot more inside than she figured, with layers of cardboard packaging, pipes, broken sheets of plasterboard, and empty drums of paint. Looking straight down at where her feet would land was something that looked suspiciously like a dead rat.
Going to another place that looked cleaner, she pushed a few things around to make a space to drop in safely. Starting at one end of the bin, she pushed things aside that were small enough to maneuver, and lifted other things out of the way. If there was one dead rat in there, there was also a live one keeping a step or two ahead of her as she proceeded.
It got easier to throw stuff out of the bin than to move it around. Clearing away the last of the old cardboard, she stood up straight to stretch her back. That’s when she noticed she was being watched.
“Anything we can help you find?” one of the workmen asked. He was there along with his buddies, watching over the top edge at what she was doing.
“If it’s in here, I’ll find it.” Maile threw another box out. They were still watching. “Don’t you guys have something better to do?”
“Not really.”
“Not every day we get to watch a nice lady go through our dumpster.”
“You’re sure we can’t come in there and help you look for something?”
Maile mostly ignored their catcalls and remarks. It wasn’t until she got to the drying pool of paint at the end that she found her box. The scarf was still wrapped around it, partly soaked with the paint. Holding that away from her body, she pulled the mess off to find the box was still in one piece. She wiped it down with a sheet of newspaper.
“All that work just for that thing?” one of the men asked.
Keeping the box under her arm, Maile climbed up to the edge of the bin and hopped down to the ground.
“What is it, anyway?”
“Yeah, why’s that thing so important to you?”
She didn’t have an answer prepared as she put on her clogs and put the box in her bag. “Something I got from someone.”
“Someone who?” one asked, laughing.
“My boyfriend,” she said, throwing junk back into the dumpster.
That brought even more laughter. “If you were my girlfriend, I give you something nicer than some old box!”
“Yeah, what’s inside, anyway?”
Maile nudged through the circle of men around her, ready to leave with her prize. “Something I cut off of him when he laughed at me one time too many.”
“Oh! So bad!”
The laughter ended as the men went back to work and Maile went back to the transit center. As she waited for the next bus to town, she knew she’d picked up a smell from inside the dumpster. Using a hanky that she got wet at a drinking fountain, she wiped down her arms and legs, trying to freshen up while she waited. She gave up on the pointless task when he bus came through.
Now a few days after stealing it off the yacht, the crime didn’t seem so bad, and she convinced herself she had done the right thing, as long as she handed it over to Detective Ota. She also knew she wasn’t cut out for a life of crime, that she’d been suffering indigestion all week from worrying over the box. Now, at long last, she was minutes away from handing it over to someone else to worry about.
As she rode along, she looked at the box more carefully. She hadn’t seen it in the light, at least not close up. It was just as she remembered it, with a seam all the way around and a small opening for a key, and hidden hinges. It had only the one logo etched on it, with a single word as a brand name, in swirly writing. She used her damp hanky to rub at the surface, but couldn’t quite make out the name. Mostly it just looked like an old-fashioned coat of arms rather than a modern corporate logo.
“Looks European, but maybe I’m thinking that because of Swenberg.”
Taking a bobby pin from her hair, she tried picking the lock. She worked at it for several minutes, bending the pin into different shapes and angles, but nothing worked. She decided to leave the lock picking to the police department.
Now that she was getting closer to town, more passengers were getting on than off. At one point, a woman boarded without paying the fare, which caused a ruckus with the driver. Maile knew enough about riding buses that once a fight started, it was impossible to get off fast enough to avoid being in the middle of it. As much fun as shouting matches were for a busybody to watch, athletic pushing and shoving was another matter. She tucked the box at the bottom of her bag and watched with interest as combatants hurled insults at the front of the bus.
The passenger was either homeless or having a bad hygiene week, and that might’ve been why the driver wasn’t letting her on. Then another passenger got involved, complaining the ruckus was delaying the bus. When it looked close to getting physical between them, Maile went to the back exit door. She yanked on the call cord several times to get the driver’s attention to let her out. From where she was, she could catch another bus into town. The driver ignored her tugs at the call cord, instead pulling away from the curb.
“Same thing every day with you,” he said, telling the woman to take a seat. “Gotta get to your job in town. One of these days, you’re gonna have to pay your fare, understand?”
Maybe the driver didn’t notice, but Maile did when he drove straight through an intersection, still griping at the homeless woman. The traffic signal was red long before they got to it, and when she heard squealing tires on asphalt, she braced. Looking straight out the exit door, she couldn’t brace enough for what was bound to hit only feet away.
She barely got her arms up as she flew across the bus, bouncing off seats and other passengers, before slamming into the windows on the opposite side from where the cement truck hit. That wasn’t the end. When the bus bounced, it tilted a little too much and went over on its side. Windows broke, glass flew, people screamed, and bodies landed on top of Maile.
When she finally came to, a firefighter was lifting someone off her. Maile could barely remember what happened, only that her back and head hurt. She tried blinking away the clouds and confusion as another firefighter and a cop swept glass from her body.
“You okay?” someone asked.
“I don
’t know.”
Someone touched her face and lifted her eyelids. Maile swatted the hand away.
“What’s your name?”
“Maile.”
“Maile, do you know what happened?”
She tried pushing up to a sitting position, wincing from the pain. “Got hit by a truck. Is everybody okay?”
“Let’s just worry about you. What hurts?”
“Kinda everything. I told you I just got hit by a truck.”
Someone laughed.
“It’s not funny. It’s my box. What’s so funny about that?”
“A box?” the firefighter asked. He immediately called for a paramedic and a rescue backboard.
It turned into a struggle, but they got her calmed down enough to get strapped on and ride the simple board out of the damaged bus. As soon as she was on the ground a safe distance away, a team went to work on her, starting an IV, putting on vital sign monitoring equipment, and checking over her body.
“I’ll ask you again. What hurts the most?”
Maile reached up with her good hand to rub her head. “My head. Back’s kinda out of whack, also.”
That got her a rigid neck collar and more straps across her body. Ten minutes later, she was lifted onto a stretcher for the trip to the hospital.
“I don’t need to go to the hospital.”
“Maile, you need to go to the hospital and get checked out,” the cop told her.
“Which one?”
“Honolulu Med.”
“No! Not that one!”
“Maile, it’s okay,” a friendly voice said.
She was able to pivot her eyes just enough to see who was speaking to her. “Brock?”
There was a gentle touch at her arm. “Yeah, I’ve been here the whole time. But you need to go to the hospital.”
“What happened?”
“You don’t remember? There was a bus accident about an hour ago.”
“I don’t remember what happened five minutes ago.” She felt the small wheels of her stretcher get pushed over pavement, and listened to people talk about her. There was something about the bus that was bothering her more than the headache that had started. “Wait. Where’s Brock?”
“Right here, Maile.”
“There’s…something…I don’t know.” Maile wanted to rub her head to get rid of the cobwebs that were plaguing her mind. “I had something.”
“The bus is a mess right now. We’ll collect all the personal possessions and get them back to their owners soon enough.”
Maile felt her stretcher get lifted and set in the back of a waiting ambulance. It was a female paramedic that was crouched next to her, checking straps again.
“Is everybody okay?”
“Everybody is fine, Hon. Just tell me your name for the paperwork, okay?”
“Hokuhoku’ikalani Spencer.”
“That’s a mouthful. You got a nickname I can call you?”
“Maile. That’s what Brock calls me.”
The ambulance siren came on and there was the movement and vibration of travel.
“Who’s Brock, Hon?”
A wave of pain hit her head. “Not sure.”
“I think that tall cop back there was named Brock. You know him from someplace?”
Nothing was making sense. To Maile, the conversation was like the game psychiatrists play with patients, the ‘what’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say this’ game. “Chop suey.”
The paramedic stopped writing. “You’re hungry?”
“No. He’s chop suey. I mean, Brock eats chop suey.”
“Just goes to show you everybody eats something.”
“You don’t understand,” Maile whined.
“I usually don’t. Maybe you should just rest a little. We’ll be at the hospital pretty soon.”
“Which hospital?”
“Honolulu Med. He just told you that.”
“Who did?”
“Your boyfriend, Brock.”
“Brock’s my boyfriend?”
“I don’t know. You’re the one eating chop suey with him.”
“We had chop suey?” Maile asked, wondering what was going on.
The paramedic set aside her clipboard and looked in Maile’s eyes with a penlight. “Look, you need to relax and quit worrying about chop suey, or whatever. As soon as you’re in the emergency room, those folks are going to take really good care of you. Who knows? Maybe Brock will come for a visit? I wouldn’t mind him dropping by my place, that’s for sure.”
Everything was a haze while Maile was wheeled into the hospital and transferred to an exam stretcher. She vaguely heard somebody report off on someone’s injuries and vital signs as several pairs of hands began touching her. Once an arm was free, she tried swatting the hands away from her. “Knock it off. Leave me alone.”
“It’s okay. You’re in the hospital now.”
“Where’s Brock?”
“Oh, yeah,” a woman said. “She has a thing for having chop suey with a cop named Brock.”
“I want a skull set and a full spine series of X-rays done…” was the last thing Maile heard before dozing off.
***
When she woke, she wished she hadn’t. Every part of her body ached and she wasn’t sure why. She was in a bed, and after a quick scan around her, she was in a hospital room. Slowly, things started coming back to her: the ride in the ambulance, getting pulled from the damaged bus, and the front end of a truck coming in through the door next to her. That’s when she flinched, her arms jerking.
“Hey, look at you! You’re awake,” a nurse said, coming to the side of the bed. She repositioned a plastic oxygen mask on Maile’s face. “Can you tell me your name?”
Maile knew the routine by heart. The nurse was checking her mental state by asking her name, the date, and location. Those were the usuals. If she passed that test, the questions got harder. “Maile Spencer, it’s Thursday, and I’m in Honolulu.”
“Very good. You left one out. Who’s the President?”
Maile rubbed her head. “Does it matter? Nothing ever changes with those guys anyway.”
The nurse chuckled. “Yep, I suppose not. Do you remember what happened?”
“I was on the bus when a truck hit it. I think the whole thing went over on its side.”
“That’s what I heard. It was even on the news. Are you having much pain?”
“Everything hurts.”
“Want a pain shot?”
“Not right now.” Maile pulled the oxygen mask off and tossed it aside. “What time is it?”
“Midnight. I just came on shift. The other nurses said you used to work here?”
Maile nodded, but even that hurt. “In the ER. Can I get a meal?”
“I’ll find something in a few minutes. Don’t you want to know your injuries?”
That was something Maile was avoiding. The good thing right then was that she was feeling pain in her legs, which was better than feeling nothing at all. “What are they?”
“Remarkably, nothing major. Some cuts and scratches, which were cleaned and sutured in the ER. Most of the bones in your body were X-rayed and nothing is broken or displaced. Whenever you’re awake, you answer questions okay, but you never seem to remember the previous time. It looks like all you got was a concussion.”
“Just what I need. Another concussion.”
“Another?”
“I had one a while back. My head must be too hard to get anything worse than that. Can I get something to eat?”
“First, you need to show me you can sit up and drink water.”
The nurse activated the switch to change the bed position. Maile endured the movement as best she could until she was mostly upright. She sipped the water she was given.
A few minutes later, the nurse brought a meal for Maile.
“Where’s my stuff?” Maile asked in slow motion as she nibbled.
“Well, your clothes are in a bag in the closet, but they were cut off in the E
R. Might not be much good to you now. Was there anything else?”
“I had a shoulder bag on the bus.”
“As far as I know, no bag came with you to the hospital.”
Instead of worrying about it, or maybe so she wouldn’t, Maile got a pain shot so she could sleep. In the morning, she was checked over by two doctors and told she could leave.
“Need to find a ride home, though,” her nurse said. Jennifer was an old nursing school classmate of Maile. “Can’t let you walk out the front door to the sidewalk.”
Maile finished her breakfast. “I don’t have my phone, and I don’t know anybody’s number by heart.”
“Who does anymore? Just tap a button and we’re connected. You can’t call your mom?”
“She doesn’t drive, and I don’t want her to worry.”
“What about your husband? You know his number, right?”
Maile held up her naked left hand. “No more husband.”
“Sorry. I didn’t hear about that.”
“Trying to keep quiet about it.”
The nurse got the bedside phone for Maile to use. “You have about four hours before you need to be out. Maybe you’ll remember a number.”
As the nurse went out, someone else came in.
“Brock…Officer Turner. What are you doing here?”
“Day off. How are you feeling?”
“Great, since I found out I can go home today.”
“Need a ride?” he asked.
“I need clothes.”
He held up his empty hands. “Can I go to your place to get something?”
“I’d rather you didn’t.”
“What if I got your mother to pick out something for you?”
“I really don’t want her to know I’ve been in an accident. She has enough to worry about.”
“What about your brother?”
“Yeah, like I want either one of you going through my things when I’m not there.” Maile eased down from her bed to get the bag of clothes she’d been wearing the day before from the bedside cabinet. Examining each garment, they weren’t in too bad of shape. “Can you do me a favor? Go to the nurses’ desk and borrow their stapler.”
“What’s this for?” he asked, returning with it.
By then, Maile had already rinsed her bra and undies in the bathroom sink and put them on damp, still wearing her hospital gown over top. “Maybe I can staple these back together.”