“No. I’m sorry.”
“Seriously?”
“I mean, she couldn’t dance before,” I say. “This won’t change things.”
“I heard that,” Cameron says, through gritted teeth.
“She’s in a lot of pain,” Willow says.
“She should be. A molten bullet ripped through the meat of her shoulder at approximately 385 miles per second, leaving a channel of boiling, bloody tissue in its wake. Her body’s trying to bring the temperature of that bullet down to 98.6 degrees. As it transfers heat to the surrounding blood and tissue, the result is exactly what you’d expect.”
“What’s that?”
“Pain.”
“What can we do?”
“There’s a small leather handle on the floor of the trunk that accesses the spare tire compartment. My medical bag’s in there. If you bring it to me, I can fix her up. There’s some bedding in there, too. Are the sheets clean?”
“Yes. And the pillow cases and bedspread.”
“Bring the bedspread.”
“Okay.”
Willow gets up and sprints to the car.
Then screams bloody murder.
For a moment I figure she’s found Bobby’s dead body.
Then I realize she’s screaming for a completely different reason.
22
I get to my feet and turn to find two men holding a gun on Willow. When she stops screaming, they start.
“What the fuck’s going on here?” one of them shouts.
They see her look at me and the other guy yells, “Sir? Stay right where you are, and don’t move a muscle. I may not look like it, but I know how to use this gun.”
He’s right. He doesn’t look like a killer. He looks like a conjoined twin.
“You,” the first twin says to Willow. “Put that shit back in the trunk and go stand beside the battered husband.”
“My friend’s been shot,” she says. “That’s Dr. Box. This is his medical bag. He needs it to help my friend.”
“Fuck your friend!” the first one says.
“Oh, stop being such a Clint Eastwood,” the second twin says. “What’s your name, honey?”
“Willow.”
“Your full name, dear.”
“Willow Breeland.”
“Nice to meet you, Willow. I’m Charlie, and this is-”
“Don’t tell him our names, you moron!” the first twin says.
“Oh, like she needs our names to identify us?” Charlie says. “She can’t just say, ‘the Siamese twins held a gun on me?’ Because there are too many of us shuffling around the greater Dayton area?”
Willow suddenly notices Bobby, lying dead in the dirt, ten feet behind the twins.
And shrieks.
The twins angle their bodies to see what she’s looking at, and Charlie says, “Omigod! Look at that penis! It looks like the space shuttle!”
“He’s dead,” the first twin says.
“If he is, he’s got petrified wood for a penis. Omigod, I made a joke! He’s got a petrified woodie!”
They shuffle to Bobby’s body for a closer look while keeping an eye on me and the gun on Willow.
“Well pardon me!” Charlie says to me. “What are you doing?”
“Pissing,” I say. “What’s it look like?”
“It looks like you’re pissing,” he agrees.
“Who’s this?” the first twin asks Willow.
“My boyfriend, Bobby.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Charlie says.
“He was a piece of shit. I hated him,” she says.
“Men!” Charlie says. “Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.”
“I can live without him.”
“You go, girl!”
“Who shot him?” the first twin says.
“He shot himself.”
“Then where’s the gun?”
She points toward the house. “He threw it over there after running out of bullets.”
“One of those bullets hit the window of our van,” he says. “It caused me to run off the road. We blew a tire and hit a tree.”
“I’m sorry,” Willow says.
“Why’s he naked?”
“It’s a long story.”
“It’s a long dick is what it is,” Charlie says, giggling. “By the way, this is my brother, Carlos.”
“I can’t believe you told her my name!” Carlos says.
They shuffle ten feet closer to me and notice Cameron on the ground.
“He shot her, too?” Carlos asks.
“He did,” I say. “And I need to get the bullet out of her shoulder before it does further damage.”
Charlie angles his head toward Willow and says, “You can take the bag to the doctor, honey.”
Willow rushes to my side and hands me the medical bag. She looks at my eyes and says, “Can you even see?”
“I could perform this surgery with my eyes closed.”
It’s a true statement, and a good thing, since my eyes are so swollen, I’m looking through slits the width of spaghetti noodles.
I give Cameron a shot of morphine and use my scissors to remove half her blouse. It takes less than five minutes to cut out the bullet, clean the wound, and stitch her up. When I’m finished, Willow wraps the blanket around her.
Behind us, the twins are laughing.
“For the love of God,” Willow says.
“What now?”
“They’re playing ring toss.”
I turn around to see them standing a short distance from Bobby, trying to toss necklaces onto his enormously erect penis.
“Two to nothing!” Charlie squeals. “I’m winning!”
23
Willow hovers over Cameron while I walk over to the twins.
