The Long Dark by Billy Farmer (best book club books for discussion .txt) 📗

down the street, Avery gasped and blurted way too loudly, “William…” He turned to me and with wide eyes said, “Someone was crouched back there. I do not think he saw us. He seemed to be focused on something behind us.”

Before I had time to react to what Avery had said, I heard a loud sniff and a grunt, followed by fast footfalls. I turned to warn Tom, but it was too late. The gray blur was on him in an instant. He had seen the attacker, as he tried to raise his rifle to take a shot, but his man was on him too quickly. The attacker saw us, but for whatever reason had peeled off in the direction we had come from, full on sprint, his head jerking inhumanly in one direction or another, oddly out of sync with the rest of his body, as he ran back towards the big bank in Barrow.

Sam quickly caught up to and surpassed me, making his way to Tom. As I approached Tom, I was pretty sure I heard him say, “The sonofabitch cut me.” I gasped as I saw crimson flowing through the gaps between his fingers as he tightly grasped his throat.

Curses and hard breaths filled the space formerly occupied by howling wind and pelting snow.

“He’s bleedin bad, boys,” Sam said.

Tish didn’t waste any time working on him. I saw her rummaging through the bag she carried. Frustrated, she said something about not having what she needed to help him. How do you like that, we brought a nurse but forgot things she might need in case of an emergency. We could’ve been a case study in how not to handle emergencies. I picked up the gun Tom and dropped off the road and prepared myself to guard against another attack. Maybe I could at least do that right.

“How bad is it?” I asked, trying to keep a lookout while struggling to get my breath.

She didn’t respond.

“Is he dying?” Avery asked.

“Shut yer damn mouth, boy,” Sam hissed.

“Apply pressure here, Sam. We got to get him inside and fast,” Tish said, as she wiped blood on her pants.

I knew we had to get him inside, but inside where? We were still more than a mile from Miley's office, so that was out of the question. Assuming the hospital was operational, and I didn't, it was farther away than Miley’s. That also wouldn't work. Instead of concentrating on what I needed to do, my mind raced, about things I should've done and things I could've done differently in my life, both past and present.

I heard a voice off in the distance; it was faint but serious. I began to wonder if that was what a nervous breakdown felt like. Then I reasoned, if was cognizant enough to question my mental state, then I probably wasn’t. I'm not sure you have the faculty of recognition during an episode such as that, but I might’ve been overthinking things.

The voice called again, louder this time, yet muffled and essentially incomprehensible. If you’ve ever watched a war movie, the voice sounded like what a soldier heard after an explosion. After some amount of time, I decided it was Tish’s voice I was hearing. She was yelling at me, now. Instantly, the world snapped back into focus.

On sheer instinct, I ran down Nanook Street. The first or second house I came to, I ran up to the door and began to kick it in. I don’t even remember checking to see if it was unlocked. I just kicked the hell out of it, over and over again. After a few good kicks, the door was swinging wide open. I called a couple warnings to anyone who might be inside and then waited. No one thankfully answered.

I busted ass getting back to Tom, sweat pouring off me as my feet pounded the snow. As tired and out of breath as I was, I still managed to help Sam carry Tom back to the broken-in house.

“Easy,” Tish said, as we gently lay him on the living room floor.

“Figure out how to keep that door closed, Avery,” I said, hands on knees and gulping for breaths of air that weren’t coming quickly enough. And if that wasn’t a testament to just how out of shape I was, then I don’t know what is. I remember being told in peewee football to stand up straight and put your hands on your head. I did that, and it seemed to help. I was dizzy as hell and coughed until I nearly puked. I needed to lose some damn weight.

We placed lamps around Tom. His face was already pale from loss of blood. He moved his mouth trying to say something, but nothing came out. His eyelids fluttered and then slid closed, hopefully just passing out from loss of blood or pain, and not anything more grievous. Tish grabbed a pillow case off a pillow lying on the couch and used it to replace the blood-soaked bandage she had applied earlier. It didn’t seem particularly sterile, but I didn’t argue with her. “Keep the pressure, Sam,” Tish said, placing his where hers was.

Tish pulled me aside. As much as she tried to hide it, she was terrified.

“William,” she whispered, with a slight tremble, “I’m not sure I can help him. I’m… I’m not ready for this.”

“None of us are. We have to do the best we can. That’s all we can do.”

Tears streamed down her face. “It could be his carotid artery…”

“Then you probably need to be working on it.”

She nodded slightly and then wiped her eyes and nose with her ungloved hands. “I have to have needle and thread to stitch his neck up,” she said.

No, we didn’t bring that either.

As I searched through a bedroom that adjoined the living room, I heard Titouan say something to the extent of shouldn’t we be worried if the homeowner comes home. To which Sam replied, “You’ll have a lot more to worry ‘bout