Because of me.
Andrew manages better than me. He stumbles backward but quickly rights himself before he falls over. One hand covers his bloodied mouth as he looks up at me, stunned beyond belief.
“Fucking pathetic?” I repeat his words, the ones that made tears come to Leti’s eyes and made her rush out of here before theycould fall. I shake out my hand, but it does little to dull the sting. “Are you kidding me, Andrew? She’s your sister. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Dude.” His voice is so garbled, I’m surprised I can make out the word. He spits the blood from his mouth before trying again. “Did you fucking punch me, man? I could’ve lost a tooth!”
“You really think I care about your dental health right now?!” I move my arm back to swing at him again, but he ducks out of the way in the nick of time. It’s for the better, really, since I’m pretty sure my hand wouldn’t be able to handle a second punch. Then he runs straight at me. Andrew’s arms wrap around my middle as he throws us both to the ground. My head knocks hard into the leg of the metal table, and I nearly see stars as my head bounces against the concrete.
“Shit, are you okay?”
Vaguely, I consider laughing at such an absurd question. Who tackles someone to the ground and then asks if they’re okay? But my ears are ringing and my skull is throbbing so hard it feels like it’s caved in, though logically I know I wouldn’t be conscious if that were the case. “Holy fuck, Julian, you’re bleeding—I NEED SOME HELP OVER HERE!”
I flinch as his voice rises, but I can hardly fault him because the panic pays off. We’re surrounded in seconds, and I’m pulled off the ground and deposited into a chair by Diego and Mr. Maldonado. Elena hands me a bag of frozen fruit wrapped in a dish towel for my head, and someone I was introduced to earlier but have since forgotten their name asks if they can inspect the injury.
“Take her up on it,” Andrew pipes up from behind. “She’s a nurse.”
Elena turns on her phone’s flashlight and holds it up so the nurse can take a look. “It doesn’t look very deep,” she finally says after abeat. “If the bleeding doesn’t stop in about an hour, you might need to get stitches.”
“What about a concussion?” Diego asks her. “I saw that fall from the window. It looked like he hit his head pretty hard.” His eyes shift back and forth between me and Andrew with something akin to disapproval. He knows damn well my injury wasn’t caused by a fall. Still, I have no idea why Diego is inclined to cover for us.
“If his headache doesn’t go away with the bleeding, that could be a sign of a concussion,” she explains. “I’d look out for any signs of confusion, fatigue, nausea—”
She backs away just in time as I double over and heave my guts out on a pair of white sneakers. Andrew lets out a long sigh before bracing himself with a hand on my shoulder, face twisting in disgust as he steps out of his vomit-covered shoes.
“My official prognosis?” She points a finger at Andrew. “Take him to the ER.”
Diego hustles the two of us to his car, his wife trailing close behind. Elena helps me into the back seat before getting in from the other side as Diego shoves Andrew into the passenger seat. Once all the doors are shut, the interrogation begins.
“What the hell has gotten into you two?” Elena blocks my view of her brother with the back of her head as she forces him to face her. Despite the confrontation, her voice is even so as not to aggravate my already-pounding head. “Diego saw that tackle from the window and don’t think we haven’t noticed the way your mouth is leaking blood. Talk. Now.”
“It was my fault.”
Elena cuts her eyes to me.
“Julian, you don’t have to—”
“I do, though,” I tell Andrew before turning to his sister. “I hit him first. Your issue is with me.”
“But why?” she asks.
Andrew turns in his seat, the question in his eyes clear. I don’t know how to begin to explain my relationship with Leti, but I have to try.
“He hurt Leticia,” I say. “I wasn’t going to let it stand.”
“Leti?” Diego asks as his wife sits back in her seat. “You’re saying you hit your best friend over something to do with his sister, who you just met?”
“I’m gonna talk to her.” Elena opens the back door, expression unreadable. “You stay here,” she tells her husband. “Make sure Julian gets his head checked and that these two don’t make any more trouble.”
“You already knew her, didn’t you?” Andrew asks as we watch Elena run up the path to our apartment building. “That’s why you were kissing her and got upset when I said all that stuff to her.”
To his credit, Diego doesn’t outwardly react to this revelation but I have no doubt he’s going to text everything Andrew and I say to each other to his wife.
“Can you start the car?” I ignore his question. I’ve implicated Leti enough for one night. “My head hurts.”
“This isn’t over,” Andrew says as Diego does as I ask. “I’ve seen enough movies to know you’re not allowed to sleep if you have a concussion. This could go on all night.”
I stay resolutely silent, though I’m too weak to think of a proper response anyway. My head isn’t throbbing nearly as hard as it was earlier and the bleeding seems to have stopped for now, but a bone-deep fatigue has washed over my body, making it harder and harder to keep my eyes open. Even holding the makeshift ice pack to my head is draining me.
