19 – Robbery at 24/7 (3)

Stellaluna arrived at the empty cottage with Lady Chatterley’s Lover in hand. Since Barry was occupied with his podcast, she figured she’d take the spare time to attempt to read the book. She sat at the table, and opened it to the first chapter.

“Ours is…” Stellaluna squinted. “essemt… essent? Ah-ly? Essentially?” She took a deep breath. “a tra-guh-ic? Tragic? Essentially a tragic ag-eh…” She wasn’t even halfway through the first sentence.

The door opened. Stellaluna whipped around, hand clutched to her chest. But it was just Yannick.

He closed the door behind him, and walked over to her. His eyes landed on the book. “You started without me?”

“Yes. You missed the first six words.” Stellaluna leaned back in the chair. “It’s too hard.”

Yannick took the chair next to her, and leaned over to read the open page. “It is still doable. We can take turns. You start with the first sentence. I read the rest of the paragraph.”

“Okay. Ours is essentially a tragic… age? So we refuh… refuse? To take it tragic...ally.”

“That was good.” Yannick gave her a smile that made her heart race. “I must ask… What is ‘tragic?’”

“Huh?”

“I know not the word.”

“Oh. It’s something sad.”

“Ah.” Yannick nodded, then smiled again. “You are not the only one learning.”

Good. It made Stellaluna feel less stupid. She watched Yannick pull the book towards himself to read the rest of the paragraph.

The two got into an easy rhythm, Stellaluna with the first sentence of a new paragraph and Yannick with the rest. It turned out not being as hard as Stellaluna originally feared. Yes, she struggled to sound out half of the words. But there were plenty of short, common words she began to recognize on sight. Progress!

Every so often, Yannick would stop to ask what a word meant. He, too, struggled with the text. But in a different way.

They reached the end of the first chapter. “What think you?” Yannick asked.

It was a lot for her brain to take in. Much more dense than The Adventures of Kate the Cat. “Overwhelming.”

Yannick tilted his head to the side.

“A lot to take in.”

“Yes. I believe it gets better.”

But it was sad that the woman’s husband couldn’t bear children. Stellaluna knew all too well what that was like, not being able to bear children, even if one wanted to. She didn’t feel like dumping her problems on Yannick though, and ruining what was otherwise a fun evening together. “I like it more than the cat book.”

“Does that mean you want to continue?”

The room had grown slightly dim. If they read any longer, they’d have to turn on a light, which came with the risk of someone seeing a light on in the supposedly-abandoned cottage. “I do, but it’ll be dark soon. And won’t people start wondering where you are?” Yannick had never been at the cottage for more than a half hour at a time, and a second chapter would push them to an hour.

Yannick shrugged. “My areas are clean enough. It is only when they are not, that people miss me.”

“If anyone ever complains, tell them I asked you to help me with something private.” Stellaluna checked her watch. It was almost 5. “We can read the next one.”

~~~~~

Maple arrived at the hospital with her brothers, and they went straight to the emergency room. Walker struck up a conversation with a man behind the service desk. “We’re here to see Neil McNeil.”

“Are you family?” the man asked.

“About to be.” Carter clasped his hand on Maple’s shoulder. “Our sister here is supposed to marry him this summer. She’s devastated.”

The man’s face softened. “I really can’t let anyone other than family see him right now, but I'll check with the doctor.”

Maple watched him walk away, into a back room. She strummed her fingers on the counter, reflecting on the last time she had been in a hospital. It was when her parents were both sick with diphtheria, and died. What would her life be like right now if they were still alive?

Her father always yelled at her about something or another. Always yelled at her mother too. And her mother just took it. She’d told Maple many times about how it’s a woman’s duty to listen to her husband, to do what he tells her to do. Seeing their depressing relationship was one of the main reasons Maple didn’t want to get married.

She didn’t miss either of them, and she doubted her life would be much different had they lived.

The man returned. “You can see him.”

They followed the man into the back, down a hallway, passing a few vacant stretchers along the way. They entered a small room with a bed. On it, laid Neil. Or, Maple guessed it was Neil. His head was wrapped in bandages, so it was hard to see his face and hair.

“I’ll leave you to it. A doctor will be in here soon to check on him.” The service man left.

The group faced Neil. He was hooked up to several tubes and machines. If Maple pulled any of them out, would he die? Would people think it was an accident, or would they be able to tell someone did it on purpose? Regardless, Maple couldn’t do anything with her brothers standing next to her. She listened to the slow beeping of the heart monitor, wishing it would go flat. Feeling like a horrible person for wishing such a thing. But it would easily solve her problem…

A doctor walked in. He gave them all a sad smile. “You must be the almost-family.”

“It’s supposed to happen this summer,” Walker said. “We were just starting to make plans.”

The doctor shook his head. “A shame. But we’re doing all we can. Not many survive a shot to the head. And if he does survive, recovery will be rough. There could be all sorts of complications. Cognition problems. Paralysis. Hearing or vision loss.” His gaze wandered to Maple. “It’ll be good for him to have a wife to help out.”

Awful as caring for Neil might be, at least he wouldn’t be able to hit her if he was paralyzed.

“But we won’t know until he’s up and talking, assuming he survives. Right now, he’s in a stage 6 coma. He can respond to pressure but, that’s about it.”

Maple morphed her face into one of concern. “So he’s more likely to die?”

“He has a better chance than most. We’re performing surgery in two hours to remove the bullet and skull shards.”

“Skull shards?”

“The bullet went through his forehead. His skull took most of the damage, so he has a fracture there. We have to do surgery on that later. He’s lost a lot of blood, so we have to wait until he recovers from that first. But usually it’s blood loss that kills people in his situation. It’s a good thing it happened in a convenience store. No shortage of supplies there to help stop the bleeding.” The doctor smiled at his comment. “After we get that bullet out, and get control on any swelling, we’ll know for sure if he’ll survive. Then, it’ll be a matter of him waking up.”

Hopefully he’d never wake up. “Can people die from just being in a coma?”

The doctor chuckled. “Like I said, it’s a stage 6. He’ll wake up. I wouldn’t worry unless it’s above stage 4.”

Damn it!

“The bullet went through his frontal lobe, and into his motor cortex. So if he does survive, he’ll have problems with movement. I’m afraid he’ll have to quit his current job.”

So he’d be home all the time, and Maple would get stuck taking care of all his basic needs. Great.

“Will he be able to get a job?” Walker asked.

“It depends on how well he recovers his motor skills. He’ll need to spend weeks in rehab, possibly months. Even after that, he won’t be the same. There’s a chance they can get him walking and moving, but he’ll never be able to chase down criminals. Maybe he can handle the paperwork instead.” The doctor looked at Maple, and nodded towards Neil. “Try holding his hand. Let’s see how he reacts.”

Maple absolutely did not want to hold Neil’s hand. She didn’t want to get any closer than she already was. But the three men stared at her, waiting. Suppressing a sigh, Maple walked over to Neil. He looked pale and gaunt, but also like he was sleeping. His arms were out over the blankets. Cautiously, Maple touched his hand with the tips of her fingers. It was rough, and warm. Very much still alive. She glanced over at the doctor and her brothers, who watched her.

Trying not to wince, Maple slipped her hand under Neil’s. Nothing happened. She released her breath, and made a move to pull her hand away. But Neil’s fingers wrapped around hers. Maple jumped back. “He moved!”

The doctor let out a laugh. “Yep. He’s still in there, somewhere. That’s always a good sign.”

Maybe to everybody else. Maple had gone right back to being stressed over her future with Neil.