Miles to Go Read Free Page A

also in the hospital—not that I was planning to send a get-well card—but it was good information to have.
    Alice said, “The police have asked to speak with you when you’re feeling up to it.”
    “I’m up to it,” I said quickly. I wanted to talk to the police for my own reasons—I had questions about the night.
    It was less than five minutes after her departure when two police officers in uniform entered my room, stopping a few feet inside my door. The officer closest to me, a short, slim man, spoke. “Mr. Christoffersen, I’m Officer Eskelson. This is my partner, Lieutenant Foulger. May we come in?”
    I looked at the other officer who was standing behind him. “Yes.”
    Eskelson turned to Angel. “Is this your wife?”
    “No,” she said. “I’m just a friend.”
    “Do you mind if she’s here for our interview?”
    “I can leave,” Angel said.
    “She’s fine,” I said.
    Angel remained seated. Officer Eskelson walked to the side of my bed. “How are you feeling?”
    “Other than the concussion and three knife wounds?” I asked.
    “I’m sorry, I’ll keep this short.” He lifted a pad and pen. “I’d like you to describe, in your own words, the night of your assault.”
    I’ve never understood why people said “in your own words.”
Who else’s words would I use?
    “It was around midnight when I stopped at the Hilton in Airway Heights for a room, but they didn’t have any vacancies, so I had to go on to Spokane. I had walked about a mile when I heard some rap music and a car pulled up alongside me, a yellow Impala with a black stripe.
    “There were some rough-looking kids in the car. I assumed they were gang members. They started yelling things at me. I just ignored them, but they pulled off the side of the road and got out of their car.”
    “Would you recognize these youths?”
    “You mean like in a police lineup?”
    He nodded.
    “I don’t know. Some of them. I thought you had them in custody.”
    “We do,” Foulger said.
    Eskelson said, “So after they pulled over, what happened?”
    “They told me to give them my pack. I tried to talk them out of it. That’s when the guy who stabbed me said they were going to take it after they beat me up.”
    “Is that what he said, ‘beat you up’?”
    “I think his actual words were, ‘mess you up.’ He said they were out looking for a ‘bum to roll.’”
    He scribbled on his pad. “Then what happened?”
    “He came at me.”
    “The kid who stabbed you?”
    I nodded. “I hit him and he fell over. Then one of the other guys hit me over the head with something. It felt like a pipe or a club.”
    “It was a baseball bat,” Lieutenant Foulger said, clearing his throat. “Louisville Slugger.”
    “He just about knocked me out. I saw stars, but somehow I kept on my feet. Then everything got crazy. They all came at me at once. Someone knocked me to the ground and everyone was kicking me. The big guy kept stomping on my head. Then everything stopped. I looked up and the little guy took out a knife and asked me if I wanted to die.”
    Eskelson took his phone and showed me a picture of a young man. The picture had been taken in the hospital. “This guy?
    I had to examine the image closely. The young man in the picture looked much different than the cocky, knife-wielding thug I’d encountered. Half of his face was eclipsed by gauze bandages and an oxygen tube ran down from his nose. He looked small and frail.
    “That looks like him.”
    He scribbled on his pad. “Were those his exact words? ‘Do you want to die?’”
    “I’m pretty sure of it.”
    He wrote on his pad. “Then what?”
    “I don’t remember being stabbed. Someone kicked me in the face. The next thing I remember was the paramedicsloading me onto a stretcher.” I combed my hair back with my hand. “So tell me, why am I still alive?”
    “Luck,” Eskelson said, dropping his pad to his side. “Or God didn’t want you dead. While you were being assaulted, a