Cuts Like a Knife
The knife was in his hand, poised above his wrist as Rome considered what his mother would think the next time she walked into this room and saw blood all over his bedspread, all over the floor, all over his dead body.
He didn’t think it would hurt. With the pain radiating out of his heart with each breath as he thought about his beautiful wife, and how she was gone now, nothing could be more painful than that. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, and he made no effort to make them stop.
So lost in his thoughts was he that he almost didn’t realize the tinkling noise he suddenly heard were rocks hitting his window, ricocheting off, and hitting the fire escape below. Once he noted what it was, he turned to look at the window and saw the next rock hit.
Someone clearly wanted his attention.
He considered not going over to the window. Whoever it was, they couldn’t make him feel any better. They couldn’t bring his beautiful wife back. He figured it was likely Antonio, returned to apologize for the horrific way he’d let him know about Ella’s suicide. When the rocks continued, he had no choice but to go tell the person to stop so they didn’t alert the guards. If they discovered someone was trying to communicate with him, they’d rush in. He didn’t want to be drugged and moved again. And he definitely didn’t want them to find the knife and take it away.
Wearing only his jeans, he moved to the window and looked outside. From this angle, it was hard to see who was on the sidewalk. He opened the curtains and strained to see what was going on. Three people were standing on the sidewalk, but he didn’t recognize any of them, not from here anyway. Still holding the knife in one hand, he pulled the window up and stuck his head out.
At first, he wasn’t sure who he was looking at. A small blonde woman with large sunglasses had her hand over her mouth as she stared up at him. Then, his eyes traveled to the other two. One was a tiny brunette he didn’t recognize at all. But the other one… was Bart.
Then, his eyes went back to the woman in the center. She was pulling the blonde wig off of her head, moving her sunglasses down her nose. Rome’s eyes bulged as he stifled a scream. It came out as a whimper, some sort of a cross between a cry and a laugh. It was her! She was here, and she was alive!
And he was trapped. How was he going to get past those guards? He couldn’t possibly stay in that room one more second.
Rome waved at her, and she waved back before putting the blonde wig back on her beautiful head and pushing her sunglasses up. She was pointing at something, something between him and the floor below him.
The fire escape, of course! He’d never used one before, but it couldn’t be that difficult. Quickly and quietly, Rome moved away from the window, setting the knife back on the plate. He found his shoes on the floor and shoved his feet into them and then pulled on a T-shirt that had been lying nearby. His eyes lingered on the knife for a moment. He’d been so close to killing himself because he thought that Ella was dead. Thank God fate had intervened, and she’d arrived exactly the moment she had, or else he might’ve killed himself and still been without her.
Once he was dressed, Rome went back to the window, glad he’d opened it quietly enough that the guards hadn’t noticed. He could hear them talking, swapping stories in Italian, laughing loudly every once in a while. Hopefully, they wouldn’t notice he was gone either.
He swung his leg out of the window. It was a tight fit, but no smaller than the window he’d squeezed through to see Ella the first time he’d gone into her room in the attic. There was a bit of a drop down to the fire escape, and he’d have to be quiet, but he managed to drop down. The apparatus shook slightly, but it wasn’t too loud. He steadied himself and then quickly made it down the flights of stairs to the last one.
There was about a ten or twelve foot drop to the sidewalk. He saw that there was another set of stairs that was supposed to drop down, but it looked like it hadn’t been moved in a while, and Rome was afraid it might not budge or it might be really loud. Not wanting to hesitate any longer, but also not wanting to break a leg, he bent down and grabbed ahold of the lip of the fire escape and swung his legs around.
Bart was there in an instant, grabbing him by the calves and lowering him down to the ground.
His friend gave him a quick hug but then let him go.
Her floral aroma hit him before he even turned his head to see her, but then, Ella was in his arms, and he was kissing her like a starving man finally finding a morsel to eat. She tasted like heaven--honey and sweetness. The feel of her in his arms made the horror of the last several days fade away.
“Oh, my God, I thought you were dead,” he said squeezing her tightly to his chest.
“I’m so sorry.” she said as he held her face in his hands. “Antonio was supposed to tell you.”
“I didn’t understand….”
“I hate to break up the reunion, but we should get out of here,” Bart said, the voice of reason.
“Yes, of course,” Rome agreed. Bart moved toward the rental car, and he and Mary climbed in front while he pulled open the back door for Ella. They slid in and Bart took off. He didn’t even care where they were going. Ella was alive, and she was here with him. Nothing else mattered.
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