As the opening notes to Billie Holliday's P.S. I Love You rose above the muted static of her record player, her eyes fell shut in unconcealed ecstasy. A flash of lightning lit the otherwise caliginous night sky outside her living room window, and it occurred to her then, in the comfort of her own presence, that this was the first Saturday night she'd had off in months. There was a 2009 vintage red on the rack next to her player that she knew would pair excellently with her record, and just as she'd been about to reach for it, her phone rang, shattering her shallow illusion of peace. It briefly crossed her mind to let it ring, but when she saw that it was her friend, she quickly changed her mind.
“Elena, this had better be good.”
White noise reverberated on the other end before her friend elicited a hacking, wet cough. “Callie, I need a favour.”
On account of her friend's rare use of her real name, she knew immediately that whatever she was about to be asked, was serious.
“I’m listening.”
“I was supposed to do a job tonight- some boutique hotel up in hell's kitchen, and I can barely get out of bed, let alone anything else.” A clap of thunder sounded closely outside, startling her, and the thought of going back out into the torrential downpour of the evening made her stomach churn with dread, but she let Elena continue. “It would mean the world to me if you took the call, Cal. The money’s good- 5 k upfront and he only needs about an hour of your time.” Elena sniffled and added, “It goes without saying but I will happily take the next call you don’t want to do.”
It was apparent that whatever bug had brought her friend down had to have been a nasty one in order for her to turn down five thousand dollars for an evening.
“You sound like shit, E. Of course I’ll do it.”
She could still hear her friend chanting thankyouthankyouthankyou into the phone when she hung up. She cast a last, longing glance at the bottle in her rack and then begrudgingly went to her bedroom to change.
Standing poised and slightly drenched in front of the hotel room door an hour later, she reluctantly knocked the way Elena’s text message had instructed and waited. Though the feeling was a rare one - she'd been playing the long game for a while now - apprehension swelled in the pit of her belly, and out of habit, she bent slightly to run a hand over the jagged outline of the knife in her boot, and just feeling it was enough to put her nerves at ease for the time being. When her client still hadn't answered the door, she became concerned that she’d had the wrong room, and just as she was about to double-check her messages, the door buzzed and swung open. When her eyes eventually adjusted to the dimly lit room, she noticed a man perched on the edge of the neatly-made bed, staring off into the distance as if in a daze, and holding a hand to his side. An undetectable bite of something hung so heavily in the air, she could almost taste the slightly salty brine of it on her tongue.
The man cleared his throat and rasped, “You Elena?”
She took a tense breath and shook her head. “Elena was indisposed this evening. I’m Jane.”
She watched the man hang his head and elicit a string of rough curse words.
As the rain dried on her skin, annoyance swirled in her belly. “Excuse me, is there a problem?”
A bark of laughter erupted from him, humorless and cold. “Yeah, there’s a fuckin’ problem. There was a reason I asked for her specifically.”
Elena had briefly mentioned something about her client requesting a girl with a medical background, but they had both chalked that up to a kink he probably had. They decided that this was just going to be one of those times where she would have to fake it to make it.
"Listen, pal, if it's a nurse thing you're after, I'm your gal. I've got a little paper hat and a stethoscope-
He cleared his throat and glanced up at her, and it was then that she noticed the complete state of disrepair the man was in, and the rest of the words fizzled in her throat. Her stomach plummeted when she realized the source of the metallic tang in the room was blood. His face seemed to have taken the worst of the damage; multiple shallow cuts oozed crimson, and a violet bruise bloomed under an umber eye that would surely take the form of a full-blown shiner in the morning. Her gaze traveled lower, to where his hand held his side, and bile rose in her throat as she noticed blood seeping out from between his fingers.
His voice was hoarse when he murmured, “Yeah kid. It’s a nurse thing I’m after alright.”
Kid? Who on earth did this man think he was?
Her mouth had become void of moisture at some point, so when she tried to say that perhaps they had better call an ambulance, his face turned up in a scowl. “Beg your pardon?”
She gestured toward the phone on the desk beside the television. “I don’t see why we can’t call for help…”
He shook his head adamantly. “Nah. No hospitals, no cops, none'a that shit. You’re here now, and if you’re able, I could really use the help.”
She could feel the ice-cold blooms of panic taking root in her, and as she glanced back towards the door, the urge to cut and run became all-encompassing. She wrung her hands together, at a complete loss for what to do.
“Look man, if you die on me- if you die here tonight, I’m screwed. Beyond screwed. And this may come as a shock to you, but I'm not exactly qualified to assist you with whatever this,” she gestured vaguely towards him. “Is.”
His laughter was genuine this time, but it vanished quickly and was replaced with a grimace of sheer pain. “I ain’t dying, kid. Not tonight anyway. And even if I did, I know a couple of okay lawyers that could get you out of a bind no problem,” His gaze found hers again, and the unexpected earnestness in it nearly floored her. “Please.”
She found herself nodding before she could fully talk herself out of it. “Oh christ, okay. What do you need?”
He inhaled deeply and gestured with the jut of his chin to a medical kit that lay open on the desk beside the phone. “There’s a needle and some thread in there-
“No,” She shook her head. “No no no. I can’t.”
He screwed his eyes shut and hissed out another expletive. “No pressure here, but there’s a high chance I’ll bleed out if you don’t and I’d do it myself, but I can’t quite reach it.”
Despite the chaotic haze of the moment, it all began to make sense. Three years ago, and after a particularly bad year, Elena had quit her job as a charge nurse at Mount Sinai. His earlier statement about asking for her friend specifically chimed like a bell through her muddled mind.
“Would it make you feel better if I told you it was as easy as sewing drapes?”
Disbelief clouded her features as she shook her head. “No, it would not.”
She wandered over to the kit and peered in, noticing two spools of black and navy thread. She pulled them both out and asked if he'd had a preference over one, which made him snicker.
“Black suits me just fine, kid.”
She got to work threading the needle, and when that was finished, she approached him reluctantly.
“You always carry a medical kit with you?”
The man tried to manage a shrug. “I’ve found it comes in handy from time to time.”
She took a steadying breath. “Alright, I'm ready if you are.”
He reached down to retrieve a half-empty bottle of whiskey, pulled the cork out with his teeth and took a hearty swig. When he set the bottle back down, he dropped his hand with a wince and proceeded to gingerly pull the t-shirt from his battered body. If she’d thought his face was bad, it was nothing compared to the carnage that littered his chest and abdomen. “Jesus,” She gasped.
“Yeah well, you should see the other guy.” He managed between gritted teeth.
He bore the faintly heady scent of gunsmoke and blood, and as she leaned closer to inspect the wound she murmured, “Judging by how this looks, I think the other guy may be dead.”
He made a noncommittal noise in his throat. “I think you may be right.”
She quickly passed a square of gauze over the wound, ignoring the pained grunt that fell from the man’s mouth and sighed. “Do I get to know your name for this?”
“You wanna know my real name? Or should I take a page outta your book and give you a fake one?”
It was her turn to choke out a breathless laugh and she shook her head. “You sure talk a lot of shit for someone at the mercy of a complete stranger.”
He hissed as the needle pierced his skin and managed a grunted, “Yeah well, this ain’t my first rodeo.”
She was entirely unsurprised.
“It’s uh… It’s Frank.” he eventually croaked.
She was quiet as she tried her best to focus on the gruesome task at hand, but the insufficient lighting combined with the calamitous thunder outside made it all a bit harder than it needed to be. “Yeah well Frank, first aid 101 says that you don’t pull the protrusion from the wound until you seek proper medical help.”
“Fuck,” He seethed when she pricked a particularly sensitive spot. “We got a smartass on our hands, I see. You gonna tell me your real name now?”
She ignored that completely. “Hey, answer me this: there was no one else in your life that you could have called besides an escort agency to come fix you up?” She found the mere notion of it all inexplicably sad.
Despite the pain he was in, a smirk ghosted his features. “I only got two people that I would trust my life with, and both of ‘em are uh… what’s the word you used earlier? Indisposed?”
He flinched and swore again.
“They’re indisposed at the moment. Plus, you offer much more of a view to look at than they do.”
Jesus, the nerve on this guy.
She gave her head a shake and huffed out an exasperated breath. “Well, I’m sure you’ll regret getting a hold of Elena when this thing heals. I’ve likely maimed you for the rest of your days.”
“Pfft, have you seen the rest of me, kid? Add it to the pile.”
While she took stock of the rest of him, her gaze drifted to the gold wedding band on a chain around his neck. “Your wife know where you are?”
Frank stiffened against her, eyes drifting to the ceiling above her head. “Nope.”
“Lucky lady,” She murmured, as she finished the last stitch and tied off the end of the thread.
She watched Frank’s Adam's apple bob in his throat before he uttered, “My wife’s dead.”
Her eyes fell shut. “I’m so sorry.”
He offered her a shrug, his face a blank page. “You didn’t know.”
The room became quiet while she busied herself packing gauze over the wound and placing tape over it to keep it there. She hastily surveyed the rest of the damage that she could see and asked if there were any other problem areas she should know about.
Frank shook his head. “None that require any more of your fancy suture work.” He pulled the blood-stained t-shirt back over his head, shielding the carnage of his toned chest from her, and she ignored the surprising prick of disappointment as a result.
“Can’t imagine you get too many calls like this.”
She let out a low whistle. “This one was definitely a first.”
Frank tilted his head to the side, studying her. “I bet you see a lot of shit though, doing what you do.”
Doing what you do.
Selling your company, your time, your body for money.
She stood from the bed then, and turned towards the direction of the washroom, desperately wanting to rid her hands of the sickeningly sticky feeling of his blood on them.
“Not as much shit as you see, doing what you do.”
She took her time at the sink, methodically scrubbing away the gore under scalding water until it ran clear, and when she entered the room again, Frank had propped himself up against the headboard of the bed and was watching her.
“I meant no disrespect, kid. You gotta do what you gotta do.”
She rolled her eyes and murmured an acerbic, “How progressive of you.”
It was hard to miss the mischievous glitter in his eyes when he cocked his head to the side and asked, “Tell me something. You ever have to use that knife in your boot?”
She couldn’t imagine how he’d known, and she tried in vain to keep her voice neutral when she shrugged and said, “Not yet, but you never know.”
A smirk lifted his lips skyward as he echoed her words. “You never know.”
She cleared her throat, suddenly desperate to change the subject. “The guy who did this to you… Is he really dead?”
A shadow passed over Frank’s face; if she hadn't been watching him already, she would have missed it entirely.
“Would you believe me if I told you he was better off that way?”
For some inexplicable reason, she could believe it, but she didn’t need to confirm it because the knowing look on his face told her as much.
She clocked the watch on the underside of her wrist. Twenty past midnight. Shit.
“Is there anything else I can do for you before I leave, Frank?”
He winced, shifting into a more comfortable position. “Yeah kid, you can tell me your name. And none of that Jane Doe horseshit.”
She scoffed. “Why? What’s the point?”
Frank's gravelly just humor me, was so quiet she almost missed it.
She kicked at a stray pebble on the carpet and sighed in defeat. “It’s Calliope. But I go by Callie.”
A smile grew on his face that caused a wave of butterflies to take flight in her belly, despite everything.
“Your folks Greek mythology buffs or Springsteen fans?”
Her eyes widened in genuine shock. “Both, actually.”
He nodded in satisfaction. “I got one more question for ya.”
She fought the urge to roll her eyes. “Seems you’re full of those tonight.”
“Why didn’t you just pass yourself off as Elena from the get-go?”
She cast around for a suitable answer and eventually landed on, “You seem like the kind of guy who values honesty above most things.”
The tension in the room seemed to reach a fever pitch as Frank’s gaze bore into hers, his expression unreadable. When the silence became too heavy, she broke it by inquiring about her payout.
Frank gestured to the desk beside the television. “It's in the first drawer there.”
She followed his instructions and pulled the sizable bundle of cash from it, turning back to him with her head cocked. “Well, I’d say it's been a pleasure Frank, but I’d be lying.”
He smiled wryly at her. “Stay safe out there, kid.”
She hesitated a moment before turning towards the door. Her hand was on the handle when he called her name, and she slowly turned back to him.
“What happens if I need your help again?”
She let her mind wander a moment before shrugging. “Just shine your bat signal toward the sky, and I’ll get the hint. See ya around, Frank.”
Once outside in the hallway, she stumbled back against the wall and allowed herself a couple of heaving lungfuls of fresh air. She was moments away from stepping into the elevator when Frank’s wrecked voice caught her attention, and she turned to see him limping toward her, a small piece of paper in his grasp.
“There’s just no keeping you down, is there?” she couldn't keep the incredulity from her voice.
He shoved the paper toward her, his face serious. “This is my number. You ever get into trouble, you ever find yourself in a situation, you give me a call.”
Her eyes widened in mild amusement. “Right, I'll call you so that you can get yourself into the same situation as tonight. Seems smart.”
He shook his head. “Look kid, I don’t care if you slam dunk it into the nearest trash can on your way out, just take it.”
The elevator dinged, and the doors opened. She grabbed the piece of paper and backed into it, giving him a small wave. “Bye, Frank.”
He mirrored her wave. “Take care of yourself, Callie.”