Seventeenth Dawn

6) Autopsy Results

Benny's funeral is to be held three days from now in the next town over at the only Catholic Church within fifty miles.

The same day Daniel would be found dead if we don't find him sooner.

"Please, Uncle Vic," I beg four hours and fourteen minutes after seeing Benny's body, the gruesome image still burned into my brain like a hot iron, "let me go talk to them. I need to know what they're saying about the killer."

He sits next to me on the puffy blue comforter over my bed and me. I can smell his cologne; an effort to conceal the musk that's built up after two days without a shower. He has been too worried to leave my side.

"I think this investigation has gone far enough where you are concerned. You just saw what happened to Benjamin, and now you want to keep meddling with the investigation? What if that was you, huh? What if you were the one to be tortured and killed and I had to see you like that?"

"What if I can insure it won't be Daniel?" My oval jaw is set. "I don't want to think about life without Daniel."

"Sweetie, I know you think you can help, but you might just get in the way. I'm not saying this because I don't believe in you. I'm saying this because you have no experience investigating a murder. And, honestly, the deeper into this you get, the more vulnerable you are. If the killer sees you as a threat or even a minor annoyance, you will be the next target."

I feel myself lose focus on Uncle Vic; my mind wandering. Air flows sharply through my nostrils, and my eyes flick back into focus. "Uncle Vic! You're brilliant!" I throw the covers off of myself, allowing the cold air to penetrate the warm cocoon. "Help me up. I just thought of something."

"I am not going to help you write your own death wish."

"Fine. Then I request that you get out of my room now."

Watching me with brown eyes flecked with green, he slowly stands and exits, arms brushing against the door.

I stare for a moment at my right leg, sheathed in a white cast up to my knee. I pull myself up to sitting position and slide my left leg off the bed, opening my legs wider than ninety degrees. I focus next on my injured leg, and wrap my hands around the upper part that is uninsured save for a few yellowed bruises. I gingerly slide my bent leg across the bed and set it over the edge. Finally, I push myself up so that I am facing the side and leaning my weight over my legs. I put my left foot down on the carpet first, taking hold of my headboard for support, and lift my broken leg in front of me. The heavy painkillers Uncle Vic picked up for me from the pharmacy make my head spin, but I brace myself and hop across the room to grab my crutches, where Uncle Vic cruelly set them out of reach to discourage me from getting out of bed as I am now.

I hop down the hall and prepare myself for the battle down the stairs. I managed it yesterday morning, but that was before I injured it more and needed some serious opioids. Putting both crutches under one arm, I place my free hand on the railing and hop down the first step. I almost topple forward, and I feel my stomach lurch, but I catch myself. I take things much slower afterwards, and manage my way to the cold wooden floor at the base of the staircase.

As I begin dialing the cab service on the home phone, Uncle Vic walks up with a cellphone in his hand. "Here," he says, voice quiet and resigned, "I picked this up for you earlier. If I can't stop you from going, the least you can do is remember I still love you and would rather you call me than let yourself get too deep in a big mess. Okay?"