Page 41 of A Breath of Life
Momentarily puzzlement eclipsed his worry, but he shook it off as though unwilling to invite more problems into his already troubled mind. “Promise me you won’t go anywhere.”
“Why?”
“Just promise me, Tallus. Don’t leave the apartment. Not alone. Don’t go to the office or the store or even down to the lobby to get the mail. Stay here. Keep the door locked.”
Alarm bells rang and clanged. Diem’s cryptic behavior, combined with his demands, shot fear through my veins. He didn’t seem inclined to tell me what the hell had happened in the hours he was gone, but the sheer agony laced with his plea was too much to ignore.
“Okay. I promise, but you had better explain yourself later.”
Without another word, he lowered his hand and stumbled into the bathroom. Under the harsh light and with his back turned, a clump of wet, matted hair at the base of his skull caught my attention.
“Oh my god.”
Diem peered questioningly over his shoulder but didn’t resist when I spun him and prodded the bloody welt on the back of his head. He hissed at the contact.
“Jesus, Diem.”
A strangled noise rose in his throat, and he tensed but didn’t pull away, enduring the examination. “Is it bad?” he rasped once I looked my fill.
“You must have the mother of all headaches.”
“I do.”
“It needs stitches.”
“I’m fine. It’s not bleeding anymore.”
“You probably have a concussion. Did you black out?”
Diem peered into the middle distance and opened his mouth once, twice, three times before both nodding and shrugging simultaneously. So, yes, but again, he didn’t want to talk about it. Knowing his stance on hospitals, I didn’t ask if he thought we should have it checked out. The answer would be no.
Concern rippled through me at the sight of him fumbling and bumbling, trying to get his clothes off. I had a million questions, but he was clearly in no mood to answer them.
Giving him privacy, I closed the bathroom door and retreated to the kitchen, where Echo sat by her empty dish, waiting for the food Diem had promised.
“Where were you guys?” I wished she could answer.
As though somehow understanding, she warily glanced at the hallway and whined, ears still flat against her head and with an expression about as distraught as a dog could make it.
“Are you hurt?” Echo endured a thorough examination much more cooperatively than my boyfriend, and when I finished, deeming her fit as a fiddle, I scooped her some kibble and freshened her water.
As she ate ravenously, I removed her work vest and hung it beside her leash. She didn’t wear it at home. Regardless, Echo always remained in tune with Diem, even off duty.
The shower ran long enough to drain the hot water tank, and it kept right on running. I resumed pacing, new worries surfacing. Nearly forty minutes went by before Diem emerged from the bathroom. He wore a loose pair of gym shorts and nothing more. His broad, hairy chest and thick, tattooed thighs were on display, still damp from a poor effort with the towel.
I examined him for more injuries but saw none. His face and soul seemed to have taken the brunt of the attack. Diem was notorious for erecting walls around his emotions. It kept people out, but the pain in. Over time, I’d dismantled those walls. He had let me in and some of his sorrow out.
Not today. He’d reinforced the barriers with new bricks and mortar. The wall was thicker and taller and more impenetrable than ever.
For a long time, Diem stood in the hallway as though undecided about which way to turn. His gaze remained a million miles away, searing a hole in the floor, muscles strained, and fists clenched. The shower had done nothing to eliminate his tension.
Fearing another argument, I didn’t inquire again about where he’d been or who had beaten him senseless. For all I knew, he’d landed at a bar or a liquor store. I’d smelled the evidence, hadn’t I? The cigarette smoke. The stale stench of whiskey or rum or some other kind of hard liquor. He wasn’t picky anymore.
Diem would stress-smoke in our earlier days of hooking up. He’d quit a hundred times, but the crutch remained, and he still grabbed a pack when life spiraled out of control.
Diem had likely ended up drunk off his ass at some seedy bar. In an inebriated state, he’d probably gotten into a fistfight with some mouthy son of a bitch who had too much to say or got in his space. Maybe he’d slept it off somewhere—a motel, a park bench, an alley—while nursing his injuries and hating himself because the DiemKrause he wanted to be did not solve problems with fists. Perhaps the brawl had raised his inner demons. Hence the distant look in his eyes. Hence his reluctance to tell me what had happened. Shame and guilt were two topics he revisited often with his therapist.
Maybe that was it.
