Crow’s Row

  That was when I saw him, standing there with his dog, the gray sweater giving him away in the shade. He had his back to me, and the tattooed man that I had seen with him earlier was next to him—I could see a spiderweb tattooed on the back of his neck. There were two other men flanking both of them—I didn’t recognize either of them.

  Meatball was a different dog. He looked vicious and rabid, slobbering madly and trying to crunch into something that I could not see.

  When one of the men shifted his stance slightly, I saw what all four of them were looking at and what Meatball had been trying to sink his teeth into. There, crouched on the ground, was a man; he was groaning. His pants were ripped and blood-spattered. From the bloody wounds on his arms and legs, I could tell that Meatball had already had a taste.

  The boy who I had obsessed over was murmuring to the crouched man. I couldn’t hear what he said, but whatever the crouched man said in response displeased the group. The tattooed man proceeded to punch and kick him.

  The others stood around, silently, calmly watching him do this, while the man on the ground curled into a ball, his head hidden in his arms, wailing. With each punch and kick came a disgusting thudding sound, like meat being pulverized. My ears were drumming, and I thought I was going to be sick, but I could not move away, could not look away. I wanted to yell, beg them to stop, but even if I’d had the guts to say anything, the muscles of my mouth were numbed.

  At last, the beating stopped.

  The man slowly peered up from between the protection of his arms, and I was taken aback. Although he was bleeding profusely, I still recognized him—he was the runner who had come out of the cemetery shortly after I did, right before I had disappeared down the hill.

  My hands came to my mouth, trying to suppress the cry that was building at the edge of my throat. And the man on the ground immediately turned his bloodied eyes to me. He must have seen my sudden movement in the shadows, I thought … like a coward, I withdrew further into the shadows for fear that he would betray my presence and present the attackers with an alternate prey.

  When he turned to his aggressors and said something that I couldn’t hear, my heart dropped. I felt powerless. Was I still breathing?

  Whatever the crouched man had whispered to the boy in the gray sweater, it had sent him over the edge. His arms started shaking. He brought his hand to his back, pulled a gun from the waist of his jeans and shots rang out in the dead air.

  When my eyes came to refocus, the man on the ground had stopped moving. Blood spattered the ground, and the three other men who were flanking the shooter had spun around.

  They looked at me with complete surprise on their face.

  Without realizing it, I had been screaming and I was still screaming and shaking and I couldn’t stop or move any other part of my body … like my legs, to run away from them.

  “Cameron,” breathlessly yelled the tattooed man, grabbing the shooter by the shoulder and forcing him to turn around.

  The boy in the gray sweater spun. Our eyes met again, and his face turned pale.

  A twig snapped behind me.

  The thunder roared one last time … before everything went dark.

  Chapter Four:

  Chow Mein

  There was a flash of light and distant noises. My head felt like someone was taking an ice pick and chipping away at my skull with sadistic blows. I decided that death couldn’t be this painful, so I was probably not dead … or this was what hell was supposed to feel like.

  My eyes were pried open, and a light came flashing again. This was followed by an animalistic groan, like a bear cub—was that me?

  I managed to flutter my eyes open without anyone’s help. Inches away from my face, someone was holding a pen-sized flashlight. I couldn’t focus enough to see him, but I could definitely smell him: cigarettes, booze, dirt.

  The ceiling was swimming. I thought I was going to vomit, and I had to let my eyelids drop to stop the spinning. Slowly, the muffled sounds became words.

  “What’s your name, sweetheart?” asked the man with the flashlight. His voice was raspy, and I could smell the nicotine off his breath.

  “None of your business,” I managed, my voice bouncing like a rock against the walls of my skull. I could hear snickering in the background. I tried to get up, but barely managed to get my head off the pillow before it fell back with a thump.

  “Whoa there, sweetheart! Not so fast! You’ve got a pretty big bump on that little noggin of yours,” said the raspy voice.

  That would explain the blinding pain. “My name is definitely not sweetheart,” I defied—and there was more snickering from the peanut gallery.

  “Of course it isn’t, honey. But that’s all I’ve got to work with right now,” he told me.

  It’s not honey, either, I thought, but was in too much pain to argue with him on his use of sexist remarks.

  “She’s probably got a mild concussion,” assessed the man with the nicotine breath. “Just make sure she gets plenty of rest and wake her up every few hours overnight. Give me a call if she gets any worse.”

  “She looks like she’s in pain. Can she take anything?” asked a deep voice that I instantly recognized. I forced my eyes open. The boy in the gray sweater—Cameron—was standing at the foot of the bed, and color still hadn’t returned to his face.

  “Not for the next twelve hours. But I’ll leave you something for tomorrow,” replied nicotine breath, like he was in hurry. The doctor’s stink matched his appearance, as if he had just crawled out of a cardboard box in a back alley. His dress shirt, which might have once been white, was untucked and had dark yellow and brown stains, particularly under the armpits and around the collar. His dress pants were grossly wrinkled and equally stained.

  “Thanks, Doc.” Cameron furtively glanced in my direction and turned to the scary tattooed man who was standing behind him, in a soldier-like stance.

  There was another boy leaning against the white wall. By the grin on his face, he must have been the instigator of the earlier giggling at my expense. He was a big kid, standing at least six feet tall and built like he should be throwing bales of hay around. He reminded me of an oversized Chucky doll, except with disheveled brown hair instead of red.

  With a nod from Cameron, the tattooed man dug into his pocket and pulled out a wad of rolled-up bills. Not missing a beat, the Doc grabbed the cash and rushed out of the room without taking one more look at his patient. So much for bedside manner.

  The tattooed man followed the doctor out the door, shooting me a frosty glare on his way out. Cameron turned his focus to the other boy.

  “Get out of here, Kid,” he ordered. I watched as the kid walked out the door without saying a word, but with the same stupid grin on his face.

  And then we were alone.

  I ran my fingers through my hair, hitting a bump at the crown of my head.

  “Ouch,” I said in an almost whisper. But Cameron heard me and glanced back. As soon as our eyes met, he looked away. I tried to read his face, but his expression was blank.

  “Get some rest,” he said harshly as he too walked out, closing the door behind him.

  I lay there, circling my fingers into my temples and trying hard to remember what had happened: the last thing I remembered was Cameron’s empty stare after I had watched him kill an innocent man in cold blood. This I tried hard to forget.

  I was still alive, and the name of the boy in the gray sweater was Cameron. Of these two things I was almost sure. Everything else was a blur, including where I was and how I had gotten there.

  I struggled to sit up and flip my legs over the edge of the bed. My eyelids were heavy; all I wanted to do was sleep.

  My feet hit the cool wooden floors—and I suddenly noticed that I didn’t have my sneakers on anymore. Slightly panicked, I looked to see if anything else was missing, or different. I didn’t know what I was expecting to find, but whatever it was, I didn’t find it. Except for the grass stains on my knees, the rubber
band that was missing from my hair, and the immense throbbing against my skull, everything else on my body was the way I had last left it.

  With a stiff neck, I scanned my surroundings; there wasn’t much to decipher. I was in a small room, lit only by the bedside lamp that was on the table next to the bed. There was an armchair with a rose velvet cushion in one corner. Three of the walls were of a pristine white and frameless. The other wall was made up of four floor-to-ceiling undraped windows.

  After waiting for another bout of nausea to pass, I went to the window, holding on to the small table as support for my shaky frame. Outside, the sun-setting sky was of resilient palettes of orange, red, and pink, and I was peering over the shadows of endless rooftops. Wherever I was, it was high above a city, at least thirty stories high. Down below, a yellow cab was waiting at a red light on an otherwise empty street. I couldn’t decide if I was still in Callister—I thought I recognized the clock tower that stood at the center of the city square, but it was too distant and I was too tired to be sure. My hand pressed against the glass; I closed my eyes until the dizziness passed.

  I slowly, painfully trudged to the door of the bedroom and placed my ear against its smooth white surface. I could hear a TV echoing in the background and hushed voices, but nothing else. I twisted the doorknob, expecting it to be locked, but it wasn’t. Without a sound, I cracked the door open. Initially I was surprised to find that no one was keeping guard at the door, and then a sound from the ground startled me. The dog, Meatball, who had apparently been keeping the guard and had suddenly just seen me, quickly got up on all fours, his tail wagging excitedly. I could tell that he was getting ready to pounce. I speedily closed the door, hearing his disappointed whine.

  I dragged myself back to bed, got under the warm covers, and let my eyelids fall once again. I had expended whatever small resource of energy I had left in me.

  I would have to stay there—wherever there was—until my broken brain healed and could come up with a survival plan.

  Within a few minutes, I was asleep.

  I heard someone clearing his throat, and I was startled awake. The room was blackened, except for the light that was pouring in from the hallway. Cameron was standing by the open door, like he was waiting for me to wake up. I looked up at him through a sleepy, confused haze. He looked tired but satisfied, and he slid out, closing the door behind him.

  I fell back asleep almost immediately.

  The same thing happened many more times. Cameron would walk into the room, make some small noise, wake me up. Then I’d look up and he’d quietly exit the room—his expression always blank. He had apparently taken on the task of ensuring that I didn’t die in my sleep—so far, he had decided to keep me alive, for whatever reason.

  In the morning, I woke up to the sound of Meatball whining at the closed bedroom door and the blinking pain localized to the top of my head. The grayish light of dawn was coming in through the wall of windows.

  I sat up in bed, letting my tired head fall against the cold wall behind me. It wasn’t until I saw Cameron that I remembered where I was—well, at least I recognized the room I was in. He was sleeping, uncomfortably sprawled on the too-small armchair. He was still fully dressed, but had obviously changed out of his bloody gray sweater—I couldn’t remember if he still had it on when I had first woke up in this room.

  His head was rolled back and resting on the wall with one hand half fallen over his eyes, an unconscious effort to block out the rising sun. His brown hair was scruffy, like he’d raked his hand through it a thousand times. The dark circles under his eyes told the story of someone who hadn’t been sleeping much, probably not for many days.

  I watched him like this for a while, committing his features to memory.

  And then his watch beeped, and he jumped awake, momentarily disoriented. His eyes quickly found me.

  “How long have you been awake?” he asked with a hoarse voice, squinting down at his watch.

  “A while, I guess,” I said with care, pulling the covers up to my chin.

  He passed both hands over his entire face, rubbing his skin awake. “How are you feeling?”

  “Fine,” I answered quickly without really thinking about the question.

  Cameron moved to the side of the bed and stopped short, deliberating. Was he debating shooting me now or later? I looked for signs of trouble, like a dog going on the attack, like a gun being pulled out from the back of his jeans.

  With a movement that was too fast for my bruised brain to analyze, Cameron sat next to me and rushed his hand to my face. In instinct, I gasped and recoiled from him. His eyes widened, and he snapped his hand away like he’d just been burned.

  The features of his face washed with … Guilt? Worry? Anger? Disappointment? I couldn’t be sure.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice notably softer. “I was just going to check the bump on your head. I won’t hurt you.”

  His concern was unreserved, which made my throat immediately squeeze shut. It was too late—the tears had sprung to my eyes.

  “I’m fine … really,” I said in answer to the increased concern on his face.

  “You don’t look fine.”

  I wiped the tears as soon as they escaped my eyes. “This is stupid. I don’t know why I’m crying.”

  “I do,” he mumbled resentfully, his jaw tightening. “Can I check your head … even if you say you’re fine?”

  I nodded through my sniffles and bent my head forward as a peace offering. My heart pumped hard in my chest while his fingers parted the hairs at the crown of my head and pressed lightly on the bump. My face winced under the cover of my hair.

  “Does this hurt?” he asked.

  “No,” I lied, the strain in my voice betraying me.

  “I didn’t think so,” he said. “I’ll get you something for the pain.”

  Before I could refuse, he was out the door, and Meatball had found his way in. In an instant, he was on the bed, crawled up and laying his head on my chest. I rubbed his floppy ears; he whined. For a big beast, he could be cute, as long as he wasn’t trying to bite your head off.

  “Meatball. Out. Now.” Cameron’s authoritative voice startled both Meatball and me.

  Like the boy the night before, Meatball immediately obeyed, but not before slipping me a lick with his sticky tongue against my hand.

  “Wow! Does everyone just jump like that when you give orders?” I blurted as I watched the dog run out.

  “Not everyone,” he said dryly. He walked over to my bedside and handed me two little white pills and a large glass of water. The water was liquid gold to my eyes: my mouth tasted like I’d been licking the chalk off a blackboard all night. As for the mystery pills, I hesitated and shyly glanced up.

  Cameron folded his arms. “It’s still really early and you need to get more rest. The pills will help with the pain so you can get some sleep.” He stood there, watching me like I was a mental patient, ensuring that the crazy girl took her pills.

  I needed to get some answers; starting with what I thought I knew seemed like a good idea. “Your name is Cameron,” I mused, my voice echoing inside the glass.

  Cameron’s body stiffened. “Uh-huh.”

  We watched each other while I took two large gulps of water to make sure that my throat was open to choke down the drugs.

  He deliberated again before sitting next to me.

  “What else do you remember?” he asked me.

  Color rushed to my face. “Is this where I tell you that I don’t remember anything?” I blurted again. As soon as the words came out of my mouth, I wished I would have spent more time thinking about the weight of his question and coming up with a response that wouldn’t get me killed.

  “No,” he said without blinking, “this is where you tell me the truth.”

  I took my time swallowing the first pill and my tears. “That man in the cemetery, what did he do to deserve what you did to him?” I needed him to tell me that the man hadn’t been just some ra
ndom runner who was in the wrong place at the wrong time—that only bad people got killed—that girls like me didn’t get killed just because they witnessed a murder.

  His face hardened. “You assume that the man was blameless.” This wasn’t a question—he had read what had been lingering in my mind. “What if I told you that justice was served?”

  “He’s dead, isn’t he.”

  “What does it matter?” he said. “It’s not like you knew him.”

  I closed my eyes, which forced the tears to drop down my cheeks. Then the words came drooling out before I had time to process them. “His family will never know what happened to him, and they’ll spend the rest of their lives wondering what they could have done to change things. There doesn’t seem to be much justice in that.”

  I fearfully braced myself for the blows that would come next. When I felt his fingers quickly brush my damp cheek, I opened my eyes. There was no anger on Cameron’s face—but his eyes were appraising.

  I cleared my throat to cut through the pain in my chest, and I swallowed my second pill. My fingers tingled—the first pill was already working its magic. Whatever I was chugging down, it was potent.

  “Cameron,” I said, “what am I doing here?”

  “You’re resting.”

  “Who were all those people in the room yesterday?” I probed again, my head falling into the pillow.

  “My colleagues.” His stare was unwavering while my eyelids were getting heavy. I was fading fast.

  “How long are you going to keep me here?” I drowsily continued.

  Cameron pulled the glass out of my numbed hands and set it on the table next to me. “For as long as it takes.”

  “And what are you going to do with me?” This came out as a whisper. My eyes were barely slit open.

  Cameron paused on this question. He scanned my face, like the answer was written somewhere between the freckles.