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“Stand clear!”
This weird, high-pitched noise whines. The two paramedics are messing with his chest and face. The woman starts counting, pressing on his chest; the man is at his mouth and looking down.
His face looks strange. His skin is gray, his eyes are rolling.
“What’s wrong?”
I can only watch as Barrett’s body twitches. His hand, curled up by his chest, unfurls and curls again as his back arches.
“Barrett!”
The paddles aren’t really paddles—more like soft stickers. The first time they shock him, I’m staring at his face. Please…please…please…
When no one moves or speaks, I start to sob, get up, and try to go up by his head. The man holds out his arm to keep me away.
“I love you!”
I can tell it worked that time because the EMTs spring into motion once again. I can’t even hear their words. Can only stare at Barrett’s face, his bleeding throat.
Oh God, please…
I beg someone to let me hold his hand.
“Okay, but if I tell you move, you have to move back.”
His face and body are so still. I kiss his fingers.
“It’s okay, baby. Gwen is here. I’m here. I love you. I don’t care what happened in the past. It doesn’t matter to me.”
This goes on for hours. Or minutes, maybe. I don’t know. Someone tells me to move back. The ambulance stops. The paramedics jump out, rushing off, and someone helps me down. I guess the driver.
He directs me somewhere. I don’t know. I’m numb. I just want Barrett, but they took him back.
“I’m his wife!”
&nb
sp; The woman at the counter looks at me like she doesn’t even care, and more tears come, and then the dark-haired guy is there, the one called Dove. He takes me to some chairs and tables somewhere.
“I just went back there. He’s stable, Gwenna.”
I don’t know. The horror of it. And it’s horror. Nothing less. Dove hugs me and I start sobbing. His shirt smells like butterscotch.
The other one is here, too: Bluebell. Michael, he tells me. I remember something about his dad being in the military, something about a threat, but not specifics.
“I’m going to talk to them again,” Dove says at one point.
I look up at Michael and my stomach bottoms out.
“You’re… Fuck!”
I jump up, running through the hall until I find a door and toss it open, getting sick inside the metal sink of one of the rooms. When I wipe my face, I find Michael in the door and cry again.
Because it’s true. It’s all true…
Michael is the guy who wanted me to share a beer bowl with him that night.
That night.
