Theresa Weir - The Girl with the Cat Tattoo

“We all need Alice and cupcakes,” Lola said. “Why do you think Joe was attracted to you in the first place? He needed some whimsy, some Alice in his life.”

A camera flashed, blinding them. Several flashes later, the man behind the camera explained himself. “I’m a reporter for the Pioneer Press. Can I get a statement from you?”

“No,” Melody said, surprised by her rudeness.

“You were witnesses, right? Did you see anything?”

The sisters kept walking.

“Can I at least get a name and phone number?” the reporter shouted after them.

“Let’s go straight to the hospital,” Melody said as soon as they were in the car. “I don’t want to take the time to drop off Max or change.” Because they might not have time. That’s what she was thinking.

Lola took Snelling Avenue to 94 E. Traffic on 94 was moving quickly, and in less than five minutes they were taking the downtown exit to Regions Hospital. Foregoing the parking ramp, Lola headed straight for the emergency lot adjoining the ER entrance. The sisters went inside the building, leaving Max alone in the car.

At least Joe had been shot within five minutes of a major trauma center, Melody thought. If there was anything good to be said about being shot.

In the past, whenever Melody visited the ER, the people at the desk had taken their sweet time gathering information. What a difference a little blood made. Before Melody could explain what had happened, or explain why they were there, trauma nurses swarmed. The next thing she knew, she was being forced onto a gurney. Then someone grabbed her arm and readied her for a blood draw. All of this in less than a minute. Melody was quite proud of them, and it was good to know they could snap to attention when the situation required it. But of course it didn’t.

“Where’s the injury?” This from someone who looked like a doctor. A young man with dark, curly hair.

Melody pushed herself up on her elbows just as a nurse began cutting at the hem of Melody’s dress.

Both she and Lola shouted at the same time.

“She’s not injured!”

“I’m not injured!”

“You’re covered in blood,” the doctor said. He didn’t believe her about the injury. Or lack thereof. She supposed they got a lot of crackheads who chewed on glass and had no idea whether or not they were hurt. And her costume didn’t really help. “It’s not my blood. I’m here to check on someone who was just brought in.”

“Name?” the nurse asked. She’d stopped cutting.

Name. “Joe.”

“Last name?”

Melody bailed off the gurney. “I’m not sure.”

“How do you know the victim?”

Now, from the corner of her eye, Melody saw a hospital security guard moving closer, a hand to his belt. Saint Paul wasn’t the sweet place painted by Garrison Keillor. Saint Paul could be as nasty and as violent as any other big city, maybe worse. Melody herself had been mugged twice.

“I’m his girlfriend,” she blurted out.

“And you don’t know his last name?”

“It doesn’t make that much sense, but…” Now several people were eying her with suspicion. Lola grabbed Melody by the arm and tugged. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

The guard stepped forward. He was an older guy. Old enough to be somebody’s grandfather. “I think you’d better leave,” he said, not unkindly but with a stern tone that made Melody want to obey.

She said, “This isn’t what you think.” What did they think? That she was a stripper? Maybe. “I’m a librarian.” As if that explained everything. As if that would suddenly make them back down.

From somewhere behind them came a snicker. Two young dudes slumped into waiting room chairs were finding the whole thing extremely entertaining.

“A children’s librarian. This evening was story hour.”

“Why don’t I just go check and see if I can get an update on the gunshot victim?” the receptionist said. She took off, and the crowd dispersed.

The woman returned a short time later. “He’s in surgery.”

Which meant he was still alive.

In the bathroom, Melody washed the blood from her face and hands and removed her apron, which was covered in blood. Back in the waiting room, a cop searched them out, and Melody found herself going over the story one more time.

“They’re crediting your cat with saving the young man’s life,” the officer said.

“My cat?”

“When the victim arrived here, he had a pink leash wrapped around his thigh. He would have died without it.”

Max’s leash. Melody hadn’t even noticed it was gone. “My cat certainly didn’t tie the leash around Joe’s thigh.”

“No, of course not, but from what I understand the cat was the first one on the scene. And he was dragging the leash behind him.”

“We heard gunshots. The noise scared him, and he ran. He got away from me.” She didn’t go into how Max had heard gunshots another time in his life. And that he’d possibly been the only witness to David’s murder. Melody had always wondered if Max had seen the murderer. He’d been in the house. But maybe he’d hidden. Maybe he’d run downstairs to hide the way he often did. But it was weird to think that if Max could talk, if Max could understand, he might be able to point out David’s killer in a lineup.

“I don’t think he could have seen anything,” Melody said. “We heard gunshots. Then a car flew past. No headlights. It was all over by the time my cat got there.”

A doctor approached them and addressed the officer. “He’s out of surgery and in recovery. You should be able to talk to him in thirty minutes or so.”

Melody’s whole body went limp. “He’s okay?” she whispered. “He’s alive?”

“He’ll be fine. We had to give him a transfusion, but he’ll be fine. If he hadn’t made a tourniquet I doubt he would have made it. Saved by a cat leash. That’s a new one.”

At that moment, Melody noticed someone just beyond the doctor. The reporter who’d taken her photo. And he was taking notes as quickly as his pen could move across the tablet.

Oh, what did it matter?

Joe was alive.

“Are you a relative?” the doctor asked.

“Girlfriend,” the receptionist piped in from her station.

“You can see him as soon as he’s out of the recovery room. We’ll let you know.”

“Thanks.”

Melody looked at Lola, communicating her fear. What now? How did she go on from this point? With this relationship? She almost wished he’d been a drug dealer, because then it would have been easier to walk away. How would he understand that she couldn’t do this? That she couldn’t be with him?

Lola, who knew her sister inside and out, said, “This will probably never happen again. I mean, how many times does someone get shot? Not that I’m trying to talk you into or out of anything, but-”

“Logically I know the odds are against it ever happening again. But what were the odds against my being involved with not one, but two men who were shot?”

He wasn’t dead.

That was Joe’s first thought when he came to in the recovery room, nurses hovering over him, making conversation, trying to figure out if he had all of his marbles. Apparently he did.

His second thought was of Melody, his third, Max. His fourth? What the hell had happened? Somehow his cover had been blown.

The recovery room was history, and he was now in a regular hospital room with a view of downtown Saint Paul. Well, he could see the tops of buildings, and he could see some stars. An officer had already talked to him, but Joe didn’t have much information to share. He hadn’t seen anything.

His cell phone, placed within reach by the nurse, beeped. He opened the message app to find a text from Jerry. Brief. Succinct. A warning. Be careful who you talk to and what you say. I suspect a mole.

Joe deleted the message and let his head drop back against the pillow. Mole. He was living a cop cliché. He thought about the cop he’d just talked to. A guy he’d seen around but didn’t know much about. He hadn’t given him any real information. He hadn’t had any information to give. But from now on he would have to be careful, and he’d have to keep a low profile. Hopefully it wasn’t a slow news night. Hopefully the story wouldn’t even merit a few sentences.

He heard a faint tap on the door, and Melody poked her head inside. “Can I come in?”

He should never have gotten involved with her. He’d known better. Not the thing for an undercover cop to do, moral implications and the fact that he could never be honest with her aside. He’d put her in danger.

She approached the bed. Her dark hair was disheveled, and her dress, her blue Alice-in-Wonderland dress, was stained with blood. His blood. Without thought, he reached for her with the hand that wasn’t tethered to the IV rack. Her fingers wrapped around his, and he gave her a firm, reassuring squeeze along with a crooked smile.

“The doctors are crediting Max with saving my life,” he said.

Some of the tenseness left her body, and she returned his smile. They were like two shy strangers, but he’d spent the night with her. He’d made love to her. He knew he should regret it. He tried to regret it.

“It’s not like he tied his leash around your leg and stopped the bleeding,” she said.

“But it’s a good story. And you like good stories.”

She thought about that and nodded. “Something the kids will like to hear when Max makes another appearance at the library.”

“And the shelter,” Joe said. “Don’t forget the shelter.” But he could sense her retreat. He could feel her pulling out of his life. Maybe he should help her.

“Lola called 9-1-1,” Melody said.

“Ah.” He’d forgotten Lola was there.

“So it was Lola and Max. I didn’t really do anything.”

But he remembered that she’d comforted him until the ambulance arrived. She’d hugged him to her and cried. That’s what he remembered.