Rescue - By Anita Shreve Page 0,58
with friends who care for her just sitting by and watching. Was it funny? Did you get a kick out of it?”
Tommy puts his hands up. “Mr. Webster, I should have been there, but I wasn’t. We went to the party together, but we both knew I would have to leave at some point to go home to see my grandmother, who just came from Indiana. When I got back to the party, I found Rowan stumbling around.”
“How long were you gone?” Webster asks.
“An hour maybe?”
“She got that drunk in an hour? And where were you?” he asks, looking at Gina.
“I wasn’t there,” she says. “I never went to the party. But I heard that when Tommy left, she went for the vodka in a big way. I’m so sorry. I wish I’d been there. I would have stopped her.”
“Some class of friends you hang out with,” Webster says.
“How is she?” Gina asks.
Webster opens the door and cocks his head in the direction of the living room. Gina slips around Webster and heads for Rowan.
“She’s right where you left her,” he says to Tommy as the kid enters the kitchen. “You’re the one who brought her home?”
Tommy nods. “I was the designated driver all night.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“I don’t know,” the boy says, flustered. “I knew you were on duty.”
“You think I wouldn’t come home to take care of my daughter?” Webster asks. “And why did you leave her here alone?”
“I had to go home,” Tommy, stricken, says. “My parents insisted I be home early.”
“You realize she could have died,” Webster points out. “She vomited twice. Thank God she had enough sense to puke over the side of the couch. Never leave someone in that position.”
Tommy lowers his head. He looks as though he might be sick, too.
“It’s not your fault,” Webster says, relenting and putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “It’s entirely Rowan’s fault. I should be thankful you got her out of there.”
When they reach the living room, Gina is already kneeling on the floor in front of the couch, murmuring to Rowan, who seems awake enough to listen.
Tommy stands awkwardly behind the couch. Entitled to be there, but not.
Webster paces.
“Where’s Tommy?” he hears his daughter ask.
He watches as Tommy puts a hand on Rowan’s shoulder. She reaches up from the covers to hold it. It’s a simple gesture, but it means something. The boy held his ground against Webster’s roaring. Backbone there. Restraint as well. Webster might have provoked another boy to be defensive. He takes another deep breath. He has to calm down.
The late morning light is garish. Rowan shades her eyes and begins to cry. Webster leaves the three of them and crawls upstairs to his bed, trailing unwanted memories behind him.
While he sleeps, he dreams of Sheila.
A cop meets them in front of the warehouse. “Jumper down,” he says.
“Really?” Webster asks. “I couldn’t believe it when the call came in. Has anyone ever had a jumper down?”
“Not in my memory,” the cop says. “Quechee Gorge maybe.” He motions toward the back of the building.
Koenig has the backboard, the trauma bag, his jump kit. Webster carries the rest. They set out on a run. A clot of cops stands around a limp patient. They move out of the way when they see Webster and Koenig coming.
“He’s conscious. He’s talking,” one of the cops says.
A security light illuminates the scene: surreal, metallic, framed in black. The patient has fallen onto his back. His left knee is bent backward in an unnatural way. A bone is sticking through his skin. A new cop to the scene says, “Oh Jesus,” and turns away.
Webster glances up. Two stories. Maybe you could kill yourself falling two stories.
“The guy in front, security, actually heard the thud,” the first cop adds. “Ran around back here to see what was going on.”
Webster squats next to the patient and applies the c-collar. “We’ll have to splint that,” he says to Koenig, pointing to the fracture.
“ETOH,” Koenig says, sniffing. He wraps a blood pressure cuff around the man’s arm.
“Sir, can you tell me your name?” Webster asks.
Why isn’t the guy screaming? Even though it’s late May, he has a multicolored cap on his head, as if knit by a grandmother, blood pooling under it. Webster applies a pressure bandage. The man has on a denim jacket and jeans, one boot. The guy should be yelling his head off with pain.
“Randall,” the man says.
“OK, Randall, can you tell me where you’re hurt?”
“My back. Knocked