UnWholly (Unwind Dystology #2)(59)
“They’re gonna . . . they’re gonna wanna give me kidneys . . . a liver . . . whatever . . . parts from Unwinds . . .”
“I know, Marcus, I know.”
Then he opens his half-shut eyes wider, locks his gaze on Lev, and grips Lev’s hand more tightly.
“Let them!” he says.
“What?”
“Let them do it, Lev. I don’t wanna die. Please, Lev,” Marcus begs. “Let them give me unwound parts. . . .”
Lev squeezes his brother’s hand. “Okay, Marcus. Okay.” And he cries, thankful that his brother didn’t just condemn himself to death, and hating himself for feeling that way.
? ? ?
Lev is examined thoroughly and told that he has a broken eardrum, various lacerations and contusions, and possibly a concussion. They bandage his wounds, which are minor, put him on antibiotics, and hold him for observation. He hears no word of Marcus, who was rushed into an operating room the moment they arrived. Aside from the nurse taking his pulse and blood pressure every hour, there’s no one to visit Lev but the police, who have questions, questions, and more questions.
“Did you know the girl who perpetrated this attack?”
“No.”
“Did you recognize her from your clapper training?”
“No.”
“Was she a part of your clapper cell?”
“I told you I didn’t know her!”
And of course, the stupidest question of all:
“Do you know any reason why they would target you?”
“Isn’t it obvious? She told me it was retribution for not clapping—that the people in charge weren’t happy.”
“And who are the people in charge?”
“I don’t know. The only ones I ever knew were a bunch of other kids who are dead now because they all blew up, okay? I never met anyone in charge!”
Satisfied, but not really, the police leave. Then the FBI shows up and asks him the same questions the police did—and still no one will tell him anything about Marcus.
Finally, later in the afternoon, during one of her routine checks, his attending nurse takes pity on him.
“I was told not to speak to you about your brother, but I’m going to anyway.” Then she sits in a chair close to him, keeping her voice down. “He had a lot of internal damage. But luckily, we happen to have one of the best-equipped organ lockers in the state. He received a new pancreas, liver and spleen, and a sizeable segment of small intestine. He had a punctured lung, and rather than letting it heal, your parents opted to replace that, too.”
“My parents? They’re here?”
“Yes,” the nurse said. “They’re in the waiting room. Would you like me to get them?”
“Do they know I’m here?” Lev asks.
“Yes.”
“Did they ask to see me?”
She hesitates. “I’m sorry, hon, they didn’t.”
Lev looks away, but there’s nothing to look at. The TV in his hospital room has been disconnected, because there’s so much coverage of the explosion. “Then I don’t want to see them.”
The nurse pats his hand and offers him an apologetic smile. “Sorry there’s so much bad blood there, hon. I’m sorry all this had to happen to you.”
He wonders if she knows the whole of it, and figures that she does. “I should have realized they’d come after me eventually. The clappers, I mean.”
The nurse sighs. “Once you get wound in with bad people, the unwinding never ends.” Then she catches herself. “I’m sorry—that was a very unfortunate choice of words, wasn’t it? I should just sew my lips shut right now.”
Lev forces a smile. “It’s okay. Once you’ve almost blown up twice, you’re not so sensitive about word choices.”
She smiles at that.
“So what happens now?”
“Well, I understand your brother is your legal guardian. Is there anyone else who might come forward to help you? Somewhere else you can go?”
Lev shakes his head. Pastor Dan was the only other person he could count on. He can’t even think of Dan now. It simply hurts too much. “I was under house arrest. I can’t go anywhere without permission from the Juvenile Authority, even if there was someone to go with.”
The nurse stands up. “Well, that’s way out of my department, hon. Why don’t you just relax for now? I know they want to keep you overnight—it can all be sorted out in the morning.”
“Could you maybe tell me what room my brother’s in?”
“He’s still in recovery,” she tells him, “but as soon as they assign him a room, I promise you’ll be the first to know.” She leaves, and in comes a detective, with more ways to ask the same questions.
? ? ?
True to her word, the nurse tells him that Marcus is in room 408, and so after dark, when all the questioning is over and the halls have quieted, Lev ventures out of his room, ignoring the aches that fill most of his body. Just outside his door, he sees that the cop assigned to guard him is down the hall, flirting with one of the younger nurses. Lev quietly slips away to visit Marcus.
As he pushes open the door to room 408, the first thing he sees is his mother sitting in a chair, her eyes fixed on Marcus, who is unconscious and intubated, and connected to a hissing breathing machine. His father is there too, his hair looking a little grayer than it did a year ago. Lev feels tears threatening to rise, but he wills them away, sucking his emotions in and locking them tight.