Gone 'Til November

THIRTY-TWO

Sara stood beside an EMT van, a blanket around her shoulders, and watched them bring the bodies out. They’d tried to get her into a van, take her to the hospital-Not yet-and eventually Hammond had given in. Her chest hurt to the touch, but she could breathe without pain.

There were nearly a dozen emergency vehicles parked in front of the refinery, radios crackling and squawking. The sun was up, had chased the shadows away. Birds sang in the trees.

They’d dressed and wrapped her wrist, made her take the blanket because they were worried she was slipping into shock, but she knew she wasn’t. One of the EMTs hovered nearby.

Elwood came up alongside her.

“Anything?” she said.

“Not yet. Statewide BOLO. Jersey plates, he won’t get far.”

“Sorry I couldn’t get the tag number.”

“Priorities, Sara. What’s important is you’re all right.”

They brought them out on covered stretchers, one at a time, loaded them carefully into the back of the other EMT vans. When they brought the fourth stretcher out, the sheriff walked beside it, and she knew it was Billy.

She let the blanket slip from her shoulders to the ground. The sheriff came around the stretcher to head her off. The EMTs stopped where they were, unsure what to do.

She looked down at the stretcher, the rough green blanket covering him. The sheriff put a hand on her shoulder.

“Is he bagged?” she said.

“No.”

She pulled the blanket down over that face. His head was tilted to the left on the stretcher, eyes half open, looking off at something only he could see.

She should feel something, she knew, but there was nothing there. Just a numbness that seemed to stretch far down into her, fill her entirely.

She reached down, and one of the EMTs said, “Hey,” but the sheriff motioned to him and he was silent. She laid fingers on Billy’s eyelids and gently closed them, then lifted the blanket back over his face.

She stepped away from the stretcher. The EMTs looked at the sheriff. He nodded.

They carried him away.

When he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer, Morgan found a side road that wound through the trees. The cassette had switched over to the other side. Sam still singing sweet and strong, but running out of time.

The road turned to dirt after a while, the Monte Carlo bumping back and forth. He powered the window down, could smell the woods, the cleanness of them, and something else on the breeze, a coolness.

When he came out of the trees, he was at a river. There was a clearing here, a gentle slope down to the water’s edge. He pulled the Monte Carlo into the shade of a weeping willow, turned the ignition off. The engine coughed and was silent.

It’s come a long way, he thought. Time to rest.

The branches of the willow moved in the breeze, brushed the top of the car. Morgan listened to the music, looked out at the river. It was moving slow, wind rippling the surface. On the far bank were more willows, another clearing, picnic tables under the trees. Early morning and no one around. The breeze that blew across the water smelled of flowers. Birds chirped in the trees.

His right shoe was full of blood, cooling now. He looked at the gearbag, wondered what was in it.

He let his head rest on the seat back, smelling the sweet air, feeling the sun on his face. And then he closed his eyes.