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Better that than the alternative, don’t you think?
As we pulled into the Emergency Room parking lot, Jackson asked, “How do you want to do this?”
I swallowed and brushed the tears from my face. “I’m not sure there’s an appropriate way to do this, you know?”
He whispered, his voice husky, “I guess you’re right.” He sighed heavily. “Do you want me to carry you, or do you want me to get someone?”
“Don’t leave me, please. Just carry me in there.” I replied. I didn’t think I could stand being left alone to wait.
“Okay, I’ll try not to jostle you too much.”
He opened the door and slid out of the truck. I cried out when he pulled me into his arms. Fresh tears coursed down my cheeks.
He grimaced and looked down at me. “Katie, are you sure you want me to carry you?”
Looking at him, the pain on his face and in his eyes broke my heart. Jackson was hurt as well. He was covered in injuries—cuts, bruises, and a fresh bullet wound. Plus, he was still healing from the last gunshot wound.
As I looked him over, I noticed he was bleeding. Dried blood covered him, but some of the wounds must have opened back up.
I needed to suck it up. I wouldn’t be a hindrance. I refused to be an albatross around his neck. He deserved better. Tears sprang to my eyes as I said, “Jackson, honey, put me down and go get someone. You’re injured, too. You shouldn’t be carrying me.”
Jackson started walking, ignoring my words. When I began to protest, he said, “Katie, I don’t care if they’d cut off both my arms. I’d find a way to carry you if you needed or wanted to be carried.”
I swore under my breath as another round of tears pricked at the back of my eyes, making my nose burn as I tried to hold them in. He was such an amazing man. He loved me fiercely, even when I was an idiot. Even after everything we’d been through, he still said the sweetest things.
“Thank you,” I whispered, my chin trembling with emotion.
I held onto him and nestled my head into his neck as the large automatic glass doors slid open. We struck a pretty gruesome picture, Jackson and I. He was in jeans and barefoot, his torso bare and covered in blood, sweat, lacerations, surgical scars, and two gunshot wounds. Then there was me, naked as the day I was born, being carried into an emergency room lobby wrapped in the bloody sheet I’d been laying on when…yeah, just when.
I wasn’t ready to go there just yet. Maybe never. My brain wasn’t on the same page, though. Once that thought crossed my mind, it hung out there, refusing to be pushed away. I remembered every horrible, devastating second. I could hear and feel his breath on my face. The smell of stale cigarettes filled my nostrils.His body odor clung to me still. I was sticky with his sweat from where his flesh slid over mine.
“Oh, my God!” A shrill voice yelled. “Margaret, we need a gurney and a chair. STAT!”
I heard people talking around me, but not everything got through. Jackson checked with me before he laid me on the gurney. He reassured me that he wasn’t going anywhere. Jackson sat in the wheelchair they gave him. But when they moved to wheel me away from Jackson, what little bit of control I had disappeared like fog under a blazing sun.
Screams echoed off the walls as I fought to stay with Jackson. There was no way in hell I was letting them separate us. I couldn’t bear the thought of either of us being alone. He couldn’t leave my sight. After everything we’d been through, fear that something would happen to him beat at me like a drum as blood rushed through my body alongside the pain that bounced around as I tried to get to Jackson.
Jackson jumped out of the wheelchair, tipping it over. He grabbed the side of the gurney. A doctor attempted to restrain him, but Jackson shoved the man and then punched the security guard, who tried to step in.
“Everyone, back off, now!” A calm voice filled with authority demanded. My and Jackson’s gazes swiveled to the newcomer. The man, a doctor, walked through the chaos, nurses, doctors, and security guards parting as if he were the be-all, end-all.
I stared at him and Jackson, unable to grasp what was being said. The doctor spoke to one of the guys who’d tried to separate Jackson and me as he proceeded around us, leading the way.Jackson threaded our fingers together and gripped the gurney with the other hand as I was pushed away from the crowd.
Once in the room, the same doctor stepped forward. I could hear and see them talking, but I’d reached my limit. My brain went offline when the doctor approached to deal with the chaos. From that point on, people came and went. Everyone gave Jackson a wide berth and looked at us both in pity.
The whirlwind of people continued over the next several hours. It droned on and on with medical procedures and interrogations. I could hear and feel people moving around me, and I spoke, but only if someone spoke directly to me. For the most part, I had checked out, blocking out everything else as I focused on Jackson.
Jackson was my hero. My savior. My salvation. The center of my universe. I pulled my love for him and his for me into mind because if living through the assault wasn’t enough, if watching the man I love to be tortured wasn’t enough, if lying there in pain wasn’t bad enough, now they had to fix what was broken.
We only ever allowed ourselves to be separated during the X-rays and scans. Even when the plastic surgeon stitched Jackson up, we were only separated by a retractable glass wall. Neither of us would leave the other’s side for long.
Jackson never left my side when they examined me. He sat with me through the entire ordeal, finger-combing my hair and brushing away my tears once he was allowed. Those small gestures grounded me. They gave me something to focus on other than the pain and humiliation.
Jackson held my hand as they popped my dislocated hip back in place. Then he moved to stand at my feet. He rubbed circleson my calf as the doctor and nurses worked on my dislocated shoulder.
They called the popping a reduction. I called it fucking hell on earth. It hurt worse for them to fix it than it did when they were dislocated.
Then, the humiliation and degradation really began.
