Chapter 44
Avidya
“Hey there, sunshine,” Travis said, giving me a smile as I opened my eyes. I had to blink them a number of times before anything came into focus.
The first thing I saw was Travis as he stood up above me, looking down in concern at me. His dark hair was wild and crazy as though he had run his hands through it one too many times. His light brown eyes were shadowed by the lack of sleep.
“Glad to see you awake,” he said, taking a seat beside me again. “The nurse should be back shortly.”
Glancing around the room, I found it to be like any normal hospital room I’d see on TV before. White, clean, and with an attempt to make it feel like home. It was a long way from being anything like home.
I was hooked up to an IV, the same hand that Travis took ahold of once more. My other arm was wrapped up in a sling against my chest, holding it still. The rest of me was covered by an ugly green hospital gown and white scratchy blanket.
I was slightly afraid to see what other damage there was.
“How long have you been here?” I asked out as I let my eyes slid closed again. It was too much work to keep them opened.
“About a day,” he answered. “You have everyone worried.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled out.
“Oh, no you don’t. I’m not letting you go back to sleep yet,” Travis stated, his voice a bit harder than I was used to. It caused me to fight to open my eyes and meet his once more. “That’s better.”
“How . . . how bad am I?” I asked out, fighting my eyes to stay open.
“What do you remember?” he asked out instead of answering me.
“Enough to know I never want to be in a car again,” I muttered out through a yawn. “I’ll just walk everywhere I want to go from now on.”
“Well, walking may not be happening for another week or so,” Travis grimaced.
I simply stared at him, waiting for him to explain to me why. It took too much work to talk too much. Thinking took too much work.
“You got . . . shot in your leg,” he said, having to pause in the middle of his the sentence.
“Oh,” was my brilliant response. I remembered the gun that was aimed at me, and it made sense on why my leg was pounding with each beat of my heart.
“The bullet was lodged near the bone,” he said, his voice weakening with each word spoke.
“Who was it?” I asked, not able to think of anything else to say. There wasn’t anything to say about it.
“Whoever it was will be wiped out sooner or later,” Carlos said, entering the room carrying a yellow McDonalds bag with him, which was shoved into Travis’ chest as soon as Carlos was in the room. “Glad to see you awake.”
“I’m not,” I muttered out as the pain began to increase along with the tiredness. Hadn’t I slept long enough already? Four days of sleep almost, and yet I felt like sleeping for another week.
“I just don’t get why he didn’t kill them both. It would have been easy to do,” Travis said with a small shake of his head as he dug into the food.
The food smelt amazing, but I had no energy to try to eat anything, let alone talk anymore as my eyes slowly slid closed. Where was that nurse with pain meds?
“I don’t know either,” Carlos said. “But we’ll find him. I have men out looking. He won’t be hiding for long.”
“He had a mask on,” I said with painful words.
“I did get that off the footage I was able to dig up,” Carlos said as he moved something that was beside me. He then pushed the button that was next to me on the remote as I lazily watched what he was doing. I hadn’t even noticed it.
“Just calling the nurse for you,” he explained with a soft smile. “Everyone will be happy that you are awake.”
He then backed away, taking a stand at the window that was only feet away. The room was much smaller than I first thought as both men attempted to make themselves smaller and out of the way as a Hispanic nurse made her way in.
I watched as she glared at both men before just ignoring them and focusing on me as she looked over my chart. Her black hair was pulled into a tight bun high on top her head, and her face was lined with wrinkles from the many years of hard work she no doubt put in here at this place.
“Everything looks good,” she noted, a slightMediterranean tang to her words. “How’s your pain?”
“She needs meds,” Travis said, not letting go of my hand.
“I can talk,” I muttered out, but not really up to fighting to talk either way.
“I’ll get you more pain relief. Since you are awake, I do need to check your leg. You two,” she pointed at Travis and Carlos in turn, “Need to be out.”
“I am not going anywhere,” Travis seethed.
“One of us will stay with her at all times,” Carlos said, pinning the nurse to her spot as he glared at her. I was glad that look wasn’t directed at me as she mentally turned to a pile of ashes.
“Fine,” she huffed out.
I was curious on what was going on, but my I wasn’t able to concentrate on it for too long as the pain began to become a bit more demanding with each passing second.
“You will need to turn around, though,” the nurse stated, holding her hands on her hips as she waited.
“I’ll step out,” Carlos stated. “He's seen it already anyhow.”
Seen what?
“What?” Travis said with a shrug as the nurse now stared him down. I would have laughed seeing his frightened over a woman.
“He’s fine,” I muttered out, wanting the pain meds sooner rather than later. The faster we could get all this over with, the better.
“Alright,” she sighed out, knowing it was a losing battle.
The nurse, who never did bother giving me a name, talked me through what she was doing step by step. Was she scared I was going to panic?
She folded the blanket back over the left side of me, keeping my good leg covered. I couldn’t help but look down, seeing my entire thigh wrapped in white gauze. The rest of my leg was pale with a few bruises that were already beginning to fade. I had wondered what the rest of my body looked like. Probably about the same or worse.
“Now, I’m gonna cut this off and replace it with a new gauze. It won’t take long. The wound will look red and ugly. The bandage has to be changed twice a day so infection doesn’t grow,” she explained as she took scissors to the white material.
My eyes were glued to what she was doing as each snip she made. From my knee, up to almost my hip, I was covered in the material.
Once the gauze was completely free, Travis squeezed my hand, reminding me most likely that he was still there.
Once the patch of dark red padding that was placed on top of the wound was taken off, I wasn’t sure if I was more shocked or grossed out at the angry colors.
A small round stitched spot, maybe as big as my thumbnail, was off to the side from the top of my leg. It wasn’t all that big, but the pain that radiated from it now with the pressure off was more than I was expecting. It was nearly black and blue a good three inches in every direction.
“Looking good,” the nurse said, being careful as she cleaned up around the area.
It didn’t take her all that long to wrap it back up and pushing a small button that was attached to the IV drip, instantly giving my pain medication.
“Next time we’ll start you on oral form,” the nurse said. “And get you to eat a bit of something too. The doctor will also be in after bit to talk to you about the rehab process.”
“Okay,” I said, fighting to keep my eyes opened as the pain medicine took over. It was a relief to not feel all the pain, but yet a bit disappointed that it made me so dang tired.
She gave another glare at Travis, who simply ignored her.
A thought hit me, and even though I knew I wouldn’t be able to fight the sleepy darkness, I still had to ask. “Zach?”
“When you can stay awake longer, I’ll tell you everything,” Travis promised.
That was enough of an answer before I let my mind fall back into the floating darkness where I’d no doubt wake up sleepy once more.