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I’m met with an eerie stillness.
“Dee!” I panic and lever myself up enough to see her face. The side lights of the limo wash over her. Eyes closed, a stain of red on the pavement. So much blood.
“No! Christ no!” She is lying deathly still. Unresponsive. I press trembling fingers to her neck. A pulse! Slow, but steady.
I’m afraid to move her. Don’t know where the blood is coming from. It’s not on her skin or dress. The crimson spread is beneath her. Had she been shot before I got to her?
“Wake up, baby. Please wake up.” I gently tap her face, the skin is cool, pale.
Flashing red lights appear. Voices, the pounding of footsteps. Quick. Urgent.
“Sir? Are you hurt?”
I lift away and look over my shoulder into the placid face of a medic. “My wife. Dee. She’s unresponsive. Bleeding. She might have been shot.”
“Alright, Mr. Peters,” he says in recognition. “I need you to stay calm for me and move aside so we can take a look.”
I nod and without going far, crouch against the limo.
“Dee.” He calls her name. No answer. He carefully turns her onto her side.
I look and wish I hadn’t. Can’t stop from looking again. The back of her hair is violent red, wet, matted and sticky. I watch him shift through the strands while I hold my breath, shaking.
“The gash is wide,” he says, “but I don’t see any evidence of a gun wound.”
My bent posture sags. But through the profound relief comes guilt. I had taken Dee down so hard, crushing her beneath me that I’d hurt her badly.
He checks her pulse and under her eyelids. Then with the help of another medic, they secure her head and neck, and load her onto a stretcher.
“We’re taking your wife to Brockville General.”
“I’m going with her.”
“It would be better if you met us there.”
“I’m going.” I straighten, imposing my size and resolve. “I’m not leaving her.”
He backs down. The gurney bumps along the ground with me following at Dee’s feet. I long to hold her. To see those golden eyes open. To see her crooked smile. Fear overwhelms me.
I vaguely register the police cars and more medics at the end of the driveway. Where was Stiles? What the hell happened? All of it goes through my mind, but the center of my focus is Dee. My beautiful Dee. I hold her limp hand, talking to her, praying as the ambulance speeds through the night.
At the hospital, a medical team rushes Dee inside. No matter my protests and rants, the staff won’t let me in while they examine her.
“Mr. Peters.” A young doctor with short dreadlocks puts a hand on my shoulder in a kind but firm manner. “I’m Dr. Granger. How you can best help your wife is to answer a few questions. Does she have any allergies?”
“No.”
“Previous head trauma?”
“No.”
“Is she pregnant?”
“No. We don’t…Dee doesn’t think she can get pregnant. But we’re going to try.”
I don’t know why I say all that. Those details don’t matter to him. They matter to me. Would we ever get the chance?
“Alright,” he says sympathetically. “I know this is hard. But let me do my job and take care of your wife. I will be out to you with news as soon as possible.”
