Page 13 of Knight's Fall

“Who cares? Go back to work, Sissy. I’ll be back in a few. I just need to clear my mind.”

Sissy scowled and turned with a huff to go back inside the diner. Courtlyn despised it when people huffed or sighed loudly or made any kind of annoying noise to get attention. The only upside to her run-in with Sissy was that it took her mind off Sexy Neighbor for a few minutes.

“Just a few more months,” she reminded herself. “That’s all you have until you’re rid of Sissy for good.”

Just a few more months of meager living, and she’ll have enough saved to invest in her dream — operating a food truck. She wanted more than just working or owning a restaurant. She wanted to connect with people, to visit a different location every day, and to be able to look outside instead of wasting away in a kitchen with no windows. Her Comfort Cuisine food truck may not seem like much of a goal to some, but to her, it was the American Dream.

She rolled her head to stretch the kinks from her neck. Time to head back inside and work the rest of her shift. If the orders slowed, she might even prepare a couple of her favorite desserts to add to the lunch specials. Maybe that would overshadow Sissy’s foul disposition and put her in a better mood.

She tugged on the door handle only to have her grip slip when the latch didn’t give. Shaking the handle, she growled at the locked door, a string of obscene names flowing through her mind, aimed at her nemesis who left her in the alley without a way inside. Her only option was to walk around the building to the front and walk in while the customers were dining, something Tabby frowned on.

Tabby only liked the employees to be seen when they were needed. Otherwise they “spoiled the ambiance” of the quaint, hole-in-the-wall diner. Sissy was well aware of this rule too, hence her rotten prank of locking Courtlyn out from the kitchen access.

“What a bitch!” She spat out the words as if she had a terrible taste in her mouth and wished Sissy could have heard her. “Of all the petty, spiteful moves! Doesn’t she know we’re adults and not middle schoolers? Bullies are so lame.”

Her grumbling fueled her steps up the alley and around the corner to the front of the diner just as Mr. Fielder stepped outside. Forcing her foul mood aside, her smile was bright as she noticed how the cuffs of his brown slacks pooled on top of his shoes and the back of his crème shirt, yellowed with age and wear, was untucked. His wrinkly face that reminded her of a cuddly bulldog was flushed. When he didn’t offer his standard greeting, she wondered if he saw her.

“Hi, Mr. Fielder. Did you enjoy your breakfast?”

Never sparing her a glance, he took a couple of steps before his slender frame started to sway. His hands reached out as if to find something to hold onto, but there was nothing around him.

Courtlyn rushed up to his side, grasping his arm to steady him. His head turned, his soft blue eyes glassy as they finally fixed on her. His mouth opened in a small oval, but no sound came from his throat.

“Are you alright? Maybe we should go back inside. I’ll get you some water.”

“N-n-n-no.” His knees buckled, and though she tried to catch him, his dead weight threw her off balance. They both fell to the gravel parking lot.

Other than dust coating her clothes and gravel burns on her exposed ankles, she was none the worse for wear from the fall. Mr. Fielder rolled to his back, and Courtlyn could hear him struggling for breath. She crawled over to his side, placing her ear to his chest and then a finger to the pulse spot at his throat. Her own heart skittered in her chest when she couldn’t feel thethump thump thumpof a heartbeat.

“Mr. Fielder, hold on for me, okay? I’ll get you help. Don’t you worry.” She looked toward the glass door and windows of the diner, but no one seemed to notice what happened. She pulled out her cell, called 9-1-1 and placed it on speaker while she tried to remember the CPR training she learned as a teenage babysitter.

“9-1-1. What’s your emergency?”

Courtlyn was barely aware of the words tumbling out of her mouth in a rush. How the operator understood what she needed, she would never know. Time seemed to move in slow motion and at hyper speed at the same time. Before she knew it, an ambulance roared into the parking lot with its sirens blaring, drawing people from the diner. She barely looked up when the ambulance stopped close to where she knelt beside Mr. Fielder. Her arms felt shaky and loose like cooked spaghetti. Her focus was on the rhythm of CPR, fighting her fatigue to push against the older man’s chest.

“Ma’am, we can take over from here.”

The words barely registered before someone pulled her back and the paramedics went to work. Voices were speaking all around her, but it was a dull roar in her ears. Her arms wrapped around her middle to form a shield against the noise.

When the paramedics declared the return of Mr. Fielder’s heartbeat, Courtlyn’s legs sagged. She would have fallen if someone hadn’t grasped her upper arms from behind and held her up. Courtlyn watched them wheel Mr. Fielder away on a gurney and load him in the back of an ambulance without any word to her.

She shivered as dread tickled her spine. From the paramedics’ frantic movements, she had a sinking feeling that whatever happened to Mr. Fielder had left him in poor shape.

“Courtlyn, are you okay?” Tabby had moved to stand in front of her, but Courtlyn’s eyes followed the ambulance until it was well out of sight. “Why don’t you come inside? Courtlyn, come with me.”

She allowed her boss to lead her away, but she felt like she was watching herself in a movie. Tears pooled in her eyes as Tabby urged her to sit in an empty booth. One of the waitresses brought her a glass of water, but her hand shook too much to hold it.

“Will he be all right?” She hadn’t realized she said the question out loud until Tabby answered her.

“I don’t know, but I don’t think he would have had a chance if you hadn’t been there. What were you doing in the parking lot?”

“Sissy locked me out of the kitchen entrance.”

“What? I didn’t. Tabby, she’s in shock and confused. All I did was tell her she needed to come back inside.”

Courtlyn stared in morbid fascination as Sissy’s face reddened. She’d never seen the waitress flustered, and she would have thought she would be more pleased to witness Sissy’s discomfiture. But she didn’t care. She didn’t care about any of it.

“I want to go home.”

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