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Doubtful.
“Please remove your shirt completely,” the doctor says.
This time when I do, and when the doctor pulls away Skye’s blazer that has been pressed into the wound to stop the blood, I watch her face. It has gone pale, and her skin has a sheen of sweat beading on her temples.
“Skye, look at me.” She’s staring at the wound.
I reach out, grab her wrist. I start to circle . . . “Inhale.” Her eyes shoot up at that word. They are wide. Shocked. Why? I rub a circle again. “Exhale.”
“How?” she whispers to herself, and I’m not sure what she’s talking about, but her skin is pale like she saw a ghost.
“Did I ever finish my story?” I say as the doctor injects me with a syringe and then is pouring a disinfectant over the wound.
Her gaze lifts up from where she was watching me touch her. “You didn’t.”
As the liquid cleans me, I let out a hiss, looking up at the doctor.
“You were very lucky,” he says to me. “It’s a through and through. The bullet mainly caught external tissue. You will be fine. However, you need time to regain the blood loss.”
I turn back to Skye. It’s time for her to know everything.
“Please tell me.” She places her other hand where I’m rubbing her tattoo. “The best and worst day.”
“The best and worst day,” I agree before I close my eyes and remember the way the sunlight beamed in through the window that morning. The way I jumped up when my father said he had a surprise for me. “It was my birthday,” I tell her. “March second.” Her mouth opens in shock. “I know. Let me continue.” She nods her head. “My father and I had just recently moved to New York. He was working on a deal, a big one. One that would change everything.”
Skye is now holding my hand. Her breath is coming out heavy. The doctor is stitching my ribs, and a burning feeling shoots up my chest.
“He told me that day, he wanted to take me out. The whole day was my choice. I didn’t know what to do first. A new town. A new beginning, another birthday, but this time it would be different.”
“Where did you go?”
“The first place he took me was a trail. We walked and talked. It was a bit chilly, but I didn’t care. I just liked to spend time with him. He told me that we would be here for a while. That this would be our new home. That the job he had been working on was becoming very lucrative. I was young. I didn’t know what that meant. He said he had basically taken out the competition. But again, at that age, I didn’t know. I thought my dad owned a business, and he did. It just wasn’t the business I assumed.”
“What business was it?” she whispers, eyes still wide, chin trembling.
“What business do you think?” I answer. Her mouth opens and closes, trying desperately to make sense of the crumbs I am leaving for her to pick up. Only then will she truly understand.
“I thought it was your uncle who got you into the business?” she asks.
“My uncle got me into it, but only because my father was dead.” Her hand reaches out and holds mine.
“When did your father die?”
I trace my thumb over her wrist. “Patience. Don’t you want to hear the rest of the story?”
“When did he die?” Her throat bobs, and I lift my hand to touch her jaw, caressing it lightly.
I don’t answer her question. Instead, I continue to relive that day. Smell the trees, taste the ice cream, remember the way my cheeks burned from smiling so wide.
“When I think back, I should have known it would all go to shit. I should have known I didn’t deserve the happiness. I was the son of a monster after all. After the walk. I wanted to go eat ice cream for breakfast, and we did. The next place we went was to a local ice cream shop. It was the old-fashioned kind, where you sat down, and they had milkshakes and servers in a little apron.”
“We had one of those where I grew up . . .” she trails off, but I continue.
“I ordered a waffle cone with two scoops of vanilla ice cream, extra whipped cream. If I think really hard, I can still taste it.” Skye smiles, our hands still joined. She squeezes. “After the ice cream, my dad made a call. I expected the day to end, but I was wrong. It was only just beginning.”
The whole time I speak, she never breaks our stare. “What happened that day?”
“A massacre. My father died. And a girl saved me.” Lifting her hand, I turn it over until the small paper airplane tattoo faces me, and I place a kiss on it.
