She flapped her hands in the air. “Let’s not talk about such awful stuff. Oh! Our food’s here.”
The server appeared, setting our baskets of wings and fries in front of us. I was still turning over the possibilities of Tyler and Gene in my head, and picked up adrumstick and bit into it, thinking I’d be hit with an eye-watering, delicious spicy kick, one that might jog my brain into a creative way to press Tyler more.
Instead, I was met with a bland, sweet chicken taste. Weird. I took another bite.
As I swallowed, I looked over at Tyler. He’d bitten into a wing and his face was flaming red. His lips looked oddly puffy, even after that one bite. Eek. Apparently, our baskets of food had been switched, and spices didn’t agree with him.
“You OK, baby?” my sister asked.
I had a fraction of a second to register my disgust at her calling him baby when he started to wheeze and clutch his chest. The red BBQ sauce stained his fingers and the collar of his white shirt.
“I’m...oh, God,” he wheezed. “Call...an... ambulance.”
Chapter Sixteen
Achaotic hour later, Jack and I sat in the waiting area of the regional hospital, while my sister talked with an orderly at a nearby nurses’ station. Her face had been etched with a perpetual frown since we’d followed the ambulance out of the restaurant parking lot.
This was not the way I’d wanted to end the evening.
“I didn’t know someone could be so allergic to spicy peppers. That chicken wing almost killed him,” Jack said.
“I’m sure glad that server called 911 so quickly. I was certain Tyler was going to die there for a few minutes.” I winced, thinking of his wheezing gasps at the table, then his shocking collapse onto the floor. “You really jumped in quickly with the Heimlich. Impressive.”
Jack made a face. “I thought he was choking on a bone. Learned that in high school, when I worked as a lifeguard on South Beach.”
When Jack had dragged Tyler to a sitting position, he’d wrapped his arms around him from the back and tried to dislodge what was in his throat by pressing into his solar plexus. My sister started to scream, and somehow Tyler—in between turning an odd shade of red and emitting a death rattle—had conveyed that he was allergic, not choking.
Fortunately, the ambulance service in Fern City was snappy, and had whisked Tyler out of the restaurant and to the hospital in what seemed like record time.
My sister walked over. Her face looked drawn and haggard. She sighed and sat next to me.
“How’s Tyler doing?” I asked.
“He’s going to be OK. They’ve stabilized him, but he’ll have to be here overnight.”
“Did you know he was that allergic to spicy peppers?”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
“Well, he should’ve told you. Or worn some kind of medical alert bracelet.”
Jack nodded along with my words, while Vera ignored me.
“I’ll stay with him here at the hospital and get a ride back somehow. You two can leave.”
“No, I can stay with you.” The idea of my sister being here alone didn’t sit well with me. “Why don’t you come home with us, then you can drive out to see him tomorrow morning. Or how about this, I’ll come with you tomorrow morning?”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t mind staying. It’s the least I can do, considering he was basically poisoned.”
I rolled my eyes. “He wasn’t poisoned. But he should’ve told the server about his allergy.”
“This wasn’t his fault,” she said defensively.
A sigh escaped my lips. “I know it wasn’t. But it wasn’t my fault either.”
“You were starting to question him about Gene.” Vera folded her arms.
“Sure, but that has nothing to do with his severe spicy pepper allergy.”