When I get home, the front door is ajar.
I get a spasm of fear. Have we been broken into?
I kick the door open with my Converse and leap back, in case there’s a robber lurking on the other side, but the door hangs open harmlessly.
Then I hear the sobbing: deep, guttural.
‘Rex?’ I call, stepping inside. ‘Is that y—? Oh fuck! Oh fuck! What happened?’
The pool of blood is streaked across the dining-room floor, like a body was dragged through it. There’s a smell like someone threw bleach everywhere.
Rex is in his work gear, slumped on the sofa alone, sobbing into his bong.
‘Rex, talk to me!’ I shout. ‘What happened here? Whose blood is that?’
Rex pulls on the end of his orange hi-vis shirt like he’s trying to tear it off. ‘Something happened to Zeke,’ he says. ‘I’m so sorry. I think he might die.’
My head spins, not from the blood, but knowing it belongs to Zeke. ‘Where is he?’ I demand. ‘Zeke?!’ I call down the corridor. ‘Where are you, dude?’
‘The ambulance took him,’ Rex mumbles. ‘Your mate went after him, too. Hammer.’
‘Hammer was here?’ I splutter. ‘Did they fight? What’s the blood from? Was he breathing? Conscious? Say something, Rex.’
Rex mumbles about him and Zeke double-teaming a random bottom. Zeke spilled poppers into his mouth, fell over and hit his head. Hammer was banging at the door, wanting to see Zeke, and Hammer called the ambulance. The bottom high-tailed it out of there in an Uber. Rex says the paramedics said Zeke’s heart was having trouble beating.
‘He was alive when they left,’ he assures me. ‘But unconscious.’
I grab my car keys from my pocket. ‘What hospital is he in?’
‘Charlie’s,’ Rex says. ‘They took him to Charlie’s.’
Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital – Charlie’s, to everyone who lives in Perth – is a massive, multistorey hospital with a big emergency department. I park crappily and sprint across the dark road between the carpark and the hospital as a light rain falls. I pull my hood up and follow the big lights of theEMERGENCY DEPARTMENTsign.
I rush into a weary queue in front of the triage nurse.
Before I’ve even progressed one spot in the line, a hand touches my arm. I turn, expecting a security guard, and instead see a tall, athletic guy with a big Mad Hueys hoodie drawn up over his head, keeping his face in shadow.
‘Hammer!’ I blurt out.
I have never hugged Hammer, but in that instant, with Zeke’s life threatened, there is something about seeing someone I know from home here in the city.
We hug.
‘What’s happened?’ I ask. ‘Is Zeke okay?’
In a much quieter voice that makes me realise I’m shouting, Hammer says, ‘Zeke’s in emergency. Maybe come outside. I’ll fill you in.’
We find a spot outside the emergency department doors, under cover from the rain but still chilled by the wind. Hammer explains he called Zeke to talk but he wasn’t answering, so he drove over to speak to him in person. He heard a thud and someone screaming for help, so he booted the door open to find Zeke bleeding on the floor. He said Zeke spilled some chemical on himself – which I immediately recognise as poppers – and his heart was doing these big, hectic pounds then falling still, so Hammer called an ambulance.
By the time the ambulance arrived, Zeke’s lips were blue.
‘I followed the ambulance here,’ Hammer says. ‘They took him straight into ED.’
‘How long has he been in there? Is he alive, conscious?’
‘I asked, mate,’ Hammer says. ‘I don’t know yet. The nurse said they’re short-staffed and someone will update me as soon as they can.’
I can’t stop thinking that the last conversation I had with Zeke was not just an argument, but one where I tried to wound him as badly as I could.
