Derek
It took a while but with Amelia's help, I managed to get up and we walked inside to the waiting room. Amelia then left, coming back shortly after with coffee and news.
"I asked on of the nurses and she said that they took Layna up to surgery." I didn't respond, just stared at the coffee cup in my hand. Amelia sighed, "This is good Derek, it means there's a chance."
"Did you see what he did to her?" I asked, my voice cracking. "No one survives that."
We were silent for a moment, and then Amelia spoke up, "Tell me about her?"
I smiled softly, remembering her, "I don't even know where I would start."
"How about at the beginning."
***
I was awoken in the middle of the night by screaming. I sat up, rubbing my eyes and looked around, until my eyes landed on the open window. Going to it, I could see that the screaming was coming from the little girl in the neighboring house. Tom and Steve were in there trying to comfort her, but she just kept crying.
"Why is she so loud?" I asked through the window, and Tom turned around to look at me.
"She had a nightmare, Derek, I'm sorry if she woke you up. Go back to bed buddy."
"She's kind of annoying," I said, and Tom smiled a little.
"Go back to bed, buddy, its late."
"Is she the one you adopted? Mom said that we had to come see her tomorrow."
"Yeah, her name is Layna."
"I don't like her."
"That's not very nice, Derek."
"I don't care. She's loud and annoying and you should send her back."
I must have spoken too loudly because suddenly the crying had stopped and the little girl had jumped up from the bed, and had run over to Tom. "I'm sorry! I don't wanna go back, please, I'll be better."
"Sweetheart don't worry, you're going to stay right here with us," Tom then turned to me, "Apologize right now Derek, that wasn't nice."
I rolled my eyes, "Sorry. Why are you crying that much anyways, everyone has bad dreams."
She rubbed her little face with her hands. "I don't like being alone."
That gave me an idea. I went further back into my room, going over to the closet where I had a box of old toys. Pulling out the one from the top, I handed it to her.
"This is superman. He's really strong, and can protect anyone. If you wake up from a nightmare, and he's there, he can protect you so you don't need to cry and bother me. Okay?"
She nodded her head, taking the stuffed animal from me. "Thank you."
"That was very nice of you, thank you Derek." Steve said.
"I just wanted her to shut up. I'm going back to bed."
As I was about to close my window, a small voice spoke up, "Will you protect me too?" Layna whispered quietly.
"Sure, whatever makes you stop crying."
"You promise?"
"I do."
***
Amelia was laughing, "You were such an ass."
I shrugged, "I was a little kid, and I was cranky from being woken up."
"From everything I've heard about her, she seems like she's really an amazing person."
"She is," I whispered, my heart heaving in my chest. "She's always been the most amazing and selfless person. She always wanted to help people, and she would give the shirt off her back if it meant that she could. I don't know about now, but when I was still here, she used to volunteer at the battered women's shelter downtown almost every single day. She would go there and help everyone, do little things for them to make them happy.
"She's fierce too; She would always give me heart attacks with the things she would do."
***
The phones loud chiming cut me off from sentence I had been writing for my essay. Checking the caller ID, I saw that it was Layna,
"Hey Lannie, what's up?"
"I need your help," she said, in that calm and controlled voice she used when something was wrong.
I stood up immediately, tensing, "What is it? Where are you? Are you okay?"
"I have Allie here with me, and we've run into a little problem. We went to the movies, and we just saw her ex-boyfriend here."
Allie was one of the girls at the shelter that Layna had became good friends with. "Did he see you guys?"
"Yes, and we are now in the bathroom; I've locked the door."
"Fuck Layna. Okay, call the police right now and do. Not. Move," I was running down the stairs as I said this, grabbing my keys and running out the door.
"I already did," There was a violent banging in the background, and I could hear Allie start crying.
"Layna do not move okay? I'm coming right now, and the police should be there soon. Everything will be fine."
There was the sound of wood splintering, and then the line went dead.
"Fuck," I yelled, increasing my speed. I don't know how many speeding laws I broke getting to the theatre, but luckily I wasn't stopped.
When I got to the theatre it was surrounded by police vehicles. I pushed my way through, getting inside and ignoring the protests form the officers behind me. Layna was in the lobby, talking to one of the police officers.
I ran over to her, wrapping her in my arms, "You scared the shit out of me. What the hell happened?"
She squeezed me back just as tightly. "He broke the door down and then tried to take Allie. So I used the gift you gave me then punched him in the face."
'The gift' had been a bottle of bear repellant. I would have gotten her pepper spray, but it was illegal in Canada.
"You're fucking crazy," I whispered to her, kissing the top of her head.
"I know. Now if you don't mind, I actually think I broke my hand so I need to go get that checked out because its throbbing."
***
I ran my fingers through my hair, pulling at the ends. How could I have let this happen? I had left her and now...
As I brought my hands down, I caught a glimpse of something red on the tips of my fingers. As I looked closer, I could see it was blood. Layna's blood.
I couldn't take it anymore. I ran to the nearest restroom, and threw up in the garbage can. I rinsed my mouth in the nearest sink, then took a paper towel and started scrubbing at the spots on my hands, and the ones on my face that I had seen in the mirror. I scrubbed and scrubbed until my skin had turned red, but I was sure that any trace of Layna's blood had been removed.
Amelia was waiting for me when I came outside of the bathroom. She hugged me when she saw me.
"All I can see in my mind is when he slit her throat. I should have stopped him."
"Derek, there was nothing you could have done. We couldn't have known that he would do that."
"I should have never left her," I whispered.
***
I was sitting in Tom and Steve's living room, waiting for Layna to come back home. They had let me in, with a sad look on their face after the award dinner.
The front door opened, and Layna walked in closing the door behind her. When she saw me, sitting there and dressed in a suit she froze, a look of confusion on her face.
"What are you doing here, Derek?"
"I just got back from the award dinner, you know, the one I invited you to? Yeah it was nice, they gave me the award said some nice words. Your parents were there; the congratulated me."
"Derek..."
"I wanted you there, Layna. You are the most important person to me, and I wanted you there so I could share that with you. Where were you?"
"I was with some friends, and my phone died. I'm sorry."
I just nodded my head, looking down at my hands. "Good to know."
"I'm sorry," she repeated.
"Do you know that they offered me a positon tonight? Instead of consulting with the FBI, they offered me a real position, to one of their teams in Florida. I said I couldn't, that I had something holding me back here."
"But you don't," she said, and I looked up at her to see her face was hard. "We aren't dating; you've made that clear to everyone who has asked."
"Layna—"
"Like you said, the age difference is too much and its not going to work. So take the job. Leave."
I stood up, infuriated. I didn't look at her as I brushed past, not even bothering to reply to what she had said. After all, I was just following what she had told me to do in the first place.
The next day, I accepted the offered job.
***
"Are you Derek Jackson?" I looked up from where I was sitting to see a nurse talking to me.
"Yeah, that's me."
She smiled, "The surgery went well, Layna's fine."