Chasing River (Burying Water 3)

“What else did he say?” Duffy pushes.

“He asked if I was alright,” I mumble. “And then he ran.”

Duffy scribbles it down. “Good, Amber. What else? What about hair color? Eye color?”

“Green eyes.” Rich, insistent green eyes. “And I think he was hurt.” Because he put himself in harm’s way . . . for me. Suddenly, I don’t want to tell these two officers anything else. Not until I can wrap my head around this. “That’s all I can remember. I’m sorry.”

Duffy brings his radio to his mouth and begins spouting off a series of words and numbers that I can’t identify beyond knowing it’s police code. Buzzing fills the air and several uniforms scatter, directing each other with fingers and shouts. They’ll be canvassing the park and the area beyond the walls.

I wonder if they’ll find him.

“That’s helpful, Amber. We’ll check the hospitals.” He pulls a business card out of his pocket and hands it to me. “Ya may remember more after a few hours or a few days. Give me a ring if ya do.”

“They’re going to be wanting to talk to ya.” O’Brien nods toward something in the distance. I peek out around the back doors of the ambulance that shield me from prying eyes. News crews have begun to trickle in, their mammoth black cameras sweeping over the area. Fortunately they’re held back by a wide perimeter of tape and I’m still hidden.

I can see the headline now: American Girl Saved by Irish Good Samaritan, Who Then Runs.

I’m guessing this would be a story that the media would love. It would probably go viral. It would certainly be my way of making sure my thank you reaches him.

But it would also reach my parents, and guarantee that my dad’s first trip out of America would be to Ireland, for the sole purpose of dragging his daughter back in handcuffs if need be, twenty-five years old or not.

I pull the rim of my pink baseball cap down. “Any chance we can avoid them? And keep my name and picture out of the media? My dad won’t take this too well.”

Duffy eyes the gathering crowd. “They are hounds, aren’t they? Maybe we should give ya a lift somewhere.”

“That’d be great. I’m staying at a house on Hatch Street, just off Leeson. It’s a few blocks away.”

“I know the street.” He radios for a spare jacket, and I use it to shield my face and upper body as they usher me to their car.

THREE

River

“What’s the story, lad?” Eamon stands in his doorway, his robe tied tight around his scrawny waist, his thinning white hair standing on end. One long, shrewd look at me—my teeth gritted to hide the pain, a cold sweat coating my face—and he ushers me inside as quickly as his eighty-six-year-old bones can manage. “Didn’t expect to see ya like this, River. Your brother, of course . . . but not you.” His slippers scratch across the dated linoleum floor. I’ve been to Dr. Eamon O’Hare’s semidetached house a handful of times in my twenty-four years. It has never changed. The same vinyl flowery tablecloth covers the kitchen table, the same braided rug—a worn shade of sky blue—protects feet from the cool living room floor. The lace curtains that I remember watching his wife—God rest her soul—stitch still hang over the windows, growing more gray and dusty as each year passes.

“What have you gotten yourself into?” He leads me into the dining room—a cramped room with no window, dwarfed by a sturdy wooden table and lit by a gaudy bell-shaped light from above.

“Aengus,” is all I say. I don’t need to explain any more. Eamon has known us since we were shitting diapers and sucking on our ma’s teat. He knew my father when he was shitting diapers and sucking on his ma’s teat. He’s been a friend of the Delaney family for decades, fixing one generation or another up when going to the hospital isn’t an option. He doesn’t ask too many questions and he doesn’t report anything.

“Let’s have us a look, then.”

With slow, pained movements, I peel off the forest-green football jersey. The few minutes of mass hysteria after the bombing allowed me the opportunity to swipe a hat and shirt from a street vendor just outside the walls of the Green. I used them to help cover my wounds and hide in plain sight.

The pub T-shirt I wear to work—the first thing I grabbed from the floor this morning, in a rush to follow Aengus—comes off next.

Eamon harrumphs.

“How bad is it?” Because it feels bloody awful and the shredded rag in my hand now doesn’t look promising.

“Looks superficial, but you never know with these things.”

“I was on the ground when it went off, if that helps any.”

“It must have. I’d say you were very lucky, from what I’ve seen before. These two here,” he taps two spots on my back, “are protruding slightly. I’ll need to remove them. This one, though, I could leave in—”

“No, get it out.” I don’t want any pieces left in my body. The image of my father’s friend Glenden pulling a chunk of metal out of his cheek at our kitchen sink, and the mess of dark lumps still waiting to work their way out, comes to mind. I was five, and the sight still haunts me to this day.

Eamon opens the china cabinet and pulls out his doctor’s bag, which I doubt gets much use anymore. He’s long since retired. Rifling through it with a low hum, he finally shakes his head. “Do you have anywhere to be today?”

“Just the pub.”

“Best you call in sick. I don’t see you being in any shape to work today.” He sets a bottle of cheap whiskey on the table. “I’m out of the good stuff.”

No anesthetic. This is going to fucking hurt.

While Eamon heads to the kitchen, I pull out my phone to text Rowen.

I can’t cover the bar today. It’s because of Aengus . . .

I can’t really explain any of this over the phone, but that should be enough for my little brother to understand that this is serious. Still, he’s going to curse me. When he enrolled in summer classes, I promised that I’d cover the bar on Wednesdays and Thursdays for him.

Maybe he can get one of our part-time bartenders in.

I crack the lid on the bottle of whiskey and take a long swig, the liquor burning inside my stomach as I prepare myself mentally, relieved that I could come to Eamon today. Walking into a hospital with shrapnel wounds on the day of a bombing wouldn’t have been wise.

Within a few minutes I hear the whistle of his kettle singing. He returns with a bowl of steaming water, fresh rags, and a handful of surgical instruments swirling in a tall glass container filled with what I assume is antiseptic. Thick-lensed glasses rest on his nose now, and he’s exchanged his morning robe for a coat that I’m sure was once pristinely white, but has seen its share of blood that no amount of bleach can completely erase.

“On your stomach,” he instructs, patting the lacquered surface with one hand, while his other fusses with a desk lamp.

I take another swig and then comply, stretching out on the cool wood. It feels soothing against my bare chest.

He hands me a short wooden stick, marred by little divots. “I can’t have my neighbors calling the gardai on me,” he warns.

Fuck. I comply, biting down on it.

Eamon snaps a glove over his wrist.