Your Guardian Angel

“Good. Now both of you step away from the door.”

We did as we were told.

“Perfect. Bravo. You go back and sit in the chair.” He pointed at me. I turned to look at Jesse and he nodded, so I sat back down in the chair and allowed myself to be tied up again, duct tape on my mouth and all.

“You can go get a chair and join your girlfriend.” Jesse pulled over a chair and sat next to me. Jeff immediately tied him up and put duct tape on his mouth. “Two little birdies for the price of one. This must be my lucky night.”

I honestly wished that Jesse had not come back; now we were both in danger instead of just me. How could we possibly survive this? The tears dripped down my face more rapidly than before.

Jesse and I looked at each other and he discreetly moved his chair closer to mine so that our hands were touching. He gave me a look that said, Everything is going to be ok. We’re going to get out of this somehow.

We were downstairs in the living room and it was in complete shambles from all the fighting; tables were knocked over, lamps were broken, pillows had fallen off couches and my blood was on the floor from when Jeff tackled me. But, there was something else on the floor too right near my feet, a shiny, silver, sharp object that Jeff must have dropped when carrying me upstairs: his knife. When Jeff was looking away, I knocked my head lightly against Jesse’s to get his attention and then I pointed my head toward the knife near my feet. He nodded and started to scoot his chair away. The noise of the chair moving made Jeff look up. He pointed the gun at Jesse. “You better not be doing something you aren’t supposed to be doing because then I might just have to kill you a little faster.”

When I see your smile
Tears roll down my face I can't replace
And now that I'm strong I have figured out
How this world turns cold and it breaks through my soul
And I know I'll find deep inside me I can be the one

Meanwhile, I used my feet to push the knife under the chair far enough that I could reach it. I struggled to grab the knife and used it to carefully cut the rope holding my hands together. Jeff turned toward me suddenly and I continued to hold my hands behind my back as if they were still tied. After awhile, he decided that I wasn’t doing anything and turned away again. I quickly untied my legs and ran to untie Jesse. Unfortunately, Jeff turned just as I finished untying Jesse’s legs. He raised his gun again and pointed it right at my chest.

“NO!” Jesse screamed. He ran in front of me just as Jeff pulled the trigger.

I will never let you fall
I'll stand up with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all
Even if saving you sends me to heaven

I started screaming as Jesse fell to the ground covered in his own blood. Jeff pulled the trigger again, but this time there was a click and nothing happened; he only had one bullet and he just used it up. The knife was over by the chair I was sitting in before; I knew I had to get to it before Jeff could. Jesse did not have much time left, so I had to act fast; I wasn’t about to lose another person I loved, not like this. As soon as Jeff realized there were no more bullets, he dropped the gun and ran at me. Acting as quickly as I could, I got a mirror off the wall right beside me and hit him over the head with it. The mirror broke and glass shattered everywhere as he fell down to the ground, giving me the perfect opportunity to run over and grab the knife. He got up and came after me again, so I plunged the knife right through his chest over and over again until his limp body fell to the ground and he finally died.

As soon as I was safe, I ran over to Jesse and quickly grabbed his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed 9-1-1.

“Hello?” said the operator.

“Hi,” I responded, my voice trembling. “I need the cops and an ambulance out here immediately. A man named Jeffrey Turner came after me and shot my boyfriend. I had to stab him in self defense.”

“What is the address?”

“219 Cherry Tree Lane.”

“Thank you. We are on our way.”

I hung up the phone and sat down on the floor, placing Jesse’s head in my lap. His body was scrunched up in pain. I got a weird sense of déjà vu remembering the time when I was holding Josh’s head in my lap and he died in my arms. I wasn’t going to let that happen this time, not again. I tried to put some pressure over his wound until the ambulance came. I heard him start to groan a little bit from the pain.

“Jesse? Babe, I need you to hold on, ok? Hold on for me. The ambulance is going to be here soon. I can’t lose you.” The tears continued to fall from my face as I could see the pain he was going through. He opened his eyes slightly.

“R-riley, I—“

“Ssh please don’t talk,” I pleaded. “You need to save your strength. Don’t you dare say your goodbyes. You are not going to die, so you need to fight. If you die, I swear I will never ever forgive you for putting me through that again. You once promised me that you would never leave me like Josh did. I’m going to hold you to that now. Remember right after my accident when you said, ‘I don’t know what my life would be like without you in it?’ Well, I could say the same for you. I need you to stay with me, Jesse. You die, I die; remember? I can’t really go on without you.”

After what seemed like an eternity, I heard sirens in the distance; they were finally here. I opened the door and the EMTs rushed into the house with a stretcher. They lifted Jesse lightly on the stretcher and immediately started giving him oxygen. The cops walked into the house and surrounded the crime scene with yellow tape. They had a camera with them and began to take pictures of everything as soon as they got there.

I was about to get into the ambulance with Jesse, but then a cop stopped me.

“Excuse me, miss, but we need to take your statement.”

“Here’s my statement, so hurry up and get it down because I have to go in the ambulance with Jesse,” I said angrily. “Jeff Turner broke into my friend’s house where I was staying, attacked me, and was going to kill me. My boyfriend Jesse showed up and hit him over the head with a lamp, but we couldn’t get out quick enough, so he pulled a gun on us and made us sit down and he tied us up again. I saw that he had dropped a knife on the floor right near my feet, so I used it to untie myself and then untie Jesse quickly. He saw what I was doing and tried to shoot me, but then Jesse jumped in the way and got shot. He tried to shoot me again, but there weren’t any bullets left, so he came after me and I hit him over the head with a mirror. I ran and got the knife when he came after me again and stabbed him with it. If you need more information, I will be happy to give it to you, but I don’t have time right now.” With that, I hopped into the ambulance and was on my way to the hospital with Jesse.

As I watched them give him more oxygen and scramble to control his bleeding, I prayed harder than I had ever prayed in my life; he had to be ok. I decided that I should probably call Jesse’s family to tell them the terrible news.

“Hello?”

“H-hi, Mrs. McCartney. This is Riley, Jesse’s girlfriend,” I said in a shaky voice.

“Oh, hello, Dear. How are you?”

“N-not so good. I have some bad news.

“What’s wrong?”

“You and your f-family need to get to Westchester General H-hospital as soon as you can. Jesse has been sh-sh-shot.” My voice cracked as I broke down again.

“WHAT?”

“I’ll explain when you get there. Please just come as fast as you can. Jesse is in bad condition and he needs you.”

I hung up his phone, put my head in my lap and cried.

Five minutes later, we got to the hospital. The doctors immediately said that Jesse would need emergency surgery, so I called Mrs. McCartney back again so that she could give the doctors permission to operate because she was not there yet to give it in person and there was no time to lose. As soon as they got permission, they hung up and immediately began to prepare him for surgery as I watched nervously from the sidelines. They had to go in and get the bullet out and close up the wound before he lost any more blood and it caused any more damage.

The doctor started to make the first incision and he had to dig pretty deep to get the bullet out. Once he saw the bullet, he went to grab tweezers, but as soon as he took his hand away, Jesse’s heart rate began to drop rapidly until he flat-lined.

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.
Seasons are changing
And waves are crashing
And stars are falling all for us
Days grow longer and nights grow shorter
I can show you I'll be the one

I will never let you fall
I'll stand up with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all
Even if saving you sends me to heaven

I covered my mouth as more tears immediately sprung to my eyes. No, Jesse, baby, please don’t die, I prayed. I need you to come back to me.

The nurse immediately started shocking him repeatedly to bring him back. It finally worked after about the third try. His heart rate slowly increased and the doctors continued their work. I took in a breath of relief. Thank God.

A few minutes later, Jesse was finally out of surgery and his family had arrived. The doctors said they could not be sure if there was any lasting damage until he woke up, which could have been for another couple of hours or even another couple of days. The only thing left to do was wait.

I decided to call Amanda and tell her what happened. A few hours later, she surprised me by coming to the hospital.

“Hey, how are you holding up?” she asked as she sat down next to me.

“Not so good,” I responded. A few minutes ago, I had went to the bathroom and looked in the mirror; my eyes were all red and puffy and makeup was all over my face from crying so much, but I didn’t even care at that point. The only thing that mattered to me was Jesse. “Thank you for coming though. You didn’t have to leave your vacation for me.”

“Yes I did. You’re my best friend and you need me now more than you ever have.”

“Yeah you’ve got that right. I never should have untied him. If I didn’t untie him, he wouldn’t have gotten shot.”

“Maybe so, but he wouldn’t have gotten out of there either. I know you Riley and you would not have been able to just leave him there as you got away. He might have saved you when he got in the way of that bullet, but you saved him right back by getting him out of there and away from Jeff.”

“I just wish he wasn’t even there in the first place. If he dies, that will be it for me. I honestly don’t know what I will do if I lose him, Amanda. That would be the second time someone has died trying to save me. I would not be able to live with myself.” The flood came back to my eyes and Amanda let me cry on her shoulder for a long time.

“Do you need anything? Do you want me to get you a drink or something?” Amanda asked after awhile.

“No, I think I’m ok, but thank you.”

“Riley, you should probably try to get some sleep; you look really tired.”

“I don’t want to sleep. I’m too afraid that if I fall asleep, something will change and I won’t be awake for it. Besides, I don’t think I would be able to sleep even if I wanted to.”

“Maybe you should at least try to rest then. It’ll make the time go by faster and you’ll probably feel better.”

“I might, but it’ll be hard. I’m so scared that I can barely sit still.”

“Did you tell your family yet?”

“Yeah. I called my mom a few hours ago and she said that she wishes everyone could be here with me. If he doesn’t wake up by tomorrow, she’s going to fly up.”

“It’s good that she wants to be with you.”

“I’m just glad you’re here with me. I think I would be going insane right now if you weren’t here to keep me calm and help me be strong and believe that he’s going to wake up.”

“What are friends for? I want to be here for you when you need me and I know that you would have done the same thing for me if it was Tyler who got shot.”

“Of course I would. Would you be ok if I asked to go see Jesse?”

“Yeah sure. Go do what you need to do and I’ll be right here when you come out.”

“Thank you! You’re the best.” I reached over and gave her a hug.

When I got to his room, his family was sitting with him. They all turned when I walked in the door.

“How is he doing?” I asked.

“There hasn’t been any change,” said Jesse’s sister Lea. Her face was all blotchy like mine was; she had been crying for a while now.

“The doctor said he should be waking up any time now, but it just hasn’t happened yet,” said his mother quietly. She seemed to be in shock.

His father seemed to be the only person that understood why I was there.

“I think we should all let Riley have some time alone with Jesse,” he said. “Maybe it will make a difference and I think I need to take a walk anyway.”

“I think that sounds like a good idea,” said Lea.

With that, Jesse’s family, including his little brother, Timmy, filed out of the room. I walked over to the chair that Mrs. McCartney had been sitting in right beside his bed and sat down. I grabbed his hand, kissed it and brought it up to my face.

“Hey, Baby,” I said. “It’s me. Your family was just here too. We’re all so worried about you. You shouldn’t have gotten in front of that bullet for me Jesse. I wish it was me lying in that bed instead of you. It should have been me. I was the one he was after, not you. You should have never even been involved. I just need you to wake up so that everything can be ok again. P-please don’t leave me.”

Cuz you're my, you're my, my, my true love, my whole heart
Please don't throw that away
Cuz I'm here for you
Please don't walk away and
Please tell me you'll stay

I put my head down beside his body and cried even more, but then I felt a hand rubbing the top of my head. I looked up as he opened his eyes slightly.

“Welcome back,” I said, smiling through my tears.

“Thanks,” he said quietly. “By the way, I’m not going anywhere.”

Use me as you will
Pull my strings just for a thrill
And I know I'll be okay
Though my skies are turning gray

I will never let you fall
I'll stand up with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all
Even if saving you sends me to heaven