Brian Freeman - Stalked

Serena saw her looking. "Those are the minor ones," she said.

"I know." Maggie pulled a chair next to the bed and sat down. She sucked her upper lip between her teeth and clamped down on it. The room was uncomfortably warm. Her eyes wandered to the amber fluid in the IV bag and then to the watercolor print of Canal Park that hung on the soothing baby-blue wall. "I'm not sure what to say. Everything sounds so stupid. How are you. Are you okay. That kind of thing."

Serena eyed the pink box in Maggie's lap. "That for me?"

Maggie looked down. "Oh, yeah. I almost forgot. Doughnuts. You want one? I've got old-fashioneds, crullers, and a couple of the cream-filled ones that go splurt when you bite them."

Serena laughed and paid for it with jabs of pain. "Old-fashioned, please."

"You want me to feed it to you?"

"No, my left arm isn't so bad. I can do it."

Maggie opened the box by slitting the tape with her fingernail and handed her a doughnut. Serena wolfed it down in three bites and brushed the crumbs from her lips. Maggie took a chocolate cruller for herself and put the rest of the box on the table beside Serena's bed.

"Why no morphine drip?" Maggie asked.

"I told them to take it away."

"Why? Burns are the worst."

"They set it up so you can push a button and get a shot when you need it," Serena said. "You know me. Addictive personality. I don't want to walk out of here hooked on painkillers."

"You need to manage the pain," Maggie told her.

"When it gets so bad I want to cut off my legs, then I call the nurse and get a shot."

"When did you have your last one?"

"Too long ago," Serena admitted.

"Don't be a martyr."

Serena glanced at the nurse's call button, which dangled near her right hand, but she didn't reach for it. "I saw the news," she said. "The Enger Park thing."

"Stride thinks the body is Helen Danning."

Serena arched her eyebrows. "So there's a tie-in to Eric's murder?"

"Could be."

"That's good for you."

Maggie shrugged and nibbled on the doughnut. She licked chocolate from her fingers. "Just as long as they don't think I did it. Beheading isn't my style, though. I hate all that blood. I prefer a quick tap to the forehead."

"Nice," Serena said.

"I hate thinking about the Enger Park case all over again. I've carried that one around for a long time."

"We all have cases like that."

Maggie knew that was true, but the Enger Park Girl was different. There was something heartbreaking and lonely about the black girl out in the wet grass, not even a girl at all anymore, just a mutilated thing left there to decay. One final humiliation on top of the agony, rape, and death. She wished she could have given the girl a name and a little justice to make her human again. She also didn't tell Serena that it was on that case that her feelings for Stride became something else, because suddenly working with him wasn't just solving crimes, it was suffering emotionally together at the failures.

"Thanks for nailing Blue Dog," Serena said. "I'm not sure I could deal with any of this if he was still out there."

"It was payback for me, too," Maggie reminded her. "He won't bother any of us again."

"That's what I thought before."

"I think even Alabama can manage to keep a one-armed murderer behind bars," Maggie said.

Serena's face was far away, and Maggie didn't know where she was.

"Did he…?" Maggie asked softly. She added, "You don't have to tell me."

"He never got the chance," Serena said.

"That's a relief. I mean, it's one less thing to deal with."

Serena bit her lip. "Sure."

"Are you all right?"

"I just want this to be over. I want to get out of here."

"Don't push it. You need to heal. At least you're going to be okay."

"Yeah. That's what they say."

Maggie watched vulnerability bloom in Serena's face. Her voice cracked, her chin trembled, and her eyes turned watery and scared.

"Hey," Maggie murmured. She leaned close and stroked Serena's hair.

"I'm sorry," Serena said. "Real tough, huh?"

"You're entitled."

"I should be grateful. I'm here, I'm going to make it. Then I cough, and my lungs feel like they're burning up, and I wonder if I'll ever be able to take a breath again without remembering. I wonder if I'll ever run again. Hell, I wonder if I'll ever walk again."

The tears flowed out of her eyes now. Maggie felt angry and helpless.

"I looked at my body, too," Serena went on. "They told me not to, but I did. Oh my God, Maggie. Oh, my God."

"Don't do this to yourself."

"It's so stupid and vain, but I don't want Jonny ever to see me again. Not like this."

"You'll heal. You'll get through this."

Serena shook her head.

Maggie whispered. "Come on, it's not just your body that needs time. It's your head, too. Remember what you told me? You were right. I was in denial. I need help, and so do you. I'm going to see Tony again tomorrow. You'll do the same thing. Anytime you need someone, I'm there for you. Stride will be, too. You know that."

"It hurts," Serena told her. "It hurts so much. When I think about it, it hurts even more. I don't think it will ever stop."

Maggie reached over and pressed the call button. Serena didn't protest. Her mouth had fallen open in agony. Her skin tensed, making it worse, and her legs jerked under the blanket. Maggie watched Serena's long fingers curl into fists.

"Nothing will ever be the same," Serena murmured. "Nothing will ever be okay."

"Shhh. Don't talk."

"Tell Jonny not to come. Tell him not to come."

The nurse ran in. She already had a hypodermic of morphine in her hand; she knew what Serena needed when the bell rang and knew that she needed it quickly. Maggie watched her swab Serena's left shoulder and then insert the needle and squeeze the plunger. The narcotic began to work almost immediately. Serena's eyes blurred and relaxed. Her body settled gently back into the mattress. Her mouth worked, but she didn't say anything.

Maggie and the nurse stayed until Serena was asleep and out of pain.

"How is she, really?" Maggie asked.

"This is the worst time," the nurse replied. "The pain makes you very emotional. Don't worry, her skin is already starting to heal. Her lungs are clearer today, and her breathing is stronger. You won't believe how much better she is in a few days."

At least on the outside , Maggie thought.

The ward was dark when Stride arrived at the hospital. It was after midnight. The lights were dimmed in the rooms he passed, and he saw patients stretched out on their beds and saw a few weary caregivers sipping coffee. He smelled the harsh cleansers that were used to scrub the floors. There were kids and adults here, men and women. Some were getting better, and some were getting worse. Living and dying. It was a struggle to remind himself that Serena was going to be fine, because this was the same hospital where Cindy had finally yielded to the cancer. Being inside this place, walking these corridors again, made the memories almost too vivid to bear.

He found Serena's room and stood at the end of the bed, watching as her chest rose calmly up and down in her sleep. He did what he had done many times years ago, take off his leather jacket, drape it over the back of the chair, and sit in the semidarkness watching the woman in his life. Back then, each day, Cindy was a little worse, and he felt as if a rat were gnawing out more of his heart whenever he saw her. He couldn't believe then that the woman in that bed was his vibrant, beautiful wife, that she had once been the seventeen-year-old girl who had changed his life in the course of one amazing summer.

She was gone too soon, and nothing was as he planned it.

He couldn't believe now that he had been given a second chance, and he did something he couldn't remember doing in years. He let himself pray. He had prayed back then, too, and when God ignored his pleas, he turned his heart away and decided that there was no point ever wishing for anything again. Until now. Until this woman came into his life, someone he would literally walk through fire to save. He was grateful that she was alive and desperate for her to recover.