The first one on the scene was Heather Acosta.
“Where is she?” she panted, looking around wildly as if Sammy were her best friend, instead of the girl she’d tortured and wished dead for well over a year.
Holly groaned at the sight of her. She was not (and would likely never be) convinced that Heather was sincere in her newfound enthusiasm for Sammy. And despite Sammy’s willingness to let bygones be bygones, Holly was not one to forget Heather Acosta’s long history of deceit and revenge (not to mention brazen backstabbing). It was hard for her to believe that three “shell-shocking” days in Las Vegas had really changed Heather.
But there Heather was, gasping and gushing concern, her red hair flashing like a squad-car light as she spun around, searching for Sammy. “She’s not …,” she said, her voice trailing off as she cast her wide eyes on Holly, Meg, and Sergeant Borsch.
And since Holly, Meg, and Sergeant Borsch each held similar suspicions about Heather, none of them jumped up with assurances that Sammy would be all right. They simply stared.
What this lack of assurance triggered in Heather was a crumpling at the knees and a scream so fierce and pathetic and loud that emergency-room personnel began appearing to see if anyone was being stabbed in the waiting room (something that was, unfortunately, not unheard of at Santa Martina’s Community Hospital).
“Stop it!” Holly shouted at Heather. “We don’t know anything yet!”
But Heather was folded into herself on the floor, so deafened by her own primal wailing that she didn’t hear what Holly was saying.
And then Casey Acosta came blasting in and saw (and heard) his sister wailing on the floor, which immediately set him falling into the same pit of despair as his life with Sammy flashed before his eyes.
The tortured look on his face could have broken the heart of Death himself. If Death was around. Which nobody really knew at that point. (Although in the emergency room the odds were alarmingly high.)
What Casey’s reaction did do was kick Holly into gear. “No one’s said she’s dead yet!” Holly shouted, jumping out of her seat. “They’re still working on her!”
This did a nice job of shutting Heather up, but it didn’t happen fast enough for Nurse Cathy Abbey, who came ramming through the main interior door, shouting, “You need to SHUT UP out here!” Her pants were a tired blue, her shoes a scuffed white, and the geometric designs on her smock were a telling sign of her impersonal approach to patient care.
“Is there any news?” Holly asked.
“When there’s news, we’ll tell ya!” Nurse Abbey snapped, then withdrew through the emergency room’s swinging door of fate.
“So she’s not …?” Heather asked, looking up from her crumpled position on the floor.
“We don’t know!” Holly snapped, and then to her enormous relief, Marissa McKenze rushed in from outside, followed almost immediately by Billy Pratt.
Marissa and Billy were tried-and-true friends. Maybe not with each other, seeing how Marissa had dumped Billy for the smooth-talking Danny Urbanski, breaking Billy’s heart for at least a week. But Billy and Marissa had been through the thick of things with Sammy, and that’s what mattered now.
“What’s she doing here?” Marissa seethed after Holly had given all of them a quick recap. Like Holly, Marissa trusted Heather about as far as she could throw a tiger. “And who is she texting?”
“She’s not just texting,” Holly said, craning a little to see better. “She’s posting.”
“What? No! Tell her to stop! We don’t want a bunch of people here!”
But the reality was, neither Holly nor Marissa knew how to tell Heather to stop. The only person who seemed to be able to reason with Heather was Sammy … and sometimes Casey.
But Casey was fighting back tears as he whispered with Billy, and Marissa didn’t have the heart to interrupt their conversation to ask him to deal with something she could do herself. Even though she couldn’t.
Meg had noted Heather’s flurry of phone activity, too, and saw a different sort of downside. She leaned over and asked Sergeant Borsch, “Does Sammy’s grandmother know what’s happened?” The question was met with the blank look of a man in shock, so she added, “Rita’s the guardian—I’m sure they’ll need her here. And someone really should tell her before the rumor mill does.” Then, since the lawman still seemed too stunned to take action, she offered, “If you have her number, I could call her.”
Gil Borsch did, in fact, have the number, but even through the daze of his despair, he knew this was not the sort of thing he should break to Rita over the phone. So he pulled himself together and stood, saying, “I’ll tell her in person.” Then he gave his cell number to Meg so she could call him if there were any developments and hauled his heavy heart outside.
On the short ride over to Cypress Street, it occurred to Sergeant Borsch that he was the very worst person for this job. Since the facts were sketchy and the outcome uncertain, he didn’t know what to say. The situation was gray on gray, and Gil Borsch worked best when things were black on white.
So he called his wife. However, instead of acknowledging that he really needed to talk to somebody, he convinced himself he was doing it because she would want to know. After all, Deb was a huge fan of Sammy’s. She’d even asked Sammy to be a bridesmaid in their wedding! Never mind that Sammy had almost ruined the wedding with one of her daredevil escapades—that was beside the point. Deb loved her and would want to know.
Plus, he could try this breaking-the-news thing out on her.
Unfortunately, it did not go well.
Not due to Deb’s reaction.
Due to his.
Besides breaking down while breaking the news, Gil Borsch also broke the hands-free law while making the call—something he’d been quick to ticket other drivers for doing.
So after hanging up, he felt both broken up and dirty—worse off by far than he’d been before he’d made the call. But as awful as he felt (and as raw and red as his eyes now looked), he was already at the Cypress Street residence, and really, there was no turning back from duty. Especially since Rita and Hudson were both sitting on the porch, presumably waiting for Sammy’s postcurfew return.
Sergeant Borsch appearing at the Cypress Street residence (either via squad car or in his personal vehicle, which he now drove) was not, in and of itself, cause for concern for Hudson or Rita. The two had grown to know (and even like) the lawman, especially since he seemed to keep a weather eye out for Sammy and had delivered her home safely from one tangle or another more often than they cared to recall.
This time, however, neither the front nor back passenger door of Gil Borsch’s car swung open.
This time, no skateboard or backpack or high-tops emerged.
This time, Hudson was the first to realize, something was wrong.
“Sergeant?” he called, hurrying down the porch steps as Rita followed closely behind.
So, with a fumbling of words and barely checked emotions, Sergeant Borsch managed to convey the crucial points:
Sammy was hurt.
Badly hurt.
They needed to get to the hospital.
Now.
Old people are not known for their quick movements. But these two seniors became instant Olympic contenders, dashing and leaping and propelling into the house and out again as they snatched up keys and cash and insurance cards and dived into the Borschman’s car without invitation.
Gil Borsch just went with it. He jumped in behind the wheel, slapped his portable spinning light onto the roof, and gunned it back to the hospital.
The car was still rolling when Rita and Hudson (apparently still vying for slots in the Olympics) bolted out and ran for the emergency-room door, leaving Sergeant Borsch to find legal parking on his own.
Once through the door, Rita and Hudson skidded to a halt.
It was as though William Rose Junior High School were conducting an assembly in the waiting room.
Only there was no presenter.
>
Just chaos.
“QUIET!” a voice across the room bellowed, and when Rita looked to see who had made the sound, she saw a bullish woman with bulging eyes. “WHERE’S THE LEGAL GUARDIAN FOR SAMANTHA KEYES?” Nurse Abbey shouted.
“Right here!” Rita called, holding up her hand.
The flash mob of teens turned to face her. And while they didn’t break into a spontaneous rendition of Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody,” they were clearly in a Bohemian Rhapsody state of mind, parting to let this older woman through as they wondered, Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?…
Then they watched the guardian and the nurse disappear behind the Swinging Door of (Maybe) Death.
3—NIGHT SHIFT
Waiting was hard. And although Hudson managed to slip through the swinging door to be with Rita, the rest were left to pace about. Or gnaw on nails. Or wring hands, or go into texting overdrive.
And as the wall clock ticked along from one agonizing minute to the next, sweeping past ten-thirty and on toward eleven, grumblings grew in the waiting room.
What was taking so long?
Why wasn’t anyone coming out with an update?
Parents began showing up to fetch their children or sending messages demanding that they return home.
After all, it was a school night.
Final exams were looming.
And who was this Sammy Keyes person, anyway?
Which underscored why Marissa and Holly were so annoyed with the crowd. If these parents had never heard of Sammy Keyes (or were asking who “he” was), clearly their kids hadn’t weathered the junior-high storm with Sammy. In fact, half of these kids had been the storm! What were they doing here?
It was a rhetorical question. Marissa and Holly knew what the mob was doing there. When the news about who Sammy’s father was had broken a few months earlier, Sammy had instantly catapulted from scrappy girl to celebrity.
To (especially) Holly’s delight, Sammy was still the scrappy girl she’d met at the soup kitchen over a year and a half ago and hadn’t let her new “popular” status change her, holding tight to the friends who’d been there for her before the Big Discovery and keeping the others politely at bay.
But the tide of people trying to break into their circle was relentless and annoying—and now, as Holly and Marissa waited in agony for word about Sammy, very upsetting. To make matters worse, there seemed to be no sign of the tide going back out for the night. Once parents were brought up to speed about the celebrity connection, curfews were automatically extended, exam concerns brushed aside, and the question became: “Do you think he’ll show up?”
“I wish they would all just leave,” Holly whispered to Marissa as they both cast a resentful eye over the mob of teens and the growing number of parents.
“Except Billy and Casey,” Marissa said. “They can stay.”
“And Officer Borsch and his wife,” Holly added (as Deb had appeared to comfort her uncharacteristically emotional husband).
“How about Heather?” Marissa asked.
“She’s outta here!” Holly snarled, and after she and Marissa shared a little fist bump, they continued scanning the crowd, whispering back and forth about who could stay and who should go.
And then finally Rita and Hudson emerged through the swinging door.
They looked pale.
Drained.
Like their hearts had forgotten how to circulate blood.
The waiting room fell quiet, and when the pallid seniors realized all eyes were on them and that they were expected to convey the news, Hudson gathered himself, cleared his throat, and said, “She’s breathing on her own. There don’t seem to be any broken bones, her heartbeat’s regular and strong, but she hasn’t regained consciousness. They’re moving her over to ICU and will keep her there until she wakes up.”
This news was received with great gusts of youthful relief.
She was going to be fine!
But amid the relief and jubilation, members of the over-sixteen set eyed each other cautiously.
Being unconscious for this long was a worry.
A big worry.
Better broken bones than an extended unconsciousness.
Better a ruptured spleen or a mangled meniscus or an impaled intestine (or even a grisly combination of all of them).
Doctors knew how to fix those things.
But unconsciousness? Maybe a coma? It was territory that was frightening in its shadowy uncertainty. And as most adults knew, the longer the uncertainty, the more frightening it became.
Unconsciousness was, in reality, often just this side of death. Or on a path toward agonizing decisions involving ventilators and vegetative states and life-support systems.
But after a long moment of shadowy fear had crossed the adults’ faces, there was a silent and almost unanimous shift toward a sunnier outlook as these same adults forced themselves to rally around optimism.
Maybe the poor girl’s unconscious state was not just this side of death.
More likely, it was just that side of sleep!
It was simply her body’s way of beginning the recovery process.
Besides, what purpose would it serve to sound the alarm or explain to the youngsters just how serious unconsciousness could be? Better to go home and get a good night’s sleep. Better to focus on the positive and hope for the best. A child’s innocence was short-lived enough these days.
So with murmurs among themselves and a few kind words to Rita and Hudson, the adults rounded up their teens (and whatever friends needed a ride), and slowly filtered out of the waiting room.
When the rest of their peers had left, Marissa and Holly (and a somewhat subdued Heather) joined Casey and Billy, and then went up to Rita and Hudson, who were quietly conferring with Meg. They still had questions. Big questions.
Like, How is she really?
Is she going to be all right?
When do they think she’ll wake up?
But the only question either senior could even begin to answer was, What is ICU?
“Intensive-care unit,” Hudson told them. “They’ll monitor her round the clock.”
“Can we see her?” Marissa asked, and her eyes were suddenly brimming with tears.
Hudson shook his head. “They wouldn’t let us stay any longer. They say they’ll call us when she wakes up.”
Casey stepped forward. “But that’s supposed to happen soon, right? She shouldn’t wake up alone in a hospital!”
“We hope it happens soon,” Hudson said cautiously. Then, in an effort to not walk further down that shadowy road, he volunteered some concrete and useful facts. “ICU is on the fourth floor of the main part of the hospital. Visiting hours are from eight a.m. to eight p.m.” He forced some optimism into his voice. “Who should we call when we get some news?”
“Me!” the teens cried in unison, but in the end they agreed that since Marissa no longer had a cell phone, Casey would be the contact person.
At this point Gil Borsch came forward with Deb at his side. “Can I give you a lift?” he asked the seniors, then looked to the teens and added, “Do you need rides?” He focused on Marissa. “Not a good idea for you to go back to East Jasmine on your own this late at night.”
“Oh,” Marissa said. Then her cheeks flushed as she explained, “We don’t live there anymore. We’re …,” she looked away, “nearby now.”
Gil Borsch studied her for a moment, but only for a moment. He’d heard rumors of gambling problems and a divorce, but gossip was for bottom-feeders, and he made a habit of trying to swim in cleaner waters. “Well, Deb or I can give any of you rides. We have two cars here, and your parents would probably like you home.”
“I can help, too,” Meg offered.
So rides were given and teens delivered, and seniors left to wearily climb the steps they’d flown from earlier. And back at their little cottage on Elm Street, Debra washed her face and went to bed, telling her husband (who was sitting in the living room in the dark)
, “Hon, do not stay up all night broodin’. You cannot help Sam by broodin’. All you’ll be is tired tomorrow when she wakes up.”
Words of wisdom, perhaps, but as the clock moved past midnight, Gil Borsch could still not shake the feeling that, regardless of how well she was monitored by the ICU staff, Sammy was alone.
And unprotected.
At last he moved his brooding from the living room to the shower (which he took in the dark), then tiptoed through the blackness of the bedroom to the closet, where he retrieved his uniform and regulation shoes. He dressed in the darkness of the kitchen, donned his personal holster and gun, and slipped out into the night.
On his way back to the hospital, he focused on getting his story straight, reminding himself that a serviceable lie was always close neighbors with the truth, and that a lie that should be the truth was barely a lie at all.
Then, knowing the hospital’s main lobby doors were locked after nine p.m., he went back to the ER entrance and gained access to the main section of the hospital without being questioned. He then rode an elevator up to the fourth floor, followed the signs to the ICU, and strode confidently through the waiting room area and up to the nurses’ station. “I’ve been assigned watch on Samantha Keyes,” he said as he flashed his ID at the nurse sitting behind the counter. “Attempted homicide victim. The perpetrator is still at large.”
Perhaps it was that violent-crime victims often landed in the ICU, or perhaps it was the authority with which Sergeant Borsch presented himself (or maybe just that it was the night shift, where energy supplies were limited and making easy things hard was just not worth it), but the lawman’s intentions were met with no resistance. The nurse simply checked her roster, pointed down the sterile corridor to her left, and said, “Room 411.”
Rooms in the ICU were private, and 411 was located near the end of the hallway, on the right. Gil Borsch hesitated at its open doorway. A light was on inside, and the foot of Sammy’s bed was visible past a drawn curtain.
In his many years on the force, Gil Borsch had seen his share of gruesome and tragic. If you joined the police force expecting to keep your cookies down, you learned in a hurry that you’d been one naïve chump. The first time an officer had to report to a scene where brains had been splattered against the wall, or a child had been hit by a car, or a decaying body had been discovered in a cellar … that was when the fantasy of the job instantly became the reality.