by L. A. Cruz
“I got Presidential fitness!” Manny had said. “That means that one day I’ll be the president.”
Helia, who had started high school, had gotten home first and was sitting on the couch and watching television as she did her homework.
“Dad’s not home,” she had said. “He's gone again.”
“Not your Dad, my Dad. Mom said he would be home today.”
“Well, he’s not,” Helia said.
That's all she had to say and Manny balled up the progress report and threw it in the kitchen trash. Helia hadn't known what was on the paper until later when she was making dinner. Her mother had already left for the late shift at the hospital. Helia poured out the extra broth and saw the paper crumbled in the trash. She took it out and opened it up. There was a line at the bottom for a parent signature. But there were no parents at home to sign it. Through no fault of his own, Manny would get in trouble for failing to complete the assignment.
Still standing against the brick wall, Helia did her thumb exercises. She made fists, in and out, in and out, as if she were squeezing an invisible stress ball.
Then she held her hands up to her face. On the back of her hands, her veins had swollen and were snaking toward her knuckles.
They gave her an idea.
Chapter 30
The next day after lunch, Helia went straight to the mood room. She slipped inside and turned on the projector. The fans whirred to life as the bulb warmed up. Once it was running, she thumbed through the clips on the attached hard drive and stopped on one she hadn’t projected before. It was the view from a mountaintop. The videographer must have put the tripod legs right up to the edge of the cliff, for a sheer drop-off was projected not a foot above the tiled floor.
In the distance the tops of pine trees swayed in the breeze and the black, cocoon-like shapes of various birds clutched the branches. The branches creaked and the birds cawed. Past the green, pointy tips, the tree line met the sky. It was nearly dusk, and the clouds, fragmented as if blown apart, were catching the last gasps sunlight in pink and purple sprinkles.
She unbuttoned her uniform shirt and lay it gently on the lounge chair. She was conscious of her heart, its beating against the wind in the trees, the birds cawing. She touched her upper arm just below the shoulder where the bone fragment had embedded itself. The skin was slightly raised. She grabbed her bicep and twisted her arm to try to see the spot. The snake now had a tiny pink scar in its mouth, like it was about to swallow a chunk of flesh. On leave, she might go in for a touch-up tat. Hopefully, her artist hadn’t fled for greener pastures.
But her tattoo hardly mattered now. She made a fist with her right hand and extended her middle finger slightly so that its knuckle made a point, incongruous with the rest of her fist. Then she took a deep breath, stared at the clouds as they floated by, and punched the snake in the head. She grimaced. Punched again. Again. She kept punching it until her fingers tingled and her left arm up to the elbow had gone numb.
Then she put on her uniform, turned off the projector, and went back to the cell block.
That evening, after dinner, Helia banged on the Colonel’s door.
“One minute,” he said.
When he opened the door, he was out of uniform. He was standing in front of the stainless steel sink and wearing only a brown T-shirt, trousers, and shower shoes. With a towel, he wiped the excess shaving cream off his face. She noticed a scar on the side of his neck.
“What is it, Corporal?”
“Can I show you something, sir?”
“What?”
“In private.”
He stepped back to let her enter. She closed the door behind her and unbuttoned her top button.
He stared at her chest. Then he grinned and unbuttoned his trousers. “I can’t say I haven’t been thinking about this for a while now.”
She paused. It made her feel as worthless as the dab of shaving cream still left on his chin. Toned or not, the guy was old enough to be her father and she winced at the thought of lying down on the bunk with him.
“Nevermind,” she said and turned for the door. “I think I’ll go.”
“Wait. I’m sorry,” the Colonel said. “I didn’t mean anything by that. It was a test.”
“A test, sir?”
“Yes. After that incident with Dunning, I wanted to make sure you weren’t going around and whoring it up.”
“I’m not whoring it up. What did Dunning say?”
“That’s confidential.”
Helia shook her head. “I came to talk about my arm.”
The Colonel re-buttoned his trousers. “Right. Of course.”
She pulled her left arm out of the sleeve and turned to show him the snake. In the mirror, she got a full view of the bruise. Like a halo, the snake now wore a black and blue ring. It was about the size of a hamburger patty.
“I just noticed it this morning.”
“Was that where you got hit with the bone shrapnel?”
“Yes.”
“Christ. That doesn’t look good. How many weeks has it been?”
“A least a month.”
“Delayed reaction, maybe. Please, have a seat. Are you feverish?”
“I don’t think so.”
He picked up his radio and thumbed the button. “This is Colonel Gates. I need you to put in a call to Dr. Greene. We need his assistance, ASAP. Tell him to bring a blood kit.”
“Roger that,” the control room said.
The Colonel sat the walkie on the shelf below the mirror. “Dr. Greene is good people. He’s stationed at the base, on call when we need him. Technically, he’s a medical examiner, but he takes care of our needs. He’ll take a look at that.”
“Thank you, sir.”
The Colonel put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed it gently. She tensed.
“You can barely see that snake with all that bruising,” he said. “A damn shame.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Care to tell me what it means?”
“No, sir.”
He smiled. “You’re a tough one, Corporal. Hang in there,” he said. He twisted the dial on his radio. “Sergeant Lawless?”
Lawless’s voice came across the static. “Yes, sir?”
“I need you to do a double shift in the day room. Corporal Crane has taken ill.”
There was a long silence on the other end of the radio. Then a grumble. “Yes, sir.”
Back in the living quarters, Helia lay down on her cot and stared at the ceiling. A network of hairline cracks spidered across the concrete as if a slight earthquake had jostled the entire slab a few years ago. She tried not to think about the Colonel’s proposition. That was the problem with high-ranking men like that. They said something inappropriate and then backed their way out of it and the chain of command made it too hard to report.
An hour later, the door opened and Helia sat up on her bunk. A man entered. He was not a Keeper. He was a carrying a hard plastic suitcase that looked more like luggage than a doctor’s satchel. He was a wearing sweatshirt that said University of Boston and a wrinkled pair of jeans. Helia had forgotten that last week, she had switched to the night shift, her days inverted, and to the outside world, it was 3:00 a.m.
“Are you Corporal Crane?”
“That’s me,” Helia said.
He extended a hand. It was warm. “I’m Major Greene. Colonel Gates sent for me. I understand you had a run in with one of those things?”
“About a month ago a piece of bone got stuck in my arm,” she said. She pulled her arm out of the sleeve and showed it to him. “I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now it’s all bruised.”
He looked at the yellow and purple bullseye. “Nasty contusion. You didn’t accidentally bump into something did you?”
“Not that I can remember.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Okay.”
“Dizzy? Feverish?”
She shook her head. “Nightmares.”
�
��Given the circumstances, that’s normal,” he said. “How long have you been below ground?”
“Going on six weeks.”
He nodded and unzipped his luggage and reached inside. “First things, first, we need to do a blood test.”
“The infection shows up in the blood?”
“Sort of. The white blood cell count decreases as the body tries to fight the hostile takeover,” he said. He took out a pair of latex gloves and pulled them on. Then he pulled out a syringe. It was wrapped in plastic. He opened it and inserted a tube in the end. “Arm?”
She held out her right arm and he stuck her with the needle. She didn’t flinch, nor look away, just watched as he pulled back the plunger and the glass tube filled with dark, red blood. Then he removed the tube, corked it, and put in a plastic bag. He pulled out a piece of gauze, pressed it to the site of the prick, and taped it down.
“That’s it,” he said. “I’ll send these to the lab and let you know if we find anything.”
“And if you do?”
He pursed his lips. “I don’t know, soldier. Pray we don’t.”
“But if—“
He managed a smile. “We’ll cross that bridge when it comes.”
He was definitely a medical examiner. Lousy bedside manner.
She coughed and he backed away. She coughed harder.
“Are you okay?”
“Can you get me some water?”
“Where is it?”
She kept coughing, her face turning red. “The bathroom. Down the hall.”
He nodded and crossed the room. When he was gone, Helia rummaged through his bag and found a clean syringe and a long, clear plastic tube—about three feet long—that could be used for running an IV. She stuffed them both under her pillow.
When he came back, he said, “I’m sorry. I couldn’t find any glasses.”
“They’re in the mess hall,” Helia said. “But that’s okay. I feel a little better. I’ll get it myself.”
“You’re sure?”
She nodded.
“Okay, that’s about it Corporal. Anything else I can help you with?”
She shook her head.
“Then I will let you know what they find as soon as I can,” he said. “Hang in there.”
“Thank you, Doctor. Major Doctor.”
“I like the sound of that,” he said. “Major Doctor.” He looked at her for a long moment and smiled out of pity. Then he grabbed his satchel and headed for the door.
Chapter 31
The next day, after breakfast, Helia went to use the bathroom before heading into the cellblock for the first shift of the day. There, she went into one of the stalls, lowered the toilet lid, and sat down.
From her uniform, she pulled out the syringe, the long plastic tube, and the leftover piece of gauze from the spot where the doctor had stuck the needle into her arm.
She had never done anything like this before. A handful of acquaintances in high school had done it at parties, but she heard her mother’s voice in her head, “Never do drugs!” and never joined the fun. A good thing, too, as she was glad she didn’t have to lie on her polygraph.
Yesterday, she had watched closely as the doctor found her vein and inserted the needle at a thirty-degree angle. Now, she rolled up her sleeve and made a fist ten times as if she were trying to choke a rock. When the veins on her forearm swelled, she stuffed the piece of gauze into the clear plastic tube and inserted the needle into the fattest of her veins and pulled back the plunger. It filled up with blood.
Once the syringe was as full as it would go—only three-quarters because she hadn’t inserted the needle correctly—she stuck the end of the syringe into the open end of the plastic tube and reversed the plunger, filling the length of the tubing with blood. The gauze at the end acted as a stopper.
The prick on her arm leaked and she dabbed it with toilet paper and applied pressure with two fingers. Now with the tube filled and feeling lightheaded, but full of resolve, she unrolled her sleeve, and fed the tube from her collar down the sleeve of her left arm, the red snake slithering past the blue snake on her arm until the end of the tube poked out of her cuff.
She wrapped the top of the tube under her collar and then raised her arm to make sure that gravity didn't allow the blood to spill out at her wrist.
She swiped into the day room and walked rigidly to the other side. Conscious of the tube inside her sleeve and trying not to dislodge the wad of gauze plugging up the end, she kept her arms pinned to her sides. The Army had never seen such good form before.
She remembered what the Colonel had said about the cameras in the arrival room and glanced up at the tiny white box in the left-hand corner. As she neared cell number twelve, she stopped, and turned and looked into the darkness as if something strange had caught her attention.
She angled her shoulders slightly and coughed. The sound made the crouching shape on the other side of the bars perk up. Not a second later, her brother thrust himself out of the squat and stumbled toward her. His legs had withered significantly and his knees were wobbly. He could barely stand, yet moved as if he were flinging himself forward.
Before she could back away, he thrust himself at the bars. A thick string of bile swung from his broken face and landed on her chin.
Helia coughed again and raised her arm to wipe if off. At the same time, she raised the arm with the tube so that the bottom was close to her brother’s mouth. She pulled out the gauze stopper and then blew into the other end of the tube and her wrist sprayed blood into her brother’s face.
His eyes opened wide and he went nuts and wiped his face and licked the blood off his fingers. Once he figured out he could use his tongue, he extended it past his lips, its root barely a shred, and tongued his broken nose.
Helia had the sudden vision of helping her mother give him a bottle when he was an infant and she blew the rest of the blood straight into his mouth. He slurped it down in a frenzy. When the tube was empty, she fingered the gauze back into place and lowered her arm, coughed again, and walked the rest of the way to relieve the Keeper standing against the wall. There, for good effect she stopped, bent over, and coughed.
“You feeling okay, Corporal?”
She nodded. “A little lightheaded. Throat scratchy. But doing okay.”
The Keeper put his hands up and kept his distance. The news had probably gone the rounds that she was under observation for possible "transformation.”
He pointed to her chin. “You’re bleeding.”
Helia touched her chin. It must have leaked from the tube when she blew it. There was more blood in the middle of her palm, a circle like a stigmata.
“It must've been from when the doctor took blood.”
“Go clean that up,” he said. “Otherwise, you’ll send them into a frenzy.”
“I’m okay,” she said and wiped it on her pants. “Let’s not disrupt the schedule.”
“I’m serious,” he said. “They retain very good olfactory senses until late into decomp. Strange, seeing how they’re not bothered by the hideous stench of this place, but then again, dogs don’t mind eating their own shit, do they?”
“For real. I'm okay," Helia said. “But thank you. Please don’t tell the Colonel.”
“That’s what number twelve said,” he mumbled.
“What was that?”
“Nothing,” he said. He transferred to the other side of the room and relieved the Keeper who was standing by the entrance.
Helia took a long, deep breath, trying to settle her pounding heart and her spinning head. Her brother was already far more gone than she had hoped, his skin hanging off his collarbones like drapery.
Hopefully she wasn't too late.
At lunch, she took her usual seat in the mess hall. She ate ravenously, trying to replace the lost blood with carbohydrates.
A few minutes later, Dunning entered. Helia looked up, but he avoided eye contact. He filled his tray and sat at another table, not even bothering to look
in her direction.
It was the old shun. The post-coitus-now-we’re-not-talking-and-every-goddamn-moment-is-awkward cold shoulder. It’s exactly why you’re not supposed to sleep with co-workers, she thought.
She still had no idea what exactly the Colonel had said to him about the incident in the arrival room. She didn’t know whether she should apologize to Dunning, try to explain herself, or just let it be.
It was probably in both of their best interests to leave it alone, she decided. Easier that way, too. Less awkward. And so she kept her head down and kept stuffing her face.
A shadow passed over her food and she looked up. It was Colonel Gates again.
“So how are you feeling now, Corporal?”
“Still a little lightheaded.”
The Colonel nodded. “Do you mind if I sit?”
“Go ahead.”
He sat down. He had no tray. “Major Greene got back to me this morning with the lab results.”
“And?”
“He says you’re a bit low on vitamin D, iron, showing signs of anemia, and your triglycerides, are bit off, as well as your liver numbers, but thanks to these cheery walls, we’re all in that boat. He says that when you go on leave, you should make sure you get plenty of sunshine and try to eat more than just cereal for breakfast.”
“So I’m okay?”
“He said he saw nothing out of the ordinary.”
“But what about the bruise?”
“You probably bumped it in your sleep. The iron deficiency made it look worse than it is.”
Helia exaggerated a breath of relieve. “Whew, I feel like I dodged a bullet. Thank you, sir.”
“Vigilance," Colonel Gates said. “That's the key down here. Vigilance. In all aspects of life.”
“Yes, sir.”
With that, the Colonel left the mess hall. Helia watched him leave, her eyes landing on Dunning’s.
He had been looking her way, but the moment their eyes met, Dunning looked away.
