Kick (Songs of Perdition #1)(25)
Author: C.D. Reiss

“Fuck you are.”

“I’m sorry I can’t be here. I think you’ll be just fine. You’re doing great.”

“Save the platitudes for the ones who need them.”

His neck tensed, and his eyes got hard. That was my gotcha moment, and I didn’t want it. His voice went from heavy cream to wire brush, and the stroke of every syllable drew blood. “Once you get out there with your cute little plea deal, you’ll get eaten alive. Maybe by the press. Maybe by that man you almost killed. Maybe he’ll kill you this time instead of breaking your teeth. The judge on your case is not out to help you, trust me. You don’t have the tools to handle life outside these doors. You’ll go back to using, and I’m not willing to wonder if I could have done something else to help you. I’m just going to do it. This is the only way to protect you.”

“It was your job to assess my sanity. Not protect me.”

He held his hands out, his clipboard clutched in his fingers. “That’s just tough, Fiona. This was the last real thing I did here, and I’m okay with it.”

“Fuck you.”

He nodded, making me feel like a tantrum-prone child. And now what? He was going to say good-bye and leave me? No. Not allowed.

“This is not done,” I said.

“Good-bye, Fiona. Meeting you was something else.”

I turned around and ran back down the hall before he could say a word. I didn’t know what I was trying to stop. Some freight train of my thwarted expectations before it ran me over? Maybe the moment where I would wake up and realize I’d failed, and I was stuck here? So help me God, I couldn’t be there, cut off from everything for another month. Something had to be done, and if no one would do it for me, I would do it myself. I slammed past the glass doors, out of breath.

Margie stood staring at her phone.

“You have to keep Doctor Chapman here,” I said in a breath. “Make them. He can’t walk away.”

Margie heard me, I knew she did. I was right there, but she wasn’t listening.

“I fucked up,” she said.

“How? You made a deal, they can’t—”

“Dad was right. I’m too inexperienced. I would have had my finger on the judge’s pulse if I’d known better.”

What she was saying hit me like a slap.

“No,” I said.

“I’m sorry, Fiona. I tried, but you need a better lawyer. It’s not fair to you.”

“Not fair to me? I’m here now with nothing and no one… I don’t have Elliot, and now you’re leaving? What am I supposed to do? Margie, how am I supposed to make it? Don’t leave me.” My hands were flying. I was screaming.

Margie was trying to grab my hands and shush me at the same time. “Calm down.”

“Stay, and I’ll calm down. Stay with me.”

“I can’t. It’s not the best—”

“Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me!”

When I tried to hold her close, hands on me pulled and tugged. There was a floor under me, and shadows in the light, and voices in all kinds of timbres and shades of gentleness. There was a discomfort in my arm like a stiff finger pushing against me, and soon after that, the hands relaxed, and everything went grey.

To be continued…