PrologueDoc
18 years old“Neil Walker?”
I hear my name, but I can’t seem to make myself acknowledge the voice.
“Neil Walker?”
There it is again, but once more, I can’t lift my arm to show the doctor my presence, and everything around the waiting room suddenly seems to morph.
“Neil Walker? Neil Walker? Neil… Walker? Neil… Wal… ker?” The voice starts out like a bad rendition of that scene in Ferris Bueller, when the teacher, in his infamous monotone voice, checks for attendance. But as my name is called several more times—or maybe just once, only the sound continues to reverberate in my head, spinning out of control until it’s unrecognizable as belonging to me anymore—my world suddenly starts to narrow, the sides, top, and bottom of my line of sight closing in as I get tunnel vision before the world just goes completely black.“Neil Walker?”
Jesus Christ, after this day, I’m changing my name. I never want to hear it repeated ever again.
I open one eye, and immediately I see all white, then am blinded by a pen light. I try to shove it away, but a soothing hand comes to rest on my arm.
“Honey, let the doctor check you out.” My mom. At the sound of her voice, I relax a fraction and do as she asks. I’d do anything for the woman, including face the most horrible day of my life.
“Can you tell me what day it is, son?” the doctor prompts, and I try to speak, but nothing comes out.
I clear my throat. “Th-Thursday,” I get out.
“Very good. Do you know why you’re here?” he asks.
Of course I fucking know why I’m here.
My girlfriend. The love of my life. The woman I planned on marrying, who I fell in love with the moment I saw her in the second grade when the teacher sat her next to me after getting into trouble for talking to her friends too much. Little did the teacher know it wasn’t just her friends she liked to chat with when she wasn’t supposed to. She’d hold a conversation with anyone who would listen. She never met a stranger. And so she just talked to me instead. About anything. And eventually, with all her questions and stories, she got the shy, quiet boy who had no friends to open up. After that, we were inseparable.
Inseparable for almost ten years.
Until ten months ago, when I was sick with a stupid fucking sinus infection and stayed home from the party one of her friends was throwing while their parents were out of town. I thought I was being a good boyfriend, telling her to go have fun without me. I trusted her, knew I had nothing to worry about. We’d already named our future kids. Already had the acceptance letters to the same college, where we were going to have an apartment of our own near campus. I only had two thousand dollars more to go before I paid off the entire four grand it would take to get her engagement ring out of layaway.
Inseparable until the one night she’d needed me the most.
To protect her from the drunk motherfucker who thought he could do anything he fucking wanted, just because he was the captain of the football team. Elias Randolph had a god complex, and the girls who threw themselves at him only spiked his narcissism.
He didn’t understand what the word no meant.
Didn’t get the fact that my sweet Shelly wasn’t just playing coy or hard to get.
I don’t know anything about S&M shit, but I’m pretty sure that even people who like it rough don’t actually fight with all their might. They most likely don’t leave claw marks across their lover’s face even in the throes of passion. Certainly, they don’t bite down on the hand over their mouth so hard they take out a chunk of flesh.
Not like my girl did.
She fought as hard as she could, with all her strength, against a guy twice her size. A guy two inches shorter than me. I could’ve taken him had I been there. I know I could’ve.
Who was I kidding? I might be taller than that fuckstick, but I’m a beanpole compared to his footballer’s muscles. But adrenaline would’ve been on my side. And sobriety. I’m a stickler for the rules. I’m not twenty-one yet, so I don’t drink. Simple as that.
Ten months ago.
She immediately called me after he left her there, bleeding from her nose, eye swollen, because he’d hit her when she scratched and bit him. I’d stumbled out of bed, dosed up on NyQuil. At the time, I thanked God I had put my phone on the loudest setting on my pillow right next to my head in case she got a little tipsy and needed a ride home. She never got drunk, but always sipped on a Smirnoff. And she was such a tiny thing, such a lightweight, that just one was enough to make her all giggly.