Upstairs, John William remembered what Myles had told him to do to Max. “Break his fuckin’ leg and put a hurting on the no-good son of a bitch. I want him to learn from this. Then, I want you to contact some of our outside pimps and see who we can sell him to. Now that he fought back, we ain’t gonna be able to use him. He’s more trouble than he’s worth.”
A short while later, John William appeared in the basement. He was carrying a box of medical supplies and two pieces of wood. “Maggie!” he snapped, opening her kennel. “Get your ass over there and bandage up that broken leg of his. Be quick about it, too.”
Maggie practically ran from her kennel to Max’s. She knelt down beside him.
“Max, I’m going to splint your leg. OK? It’s going to hurt, but I have to do it,” she explained.
Max only looked at her with confusion. All of the color had drained from his face. Maggie worked quickly to put the splint on his leg. She had no idea if she’d done it correctly or if it would help the bones to heal properly. By then, John William had retreated to the kitchen to eat with some of the other guys in the cartel.
“Max, it’s me, Maggie. Do you recognize me?” Maggie asked him.
Instead of answering, Max fainted. When he came to, it was apparent that he was still confused.
“Tell me where you have pain, Max,” Maggie stated more aggressively this time.
“My shoulder,” Max managed. “And here.” He pointed to the ribs on his left side.
“OK. How many fingers am I holding up?” Maggie persisted, holding up three fingers.
Max looked at her hand, but the fingers were so blurred he couldn’t answer. Besides, he was in so much pain that he didn’t care how well his eyes were working.
Maggie reached down and felt his belly. It was distended and hard as a rock. She suspected that it was filling with blood. She found a pulse on his wrist and counted the number of beats in what she estimated was a minute of time. She counted 160 beats.
“Cali? We have a problem,” she said with concern.
“What, Mags? What’s wrong with him?”
“I think John William ruptured his spleen. From everything I know, I think he’s bleeding internally. If he doesn’t go to the hospital, he’ll die, Cali,” Maggie cried.
“Is there anything you can do to help him? Come on, Mags. Think! What did your books tell you to do?” Cali asked, panicked.
“There’s nothing I can do, Cali. He needs surgery by a real doctor. That’s the only thing that can be done. But he doesn’t have a lot of time,” she added.
“How long? How long can he live?” Cali asked impatiently.
“I don’t know. I just don’t know,” Maggie stated in anger.
Maggie lay on the floor of Max’s cell, her body up against his. She put her arm around him and waited. There was nothing to do now but pray. John William came back a few hours later and found them. Maggie woke, feeling someone watching her.
“John William, Max needs to go to the hospital. I think you ruptured his spleen.” Maggie pulled up Max’s shirt, exposing his belly, which bulged with the blood that filled it. Suddenly, Max threw up, and blood splattered across the dirt floor of the kennel.
“He ain’t going to no hospital. So you better think about all that shit you read and fix him up real fast,” John William snarled at her.
“I can’t! I can’t fix him. Only a doctor can fix him. He’s going to bleed to death,” she pleaded.
John William opened Max’s kennel. “Let’s go! Back to your own place,” he said menacingly.
“Please let me stay with him. Please, John William. Just tonight. I swear I’ll do whatever you want. Please,” Maggie begged.
“Anything? You’ll do whatever I want, huh?” he sneered. “You’ll do whatever I want just because I say so. You get that through your stupid little head.” Then he paused, not to think, but to build her anxiety. “OK, you can stay with him tonight, but you owe me, and I always get paid.” He chuckled as he heaved himself back up the stairs.
“Mags?” Cali called out. “What’s going to happen to Max?”
“I don’t know for sure, Cali. I don’t even know if his spleen is ruptured,” she responded in a defeated voice.
Then Maggie lay facing Max. She snuggled up to him as close as she could get. Putting her arm around him, she began to tell him a story. It was the Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain, a story that Max had begged her to tell him repeatedly during their years of bondage. Max was hooked on Tom Sawyer’s story and his ability to believe in his own daydreams and allow his imagination to become his reality.
Tears streamed down Maggie’s cheeks as she told Max the classic tale. Every so often, when Maggie got to Max’s favorite parts of the book, he would look up at her and smile. When she finished telling him the story, she silently held him in her arms.
“Tell me the story about my dad, Maggie, please,” Max asked softly.