Gin Palace 02 - The Bone Orchard

like that to the Southampton stop and stared through the streaked window at the Hansom House. Then the train moved again, and when it stopped at Bridgehampton I got off. When the train pulled out I stepped onto the tracks and walked as straight as I could along its wide beams. I was heading east, into the cold morning sun.
    Eventually I made it to her house, though I had no idea how long it took me. I was more tired and cold and wracked with pain than I would ever guessed was possible. All I wanted to do was lie down and sleep. I craved my empty bed like it was the better part of me I had left behind. Her house was a hundred feet from the tracks, through a narrow line of trees. I was halfway across her back yard when she spotted me from her kitchen window. She came running out the back door to me. At the sight of her my strength started giving out. But I kept moving toward her, my eyes locked on her. I wanted to make it to her, but by then my legs were rubber and I could feel one knee buckle, then the other.
    She caught me just as I began to fall. I had nothing left. She struggled to hold me up but I was just dead weight and too much for her and ended up taking her down to the ground with me. She landed on top of me. I felt no pain, just her warm breath on my face. She felt as light as a feather.
    Then I smelled dead leaves and heard her voice but no words. I could see her face. She was talking to me but I heard nothing. Her hands were on me and I felt something inside me burst softly. Warmth spilled through me.
    I lost some time then, and the next thing I knew I was being carried into her house and placed on the kitchen table. I felt on me two pairs of hands now. I looked up at her finely lined, tanned face as she unbuttoned my denim jacket. Above her head the ceiling mounted light burned brightly, and my eyes ached as if someone was rubbing their knuckles in them.
    I heard her say, “You boys play too rough.”
    I nodded, and then my eyes closed, pinching out tears that ran down my temples to the table.
    A male voice said, “I’m going to get my kit out of the car.”
    I heard a door open and close. Then my eyes opened again. She was holding my right hand with one hand and wiping the trail of tears from my temples with the other. I just looked up at her beautiful face and the bright light behind it. I remember wishing then that I had had a different life, one that would have allowed me her. I remember opening my mouth to speak. But of course I said nothing, and my silence was the last thing I knew for a long while.
    I welcomed the nothingness.

Chapter Six

    My eyes opened to the muted light of dusk. Or was it dawn? I couldn’t tell for sure. I was under blankets on a bed in a room I didn’t recognize. The mattress felt and smelled new. The only other piece of furniture in that room aside from the bed was a Chippendale chair to the right of the door. There were two windows, one of which was open a few inches. The curtains moved slightly and I smelled crisp November air coming over the sill. The walls were bare except for a few small framed prints, the details of which I could not make out. The door was opened to a lighted hallway. I lay still and listened for a while. My muscles felt raw. Eventually I realized there was a cold compress on my forehead. I touched it with my hand. It was a folded wash cloth.
    I tried to figure out which was coming, day or night. Somewhere in the middle of this thought I must have slipped into unconsciousness again. When I came to I was no longer confused; it was full night outside the windows. The hallway beyond the open door was dark, too. I thought about this for moment, then finally realized that someone was standing beside the bed.
    I thought of sitting up but knew I wouldn’t get too far. It came to me that I was in my jeans and a clean T-shirt that was too large for me. Her husband was a big man, six foot something, and athletic. It must have been his.
    “You’re awake,” she said.
    I found her face in the darkness and muttered, “Gale.”
    She touched my forehead with the back of her hand. “You’re fever’s down. How do you feel?” Her voice was a late-night whisper.
    “Like shit.”
    “That’s a lot better than what I thought you were going to say. You’re in pretty bad shape. You’ve got a few bruised ribs, and you’ve obviously taken some blows to the head. And the cut on your shoulder is pretty deep.”
    I became aware then of a bandage over my left