The Orchard

by Charles L. Grant

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I didn’t mean to snap at you before.”

  “My fault. I’m …” He shrugged. “I hate being cooped up, helpless, you know?”

  She kissed his forehead, brushed a finger over his lips, and he watched as she attended to Rory, tickling him, mussing his hair because she knew how much he disliked it, finally telling him not to pay any attention to what the ape in the other bed said because he’s only a reporter, and everyone knows that reporters have to take a college course in advanced lying before they get their diplomas.

  “Hey!” he protested.

  Rory looked around her arm and grinned.

  “Doc, that’s slander.”

  She rose and smiled without showing her teeth. “Sue me.”

  He appealed to the boy, who was trying not to laugh, then widened his eyes when Carolyn left and Janey came in, pushing a cart in front of her with a large chrome bowl filled with steaming water. “What the hell is that?”

  “Your bath, sir,” she said. And looked at Rory. “You want to help me scald him to death?”

  It was the best five minutes he’d spent since he’d arrived—Rory kneeling on the bed, giggling and holding his arms down while Janey scrubbed his leg, swearing at the bits of adhesive that wouldn’t come off, comparing the smell of his wizened flesh to charnel houses she had known. He complained, he threatened, he told Rory he would pluck his freckles off one by one if he didn’t let go.

  Rory laughed.

  Janey laughed.

  And he played the martyr as well as he could until in his feigned tossing he saw the dark window.

  There was something out there looking in.

  Bending his right arm to bring Rory over his chest, he stared and realized it was only a reflection. A figure in the hall just out of the elevator, looking down to his room, darker than the night that framed it, larger than it should have been, and vanishing as soon as a nurse with a bedpan approached it, walked through it.

  “There!” Janey said, slapping his knee hard. “You are now almost civilized.” And exchanged glances with Rory when she saw he wasn’t paying attention. “Hey, Mike, I’m done.”

  Rory looked at the window, and scrambled off to his own bed.

  Janey looked at the window, back to Mike, and adjusted her cap. “It’s dark out, you know. You can’t see anything.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I was just looking, that’s all.”

  She gathered washcloths and towels, told him not to walk too much—she had heard of his around-the-world trip this afternoon and didn’t think it was a good idea to practice every day—and she’d be back in the morning.

  She kissed him lightly.

  He didn’t kiss her back. The affection in her touch wasn’t anything like the blank look in her eyes.

  Then Rory’s parents came for a visit, and he was left alone, finally wishing he had gotten Cora’s home number so he could find out what she had learned from the ward downstairs. If anything, he thought sourly. She probably just flirted with an intern, was intimidated by the head nurse, and decided on her own there wasn’t anything there. Which meant, if he was right, he would have to do it on his own.

  He tried calling Marc, but no one was home.

  He tried calling Chief Stockton to see if anyone had demanded ransom for the missing Jasper boy, and was told that the chief and the detectives on the case weren’t giving out information, at the family’s request.

  By the time he was finished, four fruitless calls later, he was angry and ready to pack his crutches and leave. It was dumb. It was stupid. How the hell did Marc expect him to work when he was tied down like this? And how the hell, he asked himself, did he expect to get anything done now, at night, when he’d done nothing that afternoon but play hero in crutches?

  That one was easy—he was afraid. He was creating obstacles where none existed because he didn’t want to know if, in all his years of learning, he had learned anything at all.

  Listen, Marc had said, you should know all this stuff already. You don’t belong here, you belong back in Boston.

  What he didn’t say was obvious—as soon as you grow up and stop running.

  The leg under the cast began itching, and he squirmed, reached down, and wasn’t surprised when his fingers were just too short to reach far enough under the cast. He drummed. He gritted his teeth. He hummed a prayer for a miracle to banish the torment. Then he grabbed for his crutches and hauled himself off the bed.

  “I thought you were supposed to stay there.”

  He spun and nearly fell, gaping until he recognized Rory lying in his bed. “Jesus, I didn’t know you were back.”

  “My mom says I’m as quiet as a mouse. Where are you going?”

  He pointed to the cast. “It itches. I am going to hold a nurse hostage until they get me something I can stick down there. Then I’m going to scratch like crazy.”

  The boy should have laughed, he thought; at least a smile. But he lay there, bathrobe still on, arms down at his sides and fingers grabbing the sheet, his bandaged ear looking twice as large as when he’d left.

  “See you in a little while.”

  Rory blinked for a nod.

  And as he stepped out into the hall, he heard: “Mr. Kolle, where do monsters come from?”

  He made it to the nurses’ station without falling, testing his newly unbandaged leg and finding it wobbly but reasonably strong. Then he begged the woman on duty to demolish a coat hanger he saw on the desk behind her. She laughed and deftly twisted the wire into something he could use, laughed again when he instantly shoved it into his cast and probed until he found the right place. He worked at it slowly, not wanting to break the skin, and sighed loudly when at last he pronounced himself cured.

  The woman shook her head and ordered him politely back to his room.

  He bowed as best he could, gripped the hanger in his teeth, and turned around with a brisk salute. Then he turned back and asked how the children were doing, if everything was okay downstairs in the ward.

  She stared at him blankly. “What children?” she said.

  He lifted a hand to point, grabbed the crutch quickly when he felt himself tipping, and shrugged. “Nothing,” he said, tasting the hanger as his tongue flicked against it. “Don’t listen to me, I’m hysterical.”

  She sighed and ordered him away again.

  He considered arguing. Someone else on the floor might know what he was talking about, but she was losing patience and good humor, and he decided not to press his luck. A nod, then, a farewell smile, and he steadied himself for the trip home. His foot slipped on the knob at the bottom of the walking cast, and by the time he had righted himself, sweating, cursing, he saw Rory in the doorway, arms tight across his chest and his hair in disarray.

  “Hey,” he called out. “Hang on, kiddo. I’ll be there in a minute. Long John Silver to the rescue, what do you think?”

  Rory ducked back into the room with a quick shake of his head.

  A look to the nurse and a shrug, and he thumped his way past the elevators, glancing at the unlit numbers over the doors, remembering the figure he’d seen, and not seen, here last night. Much more of that, he thought, and they’d be putting him in the psycho ward, brilliant reporter or not.

  At the T-intersection he paused and leaned against the wall. A glance to his left at the visiting room showed him it was empty; to the right, and the window at the end of the hall was blacker, for the dim lights recessed in the ceiling. Then he looked straight ahead, into his room, and saw Rory sitting in the wheelchair. Staring out. Not moving.

  Hobbling to the door, he tilted his head side to side to display the hanger in his teeth and deliberately mumbled something he knew the boy wouldn’t understand.

  Rory didn’t move.

  “Hey, pal,” he said gently. “What’s up?”

  “The monsters,” the boy whispered.

  Michael couldn’t help it; he looked over his shoulder.

  There was no one in the hal
l.

  He spat the hanger out, grimaced at the taste still lingering in his mouth, and sat on the edge of his bed, beckoning until the boy wheeled himself over.

  “Now what’s all this about monsters?” he said, trying to remain as serious as Rory looked. “Am I in for another one of your crazy stories?”

  The boy shook his head, wouldn’t look up. “Where do they come from?” A small voice, a night voice just out of a nightmare.

  Michael shifted awkwardly until he could swing his cast onto the mattress, foot on the pillow, and tuck his other leg underneath: Resting on his elbow then, he was near to eye level and tried not to listen to the silence he heard.

  “In here,” he said, tapping a finger to his forehead.

  Rory blinked. “I don’t think so.”

  “Sure they do, pal. You know what imagination is, right? God, you ought to, with all that stuff you’ve been handing out.”

  Rory nodded, reluctantly, his eyes half closed as if fighting a headache.

  “Well, that’s where they come from. Your imagination. Some guy, see, gets scared of a shadow and they turn it into some really creepy thing that hides under the bed, or in the closet, or under the porch. But it isn’t real because you made it up. So you stick your tongue out at it and it goes away. Or you turn on the light. Something like that.”

  Again the child’s voice: “Are you sure?”

  He looked around the room, wishing the kid’s parents would magically pop out of the bathroom and explain how to deal with something like this. Of course he was sure, but how do you explain it to someone who believes?

  “Yes,” he said firmly. “Imagination is what makes movies and books and comics and television shows. It’s what makes my job, sometimes, when I have to imagine what this guy or that guy was thinking when he did something. It helps to clear away all the garbage and get me what I want.” Easy, he thought then; easy, you’re lecturing. “See, I have to look for facts, Rory. And sometimes my imagination helps me find them.”

  “Don’t … don’t you ever get in trouble?”

  He laughed, knowing the boy would never understand. “You, my friend, have just hit the nail right on the head. Trouble? I have been in such trouble, you wouldn’t believe it.” He leaned forward and reached out to tap the boy’s knee. “And you know why I got into trouble, my boy? Because I let my imagination run away with me.”

  Rory looked to his pillow, looked at Michael sideways, and wheeled the chair back to the window. He got up, took off his robe, and climbed into bed, pulling the thin blanket up to his chin. “The monsters?”

  “You mean the ones downstairs or—”

  “Yes.”

  “Imagination.”

  Rory put a hand on his bandage, winced, and nodded.

  Michael waited, then maneuvered himself under his own covers, sitting under the tiny light that barely reached to his feet. The rest of the room was dark. He could hear Rory breathing, every so often shifting his legs across the sheets.

  “Hey, pal?”

  “What?”

  Michael sat up to see over the bedtable. “Where did you see these monsters of yours?”

  There was no response for several seconds, and Michael thought he’d fallen asleep. Then he pulled one arm from under the blanket and pointed to the floor.

  All night.

  Whispering.

  And the shadows of dreams.

  The next morning Michael screamed.

  The moment he opened his eyes it was there, working out of his throat from the fire rushing through his legs, from the burning on his palms, from the bars that had been thrust through one shoulder to the other. The effort to keep silent spun the scream into a groan, and he grabbed for the call button on the wire by his head.

  Holding himself rigid. Keeping his eyes closed. Nodding when he heard Janey asking sadly about the pain.

  “You’re just a big kid, you know that, Mike?”

  Janey. Lovely Janey.

  “Now be a good boy and wait, and I’ll see if Doctor Player will let you have something to take care of it.”

  Shit on growing up, he thought, if it means I can’t cry.

  “Janey?”

  Slipping a hand behind his head a few minutes later, holding a paper cup to his lips, putting a pill on his tongue, waiting while she stroked his chest until the medicine was down. Whispering something in his ear and kissing his cheek, shifting and drawing the curtain around him.

  Drifting.

  Dozing.

  Waking sometime past noon to see a pair of white coats standing by Rory’s empty bed, looking at the boy’s chart, looking up at him and telling him with their eyes he’d best rest, go back to sleep. Carolyn bent over him, brushed back his hair, and whispered something in his ear.

  “Carolyn?”

  “Hush. Go to sleep.”

  “Carolyn, my head hurts.”

  “It’s all right. When you wake up, everything will be fine.”

  Drifting.

  Dozing.

  The telephone waking him, the ringing cut off before he could reach the receiver. Turning his head, seeing Rory motionless, asleep, a fresh bandage now covering half his skull along the left side, wisps and ferns of red hair poking into the air.

  Story, he thought as he drifted off again; story, there’s a story, but he couldn’t open his mouth.

  Waking a third time to damn his impatience. If he hadn’t been so anxious to walk a hundred miles the day before, he wouldn’t be stuck now, gripping his right thigh to corral the pain below his waist, taking deep breaths as the medicine played with his vision and filled his mouth with damp cotton.

  “Hey, Rory, am I dead or what?” he said with a laugh when the pain subsided and he could think again. “God, I think I could drink a ton of water without even floating.”

  There was no answer.

  “Y’know, it feels like someone put dynamite in my head. I think if I sneeze, I’m gonna blow my brains out.”

  Still no answer, and he passed a hand over his face, over his chest, and realized that the room was in twilight, the door partially closed. The sun was gone, the blinds drawn to the sill, and little more than a lighter dark slipped in from the hall.

  Swallowing, he looked over to see if the boy was asleep; rubbing his eyes, he pushed up on his elbows.

  The bed was empty, sheets and pillow gone, blanket folded at the foot. The chart wasn’t on its hook.

  A sympathetic sigh no one heard. The boy hadn’t gone home; they must have moved him again. And from the way whatever was wrong with his ear was progressing, it was probably into a private room on the building’s other side, or down to intensive care, where he could be monitored more closely.

  He shook his head slowly, and regretted it immediately when the headache flared and made him gasp, and sent orange pinwheels through his eyes.

  “Oh, brother,” he gasped. “Oh, god, where’s the aspirin?”

  Not moving until it passed, looking again at Rory’s bed and hating to think of the kid with tubes and wires and all those freckles fading to nothing. That sort of thing wasn’t fair, not when you were just a boy and couldn’t protect yourself.

  His stomach growled. Mindful of the explosion he could bring on if he moved fast, he reached for the basket of fruit Cora had brought, and yanked his hand back. It was empty, and the apple he’d taken the bite from was still on the table, shriveled and brown, with a fly walking on its skin.

  Jesus, he thought, grimacing in distaste and working his arms until he was upright. He reached down to his left and picked up the small trash can, held it against the table, and brushed the apple off, and the basket. Voracious orderlies, he decided, or a nurse, maybe Rory’s parents or doctors. It didn’t make any difference; he was still hungry, and he used the call button in hopes he could wheedle some food from the night shift.

  A minute later he tried again.

  A minute after that he threw the covers aside and reached for his crutches. He had to use the bathroom anyway, an
d while he was up he could look into the hall and maybe flag someone down.

  His legs wobbled and held him, the headache didn’t return but remained a distant throbbing, like the throbbing under the cast, and when he was at the door, feeling little better, he looked toward the nurses’ station and saw it deserted. After a curse for rotten luck, he hopped backward on his good leg, perched on the metal footboard, and massaged his thighs. An emergency somewhere. He would have to wait and try again.

  And as he did, he thought of Rory, wondering what it would be like to have a boy of his own. One to watch, to take care of, to lie to and tell stories to and mark his own years by the birthdays he had. How much of it was romance, and how much was plain work? He guessed that, with Rory, a lot of it was listening to tall tales and excuses and doing your best not to laugh when you were supposed to be angry.

  He leaned forward, saw no one, and made his way to the bedtable, picked up the phone’s receiver, and smiled when Marc answered, laughed when the editor demanded he stop goldbricking and get his ass back to work.

  “But I have good news,” Marc said. “The Jasper boy is back.”

  “What?”

  “Right. They found him a few hours ago, up in Portland. Apparently the kidnappers got cold feet, jammed him in a sack, and dumped him in someone’s backyard. He’s okay, just scared as hell. Jasper’s giving the family that found him something like fifteen grand and a new car.”

  “Damn,” he said. “There goes my Pulitzer.”

  Feeling the first sting of another headache, and looking over his shoulder when he heard a scratching in the hall.

  “Mike, I have an idea. It won’t be a Pulitzer, but it might do you some good. Just hear me out before you say yes or no, and don’t jump to conclusions.”

  A distant scratching, a nail drawn along the floor from the bottom of an old push broom, a child walking with a stick he held to the wall.

  Michael pulled the receiver away from his ear, listened harder, leaned back in order to peer through the door.