Prologue #2
“Justin…” I try to sound soft, not prickly as I usually do when I talk to him… which is, like, five times in the last few years. In fact, today is the most we’ve spoken since… yeah, since that night. His face changes in an instant, as if he’s remembering the same.
“I didn’t forget who you are and what you did,” he spits and takes a step back, his demeanor turning hostile before I can even blink.
The fire truck screeches to a halt next to the diner, and firefighters pour out of it. I turn to look at Justin, but he’s gone. I glance around, but he’s nowhere in sight. A dang Houdini.
“Kayla? What the fuck happened to you?” Mark, one of the firefighters who used to be my neighbor and an occasional savior, drops down next to me.
“Rachel, I need some help over here!” He waves to one of the paramedics that just arrived, and a tall lady in uniform rushes to me, carrying a massive canvas bag with that unmistakable medical symbol on the side.
“Kayla,” Mark calls out again, “are you okay?” He touches my face and softly nudges me to turn toward him.
He’s the only person from my past who is still nice to me.
When you cross that invisible line from trailer park to the ‘richer part,’ you don’t automatically become one of the ‘good’ ones, and the ‘old’ ones don’t accept you anymore either.
That’s how you become a king without a kingdom—and being stuck in that purgatory gets lonelier every day.
So when I face him, I break down .
“Oh, shit,” he mutters as he gathers me in his arms. I let out all the pent-up fear, anger, and disappointment built up over the past few hours—the past few years —on his shoulder.
Rachel gives me time to cry it out, but then she tepidly suggests, “Mark, I need to check her vitals. You can resume in a few once I make sure she’s alright.”
Mark rubs my back one more time and steps away. “I’ll be back. Take care of her, Rach,” he instructs, and pulls his firefighter helmet on before rushing into the diner. Now the paramedic has full access to my injuries. She checks my blood pressure and pulse before moving to address my head.
“I’m sorry this happened to you, hon.” She gives my shoulder a supportive pat. “I hope whoever did it will be punished.”
“I think he already was,” I mutter darkly, and she hums her approval as she pulls an oxygen mask over my nose, and I begin coughing.
“Give it a moment,” Rachel assures me, helping adjust the mask. As she promised, the coughing subsides in seconds, and I start to breathe easily. Swallowing substantial gulps of pure oxygen, I watch her cleaning my wrists. “I’ll have to take you to the hospital for overnight observation.”
“No, I’m good.” I vigorously shake my head, thinking of the bills that will inevitably follow a hospital stay. I don’t have health insurance. It’d be cheaper to die.
“I didn’t ask for your thoughts on the matter.” She throws me a stern look. “You’re going to the hospital because you inhaled a lot of smoke, and the state will pay for it. Got it?”
“Yes, ma’am.” She reminds me of Marina a little—scary but caring.
She helps me into the back of an ambulance and tells the driver to go. Little Hope is not a big town, so the drive to the clinic takes less than five minutes.
I’m admitted to the trauma side. The clinic building is huge, I’d consider it a tiny hospital by local standards, but there are not enough doctors and nurses in Little Hope, so it feels eerily deserted.
I heard that a long time ago, when the clinic was built, it was famous for its family of doctors who worked there generation after generation.
But at some point, one of them got bored and moved to a big city, and the clinic began dying out.
A shame, really, because the place is enormous, and Little Hope could certainly use some good people.
A doctor knocks on the door to check up on me, circles under his eyes.
He listens to the paramedic repeating my vitals and the situation as his eyes scan his clipboard with furrowed brows.
“This town has changed so much,” he mutters, sounding personally offended.
“Assaulted. At Marina’s place downtown.” He shakes his head in disapproval.
“Your vitals look good,” he declares after a moment, glancing over me perfunctorily, “but I want to keep you overnight. The nurse will come to check on you later. Now get some rest. You look like you’ve been through hell. ”
“Thank you?” I want to laugh at his statement, but I also want to cry.
He sweeps from the room, and Rachel takes his place beside me. “I’ll let Mark know the room number. He’ll want to check on you.” She tells me, her voice soft.
I nod with a quiet “thank you.” She smiles and disappears through the door, and I’m left alone with the events of the evening. But not for long.
Mark bursts in a minute later, face smudged with ashy streaks from the fire. “Kayla, you okay? Rachel told me they’re keeping you overnight.” His mouth pulls down in a grimace. “Is it that bad?”
I wave his worry off. “No, they just want to make sure I didn’t inhale too much smoke. I’m fine, really.”
“Okay.” His relieved sigh is heavy and loud. “How did you get out of the diner?”
“Justin.”
“ Justin got you out?” Disbelief is apparent in his voice.
I still can’t believe it either. I loosely shrug one shoulder, shifting uncomfortably. “Yeah. He and Alex Crawley were there, and he… yeah.”
“Huh.” His eyes are focused on the wall, lost in his thoughts. “I guess he got one thing right.”
I chew on my lip, contemplating whether I should ask Mark to do something he won’t like. I decide to go through with my request. I don’t have any other choice. “Can you do me a favor?”
“Sure. What’s up?” He scratches his cheek, smearing the black smudges further.
“Can you find out what happened at Alex Crawley’s house tonight?”
His gaze meets mine, puzzled. “But you just said?—”
“Yeah, it’s a long story I don’t even understand myself,” I explain haplessly. “That’s why I need you to help me out. Can you?”
He nods, disappearing for about half an hour.
When he returns, he delivers the news that Freya was admitted here, too, but is staying in another wing, and that she’s got a good handful of visitors—including Justin and Jake.
I ache to go and check on her, but I don’t have the mental capacity to battle with either of the Attleborough’s right now.
Mark’s lips are firmly pressed together after he delivers all the news about the events that he could gather. “You know what’s not fair? That you’re here alone?—”
The door bursts open, and Marina flies in. Noticing me on the bed, she throws herself on me and envelopes me in a bear hug.
“You were saying?” I quirk a brow at Mark over her shoulder, a wry look on my face. Despite my elation at having visitors, I can’t help the sting deep down when faced with the fact that I’m damn lucky even two people are here for me.
After hugs, a hundred questions, and apologies, Marina releases me and discreetly dabs her eyes with a tissue. She fluffs the pillow under my head, tucks the blanket around me, and takes a seat in the chair beside the bed, making sniffling sounds.
Only a moment later, Kenneth Benson, the local sheriff and Alex Crawley’s half brother, bustles inside after a quick knock. “Sorry, Kayla, I was a little preoccupied with the madness happening in Little Hope today.”
He takes my statement and tells me the same version of events that Mark already revealed, confirming my suspicions that I was most likely attacked by the same person who attacked Freya—her vicious ex. And that he’s not a threat to any of us anymore.
I sigh in relief. Am I a bad person? And will it be too naive to hope that Justin might show up and check on me today?
Yeah, I’m too naive because he never does.