The Understorey

As we sped down the highway, Jules looked for the nearest hospital. She said she saw a sign on the way up here not too far away for a Davis Memorial Hospital. She said she took note of it, wanting to prepare herself for all possibilities.



We pulled into the snow blanketed parking lot and parked at the covered ambulance entrance to the emergency room before the truck’s heater even had a chance to kick in. The sun was just starting to rise behind us in the brightest red and orange colors.



“I refuse to leave your side,” she said.



I nodded and smirked as if to say I wasn’t going to let her even if she tried.



When the officer, sitting at the small security desk next to a sign that read ‘ER Admittance’, eyes bulged from his head I knew we must have looked something frightful. I couldn’t imagine what we looked like to him, both of us smothered in a sheet of dried blood.



“What happened to you two!” He screamed. His eyes went to my arm. “Hyacinth! Hyacinth! Get a gurney in here! We’ve got a gunshot wound! Smithy get me a wheelchair too!”



A nurse ran to us and asked if there was anything else wrong that we weren’t able to see and I shook my head.



“Yesterday he had his jaw broken by the guy who did this to us and can barely speak,” she said through tears.



“Oh my God,” the nurse said, crossing himself.



Hyacinth helped me onto a gurney and the nurse I assume was named Smithy helped Jules into the wheelchair.



“I can’t leave his side,” she said looking up at Smithy.



“I’m sorry sweetheart but he needs to be examined quickly and will probably be heading to surgery soon. You can’t go with him.”



She stood and firmly, but calmly repeated what she had said, “I told you, I can’t leave his side. You don’t know what we’ve been through,” her voice cracked.



He looked down at us and didn’t argue with her. Jules grabbed my hand and I felt our current’s relief. It made me feel sleepy it was so soothing and thrummed through my muscles and bones. The loss of blood just exacerbated the sensation.



As they examined my wound, I saw two doctors look at Jules’ head. They suspected a mild concussion but nothing major. They asked her to stand but she said she didn’t think she’d be able to. When they asked her why, she said that he had sliced the bottom of her feet so she couldn’t run and I almost lost my cool wishing I had gone ahead and hit him with the bat and cracked open his skull.



I felt awful. I noticed her limping in the snow on the way to my truck but I thought it was in attempt to help me. It made me feel like I was the worst person in the world. I had nothing but a small bullet wound in some muscle. I didn’t have to walk on my wounds. I almost got sick imagining the pain she must have felt with every step she took and my heavy body leaning against hers.



The doctor pulled Jules’ shirt back slightly to look at the ‘E’ carved into her chest and murmured to the nurse beside him that he’d need to put several stitches there as well. When the nurse named Hyacinth, saw the ‘E’ she forced a gasp back into her throat. I saw the doctor’s eyes widen at the extent of cruelty once he left the room, probably to regain the composure that was leaking from his expression while examining her.



Paying attention to Jules was infuriating the doctor examining me and he threatened to separate us. I settled down but never kept my eyes from Jules’. My poor Jules.



Eventually, they insisted we had to separate, so Jules could get a CT scan and have her head bandaged and her feet and chest could be stitched.



I was being prepared for surgery and got the distinct impression I’d wake, from my second surgery in two days, to the hysterical faces of my family lingering above me but what I really wanted when I woke, was Jules in my arms. I didn’t want her to be away from my touch ever again. She was mine to protect and admittedly I hadn’t done a very good job thus far, but that was all going to end. I promised myself.



I woke to the sound of beeps and soft murmurs.



I barely had to lift my lids before Jules said, “He’s awake!”



She leaned towards me, barely reaching my face since she was in a wheelchair.



She brushed hair from my face, tears in her eyes, “Hello my love.”



“Hello.Jules.,” I said, kissing her hand.



We were at a loss for words, just stared at each other in total awe of the other.



My mom broke the silence, “Elliott, honey....,” but she couldn’t finish.



“Mom.it’s.okay.”



“No, it’s not okay sweetheart but it will be. We love you baby. We are all so happy to see the two of you alive.”



I scanned the room and piled high to the rafters were our families. I could hear talking in the hall and recognized more family members.



“It’s not allowed but we didn’t care and they didn’t really put up much of a fight considering.....” my dad said.



He stood at the foot of the bed and squeezed my leg. We understood each other so well, no words were necessary. I nodded at him.



Jules’ mom and dad were sitting in the corner, red eyed, looking more tired than even Jules and I did.



Gerry and Ann Jacobs stood and walked to the side of my bed.



“Thank you,” Gerry told me. “Thank you.”



I signaled for a pad and pen.



I confidently wrote, Of course Mr. Jacobs. It’s my destiny to protect Julia, my calling.



“We can see that,” Ann said softly. “We can see that,” a single tear reaching the hand she held so tightly in her own.



Epilogue



A Single, Rapturous Kiss



Eight weeks after surgery and I was almost back to normal. I still had the sling around my shoulder but it was healing nicely. My jaw was no longer wired shut and it was still very difficult to eat but unlike most invalids I’d known, for example, Andy Frasier one of my team’s lineman, my broken jaw hadn’t made me lose weight and I had Jules to thank for that. She kept me well nourished, bringing a hearty soup for lunch every day and a nutritional shake for breakfast.



She picked me up every day before school, except the first couple of weeks, when our parents had to drive us because Jules had to stroll around in a wheelchair. You should have seen her rolling around beside me with my ridiculous jaw and shoulder. We looked insane together.



When things had died out a little bit, my mom insisted we take a picture together to remember our ‘cuteness’ but insisted that ‘as cute as y’all are’ that it better never happen again. I say ‘when things died down’ because our real concerns had only begun to dissipate, at a turtle’s pace I might add, just after the first several weeks.



After an extensive search for Jesse, his body never turned up and Jules would practically beg me not to leave her for the night in fear that he’d return and finish what he started. She was especially fearful when she wasn’t able to stand on her own. She knew that if she ever saw him again that he or she would have to die and she worried that, without me, it would be her.



When my shoulder healed well enough to maneuver how I’d need to in order to sneak into her window at night I would sleep on her floor. Despite the fact it was cold and I was really uncomfortable on her wood floor, the weeks I slept next to Jules were the best because she would drape her hand off the side of the bed and keep it against my arm. It was pure bliss.



Taylor Williams and Marisa Hartford cooperated fully with the police once they knew the extent of Jesse’s damage and escaped with probation and lots of community service. Both, when they saw us for the first time in our battered states, pleaded for our forgiveness, insisting they had no clue what Jesse had really planned. We believed them. We thought them stupid, but we believed them.



According to Danny, Jesse never contacted either of them or his family since disappearing into the water. Taylor kept a very clear distance from us and barely looked in Jules’ eyes. Marisa, on the other hand, offered apologies often. Eventually, I had to tell her that she was forgiven and forbidden to apologize again or I’d yell at her. She laughed and said she would never ask again but that she was going to make it up to us. I didn’t even want to know what she meant by that but nodded anyway just to get her off our case.



Jules and I thought about visiting Jesse’s mom and dad but knew that it would be inappropriate, causing them additional pain they really didn’t need but we still wanted them to know that we didn’t blame them, not in the slightest. They were good people who just happened to have a messed up son. We saw them at the grocery store once, together, and nodded with a solemn smile. They returned the favor but with tears in their eyes.



Danny told us to move on.



“Jesse drowned in that water boy. Stop creating problems for yourself. Live your life. Enjoy your girl,” he finally demanded of me after weeks of me hounding for details on the open case. I knew he was working hard to find him and just wanted us to try getting some peace from the whole ordeal.



I knew that, more than likely, Jesse had drowned in the freezing water that day but it haunted me that they couldn’t find his body. I tried really hard to focus on living life but it was difficult with the hole in my shoulder staring back at me in the mirror every day.



After two months, though, and Jesse never showing, Jules and I started to become a lot more comfortable and eventually we thought about him less and less.



While I was recovering in the hospital, Jules and I had to spend New Year’s Eve with our families inside my hospital room. Let’s just say, it wasn’t the most romantic night of our lives. So, Jules and I had decided that once we were well enough, we would go to the rock bridge and celebrate the New Year on our own.



“We’ll just pretend,” she grinned as I drove, for the first time since our injuries, toward the creek. “I have a surprise for you too.”



“Surprising me again at the rock bridge Jules?”



“I guess so,” she mused.



Jules had her picnic basket full to the brim and I couldn’t wait for our little party to start.



“That basket better be full of food honey. I’ve been deprived of some awesome stuff and I’m tired of waiting,” I teased.



“No worries!” She said patting the side of the basket, “I have you covered Elliott. Trust me. It’s all warm too. It was a lot of work but worth it. It’s a late Christmas gift as well.”



I brought a gift for you too, I smirked to myself before my thoughts turned one hundred and eighty degrees to answer.



“You’re surviving was gift enough for the rest of our lives,” I shuddered. “How’s the scar?” I whispered.



“Healing.”



Jules didn’t like talking about the night at Blackwater Falls. I didn’t blame her and didn’t want to push her, but I wanted to make sure she was moving on in a healthy way so I would periodically bring it up to her. ‘Healing’ was a better answer than the shrug she had given me last time. It was progress so I dropped it at that.



“Jules?” I asked



“Hmm?” she answered, her eyes staring at the trees along the road, distracted by her thoughts.



“We’re here, love.”