Six of us had attended that call and had stood under the tree while the fire department had gotten the ladder out to get him down. What should have been a funny moment had turned into screams and trauma for everyone.
“You swore you’d never mention that again,” Jack hissed, leaning across my chest with his finger pointed at Reid. “That was a secret.”
“Everyone knows about it, Jack,” I sighed. “We don’t want to talk about it, but our body cams were recording, and it’s definitely been the topic of a lot of discussions.”
During all this, we’d tuned out to what was happening with my wife and her family. That was immediately resolved when she snapped loudly, “Jesus Christ!”
Yeah, she tooketh the Lord’s name in vain. Loudly enough for everyone in the area to hear, and not realizing the minister for the church was seated in the waiting room, obviously waiting for treatment if the bloody bandage on his hand was any indication. Fortunately, after an incident with my friend’s/colleague’s wife where the previous minister had been paid to give her shit, this guy was new and seemed to be a bit more relaxed than the former guy.
Seeing us all watching him, he waved his bloody hand through the air. “Don’t worry about it. He probably just thinks Layla’s asking him for guidance.”
He dropped his head and lowered his voice, but we still heard it when he added, “And I’m sure he’s well aware of the reason why it keeps happening.”
The door to the ER opened again, and some of the Townsend wives came through it with their kids.
“Sorry to bring them to the hospital, but we were worried about Cole,” Maya called as they got closer. “Mrs. Anderson said he was unconscious after a traffic accident, and Mrs. Mayhew said she’d heard he had brain damage.”
Ebru, Cole’s wife, pushed through them until she was in front of us. “How bad is it? Is he in surgery?”
Hurst appeared, pulled her into his side, and said softly, “No, he had a reaction to some medication.”
Ebru’s body stiffened, and her concern morphed into a glare at the door next to us, where her husband was. “He did some stuff and hit his head on a stop sign. He’ll be just fine.”
Before she could say anything, the door opened, and we heard the doctor and nurses shouting. “No, Mr. Townsend, we need you to stay on the bed, please. You can’t go out there!”
Cole came running through, dressed only in a hospital gown and stopped when he saw his family there.
“It’s a reunion! How great is this?” Then, throwing his arms up in the air, he let out a battle cry. “Viva La reunion.”
As he continued to walk forward, the family parted and began backing up until they were all crowded around the wall I was leaning against.
“Do something,” Colette hissed, pinching me on the arm. “You’ve got cuffs, use them.”
Grudgingly, I moved away from my safe haven, pulling Reid with me. “Uh, Cole, man, we need you to go and lie down again.”
Cole turned at my voice, looking surprised to see me. “Marky Mark, you’re here, too? You know, this guy married my sister,” he announced to everyone, turning his back to the reception desk and where some nurses and doctors were gathered.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw some of them covering their mouths and heard some of the others clearing their throats, but I didn’t take my attention off Cole fully. It paid to be aware and alert when it came to him when he was like this.
I ignored the gasps and muttered reactions from the people in the waiting room at what he’d just announced, and took a step closer to him.
“Cole, your head’s still bleeding because they haven’t been able to stitch you up. Why don’t we take you back and—”
“Yes,” he cried, touching his head and jerking when the pain registered. “Those stop signs are a fake. Did you guys know that? They’re meant to stop you, but they don’t do it. We have imposter signs, cheap knock-offs. Where’s the mayor? Who’s in charge of it?”
The people waiting all pointed behind us, likely to where Hurst was standing—Piersville’s mayor.
Cole glanced over his shoulder and pointed at his grandpa. “You! What say you about these fake signs that say stop when they don’t do that?”
“To be fair, they did get you to stop by knocking you out,” Hurst eventually answered. “Not so fake when they do that, are they?”
When Cole narrowed his eyes, I knew it would explode, so I closed the distance between us and brought his attention back to me.
“Hey, let’s get your head sorted out and get you home, man. You don’t want to be here for much longer, do you?”
I heard footsteps and chanced a glance over my shoulder to see that his family had moved away from the door to the treatment area and were now moving toward the waiting room with everyone else.
Cole sighed, and his shoulders drooped. “I feel like a duzzy fuck. Does he?”