Love Lies Dying (24 page)

Zoe wasn’t there.

“I have,” she said from beside him.

He turned to face her.

He saw the shovel swinging towards him and he tried to duck.

He was too late.

It slammed into the side of his head and the blow rang in his ears.

He cannoned from the shovel into the passenger seat of the Jeep. His head hit the door roll-bar as he fell backwards.

He blacked out for just a second.

When he opened his eyes, Zoe was standing above him.

“Sorry, looks like I’m clumsy,” she mimicked him.

She smiled, turned from him and opened the glove box.

John closed his eyes and tried to will the pains in his head to disappear. A high pitched sound began buzzing in his ears. His mind was throbbing and white stars swirled in his eyes. He squeezed his eyes shut tight to make the stars disappear.

They wouldn’t.

He opened his eyes again.

Zoe was holding his right arm.

“Now what do you think, Johnny?” she asked.

John tried to mumble, but it came out as a low groan.

“Shit, Johnny,” she continued mimicking him. “Sometimes you just don’t think. No wonder I could control you so easily. Use your brain, man.”

She laughed.

John closed his eyes again and tried to get his mind to settle down; it was spinning like a top.

He heard the clicking sound and felt the cold metal around his wrist. He was then pulled forward into a sitting position.

He opened his eyes and fought for consciousness.

His wrist was attached to a handcuff. The other cuff was securely fastened to the door roll-bar of the Jeep.

John pulled himself forward and out of the Jeep. He tried to stand, but his legs were like jelly. He fell to one side and needed to rest against the side of the Jeep for support.

Why?
was all he could think.

He pulled at the cuff on his wrist; it was tightly secured and was starting to bite into skin and bone. He yanked at the chain and tried to pull the other cuff from the roll-bar of the door.

But it was no use.

WHY!

He swung his head around to look for Zoe, but his eyesight wasn’t working properly. He was starting to see double and all he could make out were blobs of objects.

His breathing was loud in his ears.

 “Don’t you get it yet, Johnny?” she was right by him, but he couldn’t see her.

“Don’t…call…me Johnny!” he said through clenched teeth.

“But I love you, Johnny!”

“Don’t…call…” he continued.

“And it’s time you realised it.”

He couldn’t see the shovel as it slammed into his head for a second time.

PART II

Eighteen

Pounding.

I can hear the pounding.

Footsteps?

No, it’s too loud.

It’s so dark.

I can’t see.

But the pounding is hurting my ears.

A heartbeat?

Could it be a heartbeat?

So loud?

It’s not possible.

Run.

I have to run.

There’s no other choice.

The sound is so loud I have to get away.

I have to escape.

Escape from the things that haunt me.

And follow me…

Escape before they can catch me.

There must be a way.

There must be safety somewhere.

Why can’t I see?

Why can’t I run?

I must.

But I can’t.

My legs won’t move.

What have you done to me?

Why?

Why won’t you let me escape?

The pounding.

Louder now, getting louder still.

I can hear them.

Laughing at me.

No, it’s not laughter.

They’re screaming.

They’re screaming too!

Why?

WHY!

Leave them alone.

Do not hurt them.

Hurt me!

You hear me?

HURT ME!

But don’t hurt them!

You have no right to hurt them.

Not when it’s all my fault.

No!

Leave them alone.

I’ll try to stand.

To reach out.

But they’re all around me now.

I can’t see them.

But I know they’re there.

The pounding is louder still.

The screaming is growing.

Leave them alone.

I’m telling you.

LEAVE THEM THE FUCK ALONE!

They’ve got me now.

The hands are all around me.

Reaching out.

Reaching up.

They have my legs.

What are you doing?

No.

No!

NO!

They’re pulling me down.

How?

Why?

You can’t!

Pulling me down.

I’m falling.

Falling into the ground.

The ground is swallowing me up.

And the screaming is turning to laughter.

You?

YOU!

You tricked me.

Why did you trick me?

And the pounding is getting louder still.

Nineteen

The pain sliced through his head and neck as he tried to open his eyes.

He lifted his head to look around him, but the double-image of his surrounds only made his head pound more.

Taking a deep breath, he tried to stand from his sitting position, but realised he didn’t have the strength.

He squeezed his eyes shut, hoping to wish away the blurred vision. Trying to stop the pounding in his mind.

What…?
was all John could think.

He took another deep breath to calm himself down, to get a grip on things.

The pain in his head continued to throb. He leaned backwards and tried to work out where he was – and why.

Slowly, he began to grasp reality once more.

Okay, take it slow,
he thought to himself.

His mind slipped into gear, pushing the pain aside as he began to regain control.

He could feel the night air around him, cold and damp.

He was outside.

The pounding he heard matched the throbbing in his mind and, raising his eyebrows, he could already feel the swelling of the large bump on the side of his head.

How did that happen?
he thought.

And then it all came back…

Zoe. The Church. Ricky Fox.

The car keys. The gun.

The shovel.

John moved his right hand to feel the bump on his head. He whimpered in pain as pins and needles flooded his arm. He jerked his hand to a stop, sending another wave of pain through him.

His arm clattered against metal.

Metal on metal.

And then he realised his right arm was hanging above him.

He had no choice.

Taking a deep breath, he slowly opened his eyes once more.

Squinting from the light around him, he began to make sense of his surroundings as his vision began to improve.

Trees, bushes and dirt. Okay, I’m outside. It’s night. Where is the light coming from?

Then he remembered the security lights on the church. It was all starting to fit back into place again. Slowly, his mind was working through the clouds of unconsciousness.

From the shadows in front of him, he realised the lights were somewhere behind him. He tried to bend his neck to see them, but he couldn’t. The stiffness in his neck added to the pain already in his head and the numbness in his arm.

John licked his dry lips; a thin film of dust from the driveway had coated his tongue. He prodded at the wound on his lip once more, and realised the dust had stopped the bleeding. It was now a dry and rough gash that tasted like gritty copper.

He remembered how that had happened now too.

Zoe…

Turning his head more, in spite of the pain, he looked over his shoulder and found he was leaning against the front of the Jeep. His right hand, hanging above him,  looked swollen and blue, and was surrounded by the shining polished metal of a handcuff. The other cuff was attached to the Jeep’s front grill.

Well, that explains one thing,
he thought.

He pulled at the cuff with his right arm, sending a new wave of pins and needles coursing through his body.

The other cuff slipped up and down the grill and clattered loudly in the night as he pulled at it, but there was no escape from its grip.

John raised his left hand from the ground, reached out for the cuff and yanked it a couple more times, but still no success. The more he struggled, the more his body screamed in pain.

The pounding in his head was louder now, and every-so-often his vision would blur again.

He sighed deeply and turned back around, resting his back against the bumper of the Jeep. He looked down at himself. The dirt and dust covered his clothes, and through his half-buttoned shirt he could see the still-seeping claw marks down his chest. They were deep and ugly, with the edges of each wound puffy and black. The dust had covered most of the wound, but there were still trickles of blood descending. The pain from his chest had, for the most part, subsided – or it was being numbed by the pain in his head.

John’s eyes focussed on his surrounding area as he searched for something – anything – that could help him out of the situation.

But he could find nothing.

Nothing.

He reached up with his left hand and gently felt the bump on the side of his head.

It was about half the size of a clenched fist and just as hard. It hurt to touch. John closed his eyes as the pain shot through his skull once more.

As he rested his left arm on his lap, he realised his watch was missing.

Why?

Zoe,
was all he could think.
Zoe, Zoe...

Why?

He opened his eyes again and looked around, searching for any sign of her. The pines he faced held no clue to her whereabouts. He turned to survey as much of the area as he could see behind him, but there was no sign of her there either.

He looked for the spilled contents of her handbag on the ground nearby.

Nothing.

John sat back once more. There was nothing he could do. Nothing at all.

Except wait
.

He sighed deeply and shook his head. Then he thought about what had happened since Friday night.

If I’d known what I was getting into, I would’ve stayed at work,
he thought.
How quickly life can change.

He tried to get as comfortable as he could on the ground. His buttocks were starting to go numb from the hard ground and his shoes were doing nothing to stop the night air from freezing his toes.

I’ll be completely numb in a few hours if I don’t get out of this,
he thought.

He sat up straighter in the hope it would relieve some of the pain from his right arm and help keep the pins and needles at bay. And he closed his eyes, concentrating on the pounding in his skull, trying to get it to diminish.

But he knew that wasn’t going to happen.

Zoe,
he thought through the pounding.
Why?

He replayed the events through his head, as he remembered them. Finding the purse and the spare car keys, dropping them to the ground, taunting her.

Maybe I pushed her too far,
he thought.
Maybe I shouldn’t’ve said the things I did. She’s been through a lot and I probably should’ve been more careful.

He nodded to himself.

She’s just a delicate child.

He looked around once more.

Yeah, delicate…
But there’s no excuse for something like this.

He shook his right arm, trying to improve the circulation. The cuffs scraped on the grill of the Jeep and the pain bit into his shoulder and side once more.

John realised he had to do something, he couldn’t sit here all night and just wait. 

He had to, if needed, apologise to Zoe for saying what he said and for doing the things he had done.

She’ll understand,
he thought to himself.
I’ll apologise and say I don’t know what came over me and she’ll let me go. Then I’ll get out of this crazy mess. I don’t need this. I don’t need to be in a situation I can’t control.

It was a simple plan, and one that was bound to work.

An apology or two, a smile from me, and she’ll be fine.

John straightened himself into a better sitting position, ignoring the pounding in his head and the pins and needles in his arm as he did so.

He opened his eyes and stared out into the night. The stars above in the clear night sky shone down unblinking at him.

For the first time, he realised he was shivering. His clothes were wet with the damp night air and his breath fogged in front of him.

He had no choice.

He opened his mouth.

“Zoe…” it was meant to be a call for help, but it came out as a cracked whisper from a dry throat.

He licked his lips and swallowed.

“Zoe…” he tried again. This time it was louder, but not loud enough.

“Zoe…
Zoe!
” Still not loud enough. He could barely hear it over the pounding in his head.

“Zoe!”

That’s better,
he thought.
You’re almost there!

“ZOOOOOOOEEEEEEE!”

The loudness of his scream surprised even him. It sounded desperate. And it cracked the silence of the night. It echoed into the darkness and caused John’s skull to hurt more. Now he could also feel the pulse of his heartbeat throbbing through the bump on the side of his head.

He listened to the night. Trying to hear anything that sounded like help was on the way, trying to divorce the thudding in his head from other noises of the night.

He waited.

He didn’t know for how long, but he waited.

Nothing.

He was pinned to the Jeep in a position where he couldn’t see the church. For some reason Zoe had turned the Jeep around so the hood faced away from the church. He tried to bend his head backwards and stretch far enough to see, but the front of the Jeep was in the way. He had no idea if Zoe was in the church or whether she could hear him.

He had no idea where she was.

What if she’s not here? What if she’s left me?
he thought.
I could die here!

John took a deep breath and tried to calm down before panic grabbed hold.

Come on,
he thought to himself.
She hasn’t gone anywhere, she’s not going to leave the Jeep behind.

He nodded his head and tried to smile. He knew what he was thinking was right.

Or he hoped it was.

She wouldn’t leave without him.

At least, he didn’t think she would.

Plus, she needed his help with Ricky Fox in the morning. So, she would have to unshackle him soon.

He just needed to play the waiting game.

Yeah,
he thought.
That’s all I have to do. Let her get her little revenge for how I treated her. Then, when I’m free I’ll let her know exactly what I think of her little game.

He’d wait out her game. He had no other choice.

He sat back and got himself comfortable resting against the Jeep. By moving his right arm every-so-often, he was keeping the circulation flowing and the pins and needles away. The numbness was starting to disappear and the feeling was returning to his arm. But with the feeling came the pain of the cuffs biting into his right wrist, and that pain was adding to the pain running through his head.

He could stand up to ease the pain in his arm, but he wasn’t sure his legs would work right now.

He could wait, though.

He’d wait her out. Soon she’d need him and come for him.

But what if you’re left here all night? You’re not going to be in any fit state to meet Fox on his own terms and beat him. You have to be at your best and you won’t be. You’ll be tired, battered and sore. He’s going to walk all over the top of you, Zoe and Helen.

John shook his head.

Helen, poor Helen,
he thought
. Hang in there, girl, I’m coming to get you!

He hoped he would be able to save her. And Zoe. Although Zoe was starting to wear a bit thin right now…

This is crazy!

Panic suddenly filled him. It rose out of nowhere, almost like it rose from the ground around him, and he knew he had to get out of this mess.

Now!

He filled his lungs.

“
ZOOOOOOOOOOOOOEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
”

He screamed it at loud as he could. His body shook with the scream, his throat burned, his head pounded. His one-word plea seemed to stretch forever until his throat gave out and the noise stopped. It echoed around him in the night and he imagined it flying across the church, past the tennis court and over the graves – heading right out into the darkness, stretching on forever.

She must have heard this time,
he thought as he slumped back down by the Jeep.

All he would have to do is wait.

He tried to get his breathing under control. He closed his eyes tight and tried to fight the pain in his head and wrist.

The pounding sounded louder somehow, clearer now.