Finally I saw AK47’s car pull into the parking lot. She parked in the visitor spaces and was wearing her rock-and-roll hoodie with the hood up.
I ran to the door and waited for her special knock on the door and when the special knock came on the door I took off the chain that you can only open from the inside of the apartment.
“Easy, Zee, easy,” AK47 said, coming in. We hugged and she closed the door and then I went and put the chain on. She took down the hood of her sweatshirt and ran her hands through her messy hair, which looked like cartoons where a person gets shocked by electricity and their hair sticks out in every direction.
“You said he left on his own?” she said. “Like, nobody physically forced him to?”
“Nobody physically forced him,” I said. “But it was Toucan.”
AK47 rubbed her face in her hands. “Fuck me right in the face. That asshole.” She breathed out some air and flopped down on the couch.
I came and sat down next to her and put my head in her armpit, which smelled a little but not in a way that made me feel bad. I closed my eyes and pretended that I was hidden and could not be seen by the world.
“When this is all over,” AK47 whispered, “I am going to tear Gert a new asshole.”
* * *
I had fallen asleep on the couch and there was a blanket over me. I was in the middle of a dream about Grendels again, and in the dream they had taken Gert from the village we lived in and burned everything down, except for me. I hid and did not save Gert, because I am a coward, and the Grendels laughed at me and Gert screamed for me to help him but I could not do anything.
When I woke up from the dream I did not know where I was and thought that I was still in the village, still being a coward, and that the Grendels were still calling me names as they drove their boats into the sea.
AK47 touched my arm.
“Easy,” she said. “It’s me. It’s AK47.”
“Gert?” I said.
“He’s back.”
I sat up and rubbed my eyes and asked what time it was.
“Five.” He had been gone for many hours, but at least the Grendels were not eating him.
“I want to see him,” I said.
“He’s not in good shape. Okay? You need to stay calm. Can you do your counting to ten?”
I did not want to do my counting to ten. I wanted to see Gert. AK47 would not let me see him, so together we took our deep breaths and did the numbers.
“Okay? The heart has slowed down?” AK47 asked.
I gave her my wrist and she touched where the big vein is and smiled.
“Atta girl.”
We walked to Gert’s bedroom, where he was lying down on the bed with his back to us.
“Hi,” I said, very quietly so I did not hurt his head. I made a scared noise when I saw the way he looked. He had a black eye, which was actually purple, and his lip was fat.
“I’m fine,” Gert said. “Relax.”
“If by ‘fine’ you mean you look like a frigging pumpkin that’s been beaten with a baseball bat,” AK47 said.
Gert looked at me. “How are you doing?”
“How am I doing?”
AK47 put her hand on my shoulder. “Get me a towel from the bathroom, okay? Can you wet it a bit with warm water under the tap?”
I ran out of the room and did what she told me.
I brought it over and she used it on Gert’s face. He was turned away from me. AK47 pressed the towel against his face. When she took it away from it, there was blood on it.
AK47 told Gert to hold it to his face until she came back.
We went to the kitchen and she shut the door behind her.
“Is he going to be okay?” I asked.
“He’ll be fine. He might need some ice, but that’s it.” She opened the fridge and took out some frozen vegetables that we never eat. She put the bag on the kitchen counter and hit it with her elbow until it was flat and not clumpy.
I asked AK47 what we were going to do about the villains who did that to him. “We need revenge.”
Váli, the Viking god of Revenge, is one of the only people who will survive Ragnarok, or the end of the world. He is the son of Odin and a giant woman named Rindr.
Now I was angry. Not at Gert, but at Toucan and the villains who had hurt my brother, who was a warrior and did not deserve to look like a pumpkin.
“One thing at a time,” AK47 said, taking the vegetables to Gert’s room. I followed her and she stopped me in the door.
“Jesus,” she said, and handed me the vegetables. She ran into the bedroom and went to Gert.
He was on his hands and knees and was throwing up onto the carpet. The sound was loud and made me feel sick too.
When AK47 came out of the room she said that Gert needed to be alone, and that he needed to be in the dark for a while.
“I think he’s got a concussion,” she said. “So for now we need to keep him in the dark and away from noise and light.”
I went to my bedroom and took all my blankets and pillows and brought them outside Gert’s room, in the long hallway, so that if Toucan or any Grendels were going to come for Gert they would need to go through me first.
I would not be the coward in real life that I was in the dream.
AK47 said it was not going to be a good idea, sleeping in the hallway.
“You’re going to be in the way,” she said.
Without saying anything, I gave her THE LOOK to show her that I was going to stand guard. “Nobody is going to take Gert away again,” I said. “He is not going to get any more concussions.”
I was so mad with Toucan that all I could think about was killing him. I had never thought about actually killing people before. I thought of defeating monsters and villains, but actually the killing part was always not my favorite part of the Viking sagas.
I thought of Toucan dying in front of me. I cut off his head and held it up and showed the world what happens to people who fucked with Gert and my tribe.
I went to my list of THINGS LEGENDS NEED and crossed out all of the villains except Toucan.
chapter twenty-seven
A day later Gert called Dr. Laird to schedule an emergency appointment after the robbery. At first Gert didn’t want to. He said I was going to be okay, and I told him I was too, but AK47 said that it was necessary.
“Trauma lingers, Gert,” she said. “Don’t forget that.”
Lingering means to hang around, and trauma is when something really bad happens, so trauma lingering means that the bad thing hangs around.
Dr. Laird told us to come in earlier than usual, first thing in the morning, which is the worst time of the day for Gert. He likes sleeping in, and hated going to morning classes, back when he was going to school and not part of Toucan’s tribe.
Gert was still upset over what had happened. He wouldn’t tell me what was missing from his room, and he did not call the police, which made me glad, since I didn’t want to have to lie more about Hendo.
I was feeling ashamed about Hendo. All night I kept trying to call him. The phone kept ringing until the voice of the recording said, “THIS NUMBER IS NOT IN SERVICE.” Google said that the recording meant that Hendo had shut off his phone and that he turned the number off, so it couldn’t have been an accident, or that he just didn’t notice that his phone was ringing.