Fictions

by Nancy Kress

  Hah! Take that, Detective Thug!

  “Thank you,” Geraci said. “Are you a physician, Dr. Erdmann?”

  “No. A doctor of physics.”

  He half-expected Geraci to be as ignorant about that as Bob Donovan had been, but Geraci surprised him. “Experimental or theoretical?”

  “Theoretical. Not, however, for a long time. Now I teach.”

  “Good for you.” Geraci rose, Officer Washington just a beat behind him. In Henry’s hearing the woman had said nothing whatsoever. “Thank you both. We’ll be in touch about the autopsy results.”

  In the elevator, Tara Washington said, “These old-people places give me the creeps.”

  “One day you and—”

  “Spare me the lecture, Vince. I know I have to get old. I don’t have to like it.”

  “You have a lot of time yet,” he said, but his mind clearly wasn’t on the rote reassurance. “Erdmann knows something.”

  “Yeah?” She looked at him with interest; Vince Geraci had a reputation in the Department for having a “nose.” He was inevitably right about things that smelled hinkey. Truth was, she was a little in awe of him. She’d only made detective last month and was fucking lucky to be partnered with Geraci. Still, her natural skepticism led her to say, “That old guy? He sure the hell didn’t do the job himself. He couldn’t squash a cockroach. You talking about a hit for hire?”

  “Don’t know.” Geraci considered. “No. Something else. Something more esoteric.”

  Tara didn’t know what “esoteric” meant, so she kept quiet. Geraci was smart. Too smart for his own good, some uniforms said, but that was just jealousy talking, or the kind of cops that would rather smash down doors than solve crimes. Tara Washington knew she was no door-smasher. She intended to learn everything she could from Vince Geraci, even if she didn’t have his vocabulary. Everything, and then some. She intended to someday be just as good as he was.

  Geraci said, “Let’s talk to the staff about this epidemic of food poisoning.”

  But the food poisoning checked out. And halfway through the morning, the autopsy report was called in. Geraci shut his cell and said, “Peltier died of ‘a cardiac event.’ Massive and instantaneous heart failure.”

  “Young cop like that? Fit and all?”

  “That’s what the M.E. says.”

  “So no foul play. Investigation closed.” In a way, she was disappointed. The murder of a cop by a battered wife would have been pretty high-profile. That’s why Geraci had been assigned to it.

  “Investigation closed,” Geraci said. “But just the same, Erdmann knows something. We’re just never gonna find out what it is.”

  SEVEN

  Just before noon on Friday, Evelyn lowered her plump body onto a cot ready to slide into the strange-looking medical tube. She had dressed up for the occasion in her best suit, the polyester blue one with all the blue lace, and her good cream pumps. Dr. DiBella—such a good-looking young man, too bad she wasn’t fifty years younger aha ha ha—said, “Are you comfortable, Mrs. Krenchnoted?”

  “Call me Evelyn. Yes, I’m fine, I never had one of these—what did you call it?”

  “A functional MRI. I’m just going to strap you in, since it’s very important you lie completely still for the procedure.”

  “Oh, yes, I see, you don’t want my brain wobbling all over the place while you take a picture of—Gina, you still there? I can’t see—”

  “I’m here,” Gina called. “Don’t be scared, Evelyn. ‘Though I walk in the valley of—’ ”

  “There’s no shadows here and I’m not scared!” Really, sometimes Gina could be Too Much. Still, the MRI tube was a bit unsettling. “You just tell me when you’re ready to slide me into that thing, doctor, and I’ll brace myself. It’s tight as a coffin, isn’t it? Well, I’m going to be underground a long time but I don’t plan on starting now, aha ha ha! But if I can keep talking to you while I go in—”

  “Certainly. Just keep talking.” He sounded resigned, poor man. Well, no wonder, he must get bored with doing things like this all the live-long day. She cast around for something to cheer him up.

  “You’re over at St. Sebastian’s a lot now, aren’t you, when you’re not here that is, did you hear yet about Anna Chernov’s necklace?”

  “No, what about it? That’s it, just hold your head right here.”

  “It’s fabulous!” Evelyn said, a little desperately. He was putting some sort of vise on her head, she couldn’t move it at all. Her heart sped up. “Diamonds and rubies and I don’t know what all. The Russian czar gave it to some famous ballerina who—”

  “Really? Which czar?”

  “The czar! Of Russia!” Really, what did the young learn in school these days? “He gave it to some famous ballerina who was Anna Chernov’s teacher and she gave it to Anna, who naturally keeps it in the St. Sebastian safe because just think if it were stolen, it wouldn’t do the Home’s reputation any good at all and anyway it’s absolutely priceless so—oh!”

  “You’ll just slide in nice and slow, Evelyn. It’ll be fine. Close your eyes if that helps. Now, have you seen this necklace?”

  “Oh, no!” Evelyn gasped. Her heart raced as she felt the bed slide beneath her. “I’d love to, of course, but Anna isn’t exactly friendly, she’s pretty stuck-up, well I suppose that comes with being so famous and all but still—Doctor!”

  “Do you want to come out?” he said, and she could tell that he was disappointed, she was sensitive that way, and she did want to come out but she didn’t want to disappoint him, so . . . “No! I’m fine! The necklace is something I’d really like to see, though, all those diamonds and rubies and maybe even sapphires too, those are my favorite stones with that blue fire in them, I’d really really like to see it—”

  She was babbling, but all at once it seemed she could see the necklace in her mind, just the way she’d pictured it. A string of huge glowing diamonds and hanging from them a pendant of rubies and sapphires shining like I-don’t-know-what but more beautiful than anything she’d ever seen oh she’d love to touch it just once! If Anna Chernov weren’t so stuck-up and selfish then maybe she’d get the necklace from the safe and show it to Evelyn let her touch it get the necklace from the safe it would surely be the most wonderful thing Evelyn had ever seen or imagined get the necklace from the safe—

  Evelyn screamed. Pain spattered through her like hot oil off a stove, burning her nerves and turning her mind to a red cloud . . . So much pain! She was going to die, this was it and she hadn’t even bought her cemetery plot yet oh God the pain—

  Then the pain was gone and she lay sobbing as the bed slid out of the tube. Dr. DiBella was saying something but his voice was far away and growing farther. . . farther . . . farther . . . .

  Gone.

  Henry sat alone, eating a tuna fish sandwich at his kitchen table. Carrie had gone to work elsewhere in the building. It had been pleasant having her here, even though of course she—

  Energy poured through him, like a sudden surge in household current, and all his nerves glowed. That was the only word. No pain this time, but something bright grew in his mind, white and red and blue but certainly not a flag, hard as stones . . . yes, stones . . . jewels . . .

  It was gone. An immense lassitude took Henry. He could barely hold his head up, keep his eyes open. It took all his energy to push off from the table, stagger into the bedroom, and fall onto the bed, his mind empty as deep space.

  Carrie was filling in at a pre-lunch card game in the dining room, making a fourth at euchre with Ed Rosewood, Ralph Galetta, and Al Cosmano. Mr. Cosmano was her Friday morning resident-assignee. She’d taken him to buy a birthday gift for his daughter in California, to the post office to wrap and mail it, and then to the physical therapist. Mr. Cosmano was a complainer. St. Sebastian’s was too cold, the doctors didn’t know nothing, they wouldn’t let you smoke, the food was terrible, he missed the old neighborhood, his daughter insisted on living in California instead of making a home
for her old dad, kids these days . . . . Carrie went on smiling. Even Mr. Cosmano was better than being home in the apartment where Jim had died. When her lease was up, she was going to find something else, but in the meantime she had signed up for extra hours at St. Sebastian’s, just to not be home.

  “Carrie, hearts led,” Ed Rosewood said. He was her partner, a sweet man whose hobby was watching C-Span. He would watch anything at all on C-Span, even hearings of the House Appropriations Committee, for hours and hours. This was good for St. Sebastian’s because Mr. Rosewood didn’t want an aide. He had to be pried off the TV even to play cards once a week. Mike O’Kane, their usual fourth, didn’t feel well enough to play today, which was why Carrie sat holding five cards as the kitchen staff clattered in the next room, preparing lunch. Outside a plane passed overhead, droned away.

  “Oh, yes,” Carrie said, “hearts.” She had a heart, thank heavens, since she couldn’t remember what was trump. She was no good at cards.

  “There’s the king.”

  “Garbage from me.”

  “Your lead, Ed.”

  “Ace of clubs.”

  “Clubs going around . . . . Carrie?”

  “Oh, yes, I . . .” Who led? Clubs were the only things on the table. She had no clubs, so she threw a spade. Mr. Galetta laughed.

  Al Cosmano said, with satisfaction, “Carrie, you really shouldn’t trump your partner’s ace.”

  “Did I do that? Oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Rosewood, I—”

  Ed Rosewood slumped in his chair, eyes closed. So did Al Cosmano. Ralph Galetta stared dazedly at Carrie, then carefully laid his head on the table, eyes fixed.

  “Mr. Cosmano! Help, somebody!”

  The kitchen staff came running. But now all three men had their eyes open again, looking confused and sleepy.

  “What happened?” demanded a cook.

  “I don’t know,” Carrie said, “they all just got . . . tired.”

  The cook stared at Carrie as if she’d gone demented. “Tired?”

  “Yeah . . . tired,” Ed Rosewood said. “I just . . . bye, guys. I’m going to take a nap. Don’t want lunch.” He rose, unsteady but walking on his own power, and headed out of the dining room. The other two men followed.

  “Tired,” the cook said, glaring at Carrie.

  “All at once! Really, really tired, like a spell of some kind!”

  “A simultaneous ‘spell,’ ” the cook said. “Right. You’re new here? Well, old people get tired.” She walked away.

  Carrie wasn’t new. The three men hadn’t just had normal tiredness. But there was no way to tell this bitch that, no way to even tell herself in any terms that made sense. Nothing was right.

  Carrie had no appetite for lunch. She fled to the ladies’ room, where at least she could be alone.

  Vince Geraci’s cell rang as he and Tara Washington exited a convenience store on East Elm. They’d been talking to the owner, who may or may not have been involved in an insurance scam. Vince had let Tara do most of the questioning, and she’d felt herself swell like a happy balloon when he said, “Nice job, rookie.”

  “Geraci,” he said into the cell, then listened as they walked. Just before they reached the car, he said, “Okay,” and clicked off.

  “What do we have?” Tara asked.

  “We have a coincidence.”

  “A coincidence?”

  “Yes.” The skin on his forehead took on strange topography. “St. Sebastian’s again. Somebody cracked the safe in the office.”

  “Anything gone?”

  “Let’s go find out.”

  Erin Bass woke on her yoga mat, the TV screen a blue blank except for channel 3 in the upper corner. She sat up, dazed but coherent. Something had happened.

  She sat up carefully, her ringed hands lifting her body slowly off the mat. No broken bones, no pain anywhere. Apparently she had just collapsed onto the mat and then stayed out as the yoga tape played itself to an end. She’d been up to the fish posture, so there had been about twenty minutes left on the tape. And how long since then? The wall clock said 1:20. So about an hour.

  Nothing hurt. Erin took a deep breath, rolled her head, stood up. Still no pain. And there hadn’t been pain when it happened, but there had been something . . . not the calm place that yoga or meditation sometimes took her, either. That place was pale blue, like a restful vista of valleys seen at dusk from a high, still mountain. This was brightly hued, rushing, more like a river . . . a river of colors, blue and red and white.

  She walked into the apartment’s tiny kitchen, a slim figure in black leotard and tights. She’d missed lunch but wasn’t hungry. From the cabinet she chose a chamomile tea, heated filtered water, and set the tea to steep.

  That rushing river of energy was similar to what she’d felt before. Henry Erdmann had asked her about it, so perhaps he had felt it this time, as well. Although Henry hadn’t seemed accepting of her explanation of trishna, grasping after the material moment, versus awakening. He was a typical scientist, convinced that science was the only route to knowledge, that what he could not test or measure or replicate was therefore not true even if he’d experienced it himself. Erin knew better. But there were a lot of people like Henry in this world, people who couldn’t see that while rejecting “religion,” they’d made a religion of science.

  Sipping her tea, Erin considered what she should do next. She wasn’t afraid of what had happened. Very little frightened Erin Bass. This astonished some people and confused the rest. But, really, what was there to be afraid of? Misfortune was just one turn of the wheel, illness another, death merely a transition from one state to another. What was due to come, would come, and beneath it all the great flow of cosmic energy would go on, creating the illusion that people thought was the world. She knew that the other residents of St. Sebastian’s considered her nuts, pathetic, or so insulated from realty as to be both (“Trust-fund baby, you know. Never worked a day in her life.”) It didn’t matter. She’d made herself a life here of books and meditation and volunteering on the Nursing floors, and if her past was far different than the other residents imagined, that was their illusion. She herself never thought about the past. It would come again, or not, as maya chose.

  Still, something should be done about these recent episodes. They had affected not just her but also Henry Erdmann and, surprisingly, Evelyn Krenchnoted. Although on second thought, Erin shouldn’t be surprised. Everyone possessed karma, even Evelyn, and Erin had no business assuming she knew anything about what went on under Evelyn’s loud, intrusive surface. There were many paths up the mountain. So Erin should talk to Evelyn as well as to Henry. Perhaps there were others, too. Maybe she should—

  Her doorbell rang. Leaving her tea on the table, Erin fastened a wrap skirt over her leotard and went to the door. Henry Erdmann stood there, leaning on his walker, his face a rigid mask of repressed emotion. “Mrs. Bass, there’s something I’d like to discuss with you. May I come in?”

  A strange feeling came over Erin. Not the surge of energy from the yoga mat, nor the high blue restfulness of meditation. Something else. She’d had these moments before, in which she recognized that something significant was about to happen. They weren’t mystical or deep, these occasions; probably they came from nothing more profound than a subliminal reading of body language. But, always, they presaged something life-changing.

  “Of course, Dr. Erdmann. Come in.”

  She held the door open wider, stepping aside to make room for his walker, but he didn’t budge. Had he exhausted all his strength? He was ninety, she’d heard, ten years older than Erin, who was in superb shape from a lifetime of yoga and bodily moderation. She had never smoked, drank, overeaten. All her indulgences had been emotional, and not for a very long time now.

  “Do you need help? Can I—”

  “No. No.” He seemed to gather himself and then inched the walker forward, moving toward her table. Over his shoulder, with a forced afterthought that only emphasized his tension, he said, “Thiev
es broke into St. Sebastian’s an hour and a half ago. They opened the safe in the office, the one with Anna Chernov’s necklace.”

  Erin had never heard of Anna Chernov’s necklace. But the image of the rushing river of bright colors came back to her with overwhelming force, and she knew that she had been right: Something had happened, and nothing was ever going to be the same again.

  EIGHT

  For perhaps the tenth time, Jake DiBella picked up the fMRI scans, studied them yet again, and put them down. He rubbed his eyes hard with both sets of knuckles. When he took his hands away from his face, his bare little study at St. Sebastian’s looked blurry but the fMRI scans hadn’t changed. This is your brain on self-destruction, he thought, except that it wasn’t his brain. It was Evelyn Krenchnoted’s brain, and after she recovered consciousness, that tiresome and garrulous lady’s brain had worked as well as it ever had.

  But the scan was extraordinary. As Evelyn lay in the magnetic imaging tube, everything had changed between one moment and the next. First image: a normal pattern of blood flow and oxygenation, and the next—

  “Hello?”

  Startled, Jake dropped the printouts. He hadn’t even heard the door open, or anyone knock. He really was losing it. “Come in, Carrie, I’m sorry, I didn’t . . . You don’t have to do that.”

  She had bent to pick up the papers that had skidded across his desk and onto the floor. With her other hand she balanced a cardboard box on one hip. As she straightened, he saw that her face was pink under the loose golden hair, so that she looked like an overdone Victorian figurine. The box held a plant, a picture frame, and various other bits and pieces.

  Uh oh. Jake had been down this road before.

  She said, “I brought you some things for your office. Because it looks so, well, empty. Cold.”