Brother's Keeper (Part 1)

This is a short story that I've broken into three pieces, for your reading convenience.

This is Part one, enjoy!

Brother's Keeper

When Paul came to, his eyes squinted against the flood of bright light. The bed he lay in had plastic bars on either side. He struggled to sit up and felt a sudden shooting pain in his lower extremities. Two hands immediately materialized from the bright, white washed background to lay against his chest; to push him back down into bed.

“Mr. Muller, I’m Nurse Lamphier. You need to lay back down; you’re in a hospital; you had an accident.”

Paul wanted to speak; he tried but groaned instead. His mouth was fantastically dry, like he could spit a camel from the desert of his throat. He saw the nurse adjusting one of the tubes running from his arm. Paul felt iciness spread through his veins. His eyelids became heavy and fluttered closed. They had gotten half way to their full awareness, where the bright light had forced them to remain. Now closed again, their bearer tumbled back into his empty, drug-induced sleep.

The next awakening was much more lucid. He had a vague memory of being told he was in a hospital. The faces that swayed towards him were recognizable, his brother, David and his brother’s wife, Maria, both smiling and talking in hushed tones. Paul tried to put on a familiar smile, but, judging by their expressions, he was well short of the mark.

“…Yes, Paul? Paul, it’s your brother, Dave. You’re in the hospital.” David leaned closer and tilted his head in question. “John is here too, he hasn’t left since he brought you in.”

David reached out and placed his palm on the coverlet that concealed Paul’s hand.

“You’ll be alright in a few weeks, and we’ll take you home with us, right hunny?” David stood up, straightened his belt and turned to look at his wife, who was assuming his previous position as if he left a vacuum she was preordained to fill.

“Paul,” Maria said as she reached for his covered hand. “The doctors say your recovery won’t be easy, but it should be full. You took a pretty hard hit.”

She leaned in closer and added in a lower voice: “You always were the tough one.”

“I used to kick his ass when we were young.” David piped up from behind her.

“Hmmah.” Paul grunted and coughed, “Horse shit.”

His voice grated like sheet metal dragged over asphalt, and he coughed again.

“Maybe a little...” David replied, with a red rouge of embarrassment newly painted on his cheeks. “It’s time for us to leave; the nurse will be in soon to give you something.”

For the first time since the accident, Paul began to remember, not the actual incident, but the moments directly preceding it. He had been sitting in a bar one minute, and woke up in this bed the next. The nurse had returned to his room and was in the process of administering his IV Dilaudid, when a grainy, black and white, still-shot memory came to Paul. Retired detective John Krimsan, whom David had referred to earlier, had been with him that day. This thought stuck with Paul, even as the powerful painkiller pushed his mind back below the waters of consciousness.

******

‘Detective’ John Krimsan sat in the hospital lobby’s green armchair tapping his heel on the floor. He sat upright, with his khaki slacked legs crossed at the ankles. His slicked white hair and bushy blondish eyebrows belied his official title; he was, in fact, a retired detective. In his prime, being ‘Detective John’ had led more than one woman to ask about his handcuffs or sidearm. Now it was a name used only by old friends and paying customers.

At the sound of approaching footsteps, John leaned forward. His eyes still held the piercing fire that had singed the truth from criminals in interrogation rooms. He immediately assessed the situation, realizing he was in a compromised position. But the approaching footsteps did not belong to any of the threats that John had always presupposed were ubiquitous. It was Paul’s brother, David, taking a seat to the right of him.

“He was awake for a few minutes,” David said with a smile, “He even spoke.”

“What did he say?” John asked.

“Well, what he said was… H.S.” he replied with a chuckle.

“H.S.? Is that supposed to stand for something?”

“Horse shit,” David replied, now outright laughing, “he said horse shit.”

John never understood how people who were so different could be so closely related. This David, Paul’s brother, was the type of idiot who ruined investigations because they wanted to remain politically correct, instead of giving an honest verbatim report of what occurred. Paul on the other hand, was as blunt as a 50 year old axe. And here’s his brother, a grown man, who wants to use code words for horse shit? Bullshit.

“Well I see he’s kept his sense of humor,” John said, uncomfortably adjusting his sweater.

“You guys were on a hell of a bender I hear.” David said, his mouth tightening into a spiteful line.

“No just the usual.” John lied. “Paul took the news about Gale pretty hard.”

John looked down at his brown dress shoes. He thought back to the call he received from Paul last Tuesday, an hour or so before dawn. He still had trouble working out exactly what had happened over the next five days. The frantic voice on the telephone that morning hardly sounded like Paul at all, and the request the voice made was totally out of character.

“John,” Paul had slurred through the receiver of the Motorola cell phone. “I need someone here to help me… fix this ceiling fan… could you come by?”

“Paul, is that you?” John answered, rubbing his eyes “Do you know what time it is?”

“Oh, I hadn’t noticed. You weren’t sleeping were you?” Paul replied.

“No, but I was trying. Let me get dressed and I’ll be right over.”

Paul’s house wasn’t far from where John hung his hat. John knocked before letting himself in through the back. In the kitchen, the refrigerator door was slightly ajar, and John closed it.

“Are you home, Paul?” John called out.

“I’m in here, John.”

John made his way towards the living room where Paul’s voice had originated. His friend, Paul, sat slouched on the couch, surrounded by empty bottles and beer cans, that floated like ghost ships on the blue sea of carpet. As John drew closer, he could see the red outline around his friend’s eyes that signify either extreme insomnia or mourning, or both.

“Ceiling fan driving you to drink, Paul?” John asked.

“She’s dead.” Paul said “Her cousin called and told me last night.”

“Oh… I’m sorry.”

“Oh god, John, look at me, I’m a mess.” Paul glanced down at himself and his immediate alcohol environment.

“Well, we knew she was sick since last year, and that it was only a matter of time. Hell, you haven’t had contact with her since she left; her cousin is the only one who’ll speak with you. I’m not trying to say you haven’t got reasons to miss her, just trying to temper your depression with some truth.” As these sardonic words left John’s mouth, he grimaced, as if they tasted as bad as they surely would sound to a man who was grieving over the loss of a loved one. Whether reciprocated or not, love was love.

“What are we drinking?” John asked to digress.

Paul made a sweeping gesture at the room around him, and held up a Jack Daniels bottle with a splash left.

“Whiskey, but I’m running dry. What do you think about making a beer run?”

“Well, I’d have to make it grow legs first.” John replied with a smile.

“You know what I mean, asshole.”

“Yeah, I know a place that’s still open. I’ll be back in a flash.”

When John returned with the supplies, his friend Paul was already passed out; he threw a blanket over him from where it was resting on the arm of the couch. Sitting down on the recliner in front of the T.V, John cracked open a cold beer and scanned his friends living room for the remote control.

******

Five drunken days after the early morning phone call, Paul and John sat in a dilapidated local bar called ‘The Grand Inn’ drinking shots of whiskey with beer chasers, and watching Sunday night football. A group of four young kids came in, obviously strung out on cheap amphetamines; obvious to anyone who knew what to look for. They took four seats at the bar directly next to Paul, not leaving the one empty chair buffer zone that courteous bar patrons observe in all empty bars. The tallest of them, the apparent ring leader, barked orders to the bartender to bring four Stella Artois. John laughed softly into his mug of Budweiser, only an idiot would think they serve five dollar bottled beers with foreign names in this place. The kids settled for Heineken, and started in talking far too loudly about some unscrupulous woman they all knew.

At this point, after countless whiskey shots and far too many beers, John knew what would inevitably happen. Paul had been staring at the kid who took the seat closest to him since they sat down. The kid must have sensed he was looking at a man with nothing to lose, because he kept his mouth shut for longer than John thought he would. The kid and Paul were in some kind of quasi-staring contest, with each man looking away only to ensure his drink made it to his lips. After his second or third Heineken, the kid had enough of being stared at.

“Hey, if this asshole isn’t watching the game, why don’t you put on some baseball? The Red Sox are on, you know?” The kid directed his question to the bartender, but Paul answered.

“Why don’t you kids go somewhere they serve imported women’s beers? Maybe they’ll even let you snort your cheap speed off the bar.”

“Hey, fuck you man, you think your tough or somethin?”

“Kid, I was sitting in this bar when your crack head mother was still forgetting to change your diapers. And I’ll be coming to this bar long after you OD on that cheap shit.”

The two guys furthest from Paul chuckled, but the one who did the talking and the tall leader stood up off the wooden bar chairs, both coming to stand behind either side of Paul. John slapped two twenties on the bar, bringing his hand down with much more force than necessary, to remind the punk kids that he was sitting there, and they looked at him, obviously sizing him up. John was still a large muscular man, but he worried about the prospect of him and Paul, in their inebriated state, trying to fight four young men hopped up on bullshit uppers.

“Well, it’s been interesting as always, Phil.” John told the bartender. “Come on, Paul, let’s get out of here.”

“Yeah, let’s get out of here, Paul,” the tall one said mockingly.

John shook his head and bared his teeth in an aggravated grin. Paul was protesting about having another round coming, but looking around at the kids and then at John, he got up and made for the door. The kids were laughing as Paul weaved his way out, stumbling from side to side, as if the bar were in the hull of a ship on rough seas. John came up beside his friend to stabilize him as best he could; not quite having his sea legs himself.

On the sidewalk outside, John was struck by how cold it had become. He and Paul made it as far as the corner when he remembered his coat; he had forgotten it on the back of his chair in the bar. Leaving Paul leaning against a parking meter, he hustled back to ‘The Grand Inn’, hoping to get to his coat before the punk kids did. On his way into the bar, he passed the kids, on their way out. He could see his coat was still hanging on the back of the chair, and he walked over to it. Leaning against the chair, with one hand on the coat’s soft leather shoulder, he spoke to the bartender.

“Hey, Phil, how about a double for the road?”

“Sure thing, John, on the house.”

As John watched the bartender pour his drink, he lifted his coat off the chair back and put it on. He was adjusting the collar, and just about to reach for his free drink, when he heard tires screeching outside. Leaving the drink where it was, he ran for the door. He looked toward where he had left Paul, but the parking meter just stood, rigid, steely cold, and alone. When John reached the corner, he found his friend lying in the rocky filth of the gutter, his legs bent at severe angles; his pant legs just beginning to discolor with blood. The car that hit him must have just kept going. John called 9-1-1 from his cell phone, telling them his friend was seriously injured and the intersection his friend was laying on. Paul groaned, then seemed to mercifully lose consciousness. John sat on the curb, not far from his friend, afraid to touch him in any way, slowly enraging himself for ordering that last drink.

******

End part 1, Part 2 is here:

Brother's Keeper (Part 2)  [18+] #1924317 A story of reignited passion, revenge, and a bizarre love triangle. (Part 2 of 3) by Eli VanDyne

Part 3 coming soon!

Thanks for reading!