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  Infusion

  by

  Alyssa Thiessen

  Cover Design by Zig Thiessen

  This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise—without prior written permission of the author except as provided by United States of America copyright law and except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a newspaper, magazine, or journal.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to people living or deceased is coincidental and unintentional.

  Copyright © 2016 by Alyssa Thiessen

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Charlie Dawg Press.

  Missouri, USA.

  ISBN: 978-1944979072

  CharlieDawgPress.com

  To my sister, Celesta, for helping me fight the good fight.

  Acknowledgements

  First, a thank you to my Mom, Francie Humby, for her endless support and encouragement. She has read this story more times than I can count, and I am a better writer because of her. I am so blessed to have her help and friendship.

  Thanks to my sister, Celesta, for listening to my ideas as they were taking shape, for being my first reader, and for constantly encouraging me to keep writing. I've been enriched by her insight on writing and on life.

  Many thanks to Carroll Wiebe, who answered my endless questions about bullet wounds and emergency medicine and to Jennifer Duerksen, whose insight and keen sense of story helped me iron out the rough spots.

  My appreciation to Jeff Gerke, although I’ve only met him once. I pitched him this story years ago at a Realm Makers conference. His kindness and encouragement during that pitch - my very first pitch of my very first draft, by the way - was what inspired me to keep writing. He also helped me figure out where this story begins.

  A great thank you to my publisher, Charlie Dawg Press, for accepting Infusion in the first place, and Glynda Francis, for her mad editorial skills. A tactful, patient, precise, wordsmithing genius, Glynda has been instrumental in Infusion’s development, as well as in my growth as a writer.

  Thanks to my daughter Rachel, for her ideas and creativity when I was writing this book. I don't think I could have finished it without her help. Thank you to my sons, Joshua and Noah, for also inspiring me daily.

  Finally, a thank you goes to my talented husband, Zig, for designing the book cover and for giving me the time and freedom I needed to write. You're an amazing father to our three children. Thanks for being my best friend and tireless partner in this life's adventure.

  Chapter One

  If I’d known I was going to die on my sixteenth birthday, I probably would’ve spent a little time on my makeup that morning. As it was, I lay in the field, cold, and all I could think was that I hadn’t even bothered to run a brush through my hair before I left. I mean, at the very least, I could’ve worn earrings. It started to rain, softly at first, and I felt my teeth chattering. No, not felt. Heard. I heard something else, too. Jared sobbing. Loudly.

  It was funny—I’d known him all my life, and I’d never heard him cry before. Would he be crying so desperately if he hadn’t been the one who shot me? I looked away from him and back into the darkening sky.

  I never considered what it would be like to die. Would it hurt? Not more than when the bullet tore through the center of my body. And certainly not more than knowing my best friend looked me in the face as he pulled the trigger. Former best friend, I guess.

  Thunder. Jared followed my gaze upwards, his face lit by the glow of nearby lightning. He leaned in close to me. His body was over mine, blocking the rain, his hands holding tight to my abdomen, trying futilely to stop the endless flow of blood.

  “I’m so sorry, Rache. I’m so sorry. So sorry,” he choked, over and over, against my ear. “I didn’t mean to— I don’t know how—”

  I willed my hand to move and, at last, my fingers touched his skin.

  “Is she okay?” A voice called from somewhere in the distance.

  “Help!” Jared’s frantic voice sounded distant even though he was right on top of me. “Help us!” He was shouting, but it was a whisper to me.

  Vibrations shook the ground. A shadow appeared above us, and then a man was kneeling beside me. Water dripped from his brown hair. His stubbled face was drawn but calm, and he was already on his phone. He placed his free hand over Jared’s, increasing the pressure on my body. His lips moved, but it was like somebody had pressed mute on the entire world. The quiet was nice.

  The man threw the phone down beside him. He fumbled in his jacket, then pulled out something silver. Something sharp. I wondered vaguely what it was for. With distant curiosity, I watched as he pulled his hand away from Jared’s and drew the object along his own palm. He shoved the thing back into his coat, pushed Jared’s hand aside, and put his own on my abdomen. Jared placed his hands down on top of the stranger’s, and four hands tried to keep my blood inside my body. I lay with my cheek on the grass. It didn’t matter. The ambulance would be too late. I was glad I hadn’t done my algebra homework.

  Slowly, I became aware of my body again. Heat radiated from where their hands pressed. No, not just heat. Burning.

  I tried to lift my arm to push their fingers away, but nothing happened. My body ignored me. My faint breath moved in and out, in and out, as if nothing was wrong. As though I wasn’t dying. As though I wasn’t on fire. I pictured myself writhing away from them, screaming, crying out. I pictured myself sitting up and pushing them back. Stop hurting me! But I lay helpless beneath the blaze.

  Frantic, I concentrated on my eyes. Jared always had the uncanny ability to see what I felt with a glance. Maybe, if I could just get them to see my eyes, they would notice. They would hear me. Concentrating hard, I thought about my eyelashes and then my eyelids. Look at me. Slowly—so slowly, I blinked. My eyes closed and, in the momentary darkness, the pain ebbed and was gone. I couldn’t move, but I could focus. I exhaled deeply and opened my eyes.

  My breath caught in my throat. I was somewhere else entirely.

  No, not somewhere else. I was still lying on the grass. And, in the distance, the field horizon was the same. Jared and the man knelt beside me, their hands pressed firmly against my body. But the grass in front of me was brown, dry, and coarse. The sky beyond, a deep red. And the trees—the small cluster of trees by the edge of the park—were gone. Where were the trees? Instead, decrepit structures stood somewhere in the distance. I squinted, trying to clear my mind. Had I fallen asleep? It was as if everything were framed by a jagged window in front of me.

  Somebody stood nearby, angled away, his body shadowed. He was leaning over and, faintly, I heard whispers. I thought about calling out to him but, before I said anything, he glanced in my direction. His elongated face was dark gray, and his eyes were round, black, and blank.

  Not a person. My scream shattered the silence. He shifted his gaze to my face. Then he cocked his head.

  The scene pinched shut. The night sky was deep blue again, and the grass shimmered with rain. I kept screaming, staring into Jared’s wide green eyes.

  He yanked his hands away and sat on his haunches, mouth agape. “What’s happening to her?” He shouted at the man who continued to press on my body. Jared grabbed his jacket, trying to pull him off. “You’re hurting her. You’re hurting her!” His voice neared hysteria.

  The man leaned closer to me. “No time,” he said. Jared gripped him by the shoulders. The sky lit up, and I lost sight of them in the brilliance.

  A sudden jolt, blinding pain, then nothing.

  I’d heard when people died and were brought back, they hovered over their own bodies, looking down at them from above. When
I woke up, all I really remembered, after the pain, was the quiet. To be honest, I was thankful I hadn’t been forced to float atop my own corpse. Aside from the humiliating hair, ugly clothes, and lack of makeup, my bloodied, pallid body lying beside Jared’s was a sight I was happy to have avoided. When I read the newspaper article about it later (I was macabrely pleased to have made the front page, although they only showed the charred grass, a little blood, and the ambulance), it said one of the rookie paramedics had been sick in the field beside me. I wasn’t sorry to have missed that experience either.

  It took me a few minutes to remember what had happened. It’s not like I opened my eyes and thought Boy, it’s good to be alive! Instead, as I gradually regained consciousness, my gaze drifted around at the yellow walls and blue sheets in the hospital, and I tried to figure out where I’d gone to sleep. A faint electronic beeping came from a small monitor close by the left side of my bed. It seemed attached to me, but caring was too much effort. Beyond it, a vase with white lilies and baby’s breath stood alone on the window ledge, and I remembered the rain.

  It rained on my birthday. It wasn’t supposed to rain on my birthday. Rain. Jared. Was it rain on his face?

  Someone spoke, a low rumble over the steady noise of the monitor. I blinked up at a white coat worn by a man I didn’t recognize. Behind him stood two unfamiliar women, one in a white coat and the other in pale blue scrubs, and my mom, red-eyed. I looked away from them, down my fingertips to the end of my bed, and my confusion doubled. Wide, clear tape was wrapped around my forearm, holding the IV tight against my skin. A thin tube ran up from it and into a bag, hanging from a metal stand beside my bed.

  “Mom, what am I doing here?” I interrupted the speaker, startling myself with the hoarseness of my own voice. How long had it been since I’d said anything?

  “I’m so glad you’re awake.” Her voice was thick, and her light blue eyes were lined more deeply than usual, dark semi-circles in the bags beneath them. “Dr. Ryan was just explaining to you—”

  “Where’s Jared?”

  “Jared?” Her weak echo offered me nothing.

  “He was with me. It was raining.”

  The doctor cleared his throat, peering over the thin metal rims of his glasses at me. “Rachel, why don’t I come back in a while to answer any questions you might have later about your care. For now, I’m going to give you some time alone with your mom.” He turned to her. “Her vitals are good. Strong. Extubation was successful and she’s responsive. Let me know if you need anything.”

  As the strangers left, Mom crossed the space between us quickly and sat in the chair beside my bed. Avoiding my eyes, she slipped off her shoes. “The doctors say you’ll be fine. Just fine, Rachel.”

  “Jared?”

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart.” She ran her manicured fingernails along the armrest. “He’s gone.”

  “Gone?” Confusion washed over me. Gone where? “What happened?”

  “Rachel ...” Finally, her eyes met mine as she reached to take my good hand in her own.

  Without warning, heat rushed through my body as I saw a distorted image of Jared standing in front of me. His green eyes were wide and black, and his lanky frame loomed garishly above me. He waved an oversized handgun in front of himself. Spit flew from his mouth as he screamed wordlessly.

  I frowned. The image was wrong. That wasn’t what happened. It couldn’t have been. Why did he look like that?

  I forced myself to focus on Mom’s face. She took a breath. “The police said— ” Emotion contorted her usually soft expression. “It was his dad’s gun. They think there was some kind of argument. People heard shouting in the field before ...” Tears streamed down her face. I sensed her anger, and a matching wave of wrath washed over me. Just then, the lights flickered slightly. Mom looked up, startled. Her face blurred; my eyes were wet. “Are you okay, Rache?” She touched my cheek gently, her thoughts returning to me.

  My silent fury ebbed. Jared’s face had disappeared. My pulse slowed, and I took a deep breath.

  “Jared shot me?” The words seemed strange but, as I said them, I knew they were true. Jared shot me. Why had he shot me? And where had he gone? As soon as I thought it, the last part of the night came back to me in a rush. Jared, kneeling by my body, his hands covered in my blood.

  “Someone else was there.” I tried to make sense of my memory of the man. Deep set eyes. Lined face. Why was he there?

  Mom studied me. “Did you know him?”

  “No. I think he was just trying to help us. Who was he?”

  “They don’t know. They’re trying to identify him. The police will be in here later to talk to you.”

  “I didn’t know him.” I forced the image of the stranger from my mind and thought about Jared again. I recalled his face when he pulled the trigger. Surprise. He hadn’t meant to shoot me. I tried to piece together the images before he raised the gun. Everything was fragmented.

  “How long was I out, Mom?”

  “Two days.”

  “How bad is it?”

  “The doctors say your heart is fine. It hit Jared before it hit you.”

  “What did?”

  “The lightning.”

  Lightning? Shot and struck by lightning. Happy birthday to me.

  “The current took the quickest path out. That man, then Jared, then you—it entered and exited through the same path as the bullet. Your heart stopped but wasn’t damaged. They were able to restart it so quickly. You’re lucky, they say, that Jared aimed low.”

  Lucky. “Does it look really bad?” I pictured the hole this must have left in my stomach. So much for wearing my two-piece this summer.

  “They think it will heal well. The Lichtenberg figures from the lightning will probably fade over time, but there’s some concern over the entry and exit points ...” Her voice faltered and she looked down at her feet as she wrapped a strand of her bleached hair around her finger absently. “We’ve already been talking to the plastic surgeon, just in case.”

  “And Dad and Evelyn?”

  “They’re coming by tonight. They’ve been here every day.”

  “That must have been fun.” It popped out before I could stop myself.

  “It was fine.” She swatted me lightly. “We’re adults. And we all love you.” She downplayed it, but I knew it would have been hard for her to be there with them. “Your dad was a wreck.”

  “I can imagine.” He’d wanted me to live with him after the divorce. But I was my mother’s girl, from her personality to her looks. A spitting image, everyone said. Or I had been, before she’d dyed her light brown hair blonde and hid her brown eyes with blue colored contacts.

  Before she’d married Mikey.

  I was glad she hadn’t brought him to see me. Jared, though— “Mom, where’s Jared gone?”

  She wouldn’t meet my gaze. “The lightning. Both Jared and the other man ...” Then she raised her eyes to mine. “They died, honey. Instantly. There was nothing anyone could do.”

  “Oh.” My voice sounded hollow in my ears.

  We sat in silence. Tears blurred the edges of my vision, threatening to spill over again. I took a shaky breath. Letting myself cry would make everything worse. Maybe if I refused to feel, none of this would be true. Jared would walk through that door, and make everything okay. How would I keep breathing without him?

  “Hey, Mom?” My voice quavered. “Do you mind if I sleep? I’m wiped.”

  “Sure. You go right ahead.”

  I waited for her to move toward the door, but she settled herself in more comfortably. I cleared my throat. “Do you mind if I have some time alone? I mean, I ...”

  “Oh.” She blinked. I’d hurt her feelings. She shifted in her chair to get up.

  “It’s okay, Mom.” I reached out to stop her. “You can stay. Of course, you can stay.”

  “Don’t worry, Rachel. I’ll be right outside.” She patted my arm. “You just rest and get better.” As the door closed behind her, I s
ank into the soft pillows.

  Why were we in that field? I closed my eyes, trying to shut out the hospital, my mother’s distress, and my distorted mental image of my friend.

  I pictured Jared clearly as he’d stood at my front door. His easy, familiar grin dared me to refuse; his tousled, fair hair hung down into his eyes. I’d been getting ready for bed and was already in my red sweatpants.

  “Come on, Rachel. It’s going to be beautiful. You haven’t done anything to celebrate your sixteenth.”

  He had been taking me to see a meteor shower. Jared was into the stars.

  “I’m not dressed and it’s supposed to rain tonight.”

  “You look great in red and if it rains, we’ll come back. You’re not made of sugar.”

  Great in red. Was the universe being ironic? I used to think red looked good on me, too.

  The hospital clock ticked, and I gradually became aware of a dull ache in my abdomen. Whatever pain meds they had me on were wearing off.

  The door opened and an unfamiliar nurse entered the room. “Hi Rachel. Just checking in to see how you’re doing. I was with you during the operation and ...” She trailed off, stopping to study my face. “What’s the matter? Are you in pain?” She barely needed my nod to know. “I’ll get the floor nurse.”

  She disappeared and, in moments, another nurse—the one in my room earlier—hurried in, tendrils of graying hair escaping from her loose bun. She hovered in my peripheral as she worked on the bag attached to my IV. “There we go. You’ll be fine in a jiff.”

  The pain faded, and I settled into the embrace of a comfortable fog.

  “I was just on my way out.” The younger nurse had returned. “I thought I’d see how you were doing.”

  As she touched my hand, I saw my own body, half-dressed on an operating table. I was intubated, a hollow, plastic tube extending from my mouth to a machine beside my bed, and my face was ashen. My long hair was wet, matted against my head. Two doctors worked over me: the one I’d seen in my room before, and a younger doctor, his hazel eyes intent on his gloved hands as he worked to close the hole in my body. Somehow, I was watching this scene from the other side of the table.