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“It’s me—Kayla Marks from Presbyterian Hospital. Remember me?”
“Hey, Kayla,” I spoke in a groggy voice, sitting up. “It’s been a while. What’s wrong? Why did you call me so late?”
“I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news for you. Your brother was brought in about ten minutes ago. He’s been hurt pretty badly.”
Sleep made my mind foggy. “Colby?”
There was a pause. “It says here his name is Felix.”
I didn’t know whether to be relieved or to cry as I remembered that Colby was already gone. That at least meant he could never be hurt again. But Felix… now that was another story.
My stepbrother and I hadn’t spoken in years, and we’d never been close, even as kids. The proof was right there in the way I referred to him. He’d always felt like a stepbrother, while Colby had always felt like a biological brother, even though he wasn’t.
“What happened to him? Where is he hurt?”
“That’s all I can disclose over the phone, dear. You know the rules. If you want more information, you’re going to have to come down here.”
“Yeah,” I exhaled, cupping my forehead. “Thanks for calling me up, Kayla.”
“No problem.”
Scooting closer to the edge of my bed, I couldn’t help but wonder.
What did you get yourself into, Felix?
My brother had never liked to play by the rules. He loved to break them, no matter their importance. After having been fired from about a million jobs, he tried his luck in the army. Personally, I didn’t think he’d fit in, although my mother was a big fan of his choice. There was a chain of command in the army. A certain structure in place, which had to be respected by everybody, regardless of their rank. Sometime later, Felix returned home with his tail between his legs, claiming he had been wronged. Of course, a conversation with his superior told a different story.
He showed complete disregard to rank.
He and some of his fellow troopers had turned the barracks into a gambling house.
As for the icing on the cake? He had picked a fight with his squad leader.
That would be all she wrote. Not only had he lost the only job that guaranteed he’d never starve, but he had tried to convince me that it wasn’t his fault. I had been sick and tired of hearing the same words come out of his mouth.
“Can I borrow some money?”
“I swear; this is the last time!”
“I’ve got something big in the works. Pretty soon, you won’t have to worry about me.”
Yeah, yeah…
We lost touch. I wasn’t proud of it, but there was nothing I could have done about it, either. My own blood had been too selfish to realize that I didn’t owe him a living. I wouldn’t always be there to save him from himself. He had to become his own man. Not depend on his little sister all the time…
More than an hour later, I was crossing the gate of Presbyterian Hospital, drowning in anger and fear. The few, unfamiliar faces around the reception desk didn’t appease me. I spotted the red emergency sign on a chart on the wall and rushed down the stairs. The wait for the elevator would feel like an eternity. In my haste, I didn’t even see a doctor coming the other way. My elbow bumping into his dossier, I knocked it out of his grasp, papers flying past the steps as that dossier tumbled to the floor.
Cool air from the air-conditioning hitting my skin, I looked around me. The “Emergency” sign was overhead, at the beginning of a somewhat narrow hall. Well down that hall, Kayla was heading in my direction. I might have not seen her in quite some time, but that girl hadn’t changed much. Her red hair and those freckles under her eyes, helped her stand out.
“Kayla,” I said, unable to keep the concern from my voice anymore.
“Hey,” she greeted me with a wave, my quick footsteps resounding across the basement. “Boy, you got here fast.”
“Tell me,” I said and paused to catch my breath. “Tell me more about Felix.”
“Well, as I was saying to his buddies back there, he’s lost quite a lot of blood,” she revealed, using her thumb to point behind her. I craned my neck and looked over her, my pulse rising more and more. Indeed, three, big figures were straight ahead, talking to one another. Hands in their pockets, they were putting distance between me and them. “He’s still in surgery. He needed a double transfusion. I’m not sure if he needs another one, but I wouldn’t rule it out. It’s a little too soon to tell.”
“Transfusion? Double?” I repeated her words, fear making my heart race harder.
