Eighty-Sixed: Chapter 49 - Sip

Photo by Michael Huh on Unsplash

David tottered unsteadily for more than a mile before the thick swath of shadow-laden foliage above him suddenly whisked away to reveal a blazingly hot sun amidst a dark gray sky filled with patches of low, threatening clouds. A blister had formed and most certainly already burst on the ball of his right foot, and David limped as he walked.  

His hands still bound behind his back, he’d lost nearly all feeling in his arms other than the relentless buzzing and tingling pin-prick sensation of compressed nerves causing paresthesia.  After so many days of endless constraint, he worried that something more dangerous than his arms falling asleep had caused permanent damage.  

Sweat trickled down his brow and alternately fell stinging into his eyes or slid down his cheeks and under his nose, the perspiration tickling as the drops grew heavy upon his top lip before finally falling off in a mist under the force of his heavy breathing.  

He attempted to focus on images of Mark and Rosie, but their faces were vague apparitions in his mind, faint.  He couldn’t understand how his children’s faces could ever fade from his memory.  How could they ever be anything but crystal clear?

He could imagine Olivia’s face more easily, with her dark brown hair as thick and clean and shiny as when he’d met her at that college party years ago when her old college roommate introduced them — what was her name?  She’d been in their wedding. How could he forget her name?

Susan Drummond.  It was Susan.  When was the last time he’d seen her?  Where was she in all of this?

It would be a few more years before David would meet either of them.  That was in, what? 1989? Or was it 1990?

A shuffling, scurrying noise caught David’s attention to his right. Upon looking up, the glare of the sun momentarily blinded him, turning everything into blurred shadows. David squinted, and as his focus returned, he looked upon a deer, a full-grown stag, staring at David without an inkling of fear or worry. It was magnificent and bold, with a majestic twelve-point crown of antlers.

Growing up in North Carolina, early Saturday mornings in the Fall were rights of passage for most boys and their fathers.  But David and Jeremy’s father, Charles LaGrange, had little interest in hunting nor sport of any kind.  His world was his work.  Charles would have no use for this deer.

Their father’s lack of interest didn’t deter Jeremy.  Most likely, Charles’s distaste for such activities spurred Jeremy’s deep-seated passion for the outdoors.  While his father wore a suit to work even when putting in Saturday morning banking hours, Jeremy walked out wearing thick camouflage and warm boots while dreaming of kayaks and hunting and fishing poles.  David soon followed, and together, the brothers learned to hunt.  They purchased their own shotguns and .22-caliber rifles with money earned from mowing grass, painting fences, and whatever other odd jobs they could think of. Jeremy took down the deer and David soon after, but neither of them had ever seen up close any deer the size of the creature that now watched David with a preternatural curiosity. 

At the very moment David thought about Jeremy, the deer turned. Its countenance suddenly changed, and it looked unnervingly fearful. David gasped as the buck galloped straight at him and then around, racing into the thick awning of forest from which David had just escaped. David watched as the deer galloped down the paved road, its hooves clacking loudly until it disappeared into the shadows.  

David turned back towards the hot and hazy, uncertain road ahead, where heat shimmered up from the pavement like a mirage. Faintly, a dark blue sedan appeared in the vapor, its front lights blaring even in midday. Spotting David, the car’s driver flashed the lights and slowed.

The last time David innocently trusted the sudden appearance of strangers, he ended up locked for days in a closet.  His hands were still bound behind him for having shown such trust.  Upon seeing the car, David was simultaneously filled with hope and dread.  His first thought was to escape, but with nothing but open prairies now to his left and right, there was nowhere to hide nor strength to run.  Instead, David stumbled to the side of the road and helplessly collapsed to the ground as he watched the car coast to a stop.

“Good Lord,” the driver said from the car’s open window.  He jammed the car into park and jumped out of the door.  From the passenger seat, a pretty young woman in her mid-thirties did the same.  As they approached, David flinched.

“What happened to you?” the woman asked, kneeling beside him.  She felt uncomfortably close.  “Tripp, get him out of that.”

“Who did this to you?” the man — Tripp — asked.  

He pulled a pocket knife from the back pocket of his shorts.  David recoiled at the sight of the blade.

“Don’t worry, son,” he said, holding up his hands with the knife gripped loosely in his right fingers.  “I won’t hurt you.”    

“It’s okay,” the woman said.  “Tripp, look at him.”

The woman reached out and gently placed a hand on David’s shoulder.  The man remained still with his hands in a pose of surrender.  

“Is it alright if I cut that rope off your wrists there?” Tripp asked.  

Defeated, David nodded.

“You’re okay now,” the woman said, soothingly rubbing David’s back.  

Tripp worked at the rope, which was now soaking wet and gnarled.  

“How long have you been tied up like this?” Tripp asked gently as he continued cutting the thick constraints.  

“I…” David started to say, but his dry throat seized up.  He coughed and tried to get his tongue working, but his body had nothing left to give.

“It’s okay,” the man said.  “We’ll get you some water.”

“Oh!” the woman said and quickly returned to the car.  “I still have a sip of soda left, I think.”

She returned with a plastic-lidded paper cup with a drinking straw sticking out. 

“I’m so sorry,” she said with a frown.  “There’s barely anything in there, but we can go somewhere to get you more.” 

She knelt again and held the straw to David’s lips.  In one weak sip, he sucked up all that was left in the cup, but that one sip was like a waterfall.  It brought relief unlike any he’d ever experienced, all within barely a drop. 

“Thank you,” he rasped. 

The rope, covered in dark blood from the raw and exposed flesh of David’s wrists, finally gave way, and David’s arms fell limply to his sides.  Tripp tossed the rope into the grass like he was throwing a snake before it attacked again, as David fell limply to his side and collapsed bodily into the woman’s arms.  

“Thank you so much,” he cried.