The Red Slayer

I open my eyes and sit up. What the hell happened? And why am I on the muddy ground with a blurry crowd of people forming a semi-circle around me? I try lifting my arms but my right hangs limply next to me. All I can do is twitch my fingers.

The kitten crawls out from my pocket and sits on my lap, completely unharmed. As she jumps onto the ground and rubs at my knee, a hand from the crowd picks her up gently.

‘Hey!’ I snap. ‘Leave it alone.’

I clamber to my feet, the ground tips up and down like a see-saw, but I manage to stand and stare up into the dark, tantalising eyes of the person holding the now-purring kitten.

‘Oh hi,’ I say, suddenly casual.

‘You shouldn’t move,’ says Kaarlo, putting his spare hand on my left shoulder. That growling just got a whole lot louder. ‘There’s an ambulance on its way?’

‘Ambulance?’ I scoff. ‘I’m fine.’

Kaarlo’s mouth hangs open for a moment. ‘Of course you’re not fine. You fell three storeys and your arm is hanging out of its socket.’

I look down at my arm again, swinging of its own accord. Why am I not feeling any pain? I turn, look up at the window, then back at Kaarlo. ‘That’s higher than I thought. Was it you calling to me?’

He bites his lip and lowers his eyes, before snapping back to reality and asking, ‘Why were you scaling a building with a kitten in your pocket?’

‘I wasn’t scaling it,’ I say, offended. ‘I was trying to get to the ground. I was looking for you.’

That’s all I can say before an anvil of pain drops on my head and I fall to the ground, holding my limp arm as the socket cries out in agony. My head is pounding. The world is going blurry again. The crowd’s murmurings turn to mini migraines. Tears stream down my cheeks for relief.

Now I understand. Adrenaline. It’s happened before. I feel no pain while it’s coursing through my veins. But the second it withdraws I realise I have twisted ankles or a giant bruise.

Kaarlo kneels beside me, hand still on my shoulder while the kitten curls into a ball in his hand and falls asleep. ‘You’ll be okay. The ambulance is almost here.’

I hear the siren moments before it pulls into the courtyard. The blurry crowd disperses and lets equally blurry yellow and green figures through. They take one look at me and help me onto the gurney.

‘Dislocated,’ says the female paramedic, tucking my arm into my vest. ‘We’ll sort that out, love.’

‘I’ll come with you,’ says Kaarlo, explaining to the paramedics that we work together, which is technically true. ‘Want me to call your family?’

I shrug with my left shoulder. ‘I tried that earlier. Dad had his phone off. I came looking for you because I didn’t know anyone else nearby.’

‘What about your mum?’ he asks.

I look at him, dead on. ‘She’s dead.’

His face is so innocent before I utter those two words. For a moment, he’s too dumbfounded to get in the ambulance. Once he sits down, looking awkwardly at the floor, I realise that was tactless.

‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘I’ve never actually had to tell anyone that. People already know.’

‘Oh,’ he says. ‘Really?’

‘Yeah. She was Clarissa Dalloway? Haven’t you heard of her?’

He smacks his forehead. ‘How did I not make that connection? She was like theatre’s Princess Di.’

I clear my throat. ‘I’ll try and call my Dad. It’s better the news comes from me.’

I take my phone out of another pocket in my vest. Thankfully the screen is still intact. This time, Dad answers.

‘Hi, Iorwen. Sorry I didn’t answer earlier. What’s up?’

I can’t think of a good lead in. I blurt out, ‘Um…I’m on my way to A&E.’

I can picture the shock filling his face and the colour escaping it. He has the same expression every time England loses in the Ashes.

′What?’ he splutters. ’Wh—How? Why?’

‘Dislocated shoulder apparently.’

The female paramedic leans over me. ‘Why don’t you let me handle this, love?’

I hand it over, she being a figure of authority and all. I meet eyes with Kaarlo again, and my clouded head stops me from melting. He strokes the kitten on his lap absentmindedly.

‘If you want,’ he says, ‘I can take care of this little guy. Where did you find it anyway?’

I explain everything, finding it under a bin, the men I tricked with fake bank notes, using the rooftops as a getaway. ‘I think it was abandoned.’

Kaarlo frowns. ‘Likely. People buy cats from breeders as presents and then forget about them. It’s sickening. I’ll take it to Battersea, don’t worry. I got my cats from there.’

I smile, my decision hurt, but it was the right one to make. ‘I suspected you were a cat person.’

He smiles. Those damn dimples. ‘Because of the shirt? Yeah, Drogon sits on everything I leave lying around.’

‘Drogon?’ I raise my eyebrow.

He nods. ’I named my dragons after the cats in Game of Thrones.’

I stare at him, wondering if my concussion switched his words. Kaarlo bursts out laughing, shaking his head. ’Cats named after the dragons in Game of Thrones. Drogon’s a black Norwegian Forest cat.’

‘Aww,’ I reply.

‘And then there’s Rhaegal, a Havana Brown. I take her for walks sometimes.’

‘No Viserion?’

He shakes his head. ’It’s hard to find a flat that’ll let you have one pet, let alone two. Maybe my next cat.’

The paramedic returns my phone, telling me Dad will meet me at St. Thomas’s, but it’d take him a while to get there. I decide to message Tara, seeing as the Florence Nightingale Museum is attached to it. She replies immediately that she’ll wait at the A&E. She’s stood waiting in the ambulance bay when we arrive, rocking my red suit.

She clamps both hands on the gurney. ‘Are you okay?’

‘A lot of pain,’ I reply.

Kaarlo spots her. ‘Are you Iorwen’s friend?’

′Girlfriend,’ she asserts. I smile at her.

I get wheeled into the regular A&E as opposed to children’s since it’s less crowded. A blonde nurse in light blue scrubs comes to wheel me over and notices Kaarlo. ‘Eh-up. You’re not visiting the kids today, are you?’

‘No,’ he replies, blushing. ‘I’m helping my friend here.’ I wave at her while Tara shoots me a quizzical look.

Once we’re left in a cubicle, Kaarlo fills out the paperwork and Tara takes charge of the kitten while I fill her in. I don’t think anyone has noticed it? Aren’t animals against the rules?

‘You’re so reckless,’ Tara remarks, wincing at my injured arm. ‘But you’re very brave.’

Kaarlo returns the finished paperwork to the nurse. ‘There’re only four or five people ahead of you.’

‘Do you think they’ll pop my shoulder back in like they do in the movies?’ I ask.

Tara grimaces at the idea while Kaarlo shakes his head. ‘Probably not. But I think they’ll give you a brain scan. You hit your head pretty hard.’

I sigh. My poor brain. It’s damaged enough from footballs, evil corners and leaning too far back in my chair. Not to mention my cousin Ben bludgeoning me with the book I might be reading. I’ll probably have vascular dementia by sixty.

The curtain whips open, startling all three of us. Dad stands on the threshold with the exact expression I predicted. Seeing me both conscious and breathing makes the look vanish, but he remains pale with beads of sweat dotting his forehead.

‘Jesus, Iorwen,’ he says, ‘You scared the life out of me with that call. Are you okay?’

Tara and Kaarlo edge out of the cubicle as Dad makes his way in, closing the curtain after them. Dad notices the kitten, but says nothing until he sits in the same chair Tara vacated.

‘Tell me what happened.’

There’s no use lying. I don’t like hiding things from him. I only kept my escapades on the rooftops with Dante secret for his own peace of mind. But in light of another secret he shared with me not so long ago, it’s only fair I come clean.

‘You walked along the roof of King’s College?’

‘And the Waldorf-Hilton.’

’Like something out of Mary Poppins?’

I nod. ‘Without the singing chimney sweeps.’

‘But why? Couldn’t you have lost those men in a crowd?’

‘It’s because of crowds I was on the rooftops in the first place. I hate crowds. No one’s in my way on the rooftops.’

He braces an arm on the adjacent table. ‘You have a preference?’

I sink into myself, wishing this hospital bed would absorb me. ‘I do extreme parkour…for fun.’

He sits back, simultaneously surprised and poised. It was him that caught me scaling our country house after all. ‘For how long?’

‘Almost a year. It’s how Dante and I met.’

Dad leans forward, rubbing his chin in puzzlement. ‘Why exactly?’

I draw a long sigh before the next confession. ‘I’m an adrenaline junkie. Going up there, taking those risks, relieves stress. I feel alive.’ I pause, expecting him to speak, but he stays silent. ‘You’re not angry, are you?’

Dad sighs slowly, looking down and shaking his head before he stands up and puts a gentle hand on my good shoulder.

‘You know what, we’re even.’

***

Most of the next hour is blurred by morphine for the pain in my shoulder. After the x-ray, I nearly fall asleep during my brain scan. Only the knowledge I’m lying in a metal tube with little space to move keeps me awake.

I’m wheeled out of the lab and find Tara waiting in the corridor for me, holding a coffee in one hand and her phone in the other.

‘I thought you’d gone home,’ I say as she walks alongside.

‘I wanted to know you’d be okay. That Kaarlo guy told me to tell you he’s taking the kitten to a vet who can hook it up with a shelter.’

‘That’s a relief.’

I’m taken to wait in a teenage ward where Tara sits on the bed next to me and Dad phones Elisa.

A male doctor in red scrubs comes bearing my results in the next hour.

‘I have good news and bad news, Miss Davis,’ he says. ‘The bad news is your shoulder needs surgery. But the good news is our on-call surgeon can fit you in this evening, though we’ll have to keep you in overnight. Your brain scan came back normal. Your concussion should clear up after a good rest.’

Dad stares at him in disbelief. ‘That can’t be right.’

‘I’m sorry?’ says the doctor.

‘My daughter fell from a second storey window. That should at least be enough to break her collarbone for a few ribs.’

’Dad,’ I snap. Shouldn’t he be glad my injuries aren’t worse?

‘Sir,’ says the doctor, ‘We have done the necessary tests.’

‘I understand,’ Dad replies. ‘But given the circumstances…’

’Dad,’ I urge again.

He looks at me, sighs and forces a smile. ‘Sorry Iorwen. I’m sure everything will be fine. How about I go home and grab some stuff for you?’

I nod. ‘That’d be great.’

He turns to Tara. ‘I’ll give you a lift home if you like.’

‘Okay,’ she says, sliding off the bed. ‘Beats getting the Tube at this hour.’ She kisses me on the cheek. ‘I’ll come see you tomorrow.’

I begin drifting off once they’re gone. The morphine dominates my body and my adrenaline levels are all but spent. But I can focus on a single fact as my eyes close. I saved a life today. Because of me, there’s one less creature not being abused or neglected. I did something because it was right, not because I wanted an ego boost.

© Alice of Sherwood, November 2019