Sleeping Tigers

by Robinson, Holly

  I felt the tears stream down my face but ignored them. When I’d finished and taken a long breath, Jon pulled me close in a quick embrace and said, “I’m so sorry, Jordan. I really thought Cam just needed more time for his system to adjust. But, if the fever’s been coming and going with this kind of regularity and this intensity, it’s probably malaria.”

  “Malaria! You don’t know that,” I said, trying to tamp down my own alarm. “Cam’s symptoms fit every tropical disease in the book.”

  Jon rubbed his chin. “But only malaria has a regularly appearing fever generally proceeded by violent chills. And only malaria lets up enough to let you feel normal between spells.”

  He leaned over to collect a t-shirt from the tidily folded stack of clothing next to his pallet. “If it is malaria, we need to know what kind it is. And you can’t know that without taking a blood sample to the clinic.”

  “But how would Cam get malaria in the mountains?” I was still puzzled. This was the one disease I hadn’t considered. “I haven’t seen a single mosquito.”

  “Right,” he said. “But we traveled through India before arriving in Kathmandu, remember? And then across the Nepal lowlands by bus. There’s plenty of malaria in that part of the world, especially during rainy season. Most Nepalis are immune to the common types of malaria, but Westerners are susceptible to it even if they’re taking the usual prophylactic doses of chloroquine.”

  I wanted to scream. The clock was ticking. “I don’t need a lecture! I just want you to help me!”

  Jon had pulled on his t-shirt and a pair of shorts. Now he stood up and wrapped his arms around my waist, steadying me against him. “I want you to know the real deal before you go to the clinic, in case you get some temporary Western do-gooder doc who doesn’t know his ass from his elbow.”

  “Do you think Cam will be okay if it’s malaria?”

  “As long as we get him the right medicine in time.”

  “You need to stay with him while I go to the clinic,” I said, desperate now to be on my way.

  “Of course I’ll stay. Jordan, contrary to what you’ve always thought, I’m not a complete asshole.” Jon took my arm, leading me to the door of his teepee. “Be ready to leave in twenty minutes,” he commanded. “And wear long pants.”

  “But…”

  “Shhh.” He put a finger to my lips. “It’s all going to be fine, Jordan. You, Cam, everything. Don’t worry so much. It isn’t all up to you to save him.”

  In my exhausted, frantic state, the next few hours were like a fairy tale, the kind of story designed to scare any child out of sleep: the black skies, the lashing rain, the tossing trees, the hasty departure from the dying prince’s side. And, in this story, the wicked witch was the sleeping prince’s last hope: an ancient, cackling, popcorn-toting madwoman who put me on the back of her knobby-kneed mule and gave me a ride to Pokhara.

  Jon appeared at the lodge shortly after I’d changed into long pants. He checked on Cam, who had fallen into a deep, fever-induced sleep. My brother’s face was bright red. Even his ears were glowing, and his t-shirt was soaked through. Jon helped me lift Cam and change his shirt.

  Then, before I fully realized what was happening, Jon had passed a needle through a match flame and was pricking Cam’s thumb with it. He collected the blood in a tiny jar, capped it, and tucked the jar into my front pants pocket, all without a word. Cam didn’t seem to notice any of this, though blood continued to seep from the pinprick. I fished a bandaid and antibiotic cream out of my backpack and bandaged his thumb, then kissed my brother’s slick forehead.

  Minutes later, the old woman appeared with her mule. Jon spoke to her in fluent Nepali, making her laugh and slap him on the shoulder before she accepted a handful of bills he gave her from his own pocket.

  “Look, I can pay for her to guide me,” I insisted, drawing Jon aside. “And anyway, I’ve been thinking that maybe it’s better for you to go. You at least know the way. You probably even know how to ride a horse.” I didn’t want to admit that I was terrified of riding alone into the mountains with this crazy crone.

  Jon kissed me briefly on the cheek. “You’re the one with people to call,” he reminded me. “By the way, this isn’t a horse.”

  “Thank you, Sherlock.” I hauled myself up onto the back of the mule behind the old woman, who stank of whiskey. Probably that was what she was swilling out of the filthy plastic container tied to her belt, I thought, as the woman let out a startling belly laugh and switched the mule into high gear.

  We bounced off through the rain, me with my teeth clenched so that I wouldn’t bite my tongue. I clung to the old woman’s tiny waist to keep from pitching off the side of the mule, trying not to remember the passage I’d read in a guidebook about Nepali helicopter pilots refusing to fly corpses. If I died, my body would be left for the Yetis.

  The old woman turned now and then to offer me whatever was in her plastic jug as we jounced on the rocky paths and skidded down the muddy ones, shaking her head in wonder when I declined. Her method of disciplining the mule was erratic, perhaps because of her alcoholic haze. She alternately tossed the animal bits of charred popcorn, so that it had to trot and snort down the path to fetch them, and switched its flanks until the animal gave an irritated toss of its head and kept pace with her sharp commands.

  We stayed on something like a path. I recognized one of the narrow bridges, as well as a certain curved stone wall near a stream. Once, though, the old woman took a shortcut, barreling beneath trees so low that we had to lie nearly flat against the mule’s back to make it beneath a tangle of branches.

  A little later, I saw a series of shapes zigzag ahead of us through the fog. I thought they were children because of their size and speed. Then the shapes darted toward us and I saw that they were giant, whistling, squeaking pheasants.

  We made it to the Pokhara clinic before dark. The doctor was a balding Indian man whose posture was bent and crooked, as though he’d suffered a severe accident and been entirely but imperfectly rebuilt. However, he greeted me in a crisp, reassuring British accent, and listened patiently while I described the course of Cam’s illness.

  “I also have this,” I said, giving him Cam’s blood sample out of my pocket. My clothing felt immediately lighter; I’d been acutely conscious, during my journey, of the weight of my brother’s blood in its fragile container.

  The doctor accepted the blood sample without a word and disappeared into a back room, presumably to view it beneath his microscope. He emerged a few minutes later, shaking his head. “Sorry. Inconclusive,” he said. “However, if this is Stage I malaria, it is indeed not surprising that the parasites are not visible. Your brother, he has been sick for how long a time?”

  I did a quick calculation. “About seven days.” My knees trembled; I sank into one of the plastic chairs.

  “The most likely possibility here is also, unfortunately, the worst case scenario,” the doctor mused, drawing his dark eyebrows into a frown. “The type of malaria most common in the Nepal lowlands is Plasmodium falciparum.”

  He went on to explain that over half of his clinical cases of malaria fell into this category; nearly all people who died of malaria were infected with this strain. “Not many parasites of this type of malaria need be present in the blood for your brother to feel the symptoms, so it would be difficult to detect without repeated testing.” He thought for a minute. “But you say your brother has a severe headache and also convulsions?”

  I nodded, scarcely able to swallow. “He shakes so hard, his eyes roll back in his head and his teeth chatter. He’s like an epileptic.”

  “Ah. Then we will give him the combination medicines,” the doctor said. He unlocked a metal cabinet behind him. “Even without the exact diagnosis, it is better to err on the side of safety. Unfortunately, I have only quinine, none of the better synthetic chemicals used in your country. There are side effects. But we have little choice. To treat this malaria before much organ damage is done, we must be working
at top speed.”

  He rummaged in his cabinet. I noted the thick layer of dust on the shelves and hoped the bottles of medicine weren’t outdated. The doctor wrapped the tablets in white paper, gave them to me, then rocked on his heels for a moment before he went to another drawer and counted out another series of tiny pills into a brown envelope.

  “What’s this?” I asked as he handed them to me.

  “A drug that will decrease your brother’s folic acid levels and inhibit reproduction of the parasites. I am hoping the combination of drugs will give your brother the best chance to beat the disease. But I am afraid this is too expensive a treatment?” The little doctor looked suddenly as mournful as a spaniel. He told me the price. I didn’t even blink at the number.

  I fished out my wallet and counted bills into the man’s hand until the smile returned to his face.

  There was no sign of my mule taxi. The old woman had indicated that she would return for me. I perched on a rickety bench outside the clinic and watched for her while I dialed the airline and changed my flight. I gave myself another week.

  Then I phone David, hoping that he could confirm or add to the information I’d gotten from the doctor. He didn’t pick up his cell. He must be playing a gig, or perhaps he was in the ER.

  “Where are you?” I blurted when David’s voice mail picked up. “God, you don’t know how much I wish I could hear you sing tonight! Right into the phone!” I hesitated, hating my own imploring voice.

  “Anyway, this is Jordan, in case you hadn’t guessed,” I rambled on. “I’m calling you from the tourist trails of Pokhara, wondering about love, malaria, and motherhood. I know you think I’m untrustworthy. I can’t blame you for that. But I’ve thought about you every day that I’ve been gone. Just wanted you to know.”

  I hesitated again, then plunged ahead with a description of Cam’s symptoms, the village, and what medications the doctor here had given me. “I’ll come back to Pokhara in a couple of days, I hope, and I’ll be able to pick up my phone messages then. Let me know if there’s something else I should be doing for Cam, if you have a minute.”

  I hesitated, wanting to ask David so much more. Instead I hung up and dialed my own apartment.

  My mother answered on the first ring, sounding wide awake. “You’ve no idea how worried I’ve been!” she said.

  “Actually, I think I do.”

  As calmly as I could, I told her about Cam’s condition, relaying the same information I had to David, though editing down my brother’s symptoms as much as possible. Why worry my mother, when there was nothing she could do at this distance?

  To my relief, she seemed satisfied. “It sounds like you’ve got things well in hand,” she said. “Thank God you didn’t listen to me, Jordan. I’m so glad you’re there.”

  “Me, too,” I said, and meant it. I just wished that I didn’t feel so terrified about Cam’s fate resting in my hands.

  There was still no sign of the old woman, so I asked my mother how things were there.

  “Oh, I’m fine. Fending off your father, who’s threatening to get on a plane and come out here to fetch me home, and the baby, too, now that he knows about her.”

  “How did he take it?” That was one conversation I was glad I’d missed.

  “You can probably imagine.”

  Yes, I could. “But he accepts Paris as part of the family?”

  I could sense my mother smiling. Thousands of miles away, yet I could still feel it. “Your father says that he can’t live without me. Nothing else matters, he says.”

  “He probably wants you to come home and make him lunch,” I joked.

  Her tone turned almost dreamy. “Dad even promised to cook once a week, or we’ll go out. Can you imagine?” She laughed outright. “Your father actually wants to take me to a restaurant!”

  “That is progress,” I marveled. “And how’s Paris?”

  “Happy enough, but she misses you.”

  “She does not!” I closed my eyes, picturing the baby, smiling a little at the thought of her weight in my arms.

  “Every day, we look at the photograph of you I keep in my wallet.”

  My throat ached with longing. “Thank you. Is she gaining weight?”

  “Oh, yes, this child is thriving,” Mom said. “And that pediatrician friend of yours, David, has stopped by a few times to confirm that.”

  My face felt suddenly hot, remembering the nonsensical, rambling message I’d just left on David’s voice mail. “He came to the apartment?”

  “Oh yes. Between you and me, though, I think it’s his way of finding out whether you’re home yet,” Mom said. “Speaking of which, when are you scheduled to fly in? Two more days, is that it?”

  I hesitated, then decided to be truthful. “I had to change the flight, Mom.”

  Alarmed, she wanted to know why. I assured her that there wasn’t anything urgent. “Cam just needs more time to rest, and I want to be here for him.”

  “Good. I’m sure you’ll get him to come to his senses and make him come home.”

  “Mom, I don’t think that’s going to happen right away…” I began, but Paris suddenly shrieked in the background. My stomach tightened. I imagined how she’d look, standing in her portable crib, the tufts of light hair rising from her damp pink forehead as Paris woke in a fury, willing her strong little body over the crib railing now that she could balance upright on her own.

  “You hush,” my mother murmured.

  From the breathlessness in her voice, I knew she’d probably scooped Paris up and was cradling the phone against one shoulder, rocking the baby while we finished our conversation. “This little gal’s a tough nut to crack when it comes to sleeping through the night,” Mom said. “She’s got a will of iron. Luckily, she knows Grandma means business.”

  “Good,” I said. “Get her all trained for me, will you?” I rushed to end the conversation before Mom could ask anything more about Cam.

  I sat on the bench a few minutes longer, feeling completely spent. By the time I looked up, the old woman was there, leaning against her mule’s hindquarters and hacking spit onto the road. The rain had stopped and I could see the first pinpricks of stars.

  Even the darkness smells green here, I thought, as I crossed the street and slung my leg over the mule’s back as easily as if I’d been born to it.

  With nearly a full moon and a sea of stars to guide us, the return to the hill lodge was less terrifying than it might have been. The old woman seemed more coherent in the night air and did nothing more alarming than mutter to herself as we rode. I was so tired that at certain points I rested my head against her wooly sweater, feeling the strong muscles beneath my cheek.

  Once, the crone reached back to pat my knee with a soothing murmur. Bats squeaked overhead, darting through the trees. I heard the occasional bleat of a goat as we passed small houses hidden deep in the forest.

  Cam was still sleeping in the downstairs living room when we arrived three hours later. Jon sat in the only chair next to Cam’s head, reading a book by lantern light. Melody was there, too, curled by Jon’s feet, her head resting on his knees. I stumbled across the room and handed Jon the medicine, murmuring instructions. My hair and clothes were soaked and I smelled like a mule.

  “How is he?” I asked.

  “About the same.” Jon nudged Melody away from his legs so that he could stand. “Fever’s still high, but no more seizures.” He expertly tipped Cam’s head back, pushed the quinine pills down my brother’s throat with one sharp thrust of his forefinger, and then held Cam’s mouth shut.

  “Doesn’t he need water with those?” I asked.

  “Nah. He’d just toss it up. Better this way.” Jon stroked Cam’s throat with two fingers until my brother swallowed, as if Cam were a cat, then repeated the whole routine with the other tablet. To my amazement, the pills stayed down.

  “What’s this other stuff?” Jon asked, inspecting the second envelope of pills.

  “Something that keeps t
he malaria parasites from reproducing.”

  “Never heard of doing that,” Jon grunted. “Who’d you see?”

  “An Indian doctor in the clinic closest to the lake. A little man with a crooked body.”

  Jon looked pleased. “Good. He’s been here for years. Oxford trained.”

  Cam shivered slightly. I lay down beside him on the bed.

  “Good girl,” Jon said. “Melody, get up there on Cam’s other side.” Melody did as she was told, her eyes wide. With the two of us pressed against him, Cam’s trembling subsided.

  “Is he going to be okay?” Melody whispered.

  I turned onto my side, resting on one elbow so that I could see her over Cam’s chest. Melody looked like a terrified child made to wait in line for an amusement park ride she didn’t want to go on. The whites of her eyes were blue with fear and her lips were pressed together.

  The anger I’d felt towards her for ignoring Cam evaporated. In its place rose sympathy for Melody, this nearly middle-aged woman who had followed a man halfway across the world in the hopes of finding peace or, who knows, even love.

  I reached across Cam’s chest and touched Melody’s bare arm. Her flesh was cool and dry, the opposite of Cam’s damp heat. “He’ll be fine,” I assured her, needing to believe that myself, too. “Don’t worry. Sleep if you want.”

  Melody did as she was told, slipping quickly and quietly into slumber, her forehead smoothing and her eyelashes resting like spiders against her plump cheeks.

  Jon was back in his chair, resting his face on one hand and snoring slightly. He looked the way my father did when he slept, his face creased in thought, his posture still upright, as if the slightest noise would startle him into action.

  But there was no more action we could take. I lay back, too, and contemplated the giant spider webs along the beamed ceiling. An insect, some sort of flying beetle, hovered there, oblivious in its industrious buzzing that it was surrounded by sticky traps on all sides.

  There was little difference between that beetle and mere humans, I mused. None of us really knows what lies on the other side of today.