Endless Possibility: a RUSH novella (City Lights 3.5) (11 page)

They took both wallets—thief bait and real—my watch, my damn
sunglasses
, my cane, and—worst of all—my bag that had my phone, my money reader, and my text-to-voice scanner. All my lifelines. Thank God I’d had enough sense to leave my passport and some emergency cash in the hotel.

They left me, curled and bleeding, on a street somewhere. I heard the squeal of tires and then all was quiet. No other cars, near or far. The only sound was the buzz of some overhead street light. I smelled brackish water and my own blood, leaking from my nose, mouth, and chin.

For a long while, I just laid on the pavement, my head reeling, the ground spinning under me. I squeezed my eyes shut, and felt my consciousness fade in and out, like a bad radio signal.

“Just go out,” I muttered and I finally did.

“Hey.”

A woman’s voice. A hand touched my shoulder gently.

“Hey. Ben je oke?”

I woke up fully and pain did too. All over my body. It took a moment to remember what had happened last night, and then the memories—sounds and remembered blows—hissed and prodded at me like a poltergeist.

I sat up slowly. “Where am I?”

“You are in the parking lot of my work,” said the woman quietly. She sounded young—about my age—and smelled of shower soap and some earthy-smelling oil. “Were you hit in the head? Your eyes are little unfocused.”

“I’m blind,” I muttered. “It’s not new.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

“So am I.” I reached for my watch to find the time but my watch was gone. Everything was gone. I had no money, no phone. Nothing.
Yep. Royally fucked.

“Can I call someone for you?” the woman asked, and helped me to stand.

“No. Uh…no, thanks.” I winced. Every part of my body hurt and yet, irony of ironies, no migraine. Go figure.

“You were robbed, yes?” the woman said. “You need the police. And a doctor.”

I waved my hands. “No police. No doctor. I just need to get back to my hotel. Somehow…Where am I again?”

“Outside A-9 Graphika? In Amsterdam Noord.”

From what I remembered, Amsterdam Noord was across the river from the city center, and somewhat more industrial. Not as tourist-friendly.
I gingerly touched a hand to my swollen lip.
Ha. You can say that again.

“You don’t happen to see a cane lying around, do you? Or a bag…?”

“No. There is nothing like that.”

I nodded, realizing none of this mattered. Nothing mattered. My lifelines were lost. I was utterly done. I didn’t even bother sending Charlotte a mental apology.

“On second thought, would you mind calling me a cab?” I asked. “I have money at my hotel…”

“No. I have a car. I’ll drive you.” She shifted beside me. “My name is Marit, by the way.”

“Sorry, yeah, I’m Noah,” I said dully. “Thanks for the lift, but don’t you have to work?”

“Not yet. It’s not even 6 a.m. I always go in very early. I have time.”

“Yeah, me too,” I muttered.

My journey was over. I had nothing but time.

Marit had a tiny car that I had to fold myself in half just to sit in, and she drove like a maniac. Or at least it felt like it to my aching face. We drove in silence, though I could practically feel the curiosity radiating off her.

Finally she said, “You know, when I asked your name, I had the silly hope you’d say it was Matt Murdock.”

“Who?”

She laughed sheepishly. “Matt Murdock is the name of Daredevil. From the comic book?”

“Never heard of it.”

“Oh, it’s an awesome story. He’s blind, like you, but he fights crime in New York City.”

“How does he fight crime if he’s blind?”

“The radioactive chemicals that took his sight gave him super-enhanced senses.”

“Lucky him.”

“So, when I saw you sitting there in the parking lot, blind and all beat up, like after a tangle with the baddies, my imagination immediately went to Daredevil.” She coughed. “Silly, I know. I just really love comic books. I’m a geek, as you Americans would say.”

“Is that what you do at your work? Draw comics?” I didn’t particularly care, but talking to Marit took my mind off the night before and all the nights ahead.

“Oh, no. I’m a graphic artist, but not for comics. I wish!”      

I made a sound that would’ve passed for decent conversation amongst grunting pigs.

“You want to talk about what happened?” she asked after a minute.

“Not really.”

“Okay,” Marit said gently. “You don’t have to talk.”

“Thank you.” I leaned my head against the cool of the window. Amsterdam sped by on the other side of the glass, and on the other side of my impenetrable dark. Goddamn, but I was sick of it, and it was obvious that I’d never stop being sick of it. What was that John Milton quote Harlan once recited to me? That being blind wasn’t miserable, it was being unable to cope with blindness that was misery.

Yep. Milton knew his shit.

A screech, and then the car came to a halt.

“We’re here,” Marit said. “I’ll park and walk you to your room.”

“You don’t have to.”

“You don’t have your cane. And your face…Um…”

I touched my bloodied nose. “It’s that bad, eh?”

“It’s not good.”

Marit led me to my suite, where I immediately went for the bed, and lay back. My ribs ached, as did my stomach, as if I’d done a thousand crunches. I heard Marit rummage in the bathroom.

“You don’t have to stay,” I said.

“I know,” she called, “but I can’t leave, either. My mother tells me I’m the neatest of her children. My teachers too, in school. I always cleaned up the messes. And you are a mess.”

She pulled up a chair next to the bed. “This might sting.” I winced as she dabbed the cuts and bruises on my face. “Anything broken? Your nose is not. A miracle, that. How are your ribs?”

“They fucking hurt.”

“Take a deep breath.”

“Hurts more.”

“But no sudden, sharp pain?”

“No.”

“Good.” She dabbed a cut over my right eye. “Ha! I feel like Claire. She’s the nurse who patches Daredevil up after he gets in a brawl.”

“So this guy loses a lot of fights, eh?” I snorted. “Some hero.”

“He usually wins,” Marit said. “He just takes a beating first. It makes the victory all the sweeter.” I heard the chair she was sitting in creak, as if she sat back. “So tell me, Noah,” she said in an overly cheery tone. “What brings you to Amsterdam?”

I barked a laugh, then groaned at my aching ribs. I gave in, and told Marit an abridged version of why I was here.

“You know that’s crazy, right?” she said quietly.

“
Was,
” I corrected. “Was crazy. It’s over now. My lifelines are gone. I can’t navigate my way to the next city, let alone make it to Charlotte’s show tonight. I’m done.”

“Okay.” Marit’s hand touched my arm. “Who can we call?”

“Lucien Caron,” I said. “He’ll be worried. But I don’t have his number. It was in my phone.”

Marit asked me a dozen questions to help track down Lucien, and then sat at the desk and made a dozen phone calls.

“Lucien Caron?” she said finally. “Hello. I am calling for Noah Lake? Yes. A moment.”

I made my way to the desk and Marit sat me down in the chair that was still warm from her presence. She pressed the receiver into my hand. The anguish in Lucien’s voice was hard to listen to.

“Noah? Are you all right? You didn’t check in last night. I called your phone. I heard only obscenities and laughter, then nothing.”

“Sounds like you spoke to my good buddy, Schuyler,” I said and held my head in my hands, hunched over the desk.

“I was on the phone with the airline just this moment to come find you. What happened?”

I told him, sparing him as much detail of last night’s events as I could.

“I’m so sorry, Noah. I shall book a flight for you this night. And a car to take you to the airport.”

I don’t know if it was Lucien’s voice, or hearing that it was over from another person, but the numbness I’d been feeling for the last few days started to fall away, piece by piece, and my heart ached as if I’d been struck with a mallet. I pressed my lips together, the goddamn tears welling in my eyes at sudden, terrible pain.

“Noah? Are you still there, my boy?”

“I failed, Lucien,” I breathed. “I can’t keep my promise to Charlotte. Not because of fate or bad luck, but because I keep screwing up.” My chest felt so tight, I had to gasp for a breath, to speak while keeping the dam from breaking. “I failed,” I said again, hoarsely. “I failed Charlotte…I failed
us.”

“You did better than anyone could have hoped, my boy. The journey itself was too difficult. The fact you made it this far is a miracle. You should be proud.”

“Proud? I felt nothing, Lucien,” I whispered. “I didn’t care what happened to me. I was down so deep…just numb. But now…” I sucked a tremulous breath. “Now that I’ve fucked it all up, I care again. I care a lot. I don’t want to quit.”

“Don’t,” Marit said from beside me. “It’s none of my business, I know but…I can help. Let me help.”

I raised my head, hopes and possibilities struggling to come to back to life. Then I shook my head. “No, you’ve done enough. I can’t ask—”

“You’re not asking, I’m offering.”

I started to protest but the overwhelming desire to not fail Charlotte was stronger than my despair. Was it possible I could continue? I’d already been to the brink of failure so many times, it felt like I lived there. I thought of the rest of the tour: Copenhagen, Warsaw and Prague, then Germany and finally Austria…Christ, could I make it through Poland or the Czech Republic where the language barrier would be even wider? On paper, it didn’t seem like much of an obstacle, but without my sight, every disadvantage weighed a thousand times heavier. And I was already so goddamn tired…

“Let me help. I’ll take care of everything.” Marit rested her hand on my arm and said gently, “If I were Charlotte, I wouldn’t want you to miss it.”

“God, I still hope that’s true.” I mentally braced myself for next few weeks, and heaved a steadying breath. “Yeah. Okay. Thank you.”

I told Lucien to wire me money from my savings so Marit could get me a new phone, and to figure out how to send me new credit cards. He sounded dubious at first, but his desire for me to succeed was just as strong as mine. “I shall do my best.”

“Aren’t you going to tell me to be more careful?” I asked dryly. “You should. Clearly I need to hear it again.”

“I am not in the habit of blaming the victims for the crimes perpetrated against them…” I could hear him smile slyly, “though I would ask that you choose your friends a little more wisely.”

I listened to Marit bustle around behind me, laying my suit on the bed. “That, I can do.”

I got off the phone with Lucien, and swiveled in my chair. “You’re not going to get in trouble for missing work?” 

“I can take the day. I never miss work. Ever. I go in early, stay late.” Her voice quieted. “It’s nice to go out for a change.”

“Good,” I said. “Then let me take you to dinner too. As a thank you.”

“You’re up for going out to dinner?”

“Rule #2: No holing up in hotels.”

“Okay, well…yes. Dinner would be nice,” she said, and I tracked her moving around the room to gather her purse and keys. “You need a shower—rather urgently—and then a nap. And I have errands to run. I’ll just…okay. Be back soon.”

The door shut and I was suddenly alone with my almost-failure. I had been at the edge—again—and been hauled back from the fall.

“For the last fucking time,” I muttered as I stepped into the shower. The hot water seemed to wash last night off me, and I felt good. Better. Almost like myself.

How is that possible?
You don’t know what ‘yourself’ is.

That was true. The accident had forever altered me. Smashed me up and rearranged all my parts so that I couldn’t sort them out. I was blind. That was the only truth I had, and it had become my identity more than my own name.

And that was a fucking terrible way to live.

I stood in the shower until the hot water ran cool. Cool like the rainwater I’d felt on Charlotte’s skin the night in New York City, when I’d disappeared on her and she’d searched for me in a storm.