Eliot Strange and the Prince of the Apocalypse

41) Our Broken Prince

We half drag, half carry Torin into Steven's old house. Torin is in and out of consciousness and when he is not moaning, he is muttering and singing. He is singing the song "I Would Walk 500 Miles", only he is making up his own words.

"I'm going to walk 500 miles. To see you Eliot, my lady. Cause I can walk 500 miles to be safe with you my lady." He quits singing and says to me, "I should have known you would be beautiful. Your mother is lovely."

"Sshh, be still Torin, I can't get the bleeding to stop if you are not still."

"I have to go find Eliot, that is what said your mother. Mountain Airy. I have to go." Torin tries to get up.

"Steven, hold him down. Get me some water. Hand me that bandage."

Steven tries to do it all and then says, "He must have been listening to us talk about your mother. He thinks he knows her now."

I put some alcohol on a bandage and use it to clean around the wound on the back. I try to be gentle, but Torin screams, "Mother, where is my mother? I need her, go get her. I want my mother. Wait, there she is, I see her." He points to the kitchen. "No, it is just Nana. Our tiny hero. Hello, Lindy's Nana."

He is so convincing that both Steven and I turn to look where he is pointing. No Nana or mother.

"Hallucinating," Steven says.

We soon know for sure that Torin is, if not hallucinating, at least going down sad memory lane. He continues to talk about others that are no longer here. "My uncle and his family are gone too," he says. "It was really sad."

"I know, I know," I say as I continue working and try to comfort him.

"I was young. I don't remember them," he says, "but still it is sad. Kaboom, and that quick, just gone forever."

"Yes, very sad," Steven agrees.

"I remember my grandfather, but barely," says Torin as I turn him over. "I miss my brother. He was afraid of the water, always afraid. And my sister. She is not gone forever, but she may as well be."

Steven and I don't speak. It is obvious that the Playboy Prince has been holding back a lot of trauma over the years. I knew about his uncle and family being killed in a plane crash, and his grandfather's heart attack, but I had forgotten that his brother drowned a couple years ago in a freak accident. What exactly happened to his sister? How is she now? I don't get the chance to ask Steven because Torin is squirming so much.

I finally get the wound cleaned out, and I'm ready to sew it up with no help from a non-compliant patient. Thank goodness for Nana's sewing basket. There's thread, but no needle in my med kit. I know it will hurt like hell, but it has to be done. I am grateful that Torin passes out again before I thread the needle.

After I cut the last thread, Torin is awake again and says he needs to call his mother, she will be worried. I wrap the wound as Steven crushes an antibiotic and something that will hopefully help Torin rest. Torin has worn us both out with his singing and talk of a dead grandmother and absent mothers and continuous squirming and attempts to walk to his lady.

Torin takes the medicine, and there is finally quiet. Both Steven and I are leaned back in our chairs with our feet propped up on Nana's coffee table. We are eating one of the apple pies and drinking some water from the spigot. I am so tired, I can barely chew.

"Damn good pie," says Steven.

"Hell yeah," I say.

"How does Carli know Jack Taylor?" asks Steven. "She ever mention that before?"