Where he left me, p.8
Where He Left Me, page 8
“Try to get him to swallow these,” I say, tapping two ibuprofen into my palm. I hand them over to Henry, along with one of the water bottles.
He just stares at the little orange pills in his hand. “What is it?”
My jaw actually drops. “Ibuprofen. An anti-inflammatory. A painkiller and fever reducer.” When I realize that Henry’s not buying it, I grasp his wrist and squeeze. “Trust me. It’ll help.”
He looks between me and Finn, contemplating. But it’s clear to both of us that Finn is suffering, and it seems like Henry is at the end of his rope, willing to take the risk. As he lifts Finn’s head and coaxes him to gulp one round tablet at a time, I use the quilts to create a sort of nest. I’ve forgotten a pillow, something to elevate Finn’s head and chest so that he doesn’t choke on any mucus.
“I’m running back to the house,” I tell Henry. “Try to get him to drink as much of that water as you can.”
Henry scoffs but doesn’t bother to glare at me as he gently wipes away liquid that has spilled all over Finn’s chin and neck. But it looks like the pills went down, and as I stand, I see Henry tip the water bottle to Finn’s mouth again.
When I return, I have three couch pillows, a bucket of cold water, and a couple of washcloths. I get Henry to help me move Finn to the improvised bed, his upper body elevated on the pillows. We pull a double-thick blanket up over the boy’s shoulders, and then I dip one of the rags into the bucket and squeeze it out. Henry watches as I wipe Finn’s face, drawing the cloth across his eyes, cheeks, and mouth. Wiping away the grime that coats every inch of his exposed skin. As I do so, I realize he’s adorable. Button nose, bow mouth, and thick, long lashes that any girl would envy. Finn moans, and when he does, a deep line appears between his eyes. I want to smooth it away but settle instead for dragging off his greasy hat and brushing his hair back. Henry doesn’t say anything until I rinse the washcloth for the last time, wring it out, and lay the cool compress on the little boy’s burning forehead.
“Where’d you learn how to do that?”
I’m not sure what he means. Use ibuprofen? Make a bed out of blankets? I decide it doesn’t matter. “My mom,” I say tightly. After Dad and Matty died, the only time she ever showed me tenderness was when I was sick. A slight fever and she nursed me like her life depended on it. Of course, when I got better and my need for her wasn’t so immediate, Alice Sheridan went straight back to being distant and aloof. But I clung to those rare moments of connection like a lifeline, and I used to pray for strep throat, a flu bug, a case of good old rotavirus. They proved to me that somewhere, deep down, my mother loved me enough to want me to be well.
Henry must have mommy issues, too, because his jaw goes rigid, and he looks away. “What do we do now?”
“Wait.”
“How long?”
“Depends. If the pills work, his fever will come down.” I shoot Henry a sideways glance. “Have you never taken ibuprofen before?”
He pauses just a second too long before saying, “Yeah, ours just don’t look like that. I didn’t know if…”
I let him trail off and don’t press the point. “Look,” I tell him, “I know I came in here a little aggressive. You were trespassing on my property, and I didn’t know who you were or what you were doing. You scared me.”
Henry grunts, and I take it to mean the feeling is mutual.
“But I’m not going to hurt you. And I swear I won’t hurt Finn.”
It’s an olive branch of sorts, but rather than accept the truce, Henry folds his arms across his chest and leans against the leg of one of the shelves that stretch the length of the greenhouse. He fixes me with a haughty look. “As soon as Finn feels better, we’re gone.”
I bite back an incredulous laugh. As if I’m keeping them here against their will. As if they aren’t the ones trespassing on my property. “You do that,” I say, settling against a shelf across from him. We’re facing each other, the narrow center aisle of the old greenhouse between us. Finn’s makeshift bed links me and the surly teen, with the sick boy’s head at my hip and his feet at Henry’s. If Henry wasn’t watching me like a hawk, like he half expects me to strangle Finn even though I’ve just done everything in my power to make him comfortable, to ease his pain, I’d rake my fingers through Finn’s hair. Maybe touch his cheek or curve just a bit closer to let him know that he’s not alone. I remember being sick, how scary and isolating it was, and how much better it felt when I knew someone was keeping vigil with me. But rather than reach for Finn, I ball my hands together in my lap.
The adrenaline that kept me focused and sharp from the moment Henry appeared on Felix’s computer screen is starting to drain away. In its absence, I become aware of just how cold it is in the greenhouse. How bright the overhead lights are. How weary I am.
“I’m going to get a few more things,” I tell Henry, levering myself up from the ground. I realize too late how weak I must look clinging to the wooden shelving as I rise. I’m a forty-something English professor, and without the aid of the bear mace and crowbar, I’m no match for an angry eighteen-year-old, no matter how malnourished he seems or how doubtful I am about his real age. I’m pretty sure he’s taller than me—pushing six feet—and his arms, exposed earlier in the saggy tank top, are ropey and strong. Henry is no soft-bellied gamer. That kind of lean muscle mass comes from hard work, and I have no doubt he could overpower me if he wanted to. Still, before I leave, I say, “Dip one of those washcloths in the cold water and hold it against your eye. You’ll feel better.”
When I return to the greenhouse for the last time, I’m carrying a battery-powered lantern and both of our sub-30 sleeping bags. I’ve slipped on my winter parka, and in the pockets, I have boxes of raisins and several of the protein bars that Felix likes. I’m also packing a small but wickedly sharp paring knife with a protective sleeve clicked over the blade, but I don’t want Henry to know about that. Glancing at the boys huddled on the floor, I berate myself for grabbing it at all. And then Henry looks up with hate in his eyes and I’m glad I did. He didn’t take my advice. The extra washcloth sits untouched beside the bucket.
“I’m going to shut off the main light,” I say, indicating the lantern. It’s already lit, glowing faintly, and will hopefully allow Finn to get some rest without leaving me alone in the dark with Henry. I don’t wait for an answer but hit the switch. The world is instantly black, the soft light of the lantern barely enough to illuminate even the first step I have to take. But I grip the knife inside my coat pocket and make my way carefully over to the boys.
“Here.” The tightly coiled sleeping bags are pinned under one arm, and I drop them into Henry’s lap. “One is for you, and I want you to open the other one up in case Finn needs it.”
“In case he needs it? It’s freezing in here.”
“We don’t want him to overheat,” I say, settling back onto the floor. “He’s buried in blankets—if the temperature drops much more, we’ll have it handy, but he’s okay for now.”
Placing the lantern on the floor between us, I lean over Finn and cup his face in my bare hands. Does he feel slightly cooler? I can’t tell, but the moisture at his temples reminds me that he needs to keep hydrating, and I raise the water bottle to his mouth for a few small sips. He drinks obediently but chokes on the last swallow and begins to cough. It’s a wracking, convulsive bark that is both wheezy and wet, and tears leak from the corners of Finn’s eyes as he struggles to breathe.
“What did you do to him?” Henry is on us at once, shoving me aside, though there’s nowhere for me to go. My shoulder slams into the rough wood of the shelf and I stay there, panting, while Henry attends to his brother. “Hey, buddy. You okay? I’m right here. It’ll pass.”
The coughing fit does pass a few moments later, but Henry stays where he is, half on top of me. He barely seems to register that I’m there at all. I want to throw him off—I feel panicked and trapped with his rank body over me—but I don’t want to trigger him. So I ease myself out from the cramped space between his steely side and the rough-hewn wood, yanking the hem of my coat when it wrenches me back. Henry doesn’t budge.
“It’s good for him to cough,” I say when I’m safely on the other side of the aisle. I’m breathless and fighting the urge to run back to the house and lock the door. Call 911, even though Henry swore he’d take Finn and disappear. The boy’s small hand curled like a chrysalis in the gentle maw of his brother’s much bigger fist is the only thing that stops me.
“How can that be good for him?” Henry asks after a few tense beats of silence.
“It clears his throat and airways, loosens up the mucus in his chest. Better out than in.” It’s what my mother used to say, rubbing my back as I bent over a pot of steaming water with a towel thrown over my head. “I have cough syrup, too, but I want to see how he reacts to the ibuprofen before we medicate him more.”
Henry doesn’t respond to this.
For a while we focus on the raspy breath raking in and out of Finn’s lungs, then I ask: “How old is he?”
“Fourteen,” Henry says.
It’s another lie. Finn is ten, eleven tops. I don’t understand why Henry feels the need to inflate their ages. Why not just tell the truth? But then Henry hands me the answer as if I voiced the question out loud.
“I’m his guardian. I make all the decisions about what happens to us. No one will take him away.”
Bingo. For some reason, Henry is afraid that he and Finn might be separated. A drop of respect for Henry bleeds into the picture I’ve been painting of him. I would lie, too, if it meant I could keep my brother with me.
My thoughts splinter, fracturing into a dozen questions and then a dozen more. But now that we’re finally settled, and Henry and I have more or less suspended the hostilities in our shared desire to help Finn, exhaustion sweeps over me like a flood. I’m warm enough, and the dim smolder of the lantern is almost homey. I know that I should fight sleep, keep vigil for both Finn’s sake and my own—I don’t dare turn my back on Henry—but the last time I slept for more than an hour or two was Saturday night. I’m wrecked, emotionally and physically, and try as I might, my body stubbornly continues to shut down.
The last conscious thought I have before I’m yanked under has nothing to do with Henry and Finn at all.
33 hours gone.
* * *
It’s after dawn when voices rouse me. The world is thick and pale outside the greenhouse, the soft gray of goose down. Inside, the air is still, compressed by the stench of illness and body odor, of dry rot and mold that I hadn’t noticed only hours before. Now it’s oppressive. It makes the long building feel close as a cardboard box.
I don’t move at first, but watch Henry as he bends over Finn, speaking softly and moving his hands in a series of gestures that seem too intentional to make him merely a prolific hand talker. When Finn raises a few fingers and signals back, I realize they’re using a sign language of sorts, but it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. Can Finn not talk? He was mumbling earlier. But perhaps the words I thought were jumbled by illness are mixed-up, regardless of whether or not he’s febrile.
I want to keep watching, to observe without letting them know I’m doing exactly that, but my neck is screaming, and my legs are completely numb. Before I can shift even an inch to ease the pain, Henry says without turning toward me: “He’s hungry.”
How did he know I was awake? “Hungry?” I echo, pulling my legs up and rubbing the back of my neck with one hand. “He’s feeling better?”
In answer, Henry shifts so that I can see Finn’s face. His big brown eyes are open for the first time since I found the brothers in the greenhouse hours ago, and though they’re glassy and hooded with exhaustion, his gaze is clear and lucid. He stares at me openly, his skin still porcelain white and his cheeks gaunt.
“Hi, Finn,” I say giving him a smile, a small wave. “I’m Sadie.”
Henry looks up at this and I realize I never told him my name. He never asked. Maybe it’s a bad idea to exchange pleasantries now, to invite these wild boys even further into the waking nightmare of my life, but the truth is, my name just slipped out. We survived the night, didn’t we? Henry didn’t kill me in my sleep. I guess that’s enough for now.
Finn waves back, an eloquent trill of his slender fingers, but doesn’t say anything. Instead, he cuts his eyes to Henry and dances his hands through another series of indiscernible movements. It’s graceful and mysterious, and I feel like there might be elements of ASL blended in with gestures that I’m sure are homemade. Years ago, when Peter and Carly, my best friends in Wisconsin, had a baby, they taught her the signs for hungry, please, thank you, and all done. It was such a successful experiment, they added help, yes, book, play, sleep, and a dozen more. Among them, mom and dad. I think I recognize those signs now—thumb tap chin twice with fingers extended and straight out, thumb tap forehead twice with fingers extended and straight out—but I can’t be sure. I try to discern as much as I can while the brothers communicate silently for several seconds, but it’s no use. All I can say for certain is that Finn is getting increasingly frustrated. And when Henry draws his lips into a severe line and gives his head a stiff shake, Finn crosses his arms over his chest and looks away.
“He’s hungry,” Henry says again.
Finn obviously said way more than that, but Henry’s not about to translate for me, and perhaps that’s for the best. Finn’s fever has broken, and maybe now they can go back to wherever they came from. If I’m right, mom and dad factor into this story somehow, and they must be beside themselves with worry. I can convince Henry to call them. Or I’ll take the brothers to Requiem in the side-by-side, or text Cleo to come and pick them up in her car.
It strikes me suddenly that as a teacher I am a mandatory reporter, and with or without Henry’s blessing, I should have called the police when I found the boys in the greenhouse. What was I thinking? I wasn’t thinking, and that’s exactly the point. It was late, I was afraid, Felix was—still is, presumably—missing… The whole thing was a recipe for disaster. But it’s not too late for me to make everything right.
“I have food,” I say, dragging myself back to the present moment. One step at a time, I remind myself. I’ll feed them, call for help, and turn my attention back to where it belongs: to my husband. I remember that the protein bars and raisin boxes are still in my pocket, and I pull them out now, offering them to Henry.
At first he just stares at the packets in my outstretched hands, then he reaches across the space between us and gathers up the lot, depositing them on the blanket that covers Finn.
“What are these?” he asks, lifting a protein bar and studying the label.
“Protein bars,” I begin, but Henry cuts me off with a huff.
“I can read,” he says, his voice dripping with derision.
“They’re good for you,” I tell him. “I thought they’d be a quick way to get a lot of nutrients into Finn.” Who are these boys? Who’s never heard of ibuprofen or protein bars? I scorned the idea of them materializing from somewhere on the mountain, but that doesn’t seem so impossible anymore.
Finn is already opening one of the small red raisin boxes. He peers at what’s inside, then plucks out one of the dried fruits with two fingers. But before he can pop it into his mouth, he’s wracked by a coughing fit that leaves him doubled over and choking. The box falls, scattering raisins everywhere.
The coughing fit is every bit as scary as it was last night. Clearly, a few hours of sleep and a couple ibuprofen have helped, but Finn is far from okay. I’d bet that his fever, though lower, is still present. Even more reason to get him out of here and into the care of someone who can provide everything he needs instead of just some musty blankets and a dirty greenhouse floor.
Guilt courses through me and isn’t assuaged in the slightest when Finn finally stops coughing and leans back, giving me a weak smile. I don’t know how much he remembers about last night, or what he thinks of my presence in the greenhouse now, but it seems he isn’t afraid of me. For some reason, children never are.
“Forget the protein bars. I’ll make some sandwiches,” I say, diffusing the moment by getting to my feet. Tearing my gaze from Finn, I address myself to Henry, the alleged legal guardian. “Finn can have another dose of ibuprofen, and maybe some of that cough syrup, too. Do you know how much he weighs?”
I haven’t said anything alarming or controversial, but Henry leaps up, Finn’s coughing fit immediately forgotten. “You’re not going anywhere,” he says, his voice gravelly and low. Threatening. “You’re going to call someone; I know you are. You can’t. I won’t let you.”
Shock must register on my face, but determination, too, because before I can take a single step away, Henry lunges. I stumble backward toward the greenhouse door, reaching behind me for the handle. Too late. He catches me by the loose fabric of my coat, yanking me toward him with a look like murder on his face. I’m astonished by this sudden turn of events, but I keep fighting, flinching away from him as I grapple for the little knife I’ve concealed in my coat pocket. We struggle, scuffing up the dirt of the greenhouse floor, but now that Henry has me in his grip, he doesn’t seem to know what to do with me. He falters, hands pinching my upper arms, and draws a noisy, tremulous breath.
We stare at each other for a moment, chests heaving and noses just inches apart, and then Henry’s eyes fill with furious tears. My face softens, I can feel it, but this makes him even angrier. He flings me away, slamming my lower back into one of the potting benches, and turns, heaving. His rage finds an outlet in the rows of nested plastic pots that still line the shelves of the greenhouse.
“Fuck!” he shouts, hurling the pots to the floor. When that proves to be unsatisfying, he grabs a whole stack of them in his hands and throws them at the glass walls. They bounce off, scattering harmlessly, and that’s when he knots his hands into fists and takes aim at anything in reach. I watch him connect with a wide beam, the uneven wood instantly splitting his knuckles. He doesn’t seem to register the pain. Instead of wincing, he merely reaches back to punch again, blood arcing through the air.
