Shuttle bus is pulling out when I get to the stop on the sidewalk, I run it down. Driver stops. "Go," I tell him, not thanks. It takes three days to get to the parking lot. At least.
My bag goes in the passenger seat through the driver's door, and I follow it in. I have the paperwork for the flight with me. It can wait. Leave black marks on the pavement, run the red light to make the left turn onto the freeway entrance, cut in and out of traffic like the crazy person I am. Onto the 10, then the first exit, run the red light onto La Cienega and I'm there.
The woman at the desk looks her up, tells me the room number, tells me I have to come back in the morning. I am gone down the hall toward the elevators. She yells something at me. I grab my badge from my pocket, flash it at the guard, get in the elevator and push three. He lets me go. Not like they could have stopped me anyway.
She's lying in a metal framed bed, white sheets, surrounded by equipment, tubes. Two of them feed her arm, wires everywhere. Her head is wrapped in a white turban of gauze, the left side of her face under a bandage, including the eye. A white sheet covers the rest of her body. One of those beeping machines is beeping, not steady, not loud. Fuck them. Fuck me for not being there.
Her aunt and another woman who looks just like an older Perez are sitting in chairs at her side. They both get up. Ariela hugs me. She starts crying. So do I. We part, and the older version of Perez hugs me. "You must be Simon. I'm Maria." She's crying too.
Ariela touches our shoulders. "I'll be back with breakfast in the morning. Try to get some sleep, Maria." She pats me on the cheek, and is gone.
"How is she?" I can barely get the words out.
"They don't know," I have my arm around her. Her speech is broken with an occasional sob. "Her head, her eye, her stomach, her chest, her leg. It's too soon. That's all they say. It's too soon. She's been asleep since it happened. Ten hours in surgery yesterday."
I help her back down into her chair, then I reach over and squeeze Perez's hand. She doesn't react. I step up next to her head, bend over, whisper in her ear.
"You're going to be alright, Perez, whatever it takes. Be strong until I can figure it out. And whoever did this, dead men. I'm going to make what happened to Ali seem like a fucking picnic to them."
I get half way back to upright when a tiny whisper comes from the bed.
"Don't do anything stupid, Air Force."
Her mom yells so loudly the entire hospital probably hears it.
"I hurt, mommy." Another whisper.
"I'll get the doctor," I say, heading for the door, leaving them alone for a minute.
Two nurses are heading down the hallway toward us at a run, must have heard the screaming. I block their way. "She's awake, and in pain."
"We have orders from the doctor, let us take care of it." I get out of their way. They make Maria surrender Perez's hand for a minute, talk to my partner briefly, and adjust a couple of the machines.
They turn to her mom. "She'll sleep because of the drugs. The doctor will be here in a few hours. You should get some sleep too." Maria nods, thanks them.
When it's just the three of us again, I suggest that Maria use the empty bed, and that I will watch Perez for her.
She squeezes my hand. "Kiana says you are a lucky charm. Now I know you are too. My husband is with your parents, will you call them for me?" I nod and she heads across the room toward the bathroom.
I speed dial dad. He answers on the first ring.
"Simon?"
"She just woke up."
"Thank God. Let me put Roberto on." I hear some indistinguishable words and the phone being exchanged.
"She's awake?" His voice is strong, with the hint of worry.
"Yes, sir. Actually, she's back asleep now, they gave her some medication, but she and Maria had a brief conversation."
"Can I speak to my wife?"
"She just went to the ladies room, you'll have to give... Wait, here she is."
I walk over to the bathroom door, hand her the phone, and do my best not to listen. I step back to the bed, and hold Perez's hand. Her breathing is slow, irregular, not terribly strong. I grab the light and ask it to do something, but nothing happens. Last time, it happened right when I changed. Soon I will find a time and get her alone.
Maria is standing beside me now, and hands me my phone. "Your papa wants another word."
"Dad?"
"We've got her brothers coming in at 10 and 11 tomorrow, and we're working on some other family members too. We may need your help picking them all up. I took you out of your flight on Friday. You staying the night?"
I look over at her. "Yes."
"Good. We'll see you early in the morning. Love you."
"Love you."
Maria is ready for bed. I dim the lights, tell her I'm running out to my car for a second, and I'll be right back. I grab my ereader and my weapon. Nice of the FAA to let us take them on board. Don't really need it, but you never know. They don't even try to stop me this time when I walk back in.
I sit in the darkness in a chair that let's me look up and see Perez whenever I want, and gives me a clear view of the door. The story takes half the front page of the
Times
, plus pages of coverage inside.
Bomb in the baggage container. Four officers dead, including McConnell. Good man. Don't know the other three well, but knew them. Lieutenant Franklin, Crane's replacement who I had yet to meet, was injured and is here in the hospital too. Asshole Spears quoted on what a fine officer Perez is. Fuck him.
No clues, they say. But we know. Rio Magdalena cartel, Guerrero. One or both. All dead, but I will honor Perez and not go running off. I will investigate, be certain, not fuck it up, not do something stupid.
At some point, I must have fallen asleep in the chair, because I am standing on the path, surrounded by a cool fog. No wind, no swirls, just the gently floating sheet of white, interspersed with the black of night. I hear the footsteps and he is in front of me.
"I'm sorry." Strange thing for him to say. "But you can't heal her."
"Fuck you. Worked fine before."
"And it cost you. We figure about a week. The light knew you wouldn't mind. But this, heal her now, and it will cost you a year, maybe two."
"I don't care."
"I know you don't, but we do. Wait, please, wait until she's done all the healing she can on her own. Then talk to her about it."
"No."
"You know she wouldn't want you doing anything without asking. Respect her enough to ask." He's right.
"And if I wait until she's finished healing, then what will it cost me?"
"Six months. At least six months."
"I can live with that. But if she takes a turn before then, you know I won't let her die, no matter what it costs."
He nods. I don't know how I can tell under that hood, but he nods.
Its six a.m., and I wake up from the sound of the door to the room opening, my dad appearing around the edge of the metal and glass.
I jump up and give him a hug. There's a tall dark skinned man next to him, broad shouldered, a little paunch. I reach out to shake his hand. He looks at my weapon holstered to my side. "Thank you." His handshake is two handed and warm. There's also a nurse in the room now, going over the equipment.
Dad and I wander down to the public restrooms to give Perez's parents some time alone with her, even though she's still asleep. He's got something on his mind too.
"That could have been you. You could have been with her. Maybe it's time to go back to just being a pilot. Your mom's been crying, and it's not just for Kiana."
"I walk the terminal helping old ladies find gates and lost parents find their kids. They don't send reservists out to make drug busts."
"Think about it? Or at least have a long talk with your mother."
"Yes, dad." The question is, do I include 784 in the conversation?
There's a delegation of people in white headed for Perez's room. We follow them.
They are changing her bandages, the doctors examining the injuries as they go, talking like we are not here. I don't like the tone of it, even though I can't make out the words. Too many heads shaking, too much quiet argument.
The doctors take her dad and mom aside. I move close enough to listen in. Basically, they still have no idea how bad things are, they aren't sure she will live, or how long she will have to stay in the hospital if she does, or what her long term prognosis is. Everything is speculation. Then they leave us alone.
It's why they call it "practicing" medicine. I know better. She's going to be fine.
Perez's
tia
arrives with breakfast burritos, and sixty seconds later five of us are surrounding her bed, eating, taunting the sleeping Perez with homemade tortillas, eggs, and cheese.
We must have been too loud and smelly, because she opens her eyes. She's a little groggy, and more than a tad uncomfortable. I don't care. She's alive. We talk about nothing that means anything, except the simple fact that she can talk means everything. She holds up for 10 minutes, and then we leave her alone to sleep.
Her mom and dad are staying with my mom and dad, plus the married brother and his wife. The seven other brothers are going to stay with their
tia.
Dad and I, along with Mr. Perez, head out to LAX to pick up the arrivals in my dad's big SUV. The airline owns a bunch of 15 passenger vans, and we're borrowing one for a while.
Using assorted badges and airport ID's, we cheat the system and are waiting at the gate when they appear. Five of them are on the 10 o'clock, the three still at home brothers, the eldest brother, and his wife. It takes a long time for the introductions and the hugs. By the time we get to the far end of the terminal, the last four brothers are landing, and we start the process all over again.
Finally, we get all nine through baggage claim, and out onto the shuttle over to dispatch, then into the van. I follow dad back to the hospital driving his SUV, Perez's youngest brother, Roberto, Jr., 14, riding with me to talk about flying.
We're violating just about every rule of intensive care. We had food in. We have 15 people crammed in her room. We're staying longer than 20 minutes at a stretch. We're armed. Finally, Ariela tells everyone to get their behinds over to the restaurant for lunch. Kiana gets a hand squeeze and/or kiss on the not injured part of the forehead from everyone.
Before we can leave, she surprises us by talking, as best she can, hardly a whisper. "Everyone get lost, I need to talk to Air Force alone. He can drive himself over." I walk back to her, pull up a chair, sit and lean toward her. I can see the pain in her eyes.
"Under no circumstances," she starts, then pauses, "are you to try to get your inner friend to fix me without my permission."
I give her my best WTF expression.
"I dreamt last night that I was standing on a path, red, surrounded on three sides by grass. Foggy, so foggy I couldn't see more than a few feet ahead. There was a wind moving the grass, but not the fog." Fuck me. Been there, done that.
"Then I heard footsteps and a very tall man appeared, taller even than your other self, all in black. I could never see his face. He told me not to let you fix me, that it would cut two years off of your life, that you already sacrificed a week to heal my bruise, that even waiting until I'm better on my own could cost you months. Promise me you won't do anything to help me."
I reach my right hand down and take hold of hers. "I can't make that promise. I am not going to let you die."
"This is not your fault, Air Force, not your fault."
I shake my head. "Isn't it? If I hadn't identified the first three drug packages the feds would never have gotten involved, and the cartel wouldn't have retaliated. For the two hundredth time, I got involved, and people ended up dead."
She looks at me, gathering herself. This has obviously been an effort. So I ease her mind, at least a little.
"I promise you that unless you are in danger of dying, I won't do anything without talking to you first."
She smiles, sort of, there's pain in it. "I'll take that for now, but we're not done talking about this."
"OK.," I pause, "Do you think they'd care if I brought a cat to stay with you?"
She laughs, and then stops in pain. "Unlike you Air Force, I didn't mind my visit from the Fog Dude. I don't need a little five pound girl to protect me."
I try to look hurt. She starts on me again. "Go eat, and come back later. I know you're going to want to do something stupid soon, and we need to talk about that too."
Pushing the chair away from the bed, I stand up, then bend over and give her a soft kiss on the cheek. "See you in a few hours, get some rest."
