Alex Bledsoe - The Hum and the Shiver

Craig gazed at the doors, then at the entrance. He seemed preoccupied, and made no mention of the ice Terry-Joe held between his legs. At last he said, “Okay, listen. I need your help with something really important. I need you to watch out for her parents. You know them, right?”

“Sure.”

“Well, they’re on their way here. Should get here any minute.”

He nodded. Eventually Kell would’ve had to call them. Now, he thought wryly, they’d get double good news. At least Aiden was too young to also go off and try to seek vengeance. “Okay. I’ll send them back as soon as—”

“ No. Please. Keep them here. I’ll keep checking back, okay? Thanks.” Craig turned and went back into the treatment room. Terry-Joe tried to find a more comfortable position, but realized that at the moment there wasn’t one.

Craig quickly found Bronwyn, who lay flat on her back on a stretcher behind a curtain. An IV had been set up, and she had an oxygen tube beneath her nose. “Ms. Hyatt,” he said. “Are you all right?”

Her voice was tight and thin. “Don’t make me laugh, Reverend, it hurts. And for God’s sake, call me Bronwyn.”

There was still dried blood on her lips and chin. He asked, “What happened to you?”

“Cracked a rib, maybe poked a lung. Waiting for the X-rays to see how serious it is.”

“How did you crack a rib in the middle of the night?”

She managed a smile. “I’m the Bronwynator.”

“Excuse me just a second,” he said, and stepped out to check the waiting room. He returned a moment later.

“Where’d you go?” she asked.

“I’m expecting someone,” he said. He touched her hand where it lay on the bed rail. “I sure hope you didn’t do anything too serious.”

She laughed, then winced. “I think, after everything else, I can handle this. It was scary for a bit, though; amazing how you get used to breathing.”

He closed his fingers around hers. The room was chilly, and the warmth of their flesh made both tingle. Their gazes met, and held.

She saw something disturbing in his eyes. “Are you okay, Reverend?”

Before he could answer, they heard a loud, wailing scream of such despair that it seemed to burrow into the hearts of everyone within earshot. It emanated from the waiting room; the doors and curtains did little to muffle its intensity. Despite the pain, Bronwyn rose on her elbows, eyes wide, because she recognized the voice.

Her mother, Chloe. In agony.

Craig rushed out of the treatment area knowing what he’d find. Dammit ! He’d done everything he could to prevent this, and at the last moment he’d been distracted by the touch of a pretty girl.

In the middle of the waiting room, Deacon Hyatt knelt beside his wife. Chloe sprawled on the floor, screaming with an abandon only sudden bone-deep grief inspires. She wore denim shorts and a T-shirt, and as she thrashed, her flip-flops shot across the room. A doctor, middle-aged and tired-looking, stood beside them, his hands extended in useless, unwanted sympathy. Terry-Joe stood as well, his jeans wet from the melted ice, his expression anguished.

The door opened behind Craig, and Bronwyn pushed past him, cradling her ribs and unconcerned with the way her hospital gown gapped open. Blood trickled from her arm where she’d torn out the IV. She slid down beside her mother, brushing Chloe’s hair back from her face.

“Mom, what’s wrong?” she shouted over the woman’s cries. Chloe only screamed again, alternately tearing at her hair and beating hands and feet against the floor.

Bronwyn looked at her father. “Daddy?”

Deacon, his face stoic, said simply, “Kell’s gone.”

“Gone where?” she asked in a small voice.

Deacon’s face darkened. “He’s dead !” he yelled at his daughter.

At those words, Chloe screamed again. By now, more doctors and nurses had gathered around them, looking uncertainly at one another. Many were part Tufa, so they knew the Hyatts and their status in the community; but they couldn’t just leave the woman screaming on the floor.

Finally Craig pushed through them and knelt beside Deacon. “Mr. Hyatt,” he said gently, “let’s get her off the floor and onto a bed.” Deacon nodded, and together they lifted Chloe, who put up no resistance. Bronwyn had seen her mother cry before, but never like this; she felt her own tears battling with confusion, rage, and pain as they sought escape.

She saw Terry-Joe standing in the door to the lobby, almost comical with the wet stain from the icepack. She rushed to him and threw her arms around him. Words rushed out, tight and thin because of her injury. “Kell’s dead, I don’t know what happened, they said he’s dead, Daddy said he’s dead….”

Terry-Joe held her close, careful not to squeeze too tight. Her choked, breathless sobs cut through him, and he felt his own tears boiling free. He stroked her hair, and despite everything thought happily that she’d run to him when she needed comfort.

Craig returned from getting Chloe onto a gurney, where her cries continued to ring out. He took Bronwyn by the arm, holding her hospital gown closed with one hand. “Come with me,” he said firmly. To Terry-Joe he said, “Could you get her a robe from one of the nurses?”

Terry-Joe started to ask Craig why he couldn’t get the robe, but the older man’s authority stopped him. “Yes, sir,” he mumbled, and released the girl he now knew he loved.

Craig took Bronwyn into the little side room where doctors delivered bad news. It was cold, bright, and inhuman. Terry-Joe knocked softly and handed in the thin robe. She sat numbly as Craig draped the robe around her.

She began to shake. She looked up at him, suddenly conscious of their different ages and positions in life, seeing him as an elder, as someone she should respect. “What happened, Reverend?” she whimpered. “I just saw him an hour and a half ago, he was fine. We were joking, he… The last thing he said to me was, ‘bitch.’” She laughed despite everything, but it was momentary. “They said it was nothing serious.”

Craig knelt beside the chair and put his hand on her shoulder. He’d never wanted to hold and comfort someone more in his life, and yet he knew that was not his role, not what she and her family needed. As gently as he could, he said, “Apparently the knife nicked a blood vessel that didn’t start bleeding until after they’d treated his injuries. By the time they noticed, it was too late. They did all they could, Bronwyn, I promise.”

“Did he say anything else?” she asked in a tiny child’s voice.

Craig shook his head. “They’d sedated him for the pain, so he never woke up. He never felt a thing.”

She nodded slowly. “Then Dwayne murdered him.”

Craig said nothing.

She blinked, rubbed her head, and said, “I didn’t see Aiden. Did Mom and Dad leave him at home?”

“Yes. They didn’t know how bad it was when they left. It all happened while they were on their way here. I’m sure they thought there was no need to wake him up.”

“Then he’s home all alone.”

Craig reached over and took her hand. “I’ll go see about him, and bring him down here to be with everyone else. If you think that’s where he should be.”

She stared at him. “Why do you care?”

He was used to the brusqueness of grief, and it didn’t faze him. “Partly because it’s my nature, partly because it’s my job.”

She took a deep breath, winced at the pain, and said, “I’m sorry, that was rude. It would be very nice of you to go get him, and I would be very grateful.”

“Will you go back to bed?”

She shook her head and got to her feet. “I have to be with Mom and Dad. And before you say anything, you’ll have to accept that that’s my nature.”