The only thing more painful than remembering Matthew was the idea she might actually forget him.
A groan escaped her lips. She quickly smothered it with the heel of her palm. This wasn’t the first time. Grief rarely attacks from the front. It prefers to sneak up on you when you least expect it. Ronald shifted in his seat, but he did not look up or ask. She was grateful for that.
So again the question rose up in her: What does Rachel want to tell me?
Her sister was not one for melodrama, so whatever it was, it had to be important. Very important. Something concerning David maybe.
But more likely: Something concerning Matthew.
Chapter
9
Good morning, Staaaaaar-shine! The earth says hello…”
I must be dead, I think. I am dead in hell, where I sit in blackness and hear Ross Sumner mangle the soundtrack from the musical Hair for all eternity. My head pounds as though someone is driving a stake through my forehead with a mallet. I start to see light through the darkness. I blink.
Ross Sumner: “You twinkle above us, we twinkle below…”
“Pipe down,” someone tells him.
I swim up to consciousness. My eyes open, and I stare into the overhead fluorescent light fixture. I try to sit up, but I can’t. It isn’t exhaustion or pain or injury that is stopping me. I look to my left. My wrist is cuffed to the bedrail. Same with the right and both ankles. Classic four-point restraint.
Ross Sumner whoops with maniacal laughter. “Oh, how I love this! What joy this brings me!”
My vision is still blurred. I take calm breaths and absorb my surroundings. Green-gray concrete walls. Lots of cots, all empty except mine and Ross’s. Ross’s face is still a pulpy mess, a strip across the broken nose. The infirmary. I’m in the infirmary. Okay, good. I know where I am, at least. I turn the other way and see not one, not two, but three prison guards by my bedside. Two are seated next to me like visiting relatives. One is patrolling behind them.
All three are giving me their most menacing glares.
“You are truly screwed now, old boy,” Ross Sumner says. “Truly, truly screwed.”
My mouth feels as though I’ve been chewing sand, but I still manage to croak out, “Hey, Ross?”
“Yes, David.”
“Nice nose, asshole.”
Sumner stops laughing.
Never show an inmate fear.
I turn my gaze back toward the guards now. Same thing here. Never show fear—not even to the guards. I meet all of their gazes one at a time. The rage I see in theirs does not sit well with me. They are righteously pissed off at something, and apparently that something is me.
Where, I wonder, is Curly?
A woman I assume is the doctor approaches my bed. “How are you feeling?” she asks in a tone that isn’t even pretending to care about the answer.
“Groggy.”
“That’s to be expected.”
“What happened to me?”
She glances over at my glaring guards. “We are still piecing that together.”
“Can you at least untie me?”
The doctor gestures toward the glaring guards. “That’s not my call.”
I look at the three unyielding faces and see no love. The doctor leaves the room. I am not sure what to do or say here so opt for silence. There is an old black-hands white-face clock on the wall. It reminds me of the kind I would stare at, hoping those hands would move a little faster, back in the day at Garfield Elementary School in Revere.
It’s a little after eight. I suspect it’s a.m. rather than p.m., but with no windows in here, I can’t know for sure. My head hurts. I try to piece together what I assume was last night, right up until the time I heard a voice I thought might rescue me. I mostly remember Curly’s face, the fear, the panic.
So what happened?
The pacing guard is tall and thin with an overly prominent Adam’s apple. His real name is Hal, but everyone calls him Hitch because he’s constantly hitching up his pants because, as one of the inmates put it, “Hal got no ass.” Hitch rushes toward me, still glaring, and leans so close that our noses are practically touching. I push my head back in the pillow to get a little space. Nothing doing. His breath is awful, like a small gerbil climbed into his mouth, died, and is now decaying.
“You’re a dead man, Burroughs,” he hisses in my face.
I nearly choke on the stink. I am about to make a rejoinder about his breath, but a fly-through of sanity stops me. One of the other two guards, a somewhat decent guy named Carlos, says, “Hal.”
Hitch Hal ignores him. “Dead,” he repeats.
Anything I say right now would either be superfluous or harmful, so I stay quiet.
Hal starts pacing again. Carlos and a third guard, a man named Lester, stay in their seats. I lay my head back on the pillow and close my eyes.
I’m clearly unarmed yet I’m being held by a four-point restraint and watched closely by three guards. Three guards. At the same time.
That seems like overkill to me.
What the hell was going on here? And where was Curly?
Did I hurt him?
I think I remember everything, but based on my history, could I be sure of that? Maybe I blacked out. Maybe that other guard, whoever heard me yell, didn’t unlock the gate fast enough. Maybe, instead of Curly getting the better of me, I grabbed the shiv from him and…
Oh damn.
And while all these theories are swirling in my head, the big tornado keeps ripping through, throwing everything else out of the way: Is my son still alive?
The back of my head pressed down on the pillow, I try to pull my arms and legs free, but they are shackled. I feel helpless. Time passes. I don’t know how much. I am plotting, and I’m coming up with nothing.
The wall phone rings. Carlos stands, walks toward it, picks it up. He turns so his back is to me and speaks low. I can’t make out what he’s saying. After a few seconds, he hangs the receiver back on the wall. Lester and Hal both turn to Carlos. Carlos nods.
“It’s time,” Carlos says.
Hal takes out a small key. He unlocks my ankles first, then my wrists. Carlos and Lester stand over me as though they expect me to break for it. I obviously don’t. I massage my wrists.
“Get up,” Hitch Hal snaps.
I feel woozy. I sit up slowly—too slowly for Hitch. He reaches down and grabs me by the hair and pulls me up. Blood rushes south. My head reels in protest.
“I said,” Hitch spits out between clenched teeth, “get up.”
Hitch rips the blankets off me. I hear Sumner start laughing again. Then Hitch picks up my feet and throws them to the side. I swing with them so that they land on the floor. I manage to get myself to a standing position. My legs are rubber. I take a step and stumble like a marionette before I’m able to get my footing.
Ross Sumner is enjoying this. He sings, “Nah nah nah, nah nah nah, hey hey hey…”
My skull aches. “Where are we going?” I ask.
Carlos puts a hand on my back and gives me a gentle shove. I almost trip and fall.
“Let’s go,” Carlos says.
Hitch and Lester stand on either side of me. They take hold of my arms, making sure they grip that pressure point beneath both elbows hard. They half escort, half drag me out of the infirmary.
“Where are you taking me?”
But the only reply is Ross Sumner finishing up his repeat of the opening stanza and waving, “…Goodbye!”