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The doctor nodded, sure she would never see them again. There were no goodbyes. She watched them through the patio doors as they ran across the backyard and headed down the path to the pool.
Her focus shifted to the kitchen floor, the massacre, the bloody, silent mess of youth, and something else that now caught her eye.
Amory’s chest was rising and falling.
She was still alive. She’d survived the bullet. Wherever it had lodged, it may have missed a vital organ or a major vessel. The doctor could save her.
She methodically turned and grabbed a pair of kitchen shears from the utensils pot and fell to the teenage girl on the floor.
“Amory, Amory,” she quietly said, feeling lightheaded as she kneeled. “It’s Elizabeth. Josh’s mom.”
Amory groaned.
“You were shot, and I’m going to cut your shirt for a second, to examine your wound.” She took hold of Amory’s bloodstained blouse, made a quick slice, and ripped through, exposing Amory’s back.
Sophie had nailed the teen below her shoulder. The bullet had fully cleared her heart, but might have punctured her left lung. The doctor checked her airway, her breathing. She balled up the blouse and applied pressure to the tiny gunshot wound. Not clean, but all she had, and time, in this case, would mean life or death. The doctor had met Amory’s mom once.
“Stay with me, Amory. Stay,” she begged, trying to save the skinny redhead. She rose to find a phone but hesitated and looked out back. She wanted to make sure the Poplovs had time to clear out before the entire circus arrived.
It would be madness: police, ambulance, media maybe—especially if Veronica and Drake showed up. And where had Josh run off to?
She had to keep her thoughts from him, otherwise the truth would be too much to bear. Her son had tried to kill her.
Her child.
In her own house. The home that she had made for him.
The doctor’s mobile was bedside upstairs, so she rose and then turned for the kitchen landline. Where was it? She couldn’t find it. She looked around. The receiver was missing. She pressed the red locator button. The handset sounded an inch from the base. She was confused. It was right there.
Her heart was still beating and pumping blood, but the beating had quickened to push more oxygen into her brain. She could feel the rush. Sense it. Her bodily systems were working in tandem, trying to cover for one another’s loss, trying to save the sum of itself. She picked up, dialed, and waited a moment.
Then another. The line rang. And rang again.
Finally, a man said, “911, what’s your emergency?”
And that’s when the doctor started to sweat.
Her hands and palms turned from cold to warm, to clammy and moist. Her forehead, her spine, behind her knees, inside her elbows, sweat poured. Suddenly a deep headache set in, and all she wanted was a drink of cold water. A sip. Ice. To clear her head. She couldn’t think.
Her head was bleeding profusely again, wrapping her up in a warm liquid blanket and lulling her to sleep. It told her to close her eyes and relax. It said to let go.
“Ma’am? You there?”
“Exsanguination,” she said to him, curling her fingers around the handset. This was her lifeline.
“’Scuse me?” he said. “What was that?”
She couldn’t find the words to explain. Her brain could no longer connect to her voice.
“Ma’am? You all right?”
She couldn’t find sound and dropped to her knees. The handset was still pressed to her ear.
“Can you hear me, ma’am? I need you to talk. What’s going on?”
“I’m bleeding out,” the doctor mumbled.
“Ma’am? I’m sending the police right now. I’ve got officers and EMTs on the way. What color’s your house?”
