Finn

by Matthew Olshan

  When the trooper was within earshot, I shouted, “Her water broke! The baby’s coming!” He took a good long look at Silvia’s wet lap. Then he pinched the brim of his hat and said, “I’m giving you ladies an escort to City General. Follow me.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  The drive to the hospital was very fast. There was no such thing as a red light or a stop sign. It was weird, not worrying about getting caught. At times, the trooper would slow down and make sure that we were still with him. He even waved to us once or twice. You wouldn’t think it would matter, but those friendly waves took almost all the pleasure out of the ride.

  It reminded me of the time Dad got me out of school early to go on vacation. He pulled me out of class, telling my teacher he needed me back on the farm. He used a hick voice. He had mussed up his hair and was chewing on his big beard. My teacher gave me a sympathetic look and said, “Certainly, Mr. Wilder.” Dad was just having fun, but I got very self-conscious. When we were out in the hall, he made us tiptoe and sneak around corners, as if we were escaping from school, instead of just leaving it. I remember playing along, but thinking the game was silly, because how could I enjoy doing anything wrong if Dad was the ringleader?

  I was hoping to get rid of the trooper as soon as we got to the hospital, but he was determined to be a hero. He ran around threatening the nurses, saying, “I have a woman in labor here who’s diplomatic.” It was probably the highpoint of his career.

  My Portuguese consul lie worked out even better than planned. The nurses took us right into the examination area instead of making us sit in the crowded waiting room. Silvia was having a grand old time. They gave her the best wheelchair in the house. From the airs she put on, you would have thought she really was the consul’s wife. I told her not to say anything and to pretend not to understand English, but that didn’t stop her from waving to all the sick people from her rolling throne.

  The nurse asked the trooper if we needed a translator. I butted in and said, no, that the consul’s wife was happy to use my services as translator, but that we would like a private room, if possible, with cable TV, because the consul’s wife liked to watch CNN to catch up on news from her homeland. “There’s been a lot of domestic turmoil,” I added. The domestic turmoil was a nice touch, the kind of detail that comes out of nowhere when a lie’s going well.

  I thanked the trooper for all his help and asked him, as politely as I could, if he wouldn’t mind leaving us now. I told him that the consul’s wife found the sight of men in uniforms upsetting. “The revolution has just devastated the family,” I said. “I hope you’ll understand.” The trooper said he understood perfectly. He told me how lucky he thought the consul’s wife was to have an assistant like me. He was about to ask me how old I was—I could practically see the question forming on his lips—so I saluted him abruptly, spun around, and strutted back over to Silvia. Through my teeth, I told her to wave goodbye to the trooper and smile, which she did. You would have thought she was Queen Elizabeth.

  The last we saw of the trooper was him proudly removing his dustless hat as he climbed into his cruiser. I never did learn why he had pulled us over, but since then I’ve heard that the police sometimes pull over Mexican drivers—just because they’re Mexican.

  Silvia and I got a private room, which made me feel a little guilty, but I figured we needed one as much as anybody. A black nurse with a nasty expression and a glittery white streak in her hair helped install Silvia in the bed. The bed was remote controlled. It whirred when the nurse pressed the button. For some reason, the nurse’s hair, together with the sound of the bed machinery, reminded me of Bride of Frankenstein, like she was raising Silvia through the laboratory roof during a big lightning storm to try to bring her back to life. I imagined Silvia’s baby starring in the sequel, where a little monster with baby neck bolts and owlish black rings around his eyes pops out of his undead Mom. I guess you could say I was feeling a little loopy.

  Before the nurse left, she turned to me and said, “You ought to get that wrist looked at,” which surprised me, because I hadn’t noticed her looking at it. I’m usually sensitive to things like that.

  There wasn’t much to do until the doctor arrived. Silvia and I started bickering about what to do next. I said “stay.” Silvia said “go.” She was determined to get to California. I told her she’d be insane to leave. Now that we were here, she should stay and have her baby. Just then, the doctor came in. His tousled red hair and heavily freckled nose made him look more like a chemistry student than a doctor, but he already had the self-absorbed look that even very young doctors have, which probably comes from people caring so much about their opinion. He unclipped a pen from his plastic pocket protector and made a few notes on Silvia’s chart. It struck me as extremely arrogant to write something down on a patient’s chart before you even said “hello” to her.

  The doctor nodded to me and then went right up to Silvia and offered his hand, which was very soft and white, greeting her with a phrase in a language which I didn’t know. If I had to guess, I’d say it was Portuguese. He looked very proud of himself. He was a little taken aback when Silvia smiled at him awkwardly and I answered him in English, as if his Portuguese had been atrocious and we were hoping to spare him some embarrassment. He apologized and introduced himself—in English—as Dr. Locke. He didn’t ask us to call him “Everett,” which was the name printed on his ID badge.

  I asked Dr. Locke to please forgive the consul’s wife because she’d been through a lot that morning and was very shy with strangers. He gave me an odd look, but he nodded respectfully and showed Silvia his bare hands, like a magician, so there’d be no surprises when he started his exam. I was sort of curious about the examination itself, but Dr. Locke asked me to step outside for a few minutes. I apologized and said that that wouldn’t be possible. “Suit yourself,” he said. He pulled the curtain around the bed, leaving me all alone in the middle of the room. I suppose I should have given Silvia her privacy, but I stayed very quiet and tried to overhear what was going on anyway. At one point, Dr. Locke pronounced the word “ultrasound” very distinctly. Then I heard a high pitched “whoosh whoosh whoosh,” like tiny windshield wipers. It was the baby’s heartbeat!

  When the examination was finished, Dr. Locke pulled back the curtain but didn’t step away from Silvia’s bed. He had a reluctant expression, like a person who’s just finished a long hot shower and doesn’t want to step out into a chilly bathroom. Then he came up very close to me and asked if we could speak privately. I told him he could say what he had to say in English, because the consul’s wife wouldn’t understand, but he said he preferred to talk with me alone and asked if I wouldn’t mind stepping out into the hallway with him.

  As soon as we were in the hallway and the door to the room was closed, Dr. Locke asked me who I was, exactly.

  “In what sense?” I said, ignoring the sudden gush of acid in my stomach. When someone is fishing for information, particularly about an elaborate lie, I’ve learned that the thing to do is to stay cool, and always answer a question with a question.

  “Are you a member of her family?”

  “Why? Is there something wrong?”

  “Not really,” he said. “Let me ask you. Were you with her when the water broke?”

  “Is it the baby? I knew I should have brought her here sooner.”

  Dr. Locke had been clicking and unclicking his ballpoint pen. Now he put it to the cleft of his upper lip and started to tap. “You didn’t see her water break,” he said. “Did you.”

  I raised what was left of my eyebrows, as if to ask, “Should I have seen it?”

  “That’s what I was afraid of. You see, the consul’s wife. . . her water hasn’t actually broken, which is worrisome in itself, because she’s overdue, to the point where it might be prudent to operate.” He paused for a moment and looked at his clipboard. “Frankly,” he said, “I’m more concerned with the story she made up. About her water breaking.”

 
“The story?”

  “I think she faked it. My guess would be with something lime, judging from the smell.”

  “How bizarre!”

  “Is there a history of—I know this may be delicate, but it’s very important for guiding our next steps. Is there a history of depression or mental illness in the family? I’m not saying that there absolutely has to be something like that. I just need to know.”

  I pretended to think back. “Now that you mention it, I did hear something once.”

  “Yes?”

  “Something mental health related. But I can’t put my finger on it. You know, I think it would be best if we asked the consul’s wife directly, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” he said. “That might be best.” He put his pen away slowly, like someone putting down a racket after losing a tennis match. He stood for a moment with his hand on the door, tapping the metal plate with the side of his thumb. “Know what?” he said. “I could use a consult on this one. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Then he bowed to me, which was very formal and out of place, and walked away. He was almost through the double doors to the waiting room when he called back over his shoulder, “And I’m going to take a look at that wrist of yours when I get back. A fracture like that could cost you your hand.” I smiled and waved toodleloo, but I didn’t like what he said about my wrist. Not one bit.

  Back in the room, Silvia had the TV on. She was watching the local news.

  “Oh my God, Chica, you have to see this,” she said. “It’s about you and me.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Everyone knows that the news on TV is phony. Try flipping from channel to channel at five thirty or six o’clock. Or eleven. All the different channels show exactly the same news stories, in exactly the same order, night after night. Talk about a conspiracy. Not to mention those hypnotized anchors with their robotic banter.

  If I had any doubts that the so-called “news” was completely made up, the story they told about me and Silvia convinced me. I remember it almost word for word, because it was all so outrageous and false. The black anchorman with the buck teeth—the one my grandfather always called “Mr. Beaver”—read it, in that fumbling anchorman way, like a five year old:

  “In a bizarre twist on a story we brought you several days ago, the alleged kidnapper of local school girl Chloe Wilder has been positively identified as illegal alien Silvia Morales. The suspect was seen by firefighters early this morning fleeing the scene of an explosion at the girl’s foster home. The girl’s grandparents, whose house was rocked by a huge fireball, claim that Ms. Morales is mentally unbalanced, and angry at being forced from the home, where she worked as a domestic until she was recently fired. No one was injured in the blast. The resulting fire was quickly brought under control. Police are asking anyone who has seen either Silvia Morales or Chloe Wilder to please call the number on your screen. Ms. Morales should be considered extremely dangerous. The two were last seen in a stolen white Dodge Aries K. . .”

  They showed the license number of my grandparents’ Dodge. Then they showed a picture of me, the one from the Field School that was on the milk cartons. It looked even less like me on TV than on a sweaty milk carton, which was something at least. They didn’t have a photograph of Silvia, which goes to show how temporary her life was at my grandparents’. Instead of a photograph, they had a police sketch. The eyebrows were thick and angry. The lips were huge. The expression on the face was more like a terrorist than a maid. The sketch had my grandfather written all over it.

  The other channels were showing our story, too. I didn’t even have to check to know that, but I checked anyway.

  The rest of what they said about us on the news was unimportant, but I do remember that right after Mr. Beaver finished reading his lies, he and the other anchorman joked about how badly some sports team was doing, comparing their bad season to the explosion at my grandparents’ house. That’s when I turned off the TV.

  Silvia and I sat there in the room, which was quiet now, except for the regular chirp of Silvia’s heartbeat from one of the monitors. We tried to kid each other about the police sketch. It might have been funny, in different circumstances.

  Silvia hadn’t understood the story word for word, so I went over it with her, which was much more painful than just watching it on TV.

  “Your grandparents think I kidnapped you? And exploded their house?” she said. I nodded and said that they could be pretty stupid at times. Silvia started to cry. She said, “I thought they liked me.” It amazed me that her feelings could be so hurt after all my grandparents had done to her.

  Silvia sat quietly for a while trying to calm her mind. Finally she asked, “What does this mean for us?” I told her it meant that we couldn’t use the car any more, because now the police would be looking for it.

  “And we have to leave the hospital?” I’m not the easiest person to move emotionally, but I leaned over and gave her a hug when she asked that. I even cried a little. Hearing the baby’s heartbeat had obviously made her want to stay.

  “Now more than ever,” I said.

  Silvia sat at the edge of the bed for a long time. Her lips were trembling. I helped pull the rubber suckers off her belly. The monitor squealed. “Then let’s go,” she said. “Roberto says the California hospitals are good, too.”

  After that, there wasn’t time to be sappy. I helped Silvia out of her hospital gown and back into her street clothes. The fizzy water had dried in one big faded blotch. Silvia noticed it, although I was hoping she wouldn’t. She started experimenting with the hospital gown, pinching it in back, examining the hems. I could tell she was considering wearing it, even though it was made out of paper. She told me it was quite nice. That’s the exact expression she used: “This is quite nice.” I told her to forget about the paper gown. My exact expression was: “You’re wasting our time with that piece of trash.” I didn’t mean to be nasty, but my words hung in the air afterwards like a bad smell.

  The scotch tape had come off my fingers, and I couldn’t feel them very well any more, which worried me, but at least there was less pain. I went though all the drawers in the room, hoping to find something for my wrist. One drawer was full of neatly rolled Ace bandages. Each roll was clamped with a pair of little toothy clips. I grabbed a few rolls. Then I hit the jackpot: a drawer with slings and arm braces. I tried some on. The only one that came close to fitting was covered with pictures of lacrosse sticks and helmets and the words “Go Team!” It screamed “stupid jock,” but it fit, so I strapped it on. I also picked up some Band-Aids, and a few tongue depressors. I didn’t know what I was going to do with the tongue depressors, but I just couldn’t resist. They were so clean and smooth and practical-looking.

  Then we left, sneaking through the halls like the thieves we were. Silvia insisted we go to the car and try to get the bag of food from the Mini-Mart. She said she wasn’t going on any more trips without real food, and since I had basically just evicted her from her hospital room, I didn’t argue. It turned out I was right about losing the car, though. When we got to the level of the parking garage where the trooper had parked our car for us, the elevator doors opened on a major crime scene, complete with tons of flashing police lights and news cameras. I shoved Silvia over to the side of the elevator and pressed the “Close Door” button about fifty times before we were on our way back up to the lobby.

  The only way out of the hospital that didn’t have a policeman stationed at it was the loading dock. It took us almost an hour to find it. By then, I practically had to carry Silvia. She was beginning to look defeated. I couldn’t admit that at the time. I remember telling myself it was probably all her hormones.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ours is a city of poor neighborhoods. Most of them aren’t so bad, unless you happen to be talking to my grandparents. If you listened to them, you’d think that everything inside the Beltway—except for two or three blocks right around their house— was practically Sodom. My grandparents are th
e kind of people who lock their doors as soon as they see a black person. They’ll be riding along in the car, and suddenly, “Thunk!”, the automatic locks go down. My grandfather won’t announce it, but you just know he’s mentally reporting the sighting: “Danger. Black man, nine o’clock!” What he’ll say out loud is: “This used to be a nice neighborhood.”

  Locking your doors like that could be a silly, totally racist thing to do. Around City General, though, it made some sense. This was a truly bad neighborhood. Most of the shootings you heard about on the news happened near City General. The hospital was famous for its emergency room. The TV news people loved to say the words, “Shock Trauma,” which is what the emergency room was called. You couldn’t stand on the sidewalk here and not think of those words. You couldn’t walk down the street and not wish you were in a car with locked doors.

  It was cool out. There was a foul breeze. A police cruiser crawled down the street like a well fed beetle, shining its spotlight into the peeling doorways and the filthy crevasses between buildings. Silvia and I kept ahead of it, trying every door, except where we had to climb over a sleeping person. The whole neighborhood seemed locked up tight and abandoned, as if an invasion was coming, or already had come. There were padlocked iron fences in front of all the stores, and I began to feel that the street was a kind of jail, only instead of being locked in, Silvia and I were locked out, which amounted to the same thing. The police cruiser was still rolling along. It was slowly catching up with us.