The Time Until (17 page)

My blood demands it.

My muscles need it.

My mind controls it.

I feel myself start to tear in two.

Present Day

My mind races and I’m being pulled in several
different directions at once.
 
On one
side, my body wants – needs – to be let loose.
 
On the other, my mind is holding back, but only to torture me with
memories I have long forgotten or repressed. The feeling of helplessness about
the accident and hospital with Sam in her bed, feeling the rage because of the
courtroom and verdict for Stanton, shame and anger at the guy in eighth grade
who wouldn’t leave Sam alone, anxiety about the time my parents tried to
separate us, jealousy and irritation from all the guys that flirt with Sam when
I’m right next to her.
 
My entire life’s
memories flood my mind pulling me into the past.

I feel every emotion like it’s fresh.

This drunk has now become the cause for everything
that has ever happened to me in my life.

Pain surges through my body invading every sense
and thought as my blood boils uncontrollably.
 
Emotions, and pain, fuel my already unrestrainable rage.
 
The effort to hold myself back is exhausting
and my fleeting hold on sanity shatters.
 
The results of the accident and hospital stay scream their frantic
warning at me even as the rage starts to take over.
 
Anger mixes with injury, each sustaining the
other growing ever more uncontainable.

The leash snaps and my body acts on its own,
smashing my fist into the drunk’s face.
 
He crumbles to the ground with a loud grunt of expelled air.
 
Vicoden
numbed pain
shoots through my arm and spreads throughout my body from the impact.
 
The automatic reaction didn’t give me time to
think about which hand I was going to use to punch him with.
 
The pins and rods in my arm ache as the
Vicoden
does what it’s best at.

The initial hit releases some of the anger I’ve
been holding in for so long and it feels great to feel it fly away.
 
The act is therapeutic in its own way and my
body craves more of it.
 
I can feel the
anger evaporate off my body and I shiver with the sensation.

The memories and old hurts I’ve been reliving
makes me rage more and more and the violent physical release is enticing.
 
Invisible restraints vanish as my mind
relinquishes control and retreats to a corner, allowing me my therapy.

The beast is free and unchecked.

Two of his buddies shake off their initial shock
and pull the raging monster that is me off of him before it starts pummeling
him.

The beast rages against their restraints as they hold
it against the car.
 
The drunk’s third
friend walks up and punches the monster in the gut causing it to cough for
breath.
 
The friends loosen their grips,
but don’t let go as it coughs.

More fuel for the rage.
 
Everything becomes fuel for the rage.

The creature recovers, growls loudly at its
inability to move and starts to fight against the grips of those holding
it.
 
Straining already strained muscles,
the monster struggles to break one of the holds.
 
It cares nothing for the pain it’s creating
in its own body as it applies more strength into getting lose.

“Whoa, man, you’re going to break something.” The
creature roars loudly as the pain from struggling starts to invade its
consciousness.
 
The gut check friend goes
in for another punch while he still has a chance, but the beast is ready for
him this time.
 
It flexes its stomach
muscles so it only barely feels the punch and head butts the guy when he gets
close.
 
The friend goes down with a
shower of blood from his nose and a string of curses from behind his hands.

Loosening their grip in surprise, the beast takes
advantage of the two friends and wrenches its arm free before smashing its
elbow into the closest one’s face.
 
It
manages to break free of the other guy and punches him as well.
 
The creature stalks over to the drunk as he
starts to get up.

“You sonuvabitch!”
The
drunk growls noticeably more sober than before.
 
The beast doesn’t respond, it simply swings its arm like a hammer and
smashes the man to the ground again.
 
Quickly turning him over, the demon sits on his chest and starts
punching him in the head repeatedly.
 
A
snarl escapes its throat as it continues its onslaught.

Ethan jumps over the hood of the car next to the
beast and pulls him off the ground.
 
A
car skids to a stop and Quentin jumps from the passenger seat to help
Ethan.
 
Arianna sprints to help Katelyn
off the ground.
 
The demon growls and
roars as it
fights
against the new set of
restraints.
 
Swinging it around, the two
friends try to talk to it.

“Calm down, Alan,” Ethan yells into the beast’s
ear, “calm down.”
 
The creature continues
to growl loudly.
 
Katelyn walks up to it
and softly places her hand on its cheek.
 
It starts to calm down as the touch slowly drains its anger away.
 
Katelyn smiles weakly under her black eye and
the creature’s anger dissipates even more, though it fights to remain
unchained.
 
It stops struggling and
starts panting from exertion.

“
It’s
okay, Alan, I’m
okay.” Her voice is soothing and gentle.
 
The beast slowly slinks back into its cage and stops it grumbling.
 
Her touch makes me start to feel better.

None of us hear the man behind us get up until he
shouts.

“Take this asshole!” Consciousness floods my
psyche as I feel his fist ram into my back.
 
It feels weird to be in control again.
 
It takes only a few seconds for me to realize that his fist is oddly
shaped for a punch and there is this weird sensation of being penetrated.
 
The pain shoots through my body as the man
drags his knife out of my back.

Then I feel nothing.

“Oh my god!”
Arianna
screams when she sees the knife and blood.
 
Ethan jumps quickly to stop the bleeding and catch me as my legs
collapse.
 
Quentin instantly disarms the
half-drunk man and knocks him out with a quick shot to the face.
 
Arianna whips out her phone and says
something into it that I can’t make out.
 
I’m focusing on the fact that I can’t feel my legs.
 
Though they move when I tell them to, I still
can’t feel them properly.
 
Kate is by my
side instantly and I find myself leaning on her for support.
 
The look of fear and concern on her face
makes me feel bad and I try to ease the look a little.

“I’m fine,” I say weakly. “Seriously, I’m fine.”

Ethan and Katelyn share a brief look and I had to
fight the jealousy that flares up inside me.
 
Katelyn pulls a cloth from her purse and starts wiping sweat from my
brow.

“You’re going into shock, Al,” she tells me
continuing to wipe my sweat.
 
I start
giggling at her statement and she looks confused.
 
I can feel a slight pulling in back; it’s uncomfortable,
but not painful so I wince when I try to change my position.
 
I giggle through the slight pinching
feeling.
 
The tingling sensation from
moving feels like a tickle more than pain.

“Shock?
Yeah, I’ve
definitely been in shock.” I look Katelyn in the eyes and my mind starts
wondering back to a past that it has no business being in.

“I’ve been in shock ever since I turned around and
saw you standing there in all your glory.” I close my eyes as I adjust again.

Why can’t I
find a comfortable position?

Katelyn smiles sadly and tries to help me
move.
 
I catch a glimpse of her face
again and I actually feel sad for her.
 
She seems so scared and I hate that I put that look on her face.
 
I try to lift my hand to soothe her by
touching her face, but my body isn’t listening to me.
 
Looking down at my insubordinate appendage, I
notice that it’s sitting in a puddle of crimson liquid.

In fact, I’m sitting in the puddle and it’s
growing larger as I watch.

“Oh God, Ethan,” Kate shrieks as she finally
notices the pond of blood, “he’s losing a lot of blood.”

Ethan leaps into action, rips his shirt off his
body and into shreds.
 
I chuckle as he
places the shards on my back.

“
You coming
on to me
Ethan Crowe? Because I’m fairly certain I’m not your type.” I try to joke, but
it comes out as a hoarse cough instead of the laugh-worthy comment it was
supposed to be.
 
The crew tries to smile,
but it just looks sad to see.
 
Ethan
places his hand on my shoulder without removing his other hand from my back.

“Definitely not my type,” he jokes, “too skinny.”

I laugh and it immediately turns into a
cough.
 
It’s a wet, slimy cough. I can
tell it doesn’t look pretty from the looks on everyone’s face.

Pain starts to creep into my system and I still
can’t get comfortable — hard to do with a hand up my back like I’m a human
marionette.
 
I winch at the pain as it
starts to intensify.
 
I can’t stop
shaking.
 
I didn’t even know I was
shaking until this moment.
 
Pain
overwhelms me every time I take a breath, but I find shallow and quick breathes
ease it enough to be bearable.

“That’s smarts.”

“Are you starting to feel the pain?” I try to nod,
but I’m too dizzy to pull it off well.

I lift my eyes with great effort to look at
Katelyn again.
 
Her face is a little
older than I remember, but she’s still the same from high school.
 
She’s still
my
Kate.
 
My head starts
playing games with me and I start reliving things from my past.
 
What was I thinking letting her go?
 
I feel tears start to sting my eyes, but the
pain didn’t call them.
 
My heart breaks
at the thought of how we ended.
 
I then
think of Sam and immediately know the answer to all my recent questions.

I give her a fragile smile.

“What happened to us Kate?” I ask her, knowing
damn well what happened to us.
 
I even
remember the exact moment things changed between us.
 
I remember it all so clearly now.
 
I was such an idiot back then, but not enough
to regret our split.

Just the way it happened and the aftermath.

Katelyn copies my fragile smile.

“We were in high school, Alan.”
As
if that explains everything.

Oddly, it does.

“We were young and immature,” she continues,
“despite our claims to the difference.”

I shut my eyes as I think about it, grimace in
pain, and try to adjust for the hundredth time.
 
Ethan removes his hand from my back and I open my eyes to try to see
what he’s doing.
 
He’s changing the shirt
for a clean one and I can see that the shirt is dyed bright red.
 
Realization starts to sink that this could be
it for me.

Strangely, I’m not as scared as I thought I would
be.

“This is the worst week of my life,” I half joke
with a chuckle.
 
Closing my eyes earlier
made it more difficult to keep my eyes open now.
 
My eyelids feel like one-ton weights.

“I think I’m going to take a nap now,” I tell them
weakly, barely a whisper.

“Wake me when the ambulance gets here,” I finish.

I have my eyes closed so I can’t see their faces,
but I can hear the dread and fear in their voices as they shout back and forth.

“Where the hell is the fucking
ambulance?!”
Katelyn screams and I can almost hear the tears in her
voice.
 
She sounds really far away.

Everything fades away.

Worst week of my life.

Understatement of the decade.

4 Years Ago (Age 16):
 
August

“That’s so bad it’s hilarious!” James, my
brother, is laughing at me after I told him what happened during my first time
— and every time since.
 
He only has a
few days left before he ships out again.
 
Despite his teasing, I enjoy having him home.
 
He tells the best stories of being deployed
and just having him back for a little while is awesome.

I’ve always been able to talk to my brother
much easier than I have anyone else — except Sam, until recently.
 
He’s a little over five-years-older than me,
so he likes to tell me that he has a lot more life experience than I do.
 
He says it makes him a great advice giver.

I’m still trying to disprove that one.

“Come on, bro, I need your help,” I plead.
 
I hate begging from him, but I really need
his advice on this.
 
I’m miserable about
everything and need to know how to fix it.
 
He takes a swig of his beer before answering me.

“Sorry little bro, there are no easy fixes.” No
help at all.
 
Ugh, he’s in one of his
Dalai Lama moods.
 
Every piece of advice
will be a conceited run around and will eventually lead me nowhere — or exactly
where I need to be as he would put it.

It’s the worst.

“I’m not looking for an easy fix, just a nudge
in the right direction,” I tell through a wary smile.
 
I know, from years of experience, that I can
easily defeat the Dali Lama mood by throwing it back at him.

James looks at me surprised for a brief moment
then smiles really big and harshly rubs his hand on my head.
 
Laughing loudly as he does.

“That’s my little brother for you right there,”
he shouts still messing up my hair in the most painful way possible.

“I’m not a little kid anymore, James,” I tell
him as I try to get his hand off my head.
 
His smile disappears replaced with a frown.

“I know that,” he softly informs me, “neither
of us
are
.” His voice scares me and I look at
him.
 
His eyes are withdrawn, haunted,
and his face wears the look of someone who has lived through more than he
thinks he should have.
 
His change of
mood throws me.

After a moment or two, he shakes his head and
returns to the fun-loving brother I remember.

“So what does Sam say about this situation?” He
asks with the most innocent smile that he could muster as he throws salt on my
open wounds.
 
I groan loudly and he
chuckles at my discomfort.

“I haven’t talked to her in weeks, but you know
that all ready.”

“I know.
 
I’m just giving you a hard time,” he apologizes.

“There are no easy answers here, Al.
 
You’ll have to try and figure it out
yourself.”
Still no help.

“But,” he starts and my ears perk up, “I can
give you a little advice in the matter.”

“Please,” I beg and he laughs at me.

“Okay, okay, put those puppy blues away.
 
They’re dangerous.”
 
I smile playfully and James follows suit.

“You need to follow yourself,” he says.

James looks at me and then breaks out into a
riot of laughter.
 
Apparently, my
confused face is hilarious.
 
I have no
idea what he talking about.

Follow myself?
 
Whatever that means.

“You have to follow this,” he tells me as he
pokes me in the chest.
 
Understanding
hits me immediately and my confused face changes to my comprehension face.
 
He laughs at that one too.

It appears I’m hilarious when I’m not trying.

“This,” I point at my heart, “is the most
confused part of me,” I inform him.
 
He
nods his head as if he understands.

“It will be until you figure out what it is you
want.”

He pauses.

“You’ll figure it out, I know you will.
 
You’re a smart boy.” He takes another swig of
his beer.

“I bet you even know what you want already.”
Truth be told, I’ve known what I want for years, but that doesn’t make it any
easier.
 
The one thing I want doesn’t
want me.

Sam.

I just nod my head.
 
James pulls me into a tight hug and gently
pats my back.
 
I return the hug.

“You won’t catch anything you don’t chase,” he
says to me from our hug.
 
I casually pull
away and nod my acknowledgement.

“I bet you Sam is waiting for you.
 
Call it brother intuition or something.”

I chuckle at that and then get up to
leave.
 
Turning to James, I dust myself
off.

“Thanks for the advice, not sure how much help
it’ll be, but thanks.”

“Anytime, little bro, anytime.” I smile at him
and he smiles back.
 
James leaps to his
feet and pulls me into another hug.

“I love you, little bro,” he softly speaks over
my head.

“I love you too, big bro,” I tell him back.

James ships back to Afghanistan the following
day.
 
They really need his help he says
with a small amount of humor.