The Last Hour

by Charles Sheehan-Miles

  “A little bit later this morning we’ll take you down to get your paperwork done. Did you have any trouble finding the place?”

  “No, it was pretty straightforward,” I replied. In fact, I’d had a frustrating morning. After a brief phone conversation with Ray, who was still dealing with his sudden assignment to Fort Myer, I’d taken the elevator down to the garage, where my car had been parked since being shipped from Texas. And it wouldn’t start. No idea what was wrong, but the engine refused to turn over.

  Luckily, I’d been compulsively early anyway, and it was a simple matter to make arrangements with the concierge to have the car towed to the dealership, then walk to the Bethesda Metro and catch a train to the NIH campus, then follow the signs. I’d arrived here with fifteen minutes to spare.

  “Well, come on then, I’d like to introduce you to the team.”

  I followed Doctor Moore to the elevators. I was new here, and with any new situation I’m hyperaware of my surroundings, or nuances in people’s expressions and tone. And I couldn’t help but be aware that Doctor Moore, who wore a wedding ring, kept glancing in my direction, his eyes scanning my body in an unmistakable way. It was creepy, and as we stepped on the elevator, I said, “Can you tell me about yourself, Richard? Married? Kids?”

  His eyes swiveled back to the door of the elevator as it closed, and he said, “Yes. My wife is also with NIH, and we’ve got two teenagers.”

  “Oh, how nice,” I replied.

  He chuckled. “I wouldn’t go that far. Teenagers can be a handful.”

  “Do they go to school in Bethesda?”

  “Yes, at BCC.”

  “Oh! I was there for my first two years of high school.”

  “Really? I didn’t realize you were from the area.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not, I’m from a Foreign Service family. My Dad was assigned at Main State for three years, so I went to school here.”

  “And Columbia and Rice. You came with very strong recommendations. Professor Ayers spoke extremely highly of your work.”

  The door to the elevator opened, and we stepped off.

  “Our offices are all on the seventh floor here.”

  We walked down the hall, and he showed me the break room and the labs, then my own office. It was small, but had a window, which was a step up from the tiny office I’d shared at Rice.

  “You’ll have three graduate assistants, but they don’t start for another week. They’ll be down the hall in the cube farm.” He looked at his watch and said, “Argh, we’re late. Let me show you the conference room, the team is meeting this morning. This is only once a week, but it can be an ordeal.”

  “Oh?”

  He gave a weak smile. “Sometimes the knives come out at our meetings. I’d like to tell you we’re all one big happy family. But I’m sure you understand. Academic jealousy. Infighting. I’m sure you’ve experienced it elsewhere.”

  I grimaced. “I’m afraid so. Is that common here?”

  He grunted, nodding. “Yes. Be prepared ... you’re a bit young and inexperienced for a fellowship of this nature. That won’t sit well with some.”

  “I suppose I’ll just have to prove myself,” I said.

  “Well, if your thesis work is any indication, that won’t be a problem. I understand you’re the primary author on a couple of upcoming papers?”

  “Yes ... both of them in The Journal of Infectious Diseases.”

  “That’s truly quite an accomplishment at this stage of your career.”

  We came to a stop in front of an open conference room. Through the glass wall, I could see half a dozen men and women sitting around a large table in various stages or relaxation. It could have been an academic or business gathering anywhere in the world, though the dress was decidedly more formal than what I was used to at Rice, where jeans were the typical uniform. I was glad I’d followed my instincts and worn a conservative grey suit that morning, with a light blue top. Perhaps it was the proximity to Washington, DC, and the fact that this was, in fact, a government institution. The men all wore suits and ties, though one of them, a balding, red-faced man at the back corner of the table, had his tie pulled down a few inches.

  Doctor Moore led me into the room.

  “Team,” he said, “I’d like to introduce Doctor Carrie Thompson, who comes to us by way of the Rice University Ecology Department. For those of you who don’t bother to read your email…”

  “That would be all of us,” the balding man interrupted.

  Moore grimaced and resumed, awkwardly, “Again, for those of you who don’t read your email, Doctor Thompson is a behavioral ecologist, and the scientist who identified the vector for community-acquired MRSA showing up in Midwest cattle. Her papers on that research are going to be published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases next month.”

  Closest to me, on the left side of the table, was a woman a few years older than me, perhaps in her mid-to-late thirties. Brunette, pale, with frown marks on both sides of her mouth. She looked at me with a droll expression and said, “Imagine that. A behavioral ecologist?” Her voice had just a tinge of contempt to it.

  I didn’t know quite how to take it. So, I followed my normal pattern, and simply pretended it hadn’t happened. I reached out a hand and said, “Call me Carrie.”

  She was startled into taking it. “I’m Lori Beckley. Microbiologist.”

  I recognized her name, and I wanted to eliminate her hostility and turn her into an ally as quickly as possible, so I said, “Not the Doctor Beckley who did the work on the New York City MRSA mutations?”

  Her eyes widened. “I am. Though I wasn’t lead author on those papers. I’m surprised you recognize my name.”

  “Actually,” I said, “The genome mapping you did was essential for our papers.”

  She smiled. “Perhaps I’m going to like you after all, Carrie. Call me Lori, and have a seat.”

  She pulled out the chair between her and the balding man. He looked up at me as I walked toward the seat and said, “Good lord, you must be seven feet tall.”

  One of the two women across the table from him, a short redhead with an unnaturally snub nose, said in a sharp voice to the balding one, “Best watch it, Renfield, you don’t want to end up with another sexual harassment case.”

  He waved a hand in a scoffing manner and said, “That was blown way out of proportion.” Then he turned to me and held out a hand. “Doctor Warren Renfield. Also a microbiologist.”

  I took his hand and smiled. He held on considerably longer than was appropriate, and it made my skin crawl.

  The redhead said, “I’m Lila Renfield. I’m an epidemiologist and this reprobate’s wife, though that may not last if he ever holds your hand that long again.”

  Lori, to my right, said, “Don’t listen to them, Carrie. They constantly fight about everything. It’s really very tiresome.”

  The final two at the table were introduced. To Lila Renfield’s right was Han Zheng, an epidemiologist, and to her left was Karina Harris, another microbiologist. I was at least somewhat familiar with the work of everyone at that table: all of them had published on the growing MRSA threat, and all of them had substantial research to their credit.

  “Perhaps we can get started,” Doctor Moore said. “If all of you are finished socializing.”

  Lori said, “Richard, it’s hardly socializing to welcome a new member to the team. Especially someone with such an unusual specialty.”

  Richard raised his eyes. “You’re all familiar with Doctor Thompson’s work?”

  Everyone at the table nodded. And I’ll admit, I was intimidated. This wasn’t a group of graduate students playing around in a lab in Central Texas. This was the primary team working on MRSA at one of the nation’s premier medical research labs.

  Zheng, one of the two epidemiologists at the table, said, “I’m quite familiar with your conclusions, Doctor Thompson, but I’m afraid I’m doubtful.”

  “Carrie, please,” I said. “And ... why?”
>
  “First of all, I’m curious what led you to believe that the cats were transmitting the pathogens in the first place.”

  I sat back in my seat. “Initially, it was just curiosity. We were looking into the dislocation of habitats in the Sierra Nevada, and trying to track the mountain lions to figure out where they were settling. It turned out they were moving not far off from major highways, going east, which in some cases brought them into contact with major population centers.”

  “Aren’t mountain lions solitary animals?”

  “They are. This was an overall population study.”

  “I see. So it’s ... correlation. You observed outbreaks of community acquired MRSA at the starting point and end points of your lion’s migration paths?”

  I shook my head. “No. The evidence is pretty definitive. Doctor Beckley’s work was what made that possible, actually ... the strain she studied from the recalled meat in New York last year had the same mutations as the Sierra Nevada strain we were looking at. So last summer we went hunting some of the animals we’d already placed tracking devices on, and found the same strain living symbiotically in their fur. One of the lions actually got an infection and was dying by the time we got to her. The research will be published next month.”

  “Oh, I see,” Zheng said. “I’m intrigued. And you were one of the authors of the paper?”

  Moore interjected, “She was the primary author.”

  Zheng raised his eyebrows. “I’m impressed.”

  From there, the conversation veered to topics having nothing to do with me or my research. The Renfields, Lila and Warren, bickered for nearly thirty minutes about the significance of variations of MRSA found in Atlanta area hospitals versus Chicago, and my eyes were starting to glaze over by the time Moore shifted the conversation. Finally, after nearly three hours, Moore broke up the meeting. It was well after two in the afternoon by that time, and I was getting so hungry I was lightheaded.

  As I stepped away from the table, Lori Beckley said to me, “If you aren’t busy this evening, why don’t you join me for a drink? It’s always good to have an ally in this bunch.” Her eyes swept across the other members of the team as she said the words.

  Ray had already told me he was expecting to be on duty all night, so it was easy to answer, “Sure, I’d like that.”

  Four hours later, the two of us were sitting down for drinks at Rock Bottom in Bethesda, and she said, “I’ll be honest with you. When you first walked in ... twenty something, tall, beautiful ... I misjudged you.”

  “Really?” I asked, half sarcastically.

  She smirked. “Moore has an unfortunate history of ... touching inappropriately. Though as far as I know it hasn’t happened in a long time. But he sees himself as a dashing celebrity in the world of epidemiology.”

  “Is there such a thing?” I asked, incredulously.

  She chuckled, her laugh a low, catlike purr.

  “Touché,” she responded. “In any event, I was afraid that you were brought on the team as, um, eye candy. I apologize.”

  I smiled bitterly. “I’ve been accused of that before.”

  “Well, you certainly fended that off. I enjoyed your tangle with Zheng.”

  “I didn’t expect it to be quite so ... combative.”

  “That’s the culture Moore fosters. He believes competition brings out the best in all of us.”

  “Sometimes it brings out the worst,” I replied. At that point the waitress arrived, and we ordered our drinks, a gin and tonic for me, and something disgustingly sweet for her.

  She told me a little bit about her own history with the team. She’d been at NIH for nine years, working on antibiotic resistant strains the entire time.

  “You enjoy the work?” I asked.

  “I do. Though for the last two years it’s more paperwork than anything. I’m coordinating large grants at half a dozen institutions, and I don’t get to do much real science any more. I envy you with your story of going out and tagging mountain lions.”

  “And are you married? Kids?”

  She shook her head, giving me a tiny smile. “No. I actually chopped my husband up into little bits and threw him into Rock Creek.” Then she slapped her forehead and grinned. “No. Sorry. That was just what I wanted to do. In fact, my ex is alive and well and married to a blonde with no more brains than a paperweight.”

  I laughed, hard, and she said, “What about you? I don’t see a ring.”

  “I’m ... very serious about a guy. I think we’re edging close to being engaged.”

  “Oh? What does he do?”

  I looked at the table, and for just a second I thought, what does Ray do? He used to be a soldier. And, I guess he was again. “He’s a soldier, actually. He just came home from a tour in Afghanistan a few months ago.”

  “Wow!” Lori said. Then she took a big drink. “That’ll shake up the pencil-necks at NIH when they try to chase you down. What does he do? Army? Marines?”

  “He’s Army infantry. But he’s planning on finishing his undergraduate at Georgetown next year.”

  “A soldier and smart. I like that,” she said. “You should introduce me to his friends.” She had a wicked expression in her face as she said it.

  “We’re going to get along just fine,” I said.

  I thought I was done (Ray)

  It was only my third night back in the Army, and somehow I managed to draw the short stick and end up on CQ duty. CQ means Charge of Quarters. Army headquarters don’t shut down at night, even for a command in the Criminal Investigation Division. So when everyone goes home at night, one Sergeant and one enlisted man sticks around to answer the phones, check for fires and unlocked doors, and be ready for the next war to start.

  I’d done CQ duty as a private before Afghanistan, but this was my first time in charge, and my crappy attitude wasn’t really helping matters. My parents had overnighted my laptop and a few other things, so at least I had something to occupy me. But the truth was, I didn’t want to be there. Up until New Year’s Day, I’d been sure I was done with the Army. It had only been a couple months since I’d gotten out, and it disturbed me how normal the uniform felt.

  Even though it was involuntary, I suppose I might have felt differently if I’d had something to do. Some responsibilities. Anything. As it was, I spent my first day in-processing back into the Army, getting issued new uniforms and a spot in the barracks. The second, third and fourth day? I spent those sitting in a chair in the company headquarters. I didn’t have a role in this unit: they were simply housing and feeding me until ... whenever. By the end of the second day I was so tense from inactivity I didn’t know what to do with myself. I brought my laptop with me to the headquarters on the third day, and spent the entire day on that. No one said a word to me. I was essentially invisible, unnecessary, and completely superfluous to the function of what was, after all, a criminal investigation unit.

  At five minutes after eleven, the front door of the headquarters opened, and PFC Bowers came in, carrying a pizza. He was a scrawny soldier, about five foot four, and looked like a strong wind would have blown him away. I tried to imagine him on a twenty-mile road march with a rucksack and rifle out in the boonies, and I just couldn’t see it happening.

  “Pizza’s here, Sarge,” he said.

  “Did you find a Starbucks?”

  “Nah,” he replied.

  Damn. I was stuck here all night, and the coffee coming out of the percolator tasted like it had been brewed fourteen years before. Amazing how quickly you get used to luxuries. I was worried about getting a decent cup of coffee. Three months ago I was worried about not getting shot by either the Taliban or my fellow soldiers.

  Screw it. I popped on to Facebook and sent a message to Carrie. You awake?

  Her reply was quick: Yes. Call me.

  She didn’t have to ask me twice. I grabbed a slice of pizza and called her on my cell.

  “Hey, soldier,” she said, her voice sleepy.

  “You don’t so
und that awake,” I said.

  “If you must know, I’m a little drunk.”

  “Shit. Without me?”

  “We’re still going out tomorrow?” she asked.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Good.”

  “So tell me about your first day.”

  We chatted, and she recounted the story. “You’ll like Lori,” she said. “She’s a funny lady.”

  “You think it’s funny she chopped up her husband?” I asked. That raised an alarmed look from PFC Bowers, who was sitting across the room from me.

  Carrie laughed. “I told you, she was joking. Besides, you wouldn’t ever have to worry about that.”

  “So what you’re saying is, I couldn’t possibly piss you off that much?”

  “Oh, I’m sure you could. But remember, I know how to handle mountain lions.”

  I laughed out loud. “All right. I’ll be very careful then. See you tomorrow night.”

  “I love you, Ray,” she said. I never got tired of hearing that.

  “Love you,” I replied then hung up.

  Crap. Seven hours and forty-five more minutes to kill. It was going to be a long, long night.

  “So, uh, Sarge,” Bowers said. “I haven’t seen you around before. You new to the unit?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Where’d you come from?”

  “The block,” I answered. The block was a generic term for where I wished I was: not in the military.

  “I don’t get it,” Bowers said.

  I shook my head. “I got out a few months ago. They called me back up and assigned me here.”

  “That sucks. Or did you want to come back?”

  I shook my head. “I thought I was done. I’m a witness in an investigation, and apparently they figured it’d be more convenient to have me close by.”

  “Oh, that sucks. What kind of investigation?”

  “Can’t talk about it. So what’s your story? What do you do around here?”

  “Battalion personnel clerk.”

  Paper shuffler. Which the Army had plenty of, and needed plenty of in order to keep things going, I guess.