My Kind of Town
Don’t leave me
>> Portlock
Suddenly Lily Ah Sun's yard was lit up by flashing blue lights and swarming with police officers. That's what happens when one of their own goes down."Over here!" Lily called from the side of the house where her cousin Quinn lay on the grass.
A paramedic took one look at the right leg of his jeans soaked in blood from ankle to hip and the paleness of his normally brown face, and hooked him up to oxygen while another prepared to give him a blood transfusion. Then Quinn was on a gurney. Just before they lifted him into the back of the ambulance, Lily leaned down, whispered "Don't you dare leave me, Quinn Ah Sun, not now that we've found one another again. Not now that I'm in love with you." And kissed his lips softly.
His eyes remained closed, but Quinn smiled faintly.
Lily couldn't believe how cold his lips felt, and that's what scared her most as they closed the ambulance door.
She hurried back inside to her bedroom. Paramedics were working on the two wounds where Rosalita Resurreccion had been struck, cheek and temple, as HPD Officer Mona Waiale'ale questioned her about the events of the evening.
Everything had happened so fast, Rosalita said. She was putting fresh sheets on Miss Lily's bed when a man grabbed her from behind, put a pistol to her head and was about to rape her when she screamed, and he hit her and knocked her out. And when she came to, there was another man -- who turned out to be Lily's cousin Quinn -- who saved her, kept the beast from raping her. But Quinn was shot, and then Rosalita grabbed the butcher knife and tried to stab the beast, and slashed his arm and he dropped his gun, and then Quinn got his gun back and when her attacker tried to get his gun, Quinn shot him in the you-know-where. And then her 6-year-old daughter Elizabeth ran into the room, crying "Mama!" And that distracted Quinn just enough that the guy jumped through the screen window and ran away and Quinn followed and that's all she knew.
This was the first time that Lily had heard the story.
"Oh my God," she shuddered, finding it hard to believe.
It was also hard to believe what had happened to her bedroom, with the white carpet and white walls and white furnishings. Blood was everywhere, soaking the bed, splattering the walls, pooling on the carpet. Two bullets had ripped into the wall above her bed and sent plaster chunks flying.
Lily didn't think she could ever sleep here again. At least not alone.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin
with weekly summaries on Sunday.
He can be emailed at dchapman@midweek.com