“Oxycodone,” the nurse said. “Just enough to take the edge off.”
“Oh,” I said, feeling the word catch in my already dry throat. It had been hours since I’d had anything to drink, and well over a day since I’d slept. My eyelids felt leaden and scratchy as I blinked. I fixed my gaze on Tyler’s face, silently willing him to keep his mouth shut.
“Don’t worry,” the nurse said. “He’ll be fine. If he doesn’t need surgery, you should be able to take him home this afternoon.”
“Thanks,” I said, and then he, too, exited the room, leaving me alone with Tyler, whose skin was as white as the sheets he lay upon. He had to be as exhausted as I was—probably more so, considering the trauma his body had endured. Again, I struggled between having compassion for the boy I used to love and wanting the man who raped me to suffer. Confronting these two opposing versions of him in my head at the same time was excruciating—maybe as much as the rape itself.
“I can feel you worrying from here,” he said, rolling his head to one side so he could look directly at me. His voice had taken on a softer edge, so I assumed the pain meds were doing their job.
“I’m not worried,” I lied, trying to sound more confident than I felt. He could still hear my thoughts before I spoke them—would anyone else ever know me so well? Could I feel as safe with another person, the way I used to feel safe with him?
“Yeah, you are,” Tyler said. “Trust me, you don’t have to.”
I took a few steps over to the sink on the opposite side of the room, grabbed a small paper cup, and filled it with water, gulping it down. I refilled the cup, drinking until my parched throat was finally quenched. I turned around, about to answer him—about to remind him that he’d stolen my ability to trust him when he held me down on that bed—but just as I opened my mouth, two uniformed police officers entered the room. I froze where I stood, the empty paper cup still in my hand.
“Amber Bryant?” one of the officers asked, looking at me. He was young, maybe even younger than me, reed-thin and tall, with closely cropped black hair and blue eyes.
“Yes,” I said, but my voice cracked on the word, so I cleared my throat and spoke again. “That’s me,” I said, then crumpled the cup and threw it in the garbage beneath the sink.
“And you’re Tyler Hicks?” asked the other officer—an older, thickly built man with salt-and-pepper hair and a full mustache.
“Yes, sir,” Tyler said.
“I’m Officer Porter,” the older cop said, and then he gestured toward the younger man, who was standing closer to me. “This is my partner, Officer Olsen.” Tyler and I both nodded, and Officer Porter continued. “Can you tell me what happened to you, Mr. Hicks?”
“Yeah, of course,” Tyler said, and again, as it had when I first entered the ER, my body tensed and I began taking shallow breaths. Everything hinged on this moment, what would come out of Tyler’s mouth next. “Amber and I went up to her parents’ cabin to winterize it,” he said, maintaining strong eye contact with the older officer. “She picked up her dad’s gun, and for whatever reason, it went off. The next thing I knew, I was on the floor and I was bleeding.”
Officer Porter glanced my direction, and I nodded, still anxious, every nerve I had still shot through with fear, because no matter what Tyler said, it was possible the cops wouldn’t believe him. It was possible that they’d poke and prod at our story until it fell apart.
“I don’t know how it happened,” I said. “I feel terrible.” This was true. I did feel terrible, but not because of the shooting. It was so much more complicated than that. Tears sprang to my eyes, and I hoped that the officers would view this response as a show of remorse instead of what it really was—the dizzying confusion I felt about the fact that Tyler had chosen to protect me now, despite also being the one who tore my life apart. If, when we got home, he actually confessed to the rape, we would need to withhold the truth of how he had been shot from everyone—from the authorities and our parents. I would have to trust that he would forever be the keeper of this secret.
“How far apart were you when the gun discharged?” Officer Porter asked.
“About six feet, I think?” Tyler said, looking at me. “Does that sound right?”
I nodded again, not trusting my voice, worried it might break and give us away.
“She helped me put pressure on the wound and got me here as fast as she could,” Tyler said. “We had to take the logging road, since the main road is still washed out.”
The tension inside my chest began to lessen as Tyler spoke, and it looked as though Officer Porter believed what we had said. I watched as Officer Olsen made notes on the pad he carried, and then looked at his partner, expectantly. He must be new, I thought. He’s waiting for a cue because he doesn’t know what to do next. I felt a little better knowing that we were only dealing with one experienced cop, hoping this meant that they’d be less likely to doubt our story.
“Where’s the weapon?” Officer Porter asked.
“In my truck,” Tyler said, and I was glad I’d put it inside the console when I’d gone to get the first aid kit. If I hadn’t, if I’d left it at the cabin, the cops might have thought we had something to hide.
“Did you check to see if the safety was on when you picked it up?” Officer Porter asked, turning toward me.
“No,” I said, suddenly tearful again. “I should have. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Tyler said, locking his green eyes on mine. “It was an accident. A mistake. I know you didn’t mean to do it. You’d take it back if you could.”
His words hit me hard, since I knew that he wasn’t only talking about what had happened with the gun. I started to cry then, in earnest. My shoulders shook and I put my face in my hands. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m so, so sorry.” But as I sobbed, I realized my apology wasn’t about shooting him—it was more about the loss of our friendship. In that moment, listening to him lie to the police in order to protect me, I felt connected to him the same way I used to before the rape. I remembered what it was like to be in on something with him, to know something that only the two of us knew—to trust someone implicitly—and it struck me, then, that we’d never have that same kind of closeness again. Everything I believed about him, about me, had changed.
“It’s okay,” Officer Olsen said, awkwardly patting my back.
“We’ll need to examine the gun,” Officer Porter said as he handed me a tissue from the box on the counter next to the sink. “And file a report.”
“Thank you,” I said, sniffling as I took the tissue from him. I felt Tyler’s eyes on me, too, but I couldn’t look at him, for fear that I might totally fall apart.