Page 30 of Jackson
10
Summer
I couldn’t stop the tears; they rolled freely down my cheeks as I looked at him. His mouth was smeared with his blood, it ran down his side and soaked into the white sheet he lay on. He mumbled incoherently, and for a few minutes, I was stunned intoparalysis.
Four words swam through my mind and I reached for Jackson’sphone.
Dex is the fixer-upper, I remembered Jacksaying.
I scrolled through his contacts and pressed call when I came to hisname.
“Jack,” Iheard.
“It’s Summer, Jack is…” My voice caught in mythroat.
“I’m on my way.” Dexter cut off the call without waiting for anexplanation.
I rushed to the bathroom and wet a washcloth. I sat on the edge of the bed and wiped it over his stomach. It was as I studied his cuts, I noticed so many scars. Most were covered over by his ink, and I wondered why I’d never noticed them before. Raised skin in straight lines covered his stomach, up his chest and down the undersides of botharms.
“Oh, Jack,” I cried as I wiped away hisblood.
I watched my tears drip onto his skin, mingle with the blood that continued to seep from one wound, the one I’d seen that extended down to the waistband of his jeans. I gently lowered the zip and parted the top of them. Old scars followed the ink down to a patch of dark blondhair.
I closed my eyes and slid from the bed. I rested my back against it and cried for my friend. I folded my arms across my knees and lowered my head. Some time after, I heard heavy footsteps on the decking. I scrambled to my feet as Dexter walked through the bedroom doors. He carried a plastic box in onehand.
“What happened?” he asked, as he made his way to the side of thebed.
“He got drunk, I tried to help him but he fell up the steps. I guess he opened those…” I struggled to finish thesentence.
“Why did he get drunk?” he asked, as he placed his box on the bedside table and openedit.
“I saw…he freaked. He…hecuts…”
“I know, Summer. Iknow.”
I watched as Dexter filled a syringe with something and injected a liquid into Jackson’sarm.
“What isthat?”
“Something to help with the massive headache he’s going to wake up with,” he said, and it surprised me to hear himchuckle.
I hadn’t found the situation remotely funny. Dexter opened a couple of packets of small wipes, which he ran over the opencut.
“Thank fuck he’s out of it, this stuff stings like a bitch,” hesaid.
The wipes left an orange smear over Jack’s skin. He closely inspected the largest one. I watched as he placed some small strips of a sticky fabric over the wound to hold it closed. He then taped gauze over it and rolled Jack onto hisside.
“That’s about all I can do for him tonight. He came to me thismorning.”
Dexter straightened and closed his box. He took my arm and led me from the room. I slumped into the daybed and he sat on a chair facingme.
“Why did he come to you?” Iasked.
“He’s struggling, Summer, emotionally, and when that happens, this is what hedoes.”
“How long have youknown?”
“D-J found him on the beach one day, pretty much in the same condition, he brought him to me. I patched him up. I counsel him, I counsel themall.”
