Chapter 4 - The Vultures’ Last Meal
The hospital doors swung open at ten in the morning,
and I could hear my mother’s performative wailing before she even reached the nursing station.
“Where is my daughter?”
she cried,
her voice dripping with false concern that made the hair on my arms stand up.
“My poor,
sweet Sadie!
We were so worried!”
She burst into the room,
followed by Melanie,
who was looking at her reflection in the glass of the door,
and my father,
who looked annoyed that he had to be there at all.
They stopped dead when they saw the two police officers and Arthur Sterling standing at the foot of my bed.
Wyatt was standing beside me,
his arms crossed,
looking like an avenging angel.
“Oh,
Sadie!”
my mother gasped,
covering her mouth with a hand that was still stained with a faint trace of my blood.
“What did that horrible electrician do to you?
We saw the ambulance and...”
“Stop it,
Mom,”
I said,
the silence that followed my words feeling like a physical weight.
“The electrician didn't hit me.”
“The dashcam showed everything.”
My father’s face went from pale to a deep,
angry red.
“Now look here,
Sadie,”
he started,
stepping forward,
“that footage is distorted,
and Wyatt here provoked me...”
“The dashcam wasn't the only witness,”
Arthur Sterling interrupted,
stepping forward with the leather-bound folder.
“Mr. Davis,
I am the legal representative for Silas Davis.”
My father’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head,
and he actually stumbled back into the wall.
“Silas is...
Silas is sick,”
he stammered,
“he doesn't have a lawyer.”
“He has the best lawyer his money could buy,”
Arthur replied,
handing my father a set of legal papers.
“These are the eviction notices for the property on Columbus.”
“And these are the warrants for the seizure of your bank accounts pending the fraud investigation.”
Melanie let out a sharp,
indignant sound.
“You can't evict us!
That’s our house!”
“Actually,
Melanie,”
I said,
looking her straight in the eye with my one good one,
“it’s my house.”
“Great Uncle Silas has transferred the deed to me.”
“He also saw you watching from the porch while Dad hit me with that brick.”
“He recorded your conversation about Wyatt's money through the attic vents.”
The room was so quiet you could hear the hum of the air conditioning.
My mother started to tremble,
her fake tears turning into real ones,
not of guilt,
but of pure,
unadulterated terror.
“Sadie,
please,”
she whispered,
reaching out for my hand.
I pulled it away,
tucking it under the safety of the hospital blanket.
“You laughed,”
I reminded her.
“You told Wyatt to see if he still loved me with 'this face'.”
“Well,
he does.”
“But the real question is,
will the judge love yours when he sees the video of you laughing while your daughter bled on the lawn?”
The police officers stepped forward,
unclipping their handcuffs.
“Mr. and Mrs. Davis,
you are under arrest for first-degree assault,
conspiracy,
and felony elder abuse.”
As they were led out of the room,
Melanie screaming that she had nothing to do with it,
May you like
I felt a strange sense of emptiness.
The vultures had finally run out of things to scavenge.
