I Think Not, Sir

Savannah

“Savannah, hold still. Don’t move. I need to see what we’re dealing with. Fuck. Hold on, baby. I got you.”

My hand goes to the pain, wetness covers my fingers.

Pulling my hand back to my line of sight, I see the bright scarlet dipped on my fingertips, dribbling down the palm of my hand.

I’m sucked back into the past.

My hand stays still, but the pale blue-gray pavement transforms to mucky, wet, brown sand.

The heat of the sun baking me gone to the chill of the wind and the coolness of the water that drowned me.

The silence gone, my Angel left behind to send me to the call of my baby brother crying out for our mom.

The sun’s rays gone, only cloudy gray thunderclouds above me now.

~Morgan in my ear.~

~Cars zooming by over the bridge, a few stopping to call in our tragedy.~

~The view of our family car gone completely.~

~Submerged under the dark water.~

~The blood on my legs covering my entire front half. The light-wash blue gone, stained and ripped to ruins.~

~My hands covered in that warm red liquid from holding Morgan to me, his nose busted and broken.~

~His sweet, innocent crimson staining me down to my soul.~

~We were just going to the movies.~

~Now they’re gone.~

~Dad is still in the car.~

~Mom’s gone.~

~It hurts. Everything hurts.~

“Savannah, hold on to me!”

My Angel’s voice calls me back, like a hairband snapping and popping the soft skin of your hands to leave a sting and a sharp red line.

The jerk of movements sends me closer to him. My chest to his, my arms around him, the hum of metal vibrating under me.

~I was just going to Reid’s house.~

The wind whips through my hair, the tears that grazed my sweaty face lighting up like puffs of winter air kissed by Jack Frost himself.

Everything goes backwards.

The alley fading away into the distance. The red brick wall out of sight. The stores on my side of the street growing smaller and smaller.

The left I needed to take switches to a right.

The roar of the bike deafening in ways that calm my spirited soul.

Like the blue, red, and white lights of cop cars and ambulances that pulled Morgan and me to safety.

The ring of their sirens falls to mute and is replaced by the growl of this silver horse’s engine, galloping to me, and racing off to keep me from my sad past.

The smell of the earth, the river water’s unique scent that blooms in that memory dulls and lifts like one of the scratch-and-sniffs that is too old, too many scratches, too many sniffs.

The smell of rain and heartbreak with sprinkles of metallic, coppery blood replaces the fresh air, oil, gas, and my Angel’s musky scent.

My heart still not beating, my lungs barely taking enough in to keep me alive. My mind in different places, frozen while others are working on max.

The memory still there, still inside my broken and flawed brain to forever torment me, but…buzzing.

Humming.

Loosening its talons in me to give me a chance to break more, this time away from it. Away from my world-ending heartbreak and letting me get to those raw edges.

Like bubble wrap around precious, irreplaceable artifacts, I feel it snuggle around those sharp points and protect me, even if it’s just for the ride.

For this time.

For this day.

Maybe even only for the next minute, but I still feel it. I still feel him. My Angel. He’s here with me. For me. He’s here.

Biker country swings in on our sides, the rows and rows of other bikes, black buildings and bar windows, the sound of music and the bump of the sidewalk going under our thick tires.

Keys dangling, his nimble hands twisting at my chin and scooping me up, leaving the helmet behind that I didn’t even know I was wearing.

The heat doesn’t catch me in time.

The pain of my newest wound gone unnoticed as well, until I feel the air conditioning and the eyes of fellow bikers on me.

Angel’s voice barking orders and things being brought in, the hardness of the wooden tables coming under me with my Angel laying me face down.

“Savannah, I got you. Look at me. You feel my hand? I’m here. I’m right here.”

I can see his dark eyes soften, pleading and begging.

“I know, Angel.” I don’t know if I actually said it, maybe it didn’t even make it out from my train of thought.

“I have to get it out, two holes but not a clean shot.”

Everything comes back in.

From low to full volume the pain stings.

“Hey! Get your hands off my ass!”

I slap behind me and swat at the stranger’s hands pulling my shorts down along with my panties to leave me ass-out in the middle of the open bar.

“Chill out, girl, you have a gunshot wound on your right side, and another on the hip. I have to get it out to stop the bleeding and stitch you up. No one trying to cop a feel.”

“I got shot in the butt?” Looking back over my shoulder at the older version of Damon with his hair long that’s braided into a man bun.

The dark green scrubs he has on and the white gloves make that black color brighter, darker, and shiny.

“Yes. Now hold still or this is gonna hurt worse. Deep breath.”

He doesn’t look at me, but I can see the light, pale blue of his eyes.

His fingers dive into my ass in a whole new way, making me tense and curse, squeezing Damon’s hand and cursing his brother like he was the one who shot me.

“There, princess.” A ding comes out, clear as day.

“That fucking hurt, you dick!”

The smirk on his face reminds me of my Angel.

“You’re doing great, baby.”

He kisses my forehead and smiles.

“You better not have messed my perfect round ass up, you hear me back there?” I toss over my shoulder and give the devil doctor a firm look—one he returns with a scoff.

“Perfect?” The raised eyebrow makes me challenge him head-on.

“Hell yes, perfect! You maybe can’t tell since it’s covered in blood and has a flesh wound, but I can assure you, my ass is the pinnacle. Ow! Stop that!”

Damon grabs my hand from hitting behind me.

Sunshine comes up, putting a thermometer to my forehead and rolling it down my cheek.

“This is going to hurt like a bitch. Put this in her mouth and hold her still.”

“Can’t you give her something for the pain?”

Damon’s tone changes.

“Not on hand. I don’t know shit about this girl, she could have an allergy.”

I can feel him pack the wound he was just prodding with something cold.

“It’s okay, Angel. I take a fistful of pills in the morning and at night. I don’t know what they’re all called, we can’t risk mixing. I can take it. I’ve had worse. Let’s do this.”

I nod, narrowing my eyes to the floor and opening my mouth to bite on the mouth guard. Fixing my hold on Damon’s hand to power through this.

I nod again. Here we freaking go.

It turns quiet as my demon doctor from hell takes up what he needs to dive into my body in a way I never thought about.

The feeling of his fingers digging inside my open flesh and prodding around the meat on my hip to find the metal shell of the bullet was in my top three on the list of most physical pain I’ve been in.

My first being waking up in the hospital and feeling all of it at once.

The second, climbing out of the car with Morgan and paddling out on one leg through the current of the river.

And three, this hip ordeal.

I close my eyes, screaming into my mouth guard, holding Damon’s hand, trying to breathe through it.

“What the fuck is taking you so long?!” Damon seethes, his face closer to me than before I closed my eyes.

“Would you like to try?! A tiny piece of metal is fucking slippery when covered in blood, dipshit.”

Before I can take a full chest of air, he digs back in.

His thick fingers poking and ripping in what I thought must be a tiny hole, but I’m quickly thinking it’s turning into a very large one from the way he is ripping me.

“Breathe through, Vannah, breathe.”

I can hear him the same time something cold is placed on my forehead.

“Her temp is spiking. Need to cool her down.” Sunshine’s voice is close too.

“Come the fuck on, Darrion!”

“Got the little fucker!”

Another ping and I relax.

Damon wipes my face, taking the silicone mouth guard out.

“Angel.”

My voice ragged and hoarse from screaming.

“Yeah, Van, I’m still here.”

Damon’s soft touch brushes the sticky strands of my hair off my face.

“Is my ass okay? Or am I deformed now?”

He booms a laugh, but I’m dead serious right now.

“You’re going to have a scar. But still perfect.”

I make a sobbing sound before blanching out.

“Scar?! My stripping days are over before I even get to start! Why, cruel world? What else must you take from me.”

I shake my head and lean into Damon’s shoulder while he laughs.

“Hey, doctor dickhead, if it’s going to scar can you sew it up like Harry Potter’s face? With the lightning bolt?”

Damon’s brother Darrion smirks, nodding with a “sure” before I feel the jab of a needle to my tender cheek.

“I want to know what in the Sam hell is a Madis doing ass-out in my bar with two fucking bullet holes being doctored.”

Everything stops.

Everyone, including my demon doctor.

Damon’s face pales before clinching and gnashing down on his teeth.

“Dad, I can explain.”