Читать книгу Last Dance - David Russell W. - Страница 11

Though the sun was up, the sweeping lights of the police, fire, and ambulance vehicles still danced across the hedges separating the school field from the private properties beyond. A crowd had gathered on the outskirts of the field, where school staff were doing their level best to keep the onlookers as far away from the scene as possible. Already media vehicles were beginning to line the street; having heard of an attack at the very same place they had been only twenty-four hours before, they wasted no time ensuring they were present for the even bigger story.

My first call had been to Andrea, since she was in effect my own personal 911 service. Tim, as I suspected, did not respond to my pleas for him to hear me. Even had he been awake, both of his eyes were so badly swollen, there was no way he could have opened them to see who was trying to rouse him. Blood oozed from the side of his mouth, dripping onto his left knee. His legs appeared to have given up the job of holding up his body. The only thing stopping him from hitting the ground was the ropes tied in three places: his upper chest, his lower torso, and the lower part of his thighs, just above his bloody knees. The rope around his stomach was tied so tightly, it had already begun to make a groove in his clothing and, I suspected, his stomach underneath. Blessedly, the downward effect gravity was having on Tim’s body had actually caused the rope around his chest to slacken somewhat, alleviating pressure so he could breathe. Had his attackers been better Boy Scouts, their knots would have held, and Tim may well have suffocated. I didn’t carry a pocketknife with me as part of my daily accoutrement, but I clumsily managed to undo the restraints and reasonably gently lower him to the ground.

Andrea managed to beat even the ambulance and fire department to the scene. She handled the unmarked Crown Victoria in that expert kind of way we’d expect from Mario Andretti. The car skidded sideways to a halt next to the field, and she burst out the door. She tossed me a very quick hostile look.

The fire department and paramedics were less than a minute behind Andy’s gravel- spurting arrival, which gave me no time to flee my angry detective friend. She held off her scolding long enough for us to determine from the paramedics that Tim, while badly beaten, would likely survive his attack. By the time on-site first aid had been given, a small crowd of students was being reluctantly herded off to the building. The students were no doubt disappointed this violent encounter would not somehow yield an unscheduled day off. As Tim’s stretcher began its bumpy journey across the sopping wet field towards the waiting ambulance, Andrea finally turned to walk towards me to begin what would no doubt be ferocious questioning. Glancing towards the school again, I noticed that one of our school’s administrators was at the front of the building, half shepherding the kids inside, half trying, unsuccessfully, to block the media’s view of the event. That left the remaining two administrators, Vice-principal Bill Owen and Principal Don McFadden, marching on a direct path towards me. I couldn’t decide which conversation was going to be worse, so I headed away at an angle about ninety degrees from both advancing war parties, hoping to evade at least one of them. It was equal parts obvious and childish, but it wasn’t as though my day had been going particularly well. The police and crime scene personnel stayed behind as Andrea broke into a trot to catch me before my supervisors could. “Where are you going?” she finally managed when she came up alongside me.

“I’m going to go prepare today’s youth for the future,” I replied without breaking stride.

“Just like that?” she demanded.

“Just like what?” Another question came my way, this time from Principal McFadden, who had joined our group. Bill Owen’s breathing, after taking more quick steps in one morning than he likely took most weeks, had rendered him essentially speechless. Just for good measure, I picked up my pace even more to make sure he would remain breathless.

“He’s just heading off to teach his classes like nothing’s happened,” Andrea replied, though to the best of my knowledge, neither knew who the other was.

“I think maybe we need to talk first,” McFadden said.

“I think I need to talk to him before he goes any further,” she replied forcefully.

“Who are you anyway?” McFadden had stopped. Andrea stopped briefly to introduce herself. By this time I had made it to a side door and was halfway up the stairs before they were able to come inside. I burst into a slight run to my classroom, hoping to surround myself with students and make it awkward for my interrogators to conduct their business. I didn’t really think it would work, but I was quite surprised when neither Andrea nor the administrators came to my door. I managed to buy myself at least a brief reprieve.

By the time the bell went at the end of the day, I was almost suspicious that they hadn’t tracked me down. True, during the lunch hour I did hide in the custodians’ office behind the boiler room making small talk with a janitor I’d never met before, but really, if they’d wanted to find me they could have. I managed to get out of the building in record time, and after a couple of quick phone calls from the car, I determined that Tim had been taken to Children’s Hospital on Oak Street, the facility kids of all sizes generally went to when their injuries were severe. At Tim’s age, for him to be at Children’s meant the damage was at least serious.

By the time I had found a place to park and walked to the hospital, a springtime rain was falling again. Springtime rain in Vancouver is different to most other seasons’ rain only by the calendar; it can be pretty grim no matter the time of year. In May, it was a bit warmer than November, so while I was still damp and looked like hell as I strode into the lobby, at least I wasn’t shivering. A uniformed police officer was standing guard in the hallway. I had already reached into my wallet and grabbed one of my old lawyer business cards, which I dutifully gave to the kind officer, and while never actually claiming to be Tim’s counsel of record, I didn’t dissuade him from thinking it. He was just about to slide the card into his shirt pocket when the door to Tim’s room opened and Andrea stepped out. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” she said.

“What?” I asked her.

My friend threw a disappointed look at the obviously freshly minted officer. “I don’t want anyone but identified family in that room unless they’ve been expressly cleared by me. Understood?”

If he was bothered at being dressed down by Andrea in front of me, he appeared too scared to show it. “Yes, ma’am,” he replied. “It’s just that I thought —”

“— you thought he was the victim’s lawyer, I know,” she interrupted. “Any idea why the victim of the attack would have felt a need to call for defence counsel?”

He seemed stunned by the question. Of course, I had been counting on that. “Do you want me to arrest him?” he finally managed.

“I would prefer that you shoot him. He can’t talk his way out of that.”

I sighed. “Are you done with the Dirty Harry routine? I’ve only got so much time on the meter.”

“Like you paid for parking.”

“It’s more the principle of delay to which I was referring.”

“Come here,” Andy demanded, and before I could protest, she took me none too gently by the arm and guided me a few feet down the corridor.

“How’s he doing?” I asked.

“He’s awake. He’s going to survive. But he took one hell of a beating.”

“So I could tell.”

“Which reminds me, why the hell did you take off on me this morning?”

“Because you were going to scold me.”

“I was,” she confirmed.

“You were going to tell me that I had gotten involved in something that was becoming dangerous.”

“I was,” she confirmed again.

“You were going to further direct me not to encourage this lawsuit between the student and the school and to focus on teaching in the classroom and allowing the business of making decisions about the school dance to be made by the people in charge.”

“All of this is true. And you didn’t want to hear it?”

“Kinda seemed redundant.”

“You forgot the part where I was thinking about trying to spring some departmental time to put a watch on you.”

“My own bodyguard? Can I pick her?”

“Her?”

“Remember that constable we ran into at Starbucks? The one you said had been on the job just a few months but showed real promise?”

“You thought she was cute?”

“I thought she was yummy.”

“Yummy? My god, you’ll never marry again. I’m serious, Win. For the time being, I really think you should try to lay low on this.”

“You still don’t think this is some kind of kid stuff?”

“Win, have a look at the kid. He’s lucky he doesn’t seem to have permanent brain damage or something. Whoever did this to Tim was pretty determined to send him a very clear message.”

“Come on, Andy. A gay student gets beaten up? That’s hardly organized crime material. We’re talking about thugs.”

“Who didn’t stop all that short of killing your student. Your name keeps popping up in this, those same thugs may well do the same to you.”

“Schoolyard fights are one thing. Attacking a teacher is something else.”

“Winston. Listen to me.” When she called me Winston, it meant she was especially serious. Her tone took on a slightly motherly quality. “Whether we’re dealing with Einsteins here is irrelevant. They’re muscle, and they’re not afraid to throw weight around. I need you to watch your back and try to stay out of trouble, at least until I can track them down.”

“All right,” I said resignedly. “I will be extra special careful and look both ways when I cross every street.”

“I’m serious,” she insisted.

“Me too, especially about that cute cop you’re going to send me as a bodyguard.”

“I said she had potential, I didn’t say she was there yet. Besides, the captain wouldn’t spring for any cash. Seems the VPD doesn’t consider you particularly worth protecting from a good beating. So you’re getting the real McCoy for the evening.”

“Oh no,” I protested.

She turned from me and headed towards the exit. “I’ll be there in a couple of hours. Try to stay alive until then and order in some decent food. I’ll be hungry protecting your ass.” Defeated, I turned and headed back to Tim’s room, the still-puzzled police officer still holding my old business card and not bothering to slow my access to his protected patient.

Inside the bleak, cream-coloured room, Tim was surrounded by a woman I assumed to be his mother and by none other than his high-school-aged, uncertified legal advocate, Sara. Both looked glum. Tim, who had wakened earlier in the day, was trying to cheer up his two visitors. “Look who’s here,” he declared to the room. “Can’t a guy get a break from school even in the hospital?”

“Mr. Patrick,” Sara exclaimed. “Can you believe this?”

“No. I really can’t.” Turning to Tim’s mother, I attempted to introduce myself, to no avail. If she heard me, she made no notice of it and instead stood staring out the window. “How are you feeling?” I asked Tim.

“It only hurts when I laugh.”

“There’s little danger of that if his jokes are as good here as they are at school,” Sara said. At least her sense of humour was recovering.

“Tim,” I said softly, “I can’t tell you how sorry I am about what’s happened.”

“Mr. Patrick,” he protested, “don’t you apologize. You didn’t beat the shit out of me and tie me to a goalpost.”

“I know, but still, I just feel like this whole thing with the legal action and …”

“That’s crap. This happened because people are homophobic and couldn’t get into the twenty-first century like the rest of us. For Christ’s sake, I could get married to my boyfriend, but I can’t bring him to the dance? This is not your fault. This was our decision to do this. Not yours.” He paused for a moment and tried to reach for the cup of ice water on the bedside. Sara beat him to it and held it up to her friend’s lips. Tim smiled and the remnants of his sip dribbled out the corner of his mouth, where his lower lip was so swollen, he probably had no feeling of the liquid escaping. “If anything, it’s her fault,” he said, nodding slightly at Sara.

His mother finally spoke up. “Tim, that’s a terrible thing to say.”

“She knows I’m kidding. Look, you guys. I feel physically like shit, but the truth is, I’m almost kind of glad this happened.”

“How so?” I asked.

“Because now it’s out there. It wasn’t exactly a secret, and I know people talked about me, but hell, now everyone knows. It’s like a burden’s been lifted.” I nodded my understanding though I couldn’t possibly have understood.

“I’m just glad you’re okay. I’m sure you just want to put this whole thing behind you. I know I do.”

“I wish it were that easy,” Mrs. Morgan said to me.

“Mom,” Tim began to protest.

“Be quiet!” I couldn’t tell if she was angry, frustrated, scared, or all three. “Tim insists he’s going ahead with this.”

“This what?”

“The lawsuit,” Sara interjected. “Tim says he’s going to keep fighting the school over bringing Van to the grad prom.” I looked at Tim lying bandaged in bed, slim, light, and looking as vulnerable as I’d ever seen any kid. Yet the spark in his eye was bright. I may not have been looking, but up until then I had never seen it.

“Are you sure want to do this? After all you’ve been through?”

He smiled at me with puffy lips. “Now more than ever.” From her side of the bed, Tim’s mother let out a groan.