by Caleb Meeks
I used the opportunity I had to close the gap between us. Being in such close quarters made it easier to ignore the pain. It required such intense focus that everything else faded to the background. Dominic’s body didn’t fade to the background, though, and every time I looked Abaddon in the eyes, it brought it back to the front of my mind. It was what was keeping me so present.
He threw a punch. I avoided. I threw a punch. He avoided it. I threw another one, and it hit. He recoiled, hitting me in the face. It was like dancing, in a way. I started to feel fatigued from the injury, but I wasn’t going to let it be the reason I died. I pushed through the fog and landed a few more solid hits. He did the same. I didn’t know much longer I’d be able to fend him off. There was no way I’d be able to win this fight, that was never the intent, but I needed to be able to get him off of me long enough to get away.
Fortunately, the hole in my stomach wasn’t deep enough to cause serious long-term injury, but it was enough that if I didn’t get to a place where I could slow the bleeding, then I could pass out, and could potentially bleed out. That was worst case scenario, though. I’d made it out of worse before.
I managed to back him up to the wall. I wedged my foot behind his and pulled one of his feet from under him. He stumbled to one side, which I used to send my left hand into his jaw. I felt it snap, but it wouldn’t be enough to stop him. I reached down with my arm and stuck my finger into the hole in his leg from the glass. He wailed in pain, and I sent three more clenched fists into his face. I could see his consciousness start to flee from him. It wasn’t enough, though. If I turned my back on him now, I wouldn’t make it out of the room. I grabbed his shirt with both hands and threw him on the ground behind me. He started to get up, but I climbed on top of him, and pinned his arms down. He smiled. I hit his face, and hit again, and again, and again. I lost control of myself. The rage from losing Dominic poured out of me with every punch to his face. Eventually, though, I got control of myself. He was not there anymore.
I got off him and ran out the door. My hands were covered in fresh blood from his nose and mouth. It was a level of aggression I hadn’t displayed in a long time, and honestly, it didn’t feel good. I ran down the stairs we had come up. Right at the base of the stairs, there was my gun. It meant so much more now than it had before, and I wasn’t leaving without it. I ran out of the front door. I didn’t know if Abaddon was behind me, but I just ran. It took everything within me not to stop at Dominic’s body, but I knew that he wouldn’t want me to.
Just outside the facility, there were woods on every side. I picked a direction, somewhere towards the city, and ran. My legs moved instinctively. I didn’t pay attention to anything in front of me. I just ran. Tree branches smacked against my face, I tripped on rocks, but I didn’t ever stop. I couldn’t stop.
Dominic’s face was the only thing I could picture. His mangled, bloody face. His lifeless eyes. The life leaving his eyes. That moment stuck in my mind. Watching the life leave his body. It’s something people always talk about, but it’s not something I’ve ever experienced. I’ve taken more lives than I can count, but I’ve never witnessed it like I did today.
I tried to deny the fact that he was dead, but I couldn’t. It was true. He really was gone. His last words kept repeating in my mind. “It’s ok, He’s got me.” I kept hearing it, over and over again. It meant something, but I couldn’t figure out what. All I knew was that the cross around my neck meant something to him, and it meant infinitely more to me now.
After running for longer than I could determine, my body just stopped. The silent fatigue caught up with me, and I hit the ground. My legs were completely numb, and I was barely able to roll over so that my face wasn’t in the dirt. I set my hand on the wound on my stomach and could instantly feel the blood still running out of it. I knew that if I didn’t get the bleeding under control, I was not going to last for very long.
I willed myself to sit up. My stomach muscles quivered, but I managed to sit up. I slipped my jacket off and could feel the chilled air. I pulled my shirt off, which sent pain spiraling out from the gash. Blood quickly started oozing out. I made quick work of the shirt and wrapped it around my torso. It was a technique Dominic had shown me a couple years ago. Who knew I’d end up needing all those lessons he gave me?
Once it was secured around my waist, I could feel the blood flow start to slow. I pulled the jacket back on and zipped it to try and keep some warmth. I laid back. With everything that had been happened, my eyes just wanted to close. Eventually, I let them, and I slipped away.
Chapter Twenty-one.
My heart pounded inside my chest. The cold doorknob felt like a gavel in my hand. Opening the door would ensure his death, but keeping it closed would do the same. The most intense fear had built up inside my stomach. My whole body was shaking, but something inside me turned the knob. The creak from the old wooden door echoed inside my mind. The flickering light from the single bulb on the roof of the small room crept out of the opening in the door. The blood on the floor, the body, it all flooded my eyes. My stomach turned in on itself.
My eyes shot open, still flooded by the imagery. For a moment, it was all I could see, almost like a filter had covered my eyes, and no matter where I looked it was all I could see. I shook my head and tried to blink the memory away. Eventually, it subsided. I could see the wooded surroundings, and I slowly recalled the events that led me to this place. Remembering the wound in my stomach, I looked down at it. My shirt was still wrapped around it, and I couldn’t see blood oozing from the area. I untied the shirt to get a better look at the wound, and it seemed to have closed well. Falling asleep may very well have saved my life. I still felt foggy, but with losing that much blood, it was to be expected. The gash still hurt, but I was only concerned if it was still bleeding. The shirt had become dried and crunchy from soaking up the blood, but I didn’t want to leave it here, so I wrapped it back around my stomach. I zipped my jacket up to conceal as much warmth as possible.
Slowly, I stood up. Once I did, though, I leaned against the tree immediately to my side. All the blood rushed to my head, and I got dizzier than I anticipated. Every part of my body ached, likely from the brawl with Abaddon. My face had garnered a few cuts from running through the woods, but they had closed and dried up while I slept. They weren’t severe enough to necessitate any attention. My whole body was covered in blood, both Dominic and Abaddon’s, as well as mine. I needed to get to the town, because I needed to get this hole in my stomach cleaned. It was risky to just walk into the town, but it was just as dangerous to risk an infection. Normally, Dominic would take care of this part for me, but I guess that’s my job now.
I slowly eased off the tree and got my footing. The worst part was that I didn’t know where exactly I had run off, so I didn’t exactly know where to walk. The sun had just risen and using a general idea of where I came in, and where I had run out, I generalized a basic idea of where I needed to go.
It seemed like I was moving at a glacial pace, since I often had to stop and give myself breaks. Being in such a vulnerable state was foreign to me. Abaddon had gotten far stronger than I remembered, which meant I wasn’t going to be able to take him out the traditional way. What that meant though, I still hadn’t figured out.
I continued in the direction I figured lead towards the town. It seemed like a long way, but under normal circumstances, it probably would have taken a small fraction of the time. It gave me plenty of time to remember everything that had just happened. Just when I’d start to think I had gotten it out of my mind, it would storm back in. Sometimes I even had to stop and breathe for a few minutes. Death had never affected me like this, not even the death of my own father.
After what seemed like an eternity, I finally reached the outskirts of the town. It was encapsulated by the greenery I had just trekked through, which gave me a place to stop and figure out what I was going to do. It was the time of the morning where everyone was out, which meant I couldn’t just wa
lk out into the public area. In a big city, I could walk right through a crowd of people, and while they would probably notice, no one would do anything. In a small town like this, however, anyone who caught a glimpse of a bloody, black-clothed man walking around would bring unwanted attention.
I decided not to risk getting seen, and continued walking around the edge of the town shrouded in the forest greenery. I may have been able to manage it, but if it ended up in a fight, I didn’t know if I’d be able to handle myself.
While I walked, I tried not to let myself get too overcome with my emotions. I wanted to be angry. I wanted to scream. I wanted to kill someone. But I kept coming back to Dominic, and I couldn’t be angry for some reason. I should be angry, and I should feel justified in going back, finding the two guards I let live earlier, and putting a bullet in both of their heads. I couldn’t, though. The words that Dominic said right before he died still repeated in my ears, almost like he was saying them right behind my shoulder. “It’s ok, He’s got me.” He could have been angry. He could have been angry at me, at Abaddon, at anyone he wanted, but he seemed accepting in his dying moment. Not just accepting, but almost hopeful. And on top of that, the moment where I sat in the tree, listening to the two men’s conversation kept replaying in my mind. How it felt to let someone live instead of just killing them. It almost felt like someone, or something, was behind me, ushering the weapon down. Dominic would have gotten a kick out of that one.
Anton’s family flashed in my mind, and a smile came across my face. Dom probably would have loved to have seen that one, too. Even though he worked with a man like me, he always seemed to appreciate the happy endings more than the bitter ones. I always thought I appreciated the bitter endings more than the happy ones. They always seemed truer to reality, at least my reality. Now, I’m not so sure. Maybe Dom was right, maybe the happy endings deserved some more attention than I gave them.
I got so lost in thought that I lost where I was going. However, when I looked up, my stomach rolled again. Standing in front of me was the epicenter of my worst nightmares. It was dusty and a little run down, but it still carried the same small-town charm that was attractive in the first place. I guess it was still charming, but the ghosts that stood guard said otherwise. As slowly as I could, I stepped up and turned the doorknob, opening the box of memories that had been stewing for the past ten years.
Just opening the door unleashed a feeling of such unsettling pain I thought I might throw up. I had to brace myself against the wall while the initial rush ran through me. I could see my younger self sitting on the floor, playing with cars. Innocence was almost tangible at that age. The image flashed to a slightly older me running up the stairs, my father screaming in the background. The lights dimmed, and the image in front of me shifted emotions. It felt so dark, and I caught a glimpse of the drugs on the coffee table. This was the night everything changed, and my father gave us a reason to be afraid of him. I watched that first hit play out right in front of me, but it disappeared just as quickly as it had appeared. The emotion dimmed again, and I immediately knew which part of the story we were in. I heard the window next to me shatter, and I jerked to the side. My father’s crazed eyes connected with mine, but it was like he was looking right through me. Of course, he couldn’t see me, none of this was real, but it felt just as real this time as the hundreds of times I’d relived it in the past. It all played out in front of me. My mother trying to calm him down, his zombie-like demeanor, me running down the stairs, fighting. Putting a bullet in his head. I stood over my own body and watched myself bleed out from the cut across my chest. The scar that had formed from that very moment ached while watching it. The memory pushed to continue. I tried my hardest to fight against it. What happened next in the story was what I had been trying my hardest to keep concealed. Not even in the darkest parts of my mind had I ever relived the next chapter, but it was pushing against the weak forces I had mounted against it. Eventually, I gave into the memory and felt myself fall to the ground.
▪
I sat there against the wall, and felt the blood run out of my chest. My father was crumpled at my feet, bleeding out of the bullet holes I had just put in him. His emaciated body looked almost alien on the ground. Bones protruded from his skin, and he had needle injections all over his body. It hurt to see him like that, but it hurt more that he would abandon his family for a life of drug abuse, only to end up back trying to kill us. The physical pain won over the emotional pain though, and because of the rapid blood loss, I slipped into unconsciousness.
I woke up not long after to multiple paramedics standing over me. “Can you hear me?” The woman closest to my head asked. I half nodded; half grunted to let her know I had heard her. The pain was mostly numbed, but I couldn’t determine whether that was from them or that I had just gotten used to it. They were quickly trying to get the bleeding from my chest under control. I was aware of all the bloody rags they were holding, and the panicked looks on their faces, but for some reason it didn’t seem to get to me. That could have just been a symptom of the intense blood loss, though. I seemed to be able to look past the paramedics working on me, and to everything happening outside. I was positioned in a way that I could see out of the house. Because of the darkness, the red and blue flashing lights were even more noticeable. There were the few neighbors we had crowded around the wide police line. The ambulance was parked in the street, and a gurney was next to it. A body bag sat on top of it.
“What happened?” I asked as clearly as I could, given my mental state. I knew exactly what happened, but I desperately wanted one of the paramedics to tell me something else.
“I don’t know, sweetie. Try and be as still as possible though, so we can get you out of here.” Her voice was shaky, detectibly full of fear. Her hands were covered in blood, and she had it on her clothes too. The other paramedics looked just as fearful as her. It was obvious that they didn’t know if they could save me. In that moment, I didn’t even care if they did. I let myself slip back into unconsciousness.
I woke up again in a hospital bed. There was a IV stuck in my arm, and my other arm was handcuffed to the bed. My mind was totally foggy, probably from the drugs in my system. Once again, everything flooded back into my mind. My father was dead because of me, and even though it wasn’t my fault, I did it. It sat on my chest like a hundred-pound weight. For a split-second, I almost wished I hadn’t woken up. That the injury from the fight had been so severe that I just hadn’t come back. Then the door to the room opened.
A male nurse walked in. “You’re awake, good!” He seemed far too happy to be real, but it didn’t seem like fake happiness, it seemed genuine. Maybe it was just that I wasn’t often familiar with genuine happiness. “How are you feeling?”
“Like I died.” I said. It came out dryer than I had planned it to.
“Funny.” He smiled. “You did.”
I scrunched my forehead. “I’m sorry?”
“Three times, actually. They brought you in and had to operate immediately. During the operation, you flatlined three times.”
“Wow.” It was all I could really conjure up in the moment.
“One of the most intense surgeries I’ve ever been a part of. Guess you really wanted to come back.”
“I wouldn’t quite make that guess.” I said, harkening back to my earlier sentiment.
“Well, then I guess someone else really wanted you to come back.” He said it with so much sincerity that I believed him, if only for a moment.
I laughed. “I guess.”
“So, I’ll ask this again, and try to be a little more specific, if you could.” He said, playful sarcasm dripping from his words. “How are you feeling?”
I chuckled. “I am tired, confused, and I can’t feel most of my body. That descriptive enough for you?”
“I guess it’ll do. That all sounds very normal, though. I’d say you’re glad you can’t feel most of your body. If you could, you’d probably be writhing on the floor in compl
ete and total agony.” He said, looking down at his clipboard. He looked back up at me with a confused look on his face. “That probably wasn’t the most appropriate thing to tell a patient.” We both shared a laugh. “If you take it easy, and get as much rest as possible, then you should start feeling more normal. Aside from the numbness, which we’ve already covered.”
“Sounds like the same thing you tell everyone else whose recovering from surgery.”
He thoughtfully scratched his head. “I would really like to disagree with you on that, but I don’t think I can. Guess it’s a universal remedy.”
“You guess a lot.” I jokingly prodded at him.
“And you are far too sarcastic for only having been conscious for the past fifteen minutes.”
“Universal remedy, I guess.” I said. He let out a belly laugh that brought out a chuckle from me too.
“Well, as much as I would enjoy staying here and filming a comedy special, I’ve got some other people to check up on. Any questions for me?”
“Actually, I have two.”
“Hopefully I have two answers, then.”
“Why are there cops outside the door?”
His face dropped slightly, probably unsure of how to explain it in a non-aggressive way. “It’s protocol for cases that involve a death by deadly weapon. Nothing personal, just protocol.”
“Got it. And where is my mother, she was with me at the house, but I never saw her after they took me.”
“She’s here. She’s just been talking to the police since you came in. They had a lot of questions. I’ll let her know you are awake, if you want me to.”