Copper and Salt, page 3
The visitors were at the front door, not the back door Oren always used, so he had to dash down the stairs two at a time to answer it. He took a second to compose himself with his hand on the doorknob before he swung it open, putting what he hoped was the right blend of surprise and irritation on his face as he gazed up at the two very large men on the other side, one of them holding a trash bag.
“Can I help you gentlemen?” Oren said.
The first man, clearly the leader by bearing and build, took a step forward and smiled. He reminded Oren of a leopard, sleek and deadly and handsome, killer claws hidden but there just the same.
“Are you the owner of this house, sir?” he asked. He had a subtle accent, different from Alex’s—it sounded eastern European, maybe Russian.
Oren glared at him, bristling. “What tipped you off, the fact that I answered the door?”
The man smiled, baring his teeth. “Of course, I apologize. May we come in?”
Oren set his feet. “No offense, but I’d rather you didn’t. I don’t know you.”
The man tipped his head, smile unwavering. “I understand. My name is Andrei, and I’m looking for a friend of mine. He’s a young man, twenty-one years old, off his medication, highly mentally unstable and a danger to himself and others in the state he’s in. Have you seen anyone recently, anyone who perhaps appeared unwell?”
Unwell? Oren had to stifle a spike of rage, praying nothing showed. He pretended to think.
“I’d ask what he looks like, but it doesn’t matter—I haven’t seen anyone but my own face in the mirror for the past three days. Do you have a business card or anything, so I can call you if he shows up?”
Andrei cocked his head, considering Oren. Finally he smiled. “Of course, sir.” He produced a card from his pocket, handing it over with a flourish.
Oren indicated Andrei’s companion. “What about him? Does he talk?”
Andrei’s smile widened. “When he has to. Thank you for your time, sir.” He half-turned as if to go and then stopped, taking the trash bag from his companion and holding it out to Oren. “We found this outside. Did you have an accident, sir?”
“Slipped on the ice yesterday,” Oren said airily, mentally kicking himself. Why hadn’t he picked it up? He’d forgotten all about that fucking bag, and it must have slid down the hill when he dropped it. “Twisted my ankle, figured I’d pick it up later.”
“You’re not limping now,” Andrei observed. “And there are tracks in the snow around the house. Now, I’m no tracker, but are you sure you haven’t had visitors?”
Oren snatched the bag from him. “I heal fast and I went out to check my traps this morning. Is there something else I can help you with?”
“No, I think that’s all I need,” Andrei said. He left, his footsteps silent and quick on the ice, and Oren shivered and shut the door, bolting it behind him and running upstairs for the bedroom.
Alex was nowhere to be seen, the bedcovers rumpled, and Oren cursed to himself. “Alex?” he called quietly. “They’re gone.” He waited, holding his breath, and after a minute, there was a shuffling and Alex emerged from the far side of the bed.
He’d been hiding underneath the bed, Oren realized, and he suddenly wanted to weep. Instead he forced a smile and rounded the bed himself, bending to help Alex up and onto the mattress again.
“Was it… him?” Alex whispered, folding his arms around his knees.
“If by him, you mean Andrei, then yeah,” Oren said, sitting down beside him. “It was him and one of his goons. And it’s time for you to start talking.”
Alex looked up sharply. “I cannot,” he protested.
“I know you don’t want to pull me into this,” Oren said, settling himself a little more firmly on the bed, “but I think at this point I’m pretty well… pulled.”
Alex’s brows drew together but Oren wasn’t done.
“You landed on my doorstep, starved and frozen half to death and beaten to a fare-thee-well. You’re terrified of this Andrei character. I may not have wanted you here, but do you honestly expect me to just let you go, wave goodbye and let you take your chances out there, especially with a broken ankle?”
Alex was trembling, his arms wrapped around himself as if to keep in the terror that wanted to rip him apart, and Oren reached for him without thinking, unable to bear it any longer. He realized what he was doing at the last second and stopped himself, but Alex made a noise in his throat and fell toward him, colliding with Oren’s chest and clinging like a desperate bramble.
Oren wrapped his arms around him, gathering Alex up into his lap so that he was securely situated, his face tucked against Oren’s throat.
“Okay,” Oren whispered, rubbing Alex’s back. “Okay. I’ve got you. Just hold on, donkey. Hold on.”
It took several minutes before Alex was composed enough to speak, but finally he stirred and sat up. Oren let him go, shifting his weight so their thighs were pressing together.
“I am from… România,” Alex said. “When… I was nineteen, my parents—” He swallowed hard. “Sold… my brother Mihai to the Russians. He was… fifteen.”
“Jesus,” Oren managed. “And you? Did they sell you too?”
Alex shook his head. “I… follow.”
Oren thought distantly that he might be sick. “You willingly went into sex slavery to, what? Rescue him?”
“To get him out,” Alex said, ducking his chin and gazing at his lap. “But to find him was long, and I am just one, I am not enough, I cannot—” He took a shaky breath. “So I stay.”
“You couldn’t get him out by yourself, so you stayed with him,” Oren said.
Alex nodded. “We came to America… to here.” He drew his good leg back up and pressed his face to it, shoulders drooping.
“How long have you been here?”
“I do not know,” Alex said to his knee. “A year?”
Oren shook himself. “Okay, look. I understand why you can’t go to the police or the hospital, but why won’t you let me give you anything for the pain?”
Alex clutched the bedcovers. When he spoke, his voice was muffled. “With them, I am not….” He hesitated. “What is word? Obey?”
“Obedient,” Oren whispered. “You weren’t obedient, were you? You fought them.”
Alex nodded, closing his eyes and pressing his face to his knee again. “Da. Yes. I fight. So they drug me.”
“Okay,” Oren said, blinking several times. “So you got out but Mihai didn’t?”
Something flickered across Alex’s face and he shook his face. “We were… put apart?”
“Separated?” Oren said.
“Da,” Alex whispered. “Separated. Mihai did not make it out. Told me… run. So I did.” He lifted his head. “I have to go for him, Oren.”
“Of course you do,” Oren said immediately. “The second the roads are clear, I promise.”
Alex’s face eased and his shoulders slumped.
Oren patted his thigh. “No more talking right now. Since you won’t take anything, it’s time for you to sleep. Do you think you can?”
Alex lifted a shoulder noncommittally. “Where… will you be?”
“Close,” Oren said. He waited as Alex slid under the covers, biting his lip and white with pain, and then tucked him in, pulling the blankets up and around his shoulders.
Alex reached for him, slim fingers bracketing Oren’s wrist.
Oren stopped moving as Alex’s thumb moved over his pulse point, brown eyes steady on his face.
“Mulțumesc,” Alex whispered.
Oren blinked. “I—what?”
“Thank you,” Alex said, a smile flickering across his lips. “Thank you, Oren.”
Oren took a chance and reached out to smooth the hair off Alex’s forehead. “I’ll stay where you can hear me,” he murmured, and left the room.
3
Oren made breakfast, gathered a few things from his workshop, and then busied himself cleaning up in the living room and kitchen, but he was jumpy, listening for any noise from the bedroom, and finally his nerves couldn’t take it any longer. He sighed, piled food on the breakfast tray, grabbed his book, and climbed the stairs back up.
Alex was on his side, eyes on the door, and he seemed to relax as Oren appeared, the tray in his hands.
“Hungry?” Oren asked.
Alex didn’t answer, but he sat up, flinching as the movement dragged at his ankle.
Oren settled the tray across Alex’s lap and then sat down on the bed beside him, waiting until Alex met his eyes.
Oren took a deep breath. “I’m not a doctor, but I have to do my best to set your ankle so it doesn’t heal crooked, okay? And it’s gonna hurt like a bitch when I do. So—” He pulled the bottle of narcotics from his pocket. “I won’t force you to take these. If you do, it will be of your own free will, just like everything else you do in this house. But I want you to understand that you are safe, Alex. You can let yourself relax. You don’t have to be in pain right now. I’ll watch out for you.”
Alex searched his face. “Why?” he asked again.
As before, Oren couldn’t figure out how to answer. Finally he lifted a shoulder. “Maybe because I wish someone had done that for me.”
Silence fell between them as Alex weighed that.
“What if they come back?” he asked after a minute.
Oren opted for total honesty. “Kid, if they come back, I’m not sure we’ll be able to stop them in any case, whether or not you’re dopey from taking a narcotic.”
Alex studied his face, and then reached out and took the bottle from Oren’s hand.
Oren drew a relieved breath. “Just take one,” he said, careful to keep his voice normal. “As skinny as you are, we don’t want you overdosing.”
Alex nodded and tapped one out onto his palm. His hands were shaking, but he swallowed it without hesitation, tilting his head back and his throat working, eyes fluttering shut.
Oren waited until Alex opened his eyes before scooting the tray a little nearer. “I want to wait until it kicks in before I try to immobilize it. In the meantime, I hope you like brown sugar oatmeal,” he said. “Demolish that for me, would you?”
Alex tilted his head. “What is… demolish?”
Oren half-laughed. “It means to destroy, to smash or obliterate. Sorry, I keep forgetting to dial it back on the euphemisms.” He smacked his forehead as Alex looked even more baffled, and gestured at the oatmeal. “Just… eat that and pretend I’m not here.”
He settled in the chair by the window overlooking the valley and the road below, opening his book on his knees as Alex began to eat.
Within twenty minutes, Oren could see the narcotic taking effect. Alex’s head drooped, the lines of pain in his face easing and the spoon in his hand wobbling.
Oren put his book down and stood as quietly as possible, tiptoeing to the bed and sliding the spoon from Alex’s fingers. He lifted the tray off and set it on the floor beside the bed and turned back, urging Alex down onto his back among the pillows and stuffing one pillow under his bad foot as gently as possible.
“Brace yourself,” he said. “I have to palpate the joint and make sure I’m getting it braced as evenly as possible.”
Alex took a deep breath and closed his eyes, firming his mouth, and Oren felt along his ankle, pressing delicately along the joint. Alex twitched a few times but didn’t make any noise as Oren lifted his foot and moved it back and forth.
“Sorry, sorry,” Oren muttered, not looking up. “Hang in there, I just have to be sure—” He picked up the small piece of birch and held it against Alex’s ankle. The piece of ash the same length went on the other side, and Oren held them both in place with one hand as he used vet wrap around Alex’s calf and ankle until he was satisfied the joint was as straight as possible and immobile.
Then he set his foot down and Alex took a deep, whooping gasp of air and sagged. There were beads of sweat on his face, Oren saw when he looked up.
“I’m done,” he said. “You can relax. God, you’re a tough one. How are you feeling?”
Alex cracked one eye open and looked at him, and Oren laughed quietly.
“Stupid question, you’re right. Think you can rest now?”
Alex nodded and burrowed deep into the pillows, pressing his face into the down and sighing. Oren smoothed the hair off his forehead again.
“You’re safe,” he said.
He stayed in the bedroom as Alex dozed for the rest of the morning. When he stirred, in the early afternoon, Oren was reading in his chair. He put his book down but didn’t move as Alex rolled over, awareness filling his eyes.
“How are you feeling?” Oren asked.
Alex shrugged, a little smile tugging at his mouth. “I am sorry, Oren, but I need to—”
“You need the bathroom, don’t you?” Oren jumped up and pulled Alex’s covers off, scooping him carefully into his arms. Alex clung to him, a disturbingly light burden, as Oren carried him down the steps to the bathroom.
Back in the bedroom, Oren frowned as he set Alex in the bed.
“What?” Alex asked, out of breath.
“You feel… warm,” Oren said. He pushed the curls off Alex’s forehead and pressed his palm to the skin. “God, you’re burning up.”
Alex caught his hand as Oren pulled it away, his eyes full of worry. “No hospital.”
“I know,” Oren said. “But—”
“No,” Alex insisted. “Andrei—will know. And he will kill Mihai, Oren.”
Oren sighed.
“Please,” Alex begged, and sneezed.
“Lie down,” Oren said. He sighed again when Alex just stared up at him. “For God’s sake, kid, I’m not going to take you to the hospital and risk your brother’s life, but don’t ask me to be happy about it, okay? Now please lie down?”
Alex shivered and let go of Oren’s wrist, sliding down the bed to curl up in a ball. He accepted the pill that Oren offered him without complaint, swallowing it silently and closing his eyes as Oren pulled the blankets into place.
“Rest,” Oren said.
Alex got rapidly worse over the course of the afternoon. By the time the sun was down, he was nearly delirious, knees drawn to his chest and tremors wracking his frame, eyes fixed sightlessly on the far wall.
Oren was getting more and more worried. He wasn’t a doctor. He had no more medical training than the summer spent as a lifeguard that he’d mentioned to Alex earlier and a brief stint working for a veterinarian, and it in no way qualified him to nurse Alex through what he suspected might well be developing into pneumonia.
Alex needed an actual doctor, antibiotics, someone who could do more than fix a chair or restring a piano.
But it wasn’t just a matter of his promise not to bring attention to them—Oren had been telling the truth when he said they couldn’t leave. It was still snowing, and the drifts were getting progressively deeper. For better or worse, they were going to have to ride this one out on their own as best they could.
Oren tidied up the mess he’d left and then leaned over Alex’s still form. “Hang in there,” he whispered.
The night passed slowly, and Oren dozed fitfully in the chair, waking every time Alex stirred. He didn’t get much sleep, but he told himself Alex would be better when the sun came up.
But in the morning, Alex was worse. When Oren woke up, Alex’s skin was bone-dry and burning to the touch.
Oren scrambled out of the chair and poured him some water, but Alex didn’t rouse to drink it.
“Come on,” Oren said, cupping Alex’s jaw and tilting the glass. “Please, Alex, wake up, you need to get some fluids in you.”
But the water dribbled out the sides of Alex’s mouth and his head lolled as Oren set the glass down.
Oren fought back a surge of worry and laid him gently down in the bed, smoothing his hair off his forehead and then running for the bathroom.
He started a lukewarm bath and went back for Alex while the tub filled, gathering him into his arms. Alex didn’t wake up, and Oren set his jaw and carried him down the stairs to the bathroom.
He didn’t bother taking Alex’s clothes off this time. Instead he just set him down directly in the water, cradling his head and making sure it didn’t thump against the porcelain.
Oren went to his knees beside the tub, one hand still behind Alex’s head, watching his face.
“Gotta bring that fever down,” he whispered.
Alex’s eyes moved under their lids as he dreamed.
Oren lost track of how long they stayed like that. When the water got too cold, he shifted positions carefully, drained the tub and refilled it, making sure Alex’s head stayed above the water. His knees were complaining and his back ached, but he didn’t move.
Finally, though, Alex stirred. “Oren?” He sounded confused, not that Oren blamed him.
Oren rolled back up to his knees and smiled at him. Alex looked exhausted, the dark circles under his eyes almost blue, his lips white, but his eyes were aware again. Oren felt his forehead and sagged.
“Your fever’s broken,” he said.
“Why am I in bath, Oren?” Alex asked, plucking his soggy shirt away from his concave chest.
Oren laughed, giddy with relief. “It’s a long story but mostly it involves you having a really high fever and me panicking a little bit. How are you feeling?”
“Hungry?” Alex said, ducking his head. “Sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?” Oren demanded. “Being hungry is a good thing, it means you’re getting better! Can you keep your head above water long enough for me to go get you dry clothes?”
Alex nodded and Oren clambered to his feet and dashed for the bedroom. When he returned, Alex was sitting up in the bathtub, his cheek on his knee. Oren helped him to his feet and onto the bathmat, where he swayed, dripping and pale.
“I’m going to strip you down,” Oren said, alarmed, “and then we’ll get you dressed as quickly as possible. Okay?”
