Ellay Saga Chapter 5: Get me
Down
“I’m sorry, sir, but your…pet is going to
have to stay outside.”
The hospital nurse eyed Julian very warily. She eyed the small monkey on his head even more warily, for it appeared to be smiling at her and waving contently. As she sat behind her desk in the reception area of the Ellay Hospital, she began to shift uncomfortably, tapping her toes on the polished marble floor and trying, in vain, to scratch her head without undoing her hair and knocking off her nurse’s cap.
Julian, on the other hand, seemed completely
comfortable with Kir’s presence atop his head.
He had grown used to the tiny primate’s antics over the past few weeks,
and Kir was actually pretty friendly once you got to know him. Still, Joshua would want to see him. “He’s
really clean…are you sure I can’t, you know, sneak him in?” he pleaded, raising
his voice half an octave in order to seem more innocent. The nurse lowered her eyes. “No. You may not.
One of you is going to have to take care of him.”
Julian turned to face his two companions,
Teddy and Loid. The first was lazily
picking at a piece of lint on his shirt, while the latter was cleaning his
glasses on his shirt. Julian looked at
both of them, then took a decision. “Teddy, you take him and wait outside.” he
said. This snapped Teddy’s attention
away from his personal hygiene and made him cock an eyebrow, which formed a
large, black arch over his sunglasses. “I don’t like the monkey.” he responded
dryly, then returned his attention to his shirt. Loid placed his glasses back on and turned to
Teddy. “Come on, man, we won’t take long.” Teddy remained adamant. “I…do not…like…the
monkey.” he announced grandiloquently.
Loid sighed, then picked Kir up by the neck and plopped him down on the
gangster’s shoulder, where the little monkey’s smile faded and his eyes grew as
he darted them over to Teddy. Teddy
began to shrink back in disgust, but restrained himself and turned towards the
door. “Fine, fine,” he said. “I’ll go outside. Just try to hurry up, got it?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Loid waved back with his hand
and turned his attention to the nurse, who was busy looking up Julian’s
request. She looked very glad to see
Teddy and the monkey go.
“Let’s see…Valencia, Van Mueller…ah, here we
go! Vasconceros!” the nurse clacked busily on her keyboard and the information
she requested appeared before her on the monochrome monitor placed on her desk.
“That would be the Intensive Care wing. Maria, Peel, and Joshua.”
Intensive care? They really were shaken up
very badly. Julian thought about that,
but decided not to dwell on it and instead focused on the nurse. “Yeah, that’s
them. Can I see them? I’m…Julian. I think they’re expecting me.” he said.
The nurse picked up a phone receiver and dialed the number to the room
they were in. After exchanging a few
pleaseantries with the nurse there, she queried about Julian. Shortly thereafter she hung up.
“Mr. and Mrs. Vasconceros are expecting you.”
she stated ever-so-politely. She called
one of the other nurses over and directed her to Julian. “The room number is
321. Nurse Carlisle will show you the way.”
***
Loid decided to stay outside while Julian
entered the hospital room holding his friends.
He decided to let himself be entertained by the nurse who led them
there, who began asking him questions about Julian and the other patients. In the meantime Julian slowly and
deliberately opened the door and stepped inside.
Depressing was the only word Julian could
find that described the scene before him.
The inside of the marble-white room was washed in sunlight, but through
the window the only thing in view was a brick wall. There was a set of two plastic chairs near
the wall, and a television set hung from a support on the ceiling. A game show was on, but the volume was turned
down low and the voices could barely be heard.
The bed that Julian could see, and the one
closest to the window, held Peel, who was distractedly staring at the
television set and holding the remote control in her hand. Her entire arm was in a cast, and her leg as
well. Her goggles were off and were
placed on a nearby nightstand. Her hair
was matted and hung limply from her head.
The room was designed so that there was a
small entryway that allowed only a partial view of the room, and obscured the
second bed from view. Julian imagined
that Vee and her parents would be there, but he didn’t see how Joshua could be
here as well.
Julian cleared his throat quietly and took a
few steps into the room. “I’m here…” he managed to squeak out. Peel whirled around instantly and spotted
Julian. Her eyes widened in glee and a
large smile made itself present on her face. “Julian!” she began. “You’d never
believe it! I thought I was gonna end up in trouble, but then Vee’s parents
come! They’re really nice, you know? And now they’re calling me ‘Peel
Vasconceros’ like I was some part of the family! It’s really wild!”
Julian raised his hands and tried to calm
Peel down, lest she start jumping around and hurting herself further. “It’s
okay, I know.” he said, walking further into the room and stepping out of the
entryway. “I just—”
His eye suddenly caught a glimpse of Mr. and
Mrs. Vasconceros, and he froze.
Mrs. Vasconceros was dressed very
simply. She wore a blue dress that
extended all the way down to her ankles, and she donned a pair of white walking
shoes. Her face was very slightly
made-up, and her hair was tied up with a ribbon behind her head. Mr. Vasconceros was a haggard, middle-aged
man wearing a blue shirt with a loosened tie, his jacket discarded to the
side. Together they were sitting beside
Vee’s bed. Vee herself was looking at
Julian blankly.
Julian’s hands dropped to the side and his
face took on a frightened countenance.
Silence fell over the room for a minute while Julian stared at the
Vasconceros’, who raised themselves as one and headed over to Julian. Mr. Vasconceros dug his hands in his pockets
and shot Julian a quizzical look. He
cocked his head to one side. When he
spoke, he did so with a loud baritone voice that rumbled softly. “You’re
Julian.” It wasn’t a question.
Julian lowered his head, psychologically
preparing himself for the verbal, and perhaps physical, beating he was about to
receive. “Listen, sir, I’m verry sorry for everything.” he said
apologetically. Suddenly he felt Mr.
Vasconceros’ hand clasp onto his shoulder and grab on tightly.
“Sorry? Why should you be sorry for saving my
daughter’s life?”
He wasn’t expecting that one. Julian’s head popped back up and found Mr.
Vasconceros to be smiling warmly and fixing his eyes on Julian jovially. “I…don’t
quite follow.” he rasped. Mrs.
Vasconceros came up to him and looped her arm through her husband’s, looking
briefly at him, then Julian. “Maria Francisca told us everything. According to
her, if not for you she would be dead!” she turned her head back and looked at
Vee. “¿No es verdad?”
Vee nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, she’s
right.” she said with a smile. Then,
seeing Julian’s confused face, waved at him and began mouthing the words, ‘we’ll
talk later’. Even Peel put in a happy
commentary.
Julian stared at the Vasconceros family,
dumbfounded. If there was anything he
did do that day, it was not the saving of lives. As a matter of fact, it was because of him
that his daughter was hurt in the first place.
He tried to get out some sort of protest, but he found that his own
vocal chords seemed to have abandoned him.
In the meantime Mr. and Mrs. Vasconceros sat back down. “Don’t worry
about Peel and Joshua.” Vee began explaining while Mrs. Vasconceros took her
hand. “I’ve explained everything and we’re more than happy to help you.”
This was like some sort of bizarre
dream. The best possible scenario was
unfolding right before his eyes and he didn’t even deserve it! Something had to
be wrong; there was no way things could be turning out this way…
“Listen, I’m very sorry, but you’ve got
everything wrong. It’s because of me that Vee’s in this mess in the first
place!” Julian protested, trying to incur at least some sort of reproach from
the married couple before him. But they
had none of it. Mrs. Vasconceros waved him off and smiled again. “Oh, don’t be
so modest, dear!” she said. “I’m sure you did the best you could.”
Julian shook his head and shot a desperate
look at Peel, who shrugged, as if to say, ‘go with it’. Vee looked pretty much the same way, only she
was smiling a lot more. What did all of
this mean? Julian couldn’t understand.
Then, suddenly, a very sinister thought
creeped into his head.
“Where’s Joshua?”
The Vasconceros’ smiles faded instantly and
their heads dropped to the floor. Mr.
Vasconceros cleared his throat. “The…little one is still unconscious. He was
burned very badly, and the doctors say the fall hurt him gravely. They won’t
let us see him.”
Julian’s shoulders drooped and he shook his
head. Maybe that’s why they were so nice
to him…to mask the fact that Joshua was hurt…
Peel read the grief in Julian’s eyes and
instantly tried to cheer him up. “Don’t feel bad! He’s gonna pull through, you
know? They just need to keep him here a while…it’s okay!”
Julian waved her off. “This is all my fault.”
he said. “All my fault…”
No one was able to cheer him up for the rest
of the day. Despite Peel’s constant
encouragement and the Vasconceros’ constant praise of him (which was mostly due
to Vee’s somewhat distorted retelling of the day’s events), Julian couldn’t
stop feeling the shame and the guilt of having been indirectly responsible for
his friends’ current state. Inside him
he felt a great emptiness…he felt like he just wanted to go home and lie down
and pretend none of this had ever happened.
For the first time in many months, Julian
cried.
***
Earth Bluesman found himself staring at the
face of his female associate once again.
She was smirking, like always.
They were standing in the middle of a dark
alley near the Ellay Hospital, where there were two dumpsters and a few stray
cats. It was sunset, and most of the
place was cast in shadow, which made the cool alley an even better place to
talk in secret than it normally was.
Earth Bluesman tipped his hat upwards with
his cane and stared at the young girl, who was still wearing the same outfit as
before, and had her arms akimbo. He
sighed placidly. “It progresses beautifully.” he said, his voice joyfully
triumphant. “I have been able to break the boy down psychologically with very
little direct effort. The crescendo of emotion will soon become too big, and
then…” he spread out his hands. “Finale.”
The girl didn’t seem very impressed. She began pacing back and forth, waving her
hands in the air and treading lightly so as not to make any noise. “I still
prefer the direct approach.” her smooth contralto rang out. “I do not see the
point of all this…trouble.”
Bluesman smirked in turn and place his hand
in his pocket, while the other began tapping his cane on the pavement. “Patience,
Lisa…” he said. “Your turn will come soon enough.” The girl stopped smirking
and leered at Bluesman, her eyebrows creasing and her mouth twisting into a
snarl. “Do not call me Lisa.” she commanded threateningly. “That is not my
name.”
“…it was your name.”
“Not anymore.” her hand reached into her vest
pocket and grasped onto the tiny object inside. “I never want to be called by
that name again.”
Bluesman sighed and bowed apologetically,
swinging his hand to one side and using the other to lift his hat. “It was…my
mistake. Forgive me.” The girl shook her head, and a trace of arrogance creeped
back into her face. “You never change, Earth Bluesman. Dub ist blöde…”
“It
doesn’t change anything.” Bluesman replied, ignoring the comment from his
associate. “Soon enough I will have the [key]…then we can drop this nonsense.”
The
girl took her hand out of her vest pocket.
She took two steps forward and placed herself in front of Bluesman, then
she bent down so that they were eye to eye, using a finger to gignerly lift
Bluesman’s hat. She stared at him
nastily. “Show me the [key]…and then we’ll talk.” Bluesman’s smile dropped and
he stared back at the girl. The two
remained like that for a moment.
Suddenly
the girl broke off and began walking away nonchalantly. “My time has been
wasted. I have other things to do.” she said. “Next time do not call me to mock
me.”
Earth
Bluesman chuckled to himself and he watched the girl go. Very slowly he lowered his hat, then began
walking off as well. “Whatever you say…Lisa…”