The Affliction Read online

  “I don’t know” I spat out. “Cara told me to meet her at the camp, and when I got there, she was like this,” I gestured towards her.

  “Yins weren’t plannin’ on camping, were ya?” he asked skeptically as he looked into my car, which was suspiciously empty of camping gear.

  “Oh, no, we were just gonna hang out for the day.” I fibbed. It was easy to lie when the alternative was possibly compromising someone you would rather kept their life.

  “Is an ambulance comin’?” His voice was fraught with concern.

  “Yeah, I rushed her here as fast as I could. I’d have taken her to the hospital myself, but I couldn’t drive anymore,” I half lied. I said it with a little more acidity than I’d meant, but I grew increasingly impatient with the continued absence of sirens. Earl clearly realized the reason for my acerbic comment as he responded, gazing down the road from where help would soon arrive.

  “She goin’ to Ellenville? That’s probably the closest one and it’s still pretty far,” he grimaced. Indeed, the Ellenville Regional Hospital was the closest and half an hour away. It would take considerably less time than that, bearing in mind the state of emergency, but still frustrated me nonetheless.

  Earl began pacing, his eyes continually flitted back and forth between Cara and the curve in the road, beyond which the ambulance would surely swerve around at any moment. I couldn’t bear to watch him, didn’t want to join him, so I turned to walk back into the Inn.

  Very noticeably, the people who had been watching failed miserably at inconspicuously retreating from the windows and looking busy with other things. Even in this slight crisis, I had to chuckle to myself. Small towns are so predictable, I thought to myself. I purposely rammed the door open with unnecessary force and caused those pathetic onlookers to flinch in their seats. I smiled grimly.

  I needed to sit down, or I was going to be sick. I looked around for an empty place to rest, and although that mission was not successful, I fell into a booth across from a complete stranger. I probably would have just walked back out and sat on the sidewalk had I not seen him sitting there. He was, after all, not hard to miss. He looked out of place among the older crowd; standing out from the regulars, who all seemed to have a dwindling tooth count, a cigarette permanently fixed between their fingers, and a pile of peel off tickets growing in front of them. He gawked at me, too, but not like everyone else, and he didn’t seem ashamed as I caught him staring.

  He looked at me with speculating eyes, but not with the curiosity of the others that suggested only an interest in material for later gossip. His expression didn’t change much as I unexpectedly joined him, but I did notice a twitch of surprise cross his face. I didn’t feel like talking, and apparently neither did he. He just continued to gaze at me as though he’d never seen anything like me before, his hand frozen an inch from the table. I had leaned in far enough that I could smell the whiskey in his glass and it heated my stomach without even tasting it.

  Eventually, he set his glass back on the wooden plank with a dull thud and looked away. I couldn’t help but glance up at him. I blinked a couple of times, but I wasn’t mistaken in what I saw. I hadn’t noticed before in my nervous haste, but I saw them then…the scars. Raised and twisted skin slashed down in angry streaks from his temple, across his slightly scruffy left cheek and neck, to finally disappear beneath his shirt. The corners of his lips rose. He knew I was looking at him. I continued to stare anyway.

  He appeared as though he were about my age, maybe a couple of years older at the most, with medium length hair just a few shades sandier than my own. I couldn’t tell what color his eyes were, but I kept changing my mind between gray, green, and blue. He was attractive in a rough but injured sort of way, and as I looked deeper into his face there was something too mature about it; grave, somber.

  He was thin, but I could make out well-formed chest muscles beneath his black T-shirt, and I doubted I could wrap both hands around the top of one of his arms. I probably should have been scared of him, especially after all that had taken place in the past day, but he had a certain puppy dog look of loyalty and sincerity about him. Beyond that, I felt like if I stood up and walked away, I would have made a huge mistake. By the time I considered all of this I had stopped and wondered to myself why I was so interested anyway.

  Either he started to feel awkward under my searching eyes, or he burned to talk to me since I sat down, because he looked back at me with obvious impatience in his eyes.

  “What’s your name?” he asked almost nervously, clasping his hands on the table in front of him. I was taken a little off guard as I hadn’t expected him to say anything to me.

  “Um, it’s Aubrie,” I stuttered, as though I had trouble remembering what my own name was. He still looked expectant, as though he wanted more. “Aubrie Lander,” I said a little more powerfully, looking up at him warily. He didn’t seem entirely satisfied, but he continued anyway.

  “And you were born where?”

  “Aurora,” I blurted out, partially wishing I hadn’t been so truthful. He seemed puzzled and looked away towards the door. After a couple of prolonged minutes of silence, he turned back to me.

  “I don’t know you,” he resolved, something like denial in his voice, as his shoulders sank. That was an odd thing to say, I thought.

  “Should you?” I asked hesitantly. He contemplated that as his eyes shifted back to the door and then to me again. He looked like he was about to say something, but stopped and shook his head.

  “What’s your name?” I asked in the placement of his non-answer.

  “Gabriel,” he smirked. I looked expectantly back at him, trying to manage the same look he’d given me. It didn’t work. He didn’t say anything else.

  “Just Gabriel?”

  “Yep.” All right. I wasn’t going to pry.

  “Why did you smirk when you said your name?” I asked, unable to keep the curiosity out of my voice.

  “Gabriel happens to be an angel’s name,” he said, suddenly serious as he peered up at me with caution etched all over his face, as though he were about to say something he shouldn’t. I wasn’t about to let it go.

  “What?” I pried as I attempted to look innocent and a touch flirty at the same time, and most likely failed at both. “Are you trying to tell me you’re some kind of angel?” My turn to smirk.

  His eyebrows contracted and he sighed. Then he suddenly had an unusual spark in his eyes, as he thought about what he was going to say next.

  “How’s your head?” he whispered, an impish expression on his face. I gawked at him stupidly, having not expected this question at all, and not completely understanding. Nothing visibly remained to prove I had any head injury. My pulled-back hair hid any evidence of the violence from the night before. I glared mildly at him through narrowed eyes.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I stated matter-of-factly and turned away from him to glance at the door myself.

  “Hmm. Perhaps then, I should ask how your lamp is.” I gasped and returned my gaze to his irritatingly smug face.

  “It was you,” I accused, while I subconsciously felt for the bruise on my scalp. Maybe I had injured my head; I should have run away from anyone who willingly admitted to breaking into my apartment and smashing a lamp over my head, but all I could do was sit glued to the seat in excitement as a thousand questions popped into my mind.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, although the look on his face plainly stated the contrary.

  “You tell me what’s going on,” I demanded. “Now,” I added after a few seconds when it appeared he did not plan to answer me. No response. “I would at least appreciate an acceptable excuse as to why you hit me over the head with a lamp,” I hissed, “or what you were doing stalking me in my house!” He just looked at me, and I recognized his expression as the same one I wore when Earl had asked me what happened to Cara.

  He must have read the understanding in my eyes because he merely nodd
ed stiffly. Even though I intuitively knew he couldn’t answer my questions without bringing harm to someone, I planned on prodding further. I felt so excluded from the whole business.

  I inhaled deeply, ready to proceed with my questioning, and sirens sounded in the distance, growing nearer. I automatically stood up and turned toward the exit, and Gabriel brushed past me as he walked swiftly away.

  “Hey, wait,” I squeaked. “I’m not done with you yet.” He turned back towards me and winked, and then escaped through a gaggle of people entering the bar, while I got stuck waiting for them all to shuffle inside. I slipped out the door as soon as I could and looked up and down the street, only to see the ambulance as it screamed down the road toward us. No Gabriel.

  This whole disappearing thing really started to annoy me.

  Chapter 7

  I never thought I would have to visit one of those horrible white rooms again. At least not so soon. And despite the fact that my intuition had warned me not to go there, I had accompanied Cara to the hospital, where I sat on an uncomfortable plastic chair and watched her as she slept, attached to machines and tubes and electrodes. She lay asleep in the hospital bed after surgery for the three breaks in her tibia and fibula. She had also broken her forearm, but it was a closed break and apparently not very severe, at least that’s what the nurses told me. Other than that, bruises, cuts, and scrapes were the worst that marked her body. The sick bastard who placed the live bait sign on Cara had beaten her to within an inch of her life.

  Since I was the one who found her and she was in no condition to tell them the story herself, the doctors and police had both questioned me relentlessly, and I repeated the half-true scenario I had told Earl back at the Whitetail Inn. Cara then woke a little while after she arrived in the ER and the scoundrels pounced on her, barraging her with questions, but all she would say was “where’s Aubrie, is she okay?” The woman in green scrubs at the reception counter wouldn’t let me in since I wasn’t immediate family, and by the time they had her set up in a room and told me I could enter, she was either sedated or asleep of her own volition.

  After the receptionist finally directed me through the two heavy automatic doors to the correct room at the end of the hallway, I rushed eagerly to Cara’s bedside. When I realized she was asleep, I placed myself on the edge of the only chair in the room and watched the sun’s rays send sparkles dancing on the wall, as it peeked through the tempestuous clouds. The humidity from the day before finally broke and the thunderstorms rolled in overnight. It no longer rained, but the fierce covering still blanketed the earth from high above, a gauzy ceiling to the world. I could tell it was the sort of day where the sun went to war with the clouds; it occasionally broke through the front lines and gave a few minutes of false hope, only for the clouds to beat it back again, all below lost to the gloom and shadows.

  Indeed, the events of the previous twenty-four hours had suddenly submerged my own life into darkness. I still didn’t know what I had wrapped myself up in, but my intuition had been correct. I began to feel the influence of the underworld I was about to break into and how it had already changed me. I shook in my seat, knowing I should leave the hospital, but I refused to abandon Cara.

  Finally, her eyes flickered open, unseeing at first, but then roamed anxiously around the room until she caught sight of me and her face underwent so many changes in a matter of seconds it would have been comical had we been in another situation; instead, it made me sick. Initially, there was an apparent relief, then sadness and fear, which then shifted into unmistakable, fierce anger. She tried to sit up but didn’t have the strength, and frustration now crossed her livid features. I had never seen her as upset as she was then.

  In the days leading up to the hospital, I had witnessed more emotion and passion in her than I had seen combined in my entire time of knowing her. I think that before then, I hadn’t fully realized humanity’s capacity for emotion and feeling. As I watched her falling apart from the soul, I understood how severely I had underestimated the human species.

  I braced myself, ready for the unleashing of Cara’s wrath, though I did not fully understand why I was about to experience it. What had I done so wrong that would provoke such a response from her?

  I started to wonder if my mind filtered the information that entered my brain and only let through what wouldn’t hurt me. Perhaps it rejected the response of panic I should have felt and consoled me into believing nothing was wrong. That wouldn’t have been atypical for me…my brain had developed so many defense mechanisms I could hardly tell what was real or not anymore.

  I tried to ignore the splatter of something red as it blasted onto the window beside me and I desperately cringed away from it. Cara didn’t move because she didn’t see it. It wasn’t really there.

  She finally decided what she wanted to scream at me most and found her voice.

  “Aubrie, what the hell are you doing here?” She yelled as loud as she could while hampered by her dry throat. She coughed, her body not able to handle such force. I stared at her in shock, utterly bewildered. The accusation behind her words upset me, and my anger flared. I could feel the blood as it rushed to my face and I prepared to let her have it.

  “I…you…why…I saved you,” I finished lamely. My confusion won me over.

  “No shit, Aubrie, I can see that. Ugh! I would kill you myself right now if that wasn’t what I’m trying to prevent here!”

  “Well, thanks but I can take care of myself!” I yelled back. “If you hadn’t noticed, you’re the one who needed to be rescued, not me! And if everyone doesn’t stop trying to save people we’re all going to get killed.”

  Just as Cara started to retaliate with her face screwed up and her finger pointed at me, a pleasant but obviously annoyed nurse peeked around the doorway to find the source of the raucous and glared at me when she noticed her upset patient.

  “Is everything OK?” she asked in an irritatingly sweet voice, which contradicted her scornful expression. Everything was not okay unless the raised voices she heard from the hallway were what you would consider normal. I tried to calm down and Cara dropped her good arm back to her side. The nurse smiled, ostensibly pleased by our reactions, and left.

  I launched the most hideous glare I could muster back at Cara, who stared right back at me with narrowed eyes. Then her face fell, she started to cry, and I hurried to her side, suddenly repentant.

  “I’m sorry, Cara, I don’t know why you’re mad at me, but I’m sorry,” I whispered as I grabbed her right hand, afraid to hug her frail body. She sighed.

  “No, Aubrie, it’s my fault,” she hiccoughed, barely audible. “I shouldn’t have run to your house. I put you in danger, and that’s what I was trying to tell you. I was so worried they would hurt you, too. It’s a good thing he showed up.” I frowned.

  “It’s a good thing who showed up?” I asked, glancing anxiously at the window, which now dripped with what looked miserably like blood. I took deep breaths and told myself it wasn’t real.

  Cara looked around nervously, too, as though she expected someone. I thought I understood why. The fact that we were in a hospital probably wouldn’t inhibit the person or people who hurt her. They could have been watching and listening as we reconciled, forming plans to do away with Cara, determining if I knew enough to have to include me in the execution. Was the blood on the window warning me?

  She gulped. “I don’t know who he is, but from what I’ve gathered, he’s a Guardian. He saved you from them. I think he was coming for me, but for some reason, he set on you. I’m grateful of course, no complaining here; I was ready to beg him to leave me anyway.” She whispered so faintly I had to bend my head down with my ear just over her mouth to hear her. I realized she had quit speaking, so I straightened up and tried to fit everything together. She resumed talking, this time loud enough that I didn’t have to lean into her.

  “I’m sorry I was so angry at first. It’s just that when I saw you here, I knew you had involved yourself,
knew you went looking for me. You’re the only one who would know where to find me. Hey…” she drifted off, face puckering.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Adam. He told me to meet him there. He wasn’t there.” And then her eyes widened, and she grabbed my arm with surprising strength as she continued in an increasingly frantic and high-pitched voice. “Adam. Oh, no, Adam, no. Oh, my God!” I could see where her mind went and I had to stop her before she gave herself a heart attack.

  “Cara, no, he’s okay!” I said abruptly, clutching her hand again, while looking earnestly into her eyes until she calmed down and realized I must have told the truth. “He’s all right, I saw him, and he’s not hurt at all,” I reassured her. Her breathing slowly steadied, and the spikes on the machine by her bed returned to normal.

  “You saw him?” she finally managed to blurt out.

  “Yes,” I nodded, “but he just told me to bring you here and then he left.” I wasn’t going to relay to her the agony I’d seen Adam in. She didn’t need to know. “Cara, he loves you so much,” I edited. She smiled briefly, and it did wonders to her face.

  “I know,” she sighed. “Everything I told you was technically the truth but there’s more to it. I’m sorry I didn’t explain more but I didn’t want you to know anything that might hurt you.” Her voice was soft again, and she looked at me, inches away, and a please-forgive-me expression crossed her face. I smiled encouragingly, and she generously continued. She finally gave me some answers and I didn’t plan to interrupt her.

  “Adam left me because he found out that the other side got wind that I knew too much. I actually know way more than Adam even realizes. He left me just like that, like what we had didn’t even matter,” she wailed.

  I thought back to what Adam had said in our brief encounter. “Wait, Cara, he told me he only left for your safety, not because he wanted to! He thought you were safe at my apartment.”

  “Really? He said that?”