Chapter 21
Fuck, oh fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck!
My inner monologue is a stream of panicked, pain-filled obscenities as I struggle to get off the floor with only one functioning arm. I’m pretty sure my dad jerked my shoulder completely out of the socket when he dragged me to the ground—I can’t move it and the burning in the joint is excruciating—but that doesn’t matter now.
What matters is that my father is trying to kill my boyfriend before he’s even officially become my boyfriend.
We didn’t label things last night after we confessed our feelings. I assume professions of love and offers to set me up with a key to his place and a bank account in New York City are enough to take the boyfriend part for granted, but I don’t want to take it for granted.
I want to have that conversation with Weaver. I want to get excited about the first serious, committed relationship of my adult life. I want to relish every brilliant beautiful thing about being in love and taking the next steps with my person.
But, of course, none of that is going to happen.
It never was. Weaver and I were doomed from the start. This run-in with my father is just speeding along the inevitable ruin of the happiness I stupidly thought could be mine.
“Stop!” I cry out as my dad slams Weaver against the exterior of the elevator, sending a shudder through the glass encasing the shaft. “Dad, stop!”
But he just keeps slamming his fists into Weaver’s stomach with a speed and ferocity I didn’t realize my father still had in him.
As a younger man, he was one of the best boxers in the area. Before I was born, he used to win prize money in the amateur fights up and down the coast, and use it to take my mom out to fancy dinners. He still has a picture of them out at their favorite Italian place in Bangor on his mantle—Mom in a slinky gold dress and him with a black eye and a big grin.
But Dad hasn’t been that fit, powerful man in a long time.
This intensity isn’t a result of training or excelling at a sport; it’s rage, pure and simple. He’s running on adrenaline and hatred, and I can only hope he’ll run out of both before he does serious damage to Weaver’s body.
Because Weaver isn’t fighting back. He’s deflecting the blows as best he can, but he isn’t even trying to land a punch. He’s letting my father beat the hell out of him.
Maybe because he feels guilty for what he did years ago, maybe out of concern for me, but either way, it’s not right.
My dad is the one to blame. He’s the one who’s drunk at seven in the morning—I could smell the whiskey on him as he stumbled and dragged me down—and he’s the one who attacked Weaver.
“Stop!” I scream again, crying out in pain as I force myself to my feet, sending my useless arm swaying in an agonizing arc before it returns to my side.
I glance around, but there isn’t a member of the hospital staff to be found, and the rest of the bystanders are backing away from the violence. Poor Aunt Cathy is the only one trying to get through to Dad—screeching at him from a few feet away—but she’s shaking so hard I can’t understand what she’s saying.
There’s no one here to intervene.
No one but me.
So, I do what I’ve always done. I step up. I walk up to my father, channeling the bravest version of myself, and grab a handful of his hoodie with my good hand. I start to pull him backward, but he spins and slams his fist into my stomach so hard I swear I feel his knuckles connect with my spine.
“Oh fuck, Gertie,” my dad slurs, his clenched fists releasing with a spasm. “I didn’t see, I didn’t know it was you.”
My breath rushes out and stays out as I clutch at my midsection. Pain blooms deep in my core, spreading like a fast-moving cancer. A second later, my knees buckle and hit the ground.
“Oh no, oh, Gertie, I’m sorry,” Dad says, sinking down beside me as I fight for a breath. “Come on, honey, let me help.”
“Get away from her,” Weaver grunts from behind him.
“You get the fuck away!” Dad screams like the lunatic he is, adding a heaping helping of shame to the misery roiling through my belly. “This is your fault, you piece of shit. You ruined my life. You ruined everything! You’re a fucking devil.”
“This isn’t about you or me. She’s hurt,” Weaver says, his voice thick-sounding. “She could have internal injuries. We need to get her to the emergency room.”
I finally manage to wheeze in a breath, but before I can speak my dad shouts, “Fuck you! Don’t you dare tell me how to take care of my family.”
I look up, my heart shattering as I see the blood pouring from Weaver’s nose and down the front of his Yacht Club sweatshirt. He’s clutching his stomach, too.
I want to tell him how sorry I am. I want to tell him to run, to get away from my toxic father, but suddenly I’m bent over, vomiting watery streams of coffee onto the shining white tile as my internal organs continue to throb.
“Oh honey, oh no,” my dad sobs, his words barely audible over his blubbering. He puts his hands on my back, and I instinctively flinch away, which only makes him cry harder.
From my hunched position, I see two hospital employees with walkie-talkies and security uniforms running across the atrium, and know this nightmare is almost over. But the thought doesn’t bring much comfort.
The damage has already been done.
Everything is ruined. Even if Weaver still wants to be with me, my father has basically guaranteed that it will tear our family apart. As awful as Dad is, he’s still a Sullivan, and the Sullivans are a tribal lot.
As the guards grab Dad by each arm, dragging him away from me while he shouts and cries, I’m already making a mental list of all the relatives I’m pretty sure will side with him. There won’t be any more Christmas craft beer bingo at Great Uncle Charlie’s for me, no summer sleepovers at Aunt Emma’s little island cabin, and maybe not Thanksgiving dinner, either. Aunt Cathy loves me, but Dad’s her baby brother. There’s at least a fifty percent chance she’ll choose him.
Or choose neither of us.
The Sullivans might decide this entire branch of the family should be cut off in a clean break. If Gramps dies, there won’t be anyone with real influence to advocate for us. Gramps is our patriarch, our leader, and he’s lying in an operating room on the third floor having stints put into his heart.
“Oh God,” Aunt Cathy says as she crouches down beside me, breathing so fast I’m afraid she’s going to hyperventilate and pass out. “Oh God, honey. Are you okay?”
I shake my head, tears sliding quietly from my eyes as I watch Dad being tasered by a third guard who’s appeared on the scene. Or maybe he’s a police officer. Maybe they all are. I can’t really tell. Whatever they are, they’re efficient. Once they’ve tasered Dad, they have him flat on his stomach with his hands zip-tied behind him in seconds.
“Oh no, oh no,” Aunt Cathy says, continuing to babble something about how she should have known better than to call my dad with bad news as Weaver appears on my other side, resting a gentle hand on my hip.
“Can I help you up?” he asks, his words still muffled by the blood in his nose. I thought Dad mostly got him in the stomach, but he clearly hit his face at least once, too.
“I’m sorry,” I manage to mumble, the tears coming faster, hotter.
“Don’t you dare apologize for him,” Weaver says, squeezing my thigh. “He doesn’t matter. You matter. Can I help you up and carry you to the ER? Do you want me to find a nurse and a wheelchair?”
“I can walk,” I say, even though I’m not sure I can. I’ve never experienced pain like this before. It feels like someone put a hot coal in my guts and left it there to burn.
“All right, let’s take this nice and slow,” Weaver says, guiding my good arm around his shoulders. Then, with his arm around my waist, he lifts me to my feet as gently as he can.
I know he’s being gentle, but the shift of my dislocated arm causes another blinding wave of pain to shoot from my shoulder straight into the base of my neck. Bright light flashes behind my eyes and for a second, I’m afraid I might pass out.
I’m not that girl, the swoony kind. I’m the girl who hoists my bestie across my shoulders and carries her off the beach when she’s had too much to drink. I’m the girl who finished a ten-mile hike with a twisted ankle and not a word of complaint.
I’m the girl who does the saving, not the one being swooped into a man’s arms.
But apparently, today, I am that girl.
Even though Weaver is probably hurting every bit as much as I am, he scoops me up, cradling me close as he whispers, “I’ve got you, Sully. I’ve got you.”
“Oh, thank you,” Aunt Cathy says, mincing along beside us as Weaver starts down the long hallway, leading to the older part of the hospital. “Thank you so much.”
“Sir, we need to speak with you,” a male voice calls from behind us. “We need to get your statement about what happened here.”
“Then follow us to the emergency room,” Weaver shoots back without slowing his pace or so much as glancing over his shoulder. “She’s hurt and needs to be checked out. Now.”
“You too,” I wheeze, curling my good hand into his shirt, where the fabric is tacky with cooling blood. “You’re hurt. You shouldn’t be carrying me. Put me down, I can walk now.”
“I’m fine,” Weaver says softly. “Don’t worry about me.”
“I’m sorry,” I murmur again, fresh tears in my eyes.
“We’re both so sorry,” Aunt Cathy pipes up, turning to the guard who appears beside her with a nervous flap of her hands. “Oh, please, just let him take my niece to the emergency room. I can talk to you. I was there. I saw everything. This man did nothing wrong. It was all my brother, the man your friends took away. He’s not well. He’s sick. In the head. He has been for years, the poor man. He didn’t realize what he was doing.”
The poor man…
Guess Cathy won’t be choosing me in the big family break-up, either. She’s being sweet to Weaver now, but once she realizes Weaver and I are more than just casual acquaintances, that will change, I’m sure. Cathy isn’t as anti-Tripp as my grandfather, but she proudly wears her “Tripp Lobsters Stick in my Craw” shirt when she hits the local pub with Uncle Tom.
“And our dad is having open heart surgery right now. Leon’s just out of his head with grief,” she continues, tears pooling in her faded blue eyes. She swipes at them with the sleeve of her flannel as we emerge from the hallway and Weaver takes a right.
The security guard or policeman, or whatever he is, still trails along beside her, and soon he’s joined by another guard. I catch a glimpse of the larger man, wearing what looks like a bulletproof vest, as Weaver stops in front of the elevator bank and hits the down button. We’ve acquired quite a following, but at least no one is trying to stop us and they seem to realize that Weaver isn’t to blame.
“Your brother still assaulted two people, ma’am,” the larger man says. “Once they’ve been treated in the ER, I’ll need to get their statements, and they’ll have the option to press charges.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head as the elevator doors open and our entire caravan of chaos files inside, causing the older couple waiting by the door to scuttle to the back of the car. “I don’t want to press charges. He didn’t mean to hit me. He’s never hit me before. It was an accident.”
The larger man sighs, his eyes sad and understanding and disappointed, all at the same time. “He’s your dad?” he asks, gently.
I nod. “Yeah. And Cathy’s right, he isn’t well. He has a drinking problem. A bad one. He has for a long time.”
“And what’s your connection to the assailant, sir?” the man asks, shifting his attention Weaver’s way as the elevator dings its arrival on the basement level.
“No connection,” Weaver says in his ice-cold voice. “And I will be pressing charges.”
Before the man can reply, Weaver’s hurrying through the open doors, aiming himself for the check-in desk across the large waiting room.