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“She has a GSW, Drew. They’ll get her to the nearest hospital then med-flight her to LAC.”
“That bad?” Shock ripples through me. I’m doubly determined to follow.
“You’ve broken so many laws. We have to take you into custody.”
“That has to wait.” I push past him. He lets me, but Mark’s right by Tiffany’s front door. He’s a wall, a barrier, a border between me and Lindsay.
“You have your own wounds, Drew.”
I brush him off. “I’m fine.”
“Looks like you broke something in your left hand, and you’re limping. You’re not fine.”
“I’m fine. I’m not letting her leave without me. I’ll ride in the ambulance with her.”
“No.”
“Fuck you.”
“No to that, too. You don’t understand how bad this is.”
“And you don’t understand how bad this is going to get if you don’t let me go with her.”
“Is that a threat?”
“It is what it is. Let me go with her, damn it.”
“I can’t. I have to take you into custody.”
“What?”
“You just killed a man on live television, Drew. So did Lindsay. Jesus Christ, millions of people just watched this scene as it unfolded! You killed two people here. I can’t just let you go.”
“Then take me to the hospital with her.” I start coughing. I taste blood. I lick my lips.
His face fills with alarm and he waves a medic over. “Pull up your shirt,” Mark orders.
“What?”
Without asking, he grabs my shirt. My belly is covered in nasty contusions, bright red marks deep. I inhale sharply and feel a diffuse pain, spreading through me like sunshine when you’re camping in the pines in the northern woods, that moment when the sun pours through and chases the cold away.
“You could have internal bleeding.” He’s somber, glaring at me like I’ve done something wrong.
I cough again. More blood.
“No. I have to go with her -- ” The coughing fit consumes me, followed by a sudden tightness inside my gut, like someone’s twisting and pulling a rope in me. My organs are playing tug of war. I’m aware of thirst, then pain, my eye fuzzy, vision weird. During the lead-up and the fight, I fought it all off.
The body remembers.
The body demands to be heard.
“God damn it,” Mark snaps, holding my arm. “We need another stretcher for him!” he shouts as a strange pounding fills the room, like thousands of soldiers in formation, headed for war on a hollow gymnasium floor.
“I’m fine.” Cough. “I’m -- ”
I’m tired.
So tired.
