Injuries Consistent With a Fall

Kat took a final look in her compact mirror. For 58 she was holding her own, and she knew it. Forty years of running, self-defence classes, Judo, and good nutrition had kept her petite frame fit. Although her date ran late, she remained confident and focused. She took another sip of her Merlot, Mohave Rain, and held it on her tongue, the velvety warmth spreading through her, enjoying the chocolatey finish. That was what prompted her to choose this restaurant—the selections of wine. She couldn’t care less if Cole Bannerman liked it. The occasional glass of Merlot was her one treat, and she always felt it outrageously decadent and enchanting.

She dropped her compact into her purse and carefully tucked a red strand behind her ear. She’d only been back in this town for three months, and although she was widowed more than five years earlier, this was her first—and last—date.

She drummed her fingers restlessly on the white linen tablecloth and mentally reviewed what she knew. Cole Bannerman was 56 years old. He worked as a plumber in his own company that he’d partnered with his brother, Luke. Luke had married and divorced, twice, and two years earlier succumbed to cancer. Cole, on the other hand, had never made it to the altar.

Neither had fathered children.

Cole, handsome in his youth, had taken to alcohol after a problem during his junior year. He was now a doughy, pig-eyed man, still trying to find the charm. Wouldn’t have been her first choice for a date, but what the hell, she thought, taking another sip of the Merlot. From all outward appearances, Cole was weak. Broken.

Luke had been mean, and prone to violence. An unchecked memory sent a frisson of doubt up her spine, and she self-consciously swept her fingers over her forehead, gently touching the familiar raised skin under her bangs.

Thank God for Google, she thought, or she never would have mustered the courage to go out on this limb. She was pulled from her reverie when male voices carried from the host’s desk. One surprisingly melodious baritone, and the more nasal tone of the host.

She had a visceral response to him as the two men first rounded the corner into the expansive dining room, and her fingers tightened involuntarily on the delicate crystal stem of her glass. Due to the early time, the room was all but deserted. With only one other couple on the far wall, she suddenly felt vulnerable and foolish for having engineered this date. In a couple of hours, this room would hold twice as many people. This was a bad idea. She clutched the stem of her wineglass until she thought it would snap and then forced herself to relax. She dropped her hands to her lap to hide the tremor.

He made eye contact in the dim light as he stepped up to the table, “Kat?”

“Cole Bannerman,” she said, forcing a smile. She took his outstretched hand briefly. Revulsion threatened to overwhelm her and she removed it discreetly from his clammy grasp and wiped it vigorously on her skirt beneath the table as he worked to wedge himself into the chair too narrow for his girth.

He was taller than she had estimated from his photos and due to the story told by 42 years of hard-drinking, he was a stranger. Fleshy with an extra 60 pounds around his middle, barely visible was the 14-year-old boy she had barely known.

Now stuffed into his seat he eyed her glass of wine. “What are you having?”

“Merlot,” she smiled. “They have an excellent wine selection here.”

His thick, wet lips came together into an unflattering pout, and he waved his hand dismissively at the wine glass. “Bring me a rye and coke,” he said, brusquely. “Do you have Old Forester?”

“We do, Sir. I’ll send the waiter right over.”

Kat grimaced inwardly. Everything about the man was coarse, and repellent. She forced a pleasant smile on her face and observed his petulant observations of the room, checking frequently on the progress of his drink. Sweat had gathered on his upper lip and forehead from the exertion of walking into the room. In fairness, there were probably some nerves at play as well, she thought.

“Did you find the restaurant okay?” She asked.

“Yeah. Lived here my whole life but I don’t come to this place,” he said, jutting his chin. His voice just didn’t fit, she thought. His beady eyes watched, impatient for his pending libation. The pause was bottomless as he anticipated fuel and he did not appear interested in a conversation. She vaguely wondered if the conversations they’d had online were him at all and surmised a highball was never far from his grasp.

Finally, his eyes turned to her. She bore the inspection with a calm smile but did not sit forward into the candlelight. “So, what do you do?” she asked to fill the silence.

“Always the first question women want to know,” he said, peevishly.

“It says a lot about a person,” she chirped. No response, so she sipped her Merlot. “I’ll go first then. “I’m a writer.”

“Uh-hum. Well, that is interesting.” Interesting was spoken inerestin. Turning back toward the bar, he spotted the waiter with his drink and his relief was palpable. Kat felt a rush of pity and immediately brushed it off. Did he show her pity? She shrugged the thought away.

He accepted the drink from the waiter with a wink. Two big gulps, his confidence suitably replenished, he turned to her. She wished it was so simple for her, and she wondered how many drinks he’d had just to get his fat ass out the door. She felt ashamed of her mercenary attitude. This was not the plan.

“So you’re a writer?” He mopped at his forehead and upper lip with the linen napkin. “What sort of things do you write?” His eyes continued their search of the room, and suddenly she was eager for the charade to end.

“Romance,” she replied. This was all her idea.

“Huh, well, I guess you showed me yours,” he said, following up with a wet cough. “I’ll show you mine. Got a plumbing outfit I started up with my bro.”

“Luke,” she said, softly. She rested her chin on her laced fingers, casting her face into the light of the single candle on the table.

“Yeah, that’s right.” His eyes narrowed and he took another greedy swallow of the rye. “How’d you know that?” He paused. Drank. “Where did you say you went to school?” he asked. His eyes, now suspicious locked on her face.

“My senior year I did in France,” she said, little more than a whisper. Her throat was dry and the Merlot did little to whet it. “But I went to South Valley High right here.” Her lips twitched as she watched the mean eyes search her face, her hair. She sensed the recognition settle in. His wattle started to quiver in a repugnant manner.

“Remember?” she whispers. “I was on my way home from my piano lesson. I was crossing the orange bridge when I met up with you and Luke.”

Cole’s beady eyes bulged and his lips moved in a silent gaping rhythm. A single drop of sweat fell onto his shirt front.

“You do remember then,” Kat said. She leaned back in her chair, satisfied. At least he hadn’t forgotten.

Her words were met with silence as his eyes dropped to his glass. The fat digits of both hands were curled into fists.

Four decades earlier, Cole, frustrated in his inability to carry out rape, achieved satisfaction by delivering a beating instead. He’d delivered two cracked ribs, a broken arm, and cuts about her face and head. For reasons still unknown to Katelyn, she had lied to her parents and told them she had climbed on the railing of the bridge and fallen over. The emergency doctor confirmed her injuries were consistent with a fall, but her parents were still suspicious even though it was determined she had not been raped. The torn clothing and bruises on her thighs and hips had been enough. That autumn she was sent to France as an international student.

She had long imagined that so inconsequential were the events of that day that the two vicious predators had, after a brief laugh, immediately put the attack out of their minds. She could hear Luke’s laughter still as Cole had whipped her with his belt and kicked her prone body in his rage and frustration.

But she remembered. She remembered every time she had set foot out her door. It had lingered far after the wounds healed and the bones mended. The self-disdain she had carried with herself for months had dissipated, but the loathing for her attackers only became more malevolent. She had long fantasized about revenge. Fear had left her, but malice had not. And then in her final year of University, she’d read and found resonance with Confucius’ proverb:

‘Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.’ Only then did the serpent finally begin to uncoil.

She forgave herself slowly at first. Now with forgiveness for Cole and Luke near to hand, she had sought to meet Cole Bannerman face to face. She would forever strip him of his power over her, by forgiving him.

As she observed her broken down, pathetic attacker from across the table sobbing quietly in his highball, she suddenly felt a sweeping sense of relief coupled with empathy. He could no longer hurt her. He had broken bones and skin, but the power he held over her was short-lived. She had gained success, love, and peace. She was happy that the last leg of the journey was here.

“I hold no ill will. But I needed to meet you face to face, Cole Bannerman. I suffered broken skin and bones, but my spirit survived.” She signalled the waiter to bring the bill and flipped enough cash to cover their drinks onto the table. “Which is more than I can say for you.”

Cole’s head hung so low that his wattle rested on his chest. His florid, mottled face was soaked in sweat and he emitted a wet rattle. Tears stained his blotchy cheeks. She felt free, and as she witnessed the pathetic, sobbing mess a wave of pity washed over her again. He’d not spoken a single word since he’d recognized her as Katelyn Waters, instead of Kat Miller, so absorbed he was in self-pity.

He had broken only one of them that day, she realized, and it wasn’t her. She briefly touched his shoulder as she prepared to leave and felt his shoulders shake as he silently tried to gain control. He had not said he was sorry, so she did not say she forgave him. Her mother always said don’t forgive someone who doesn’t ask for it. But she wanted—no—she needed to forgive Cole and Luke Bannerman, and so she did.

She left the restaurant without looking back. She accomplished what she set out to do. Despite the stellar wine selection, she would not return. She’d order her Merlot online from now on.