Page 51 of Last Destination

No more vodka, I promised and gently laid her down on the sagging cot. I’ll be here for you in the morning, baby girl.

I would give anything to be the one to comfort her tonight, but Madman had taken that position, and after the day he had, I wouldn’t dare challenge him for it.

I reluctantly left her shack and returned to my own. The shaggy cot was an outright luxury. When I laid my head on my hand, Ambrose curled up behind me and I breathed a deep sigh of gratitude.

We were all together again. Battered, broken, and bruised, but together.

“Turn on the news.”

My mother’s voice held the terrifying energy of horror as she stared at her phone, scrolling through a news feed on the couch beside me. “It’s about your father.”

My whole body snapped as if my bones had become steel. We refused to talk about Papa, his name far dirtier than any curse word. We didn’t talk about Charlie either. The memories were too haunting for either of us to bear.

It had just been us the last two years, after Charlie’s death and my near-miss were the final straw. She couldn’t prove criminal negligence against our father. The decorated war hero title carried too much weight and I’d refused to testify, too damaged by my grief to lend any credibility, but he’d agreed to the divorce in a small, quiet settlement.

My relationship with Mama was strained. Charlie had always been her favorite, and she was stuck with me, instead. Our identical faces were a constant reminder of what — who’d — she’d lost, and I was held at a distance. Always provided for, but never truly loved.

I flicked through the channels to find the evening news. Graduation was in a week, and I’d debated reaching out to Papa for the first time to tell him I’d gotten accepted into Purdue on a full scholarship. My entire life had become studying when I wasn’t able to leave the comfort of my bedroom for anything other than the dregs of a school day, but it all felt worth it with the acceptance letter in my hands.

When I told Papa my dream as a little girl, he wanted me to join the Air Force, to “serve my country like he had.” I wanted nothing to do with the organization that had turned my father into a monster, but the dream to fly never died. I would become a commercial pilot and see the world from above. Exploring the world on foot — the woods — I would never do it again.

The news anchor stared back at me with blank eyes as she read from a prompter. Chills covered my skin in an icy sweat watching several images flash behind her. Then the military head shot of my father popped up on the screen.

“Earlier today, an armed man entered Huntington Bank, demanding to empty the contents of his account. After a standoff with the National Guard, Armand West took the lives of three civilians — a bank teller and two customers — before turning the gun on himself. Victims' families are currently being notified, and will not be released until later today. Armand had a history of depression and mental health issues, including schizophrenia, and this is not the first time he’s had run-ins with law enforcement, although this instance has proven to be the deadliest. It is possible this was a psychotic break, and Dr. Mitchell St. Pierre will tell us more at six.”

Warm tears rolled down my cheeks and I wiped them away, my ever-present grief trickling out of me in tiny streams. Mama stood from her seat at the kitchen table, a hand over her mouth like she was about to vomit. She took off into her bedroom and closed the door, shutting me away from her pain and leaving me to deal with mine alone. I turned off the television, but the absence of terrible photos and voice-overs did nothing to dull the deep dreadful ache in my chest.

I sat numbly on the couch, clutching a pillow to my heart, before moving it to cover my mouth and screaming into the cotton like it could possibly rid me of the ghosts that would never leave. Four lives lost today — four needless lives lost — if only my father had taken care of himself. If only the government had cared enough to take care of him.

If only he had cared enough to take care of me.

My tears formed an endless waterfall off my chin. I hadn’t seen Charlie in months on my new medication, but I wished she would come to me now. Her presence alone might be enough to soften the sting. I didn’t even have a friend to call. My heart had been too shattered when we’d held her funeral to even try to replace the hole in my life.

I summoned the strength to move into my bedroom, knowing Mama would not want my company. I crawled into bed and pulled out the small drawer of my nightstand, uncapping the small bottle of sedatives prescribed for whenever the dreams became too much. I dry-swallowed two, then covered myself in blankets, desperate for the comfort no actual human would offer me. Within minutes, my tears dried, my breathing settled, and I drifted into catatonic sleep.

When I awoke the next morning, my mouth felt like I’d dried it with a towel and a familiar iron tang coated my tongue. I slowly shifted out of bed, each limb weighing more than my body, and shuffled to the bathroom to pee.

I pushed open the door and stumbled in, the morning light streaming through the small window at the back wall. I’d slept the entire night, which was no surprise. The only difference between a corpse and me on those drugs was a corpse had stopped breathing.

The bathroom had an odd scent, coppery and stale. I peered around for the source, freezing in place at the body sitting upright in the clawfoot tub to my left, the skin so gray it matched the shower curtain. The waist-deep water was crimson. A wrist was visible, one deep line cut along the artery, clouds of red still seeped from the wound.

I stared numbly at the tableau, my brain struggling to catch up with what was real and what the drugs had influenced. When time finally sped up, bringing my synapses along with it, the visceral scream of a banshee shot up my throat, filling the bathroom with my despair.

My mother’s blank face stared back at me, her eyes open and lacking all life.

She’d left me truly alone.

“She’s been in this state for how long?” The doctor posed the question to Nikki, but Ambrose answered.

We’d eaten our first real breakfast in weeks, sticks of meat and fried potatoes from a roadside cart. I could already feel it strengthening me, but our captain had refused to eat.

“Four days. Well, four days where she’s mentioned seeing another person who wasn’t there,” my third stated with authority, his arms crossed over his chest as he hovered over the doctor.

The office we’d crammed into had not been intended for six people. Jamie’s presence had not been welcomed, but my threats to his life could not keep him outside. The shack was barely larger than our sleeping cells. Standing room only for bystanders. Marley lay on the small cot in the center, conscious but silent, staring at the thatched roof ceiling with lifeless eyes and languid limbs.

I’d had misgivings about the care she would receive here, but the doctor had been thorough in his examination, and each instrument he’d used came in a clean plastic package, just as they were in prison.

The entire village resembled the prison I’d called home. Not in appearance, but in its energy, a volatile hum of fear. Desperate, scurrying rats in the form of humans in every corner, with armed guards hovering to ensure quiet compliance. I’d avoided their gazes and kept my focus on Marley when we walked by their cluster this morning, and other than a passing glance, we were ignored.