Gun Shy(53)

I kneel beside her, ripping away the tape that binds her wrists until my fingernails break, unsure of what else I can do. Damon has a gun. I have nothing but a pair of threadbare pajamas and a full bladder. Damon dials his brother and hands the phone to me. “Tell him to hurry.”

He’s in Reno, I think. Or possibly Vegas. How is he going to hurry?

I swipe the phone from his hand and press it to my ear. Ray answers almost immediately. “Ray,” I begin before he can start.

“Oh, hey, little lady,” Ray replies, his voice taking on a predatory edge that I don’t like. “I was just thinking about you.”

I’m sure you were.

Ray,” I interject. “Listen. You have to call us an ambulance —”

His tone change immediately. “Is my brother all right? What’s happened?”

I roll my eyes, patting Jennifer’s shoulder with my free hand. “Damon is fine. Jennifer and her baby are not fine.”

Damon rips the phone from my hand. “No ambulances,” he barks, pacing the length of the attic. “You need to get here, now.”

I can’t hear what Ray is saying anymore. I look down at Jennifer, realizing she’s quiet because of the duct tape across her mouth. Wincing, I locate an edge of the tape and pull it from her mouth in one swift rip. She’s in so much pain already, she barely reacts.

“Jenny,” I whisper. “What happened? Who did this to you?”

Her eyes dart to Damon momentarily before looking back at me.

“You did this to yourself, Jennifer,” Damon mutters.

Jennifer cowers beneath my hands as Damon addresses her.

“Do you think you can walk if I support you?” I ask. Jennifer shrugs, tears streaming from her eyes. I’ve never seen so much blood in my life, and why won’t Damon call an ambulance for this poor girl? I can’t even fathom how she came to be up here. I can’t bear the thought that she might have been above me as I slept this entire time; that I could have somehow saved her before this.

Suddenly, Jennifer squeezes my hand hard enough that my bones hurt, a wail coming from her mouth. She’s bearing down, her face scrunched up, her eyes closed as a wave of something paralyzes her.

“Contractions,” I mutter. “Damon. She’s having contractions. It’s too early for this baby to be born.” I’m no doctor, but her stomach, although clearly protruding, is tiny. She’s barely in her second trimester.

“We have to call the police,” I say to Damon.

He grits his teeth so hard, I think they might shatter from the pressure. “I AM the fucking police, you stupid girl.”

The cogs in my sleep-addled brain are starting to turn. But I barely have time to voice my suspicions because Jennifer is screaming. I look to Damon, who responds by slapping his hand over her mouth to drown out the noise.

“Be quiet,” he hisses. She shrinks away from him, terrified. I know that feeling. Something tells me that Jennifer knows it much more intimately than me, though.

Jennifer’s contraction subsides, and Damon takes his hand away. She tries to sit up, balanced on her elbows. “I can f-feel something,” she whispers. “I need to push. Oh, God.” Her hands are tied but her legs are free, and she’s trying to open them wider.

I look at Damon for a moment, before my instincts propel me. I scoot around so I’m in the juncture created by Jennifer’s legs, the dim light only showing me a vague outline. She screams once more, and something wet and dark slides out of her.

“Oh, Jesus,” I stammer. Jennifer’s elbows go out from under her, the sound of her skull hitting the floorboards sickening. A rush of dark red blood surges from between her legs, pooling beneath her.

“I think the baby came out,” I whisper. Jennifer isn’t moving anymore; her knees fall together, her eyes flutter shut. Damon, wide-eyed and probably in shock, shoves me aside as he discovers the avocado-sized lump on the floor that, in exiting its mother too early, has just caused her to die horrifically.

“No,” Damon whispers. “No, no, no.” He sits back on his heels, the tiny baby in his hands, Jennifer’s blood all over him, all over me, all over the attic.

Jennifer’s eyes are still open, staring at the ceiling, unseeing. I put two fingers to her neck to check for a pulse. Nothing. I use those same fingers to press her eyelids shut. I’m not a religious person, but I put my palms together and say a prayer for Jennifer Thomas anyway because if I don’t, nobody will.



Ray is soothing. Ray is kind. To his brother, he is these things.

While Damon refuses to let go of the tiny baby Jennifer birthed — while Damon loses his fucking mind — Ray speaks softly to him. I have never heard the kindness in him but he possesses it, in his own way. He takes the baby in his hands and gives it to me, even though I don’t want it. I take it, anyway, fresh shellshock running up and down my limbs as I stand in the middle of the attic.

Ray takes Damon away, out of the attic, and I am left alone with Jennifer and her baby. I hear the shower turn on, and a few moments later, Ray reappears in the attic. I place the baby on its mother’s chest, looking to Ray for - what? Permission? Instruction? My own ending?

I knew the moment that Ray arrived that he might kill me. Damon might love me, but Ray doesn’t. I see the indifference in his eyes, the calculations. I am a loose thread. He is figuring out how to tie me up.