by David Bajo
“I’m barely standing here.”
“So go,” she told him again. “Use whatever passageway you have down here. Go be with your wife. Take her to the park. Raise a glass to me.” The light was gray; air vents purred. “Raise a glass to me.”
The ER proved a mistake. Claiborne had tried to warn her, offered to go gather the supplies for Julia. “They pretty much stay out of the basement. But they know you slipped containment and will come looking for you,” he had told Mendenhall. Her patients had been moved to a far wall. Her cubicle was occupied by Dmir. He was sipping from a mug and tapping her keyboard. His furrowed brow tried to convey concern but showed confusion. A curtained partition now cut the bay in two, cutting off flow and sight lines.
Extra beds had been moved in, lights added, pale music. Security stood in pairs.
And Pao Pao was gone.
In a few seconds her vantage point would be compromised.
She slid to the next corner. Nurses doing nothing at the station recognized her. One pointed, and a security pair turned. Mendenhall charted her path. Behind her an elevator chimed. She didn’t know if it was too late to simply retreat, to return to the basements and survive containment there, work there, cooperate. Claiborne could only guess. He had warned her, but she had needed to see. She had thought she didn’t.
It was Pao Pao, the notion of her taken from the floor.
Mendenhall tried to resist the possibility that she was the cause, that she had betrayed her floor, that she had betrayed Claiborne, was still betraying him by not telling him everything, especially about Silva.
Getting fresh IVs for Julia was definitely not an option. She moved with the open whisper of the elevator, lost her trackers, evaded the nurses. Had they stepped away from their station, two simple strides, they would have seen her. She made it to the old file room. Some EMTs and nurses were in there, sitting on the floor, leaning their shoulders against the wall. The inside fluorescents were off, and the outside parking lamps cast a solemn glow and long shadows. One nurse was smoking; others were sipping coffee.
None of them showed any interest in Mendenhall.
A bedpan in the middle of the floor was filled with ashes.
Another beside it contained three cigarette butts that had been straightened and reshaped. The smoking nurse passed her cigarette to the EMT on her right.
Mendenhall positioned herself against the wall.
“The ante is two butts or one whole.” The EMT spoke holding his inhale.
“I just want to sit here.”
“You,” said one of the nurses. “You started this.”
“You’re mistaken.”
The EMT released his smoke. The next in line, a feline nurse, her long legs crossed, her feet bare, pinched what was left, inhaled, cheeks hollowed. “No. It’s you,” she said in slow exhalation, the smoke powdering her words.
Mendenhall curled beneath the cloud. “I just need to sit for a while.”
“You mean hide.” The long nurse passed the cigarette, a white speck in the shadows. She followed with a languorous stretch, toes pointed, then spread.
“I’m not hiding.”
“You should be. Your nurse should’ve.”
Footsteps sounded outside the door, stopped. Mendenhall hunched more against the wall, dipped in the shadows of the others.
The door opened, and there was the tall silhouette of Mullich. He took a half step in and spotted her. She knelt forward, didn’t know what to do with herself.
“Hey,” she whispered. “Hi.”
He retreated, motioned to someone in the hall, and made room for two security pairs. One pair remained in the doorway while the others swept in and reached for Mendenhall. They didn’t let her stand. Their grip cut the blood flow in her arms. A sharp line of pain slashed diagonally through her left shoulder, just over the heart. She sought dignity, legs together, chin up, thinking of countless ER arrivals sprawling and crying and clawing their arms and legs, shirts or dresses riding up, vulnerable, surrendered, prey for the nurses and EMTs. She braced her arms and double-fisted her hands together, ready to take a swing if freed. She took aim at Mullich’s jaw, the angular shadow.
60.
She had always pictured it as beds lined neatly behind glass.
Mercy’s formal quarantine consisted of three adjacent rooms, four beds each, sliding glass doors. She was not there. She was in what used to be a laundry room. The machines were gone, but the concrete platform that had once held them was still there, pipes standing and capped. For her, there was a bed, table with pitcher, and bench. A flatscreen hung in a ceiling corner. The muted channel showed brush fires, then switched to a man in a DC lab coat talking about the outbreak. A helicopter shot of Mercy General filled the screen. It looked festive in the evening light, fires glowing behind the hills.
She was alone, and she felt empty. The fluorescent lighting made a sickening buzz, a pallor rather than a glow, something less than white. She was more angry with herself than with Mullich, not so much for trusting him but just for moving toward him, greeting him, showing herself as a fool.
Through the small door window she could see the adjacent room, another level of quarantine. Pao Pao was in there, tending to those who were still in their beds. Two patients played chess at a folding table. Pao Pao stopped by their game and adjusted one of the table legs, wedged a tongue depressor underneath for stability.
The players smiled thanks as she moved to the next bed.
Mendenhall pressed her face to the glass, palms to the door. Pao Pao was helping a patient flex his ankles and legs. She kept him covered as she fitted the heel of her hand into his arch and then pushed. She asked a question, then repeated the exercise.
Mendenhall backed away. She toyed with the copper standpipes as she watched the flatscreen. A newscaster was talking in front of footage showing covered bodies on gurneys being rolled into a building. Mendenhall didn’t recognize the area of the city. The story changed to live shots of the brush fire. TV depressed and alienated her. She couldn’t translate it, couldn’t focus on it because it never explored or even touched what was fascinating. It slid by her, a dream of frustration.
She needed sleep, hours of it, a half day of it. The hospital was approaching the twenty-four-hour mark of containment. She resisted the bed. She didn’t want to lie there and feel sick about what she had done to Claiborne, Pao Pao, Silva, what she had allowed Mullich to do to her.
The entire space reminded her of him. She could imagine a few possibilities: an interrogation room, a spa for surgeons and DC people, a gym—a room for crazies. A wave of fatigue passed through her. She poured herself a glass of water and sat on the bench, back straight, shoulders square, a muscle refresher taught by her mentor. Spend a little energy, gain a little more.
She faced straight ahead as she sipped her water. Someone had drawn an arrow on the wall. In pencil, it pointed to a back corner. When she stood to follow its direction, she noticed that the arrow disappeared. It reappeared when she sat back down and straightened herself on the bench. She tested this effect three times, making the arrow disappear with any angle outside 90
degrees.
Mullich.
She stepped through the row of standpipes and turned to the back corner. The walls were whitewashed, bare. She pressed her left shoulder to one and looked 90 degrees forward. Nothing.
She touched her right shoulder to the adjacent wall and faced 90
degrees. A thin pencil outline of a square, much the same as the one that had marked the dumbwaiter. With her thumb she brushed the line. Something as if from a moth wing dusted her fingers. It vanished with slight movement, reappeared.
She wasn’t sure she wanted to follow this, wasn’t sure she was up for it, wasn’t sure her legs and brain could make it. She could sleep away containment, quarantine, wake up to the normal chaos of the ER. In the far corner the TV showed fire, then the guy in the lab coat, then the newscaster.
The pencil outline was square, rule
d. But it was drawn, not cut like the previous one. She looked behind her, directly facing the opposite wall. Stepping over pipes, she kept her eyes level on the wall as she paced toward the other back corner. Nearer, she watched for an appearance, a shimmering line or arrow, a red dot of light, her tired eyes aching for it.
Her drop began slowly, knees buckling, head faint. The wall eluded her reach. The corner pitched to one side. The floor hinged with a creak and a clang, throwing her into darkness. She slammed inside hollow metal, slick against her clothes, impact acid on her tongue, a blood taste.
And she was falling.
The metal gave whenever she struck and ricocheted, so there was little pain besides friction burns. She covered her head with her arms. The upward blast pushed at her. She almost passed out from the acceleration. The darkness was complete. She was collapsing, going terminal, nerves flaring. She sought to cover herself, to hold the hem of her skirt with one arm while wrapping the other about her head.
She screamed as though underwater, the sound thickened into bubbles. The air gained substance, slowed her, grabbed her. Clothed her. Linen covered and blinded her with white. She came to a stop, then bounced softly, pushed to the surface, sank back. Her pulse was racing. Everything else felt all the more still: the nest of linens and laundry bin that held her, a clean room, the distilled air of the basement.
She was now more angry at Mullich. She stared into the black square, a laundry chute suspended from a white ceiling in a small room. In the distance, from beyond the door, she could hear faint notes from some of Claiborne’s music. She remained still, letting the cloth suspend her, letting her pulse normalize. She counted three full and even breaths.
The black square directly above her was silent.
Then, “Anna.”
The A echoed foreign, almost an H in front, soft, deep, down the chute, falling over her.
Mendenhall raised her head.
“Stay still,” said another voice, a young woman. Silva. “That’s it.
Hold still for a while. Sounds come out of it once in a while. The building expanding and contracting. They sound human. Always in two syllables. Mullich says, anyway.”
Mendenhall worked herself into a standing position. Silva had removed her lab coat and changed into a dress, blue with vaguely Thai piping. She wore black ballet flats. Her ponytail was set higher than usual. The disguise worked, giving the impression of Eastern, far from Brazilian.
Still buried up to her shoulders in linens, Mendenhall tried adjusting her own failed disguise, tugged the skirt, twisted the blouse, curled her toes to make sure the Mary Janes hadn’t flown off during her plunge. Her clothes embarrassed her. She wanted to remain in the bin.
“I stuffed as much as I could up the chute,” Silva told her.
“Mullich said not to bother. But he’s never done it. It’s all blueprint to him.”
“I liked him better as an enemy.”
Silva offered Mendenhall her cell.
“Get rid of it,” said Mendenhall. “They’ll just track us with it.”
Silva maintained distance. Her feet were together, prim.
“How long have you been in here?” Mendenhall worked her way to the edge of the bin.
“About two hours.”
Mendenhall looked to the chute. “From there?”
“Yes.”
“From Four?”
Silva shook her head. “They never found me. I dropped from Seven.”
“Seven.” Mendenhall shivered. A double moan came from the chute, a kind of chant.
“He put stuff in it. For me. It slants a bit. Good design, he says.”
“Mullich showed it to you?”
“The journalist,” replied Silva. “Mullich showed him; he showed me. When I was trapped on Seven. Promised a soft landing. It wasn’t that soft. I tried to make it better for you.”
“The journalist. He’s still here?”
“He found me because he knew you were outside. Knew
somebody was pretending to be you. Here. He’s really good.
But high.”
Mendenhall pried herself over the side of the bin, stuck her landing as best she could, tried to look awake and ready. She could have returned to the linens and in their coolness slept for hours.
Silva took a step back. “I’m thinking of turning myself in.”
“We have more to do.”
“There’s nothing left to do.”
“We can help Dr. Claiborne.”
“If I go to his lab, it’s a threat to him.”
Mendenhall pulled on her shoulder, tested the joint. “You’re a kind person.”
“Why do you say that?”
Another chant fell from the chute, almost her name. It seemed to cut across her, shift her, a stick in water. She craved an apple, a slice of ginger, that pinot she had left back at the bar, her work in the ER, arrivals, and sleep, a hard full slam, darkness, blackout.
“How would you have treated Cabral?” Mendenhall closed her eyes and rolled her shoulder some more. “If you had known? How would you have treated him? Before he slept and died.”
“Full rest, oxygen, glucose.”
“Would you have left him alone? Bedside?”
“No,” Silva answered. “That would be the worst. I would think.”
“But I mean would you have left? Even if someone else remained?”
“No.”
“Then don’t turn yourself in. Stay down here.” Mendenhall tested their distance, took a half step. “Help me with someone. I brought her in. Julia. Her name is Julia.”
Silva neatened her stance. Mendenhall imagined her fall, a diver, feet first, arms folded, given over, slicing the dark.
“I’ll show you what I found.”
61.
The basements weren’t as open as Mendenhall had hoped. From beneath the door she and Silva could tell a security pair was patrolling the hall.
“I could go out.” Silva tightened her hair band, adjusted her flats.
“They get me. You get to Julia.”
“There might be more.” Mendenhall put a hand to the tech’s shoulder. “I have a better idea. You play doctor. I play dead.”
Mendenhall lay on a gurney, arms straight. Silva covered her with a sheet, hung a toe tag on her right foot.
“This won’t fool anyone.”
Mendenhall relaxed in the whiteness. She would have to fend off sleep. “They’re very scared of death,” she replied. “We don’t have to fool them. I scared one away by just stepping out of the shadows.
Up there they are brave. But very skittish in the basements. When they see you, know this.”
“If this doesn’t work, then we both get caught. What happens to your patient?”
“Dr. Claiborne will be with her.”
“The sheet moves when you breathe.”
“Listen. They—the DC security—seem to think the virus is down here. That it began down here or is being shoved down here.
Put on your mask and gloves. Go straight to that room. Hold your breath if you have to, and I’ll hold mine. One minute. That’s all it takes.”
In the hall, she lost confidence. She was blind, the white now smothering. She quickly lost breath and had to gasp, sucking in the sheet. She sensed Silva breaking stride, losing the straightness of the gurney. The wheels skidded sideways. Dead gurneys were different, meant for delivery, not speed, cold and heavy. Mendenhall’s back ached. She needed a pillow.
She heard a pair of footsteps, boots. The gurney swayed to the side. Silva took a quick breath.
The steps changed pace, and a low voice asked questions, the answers silent—a cell. Mendenhall felt cold, helpless beneath the sheet. Foolish.
“Ask them for help,” she whispered. “Ask them for escort. To open the door for you.”
She slipped her fingers beneath her waistband.
“Please.” Silva’s voice sounded all wrong as she called to them, almost begging.
The boot steps quicken
ed. Mendenhall’s lungs tightened. She locked her knees, tried to count, to remember with her fingertips which colors were where. She could hear the men moving fast, the familiar squeak of heels on linoleum, a sound that triggered the best in her. The pair surrounded the gurney. Silva gasped. Mendenhall let them yank the sheet, let them fill their hands.
She gripped a syringe in each hand, thumb on plunger. She had never injected anyone without knowing what, without knowing how much, without getting to assess them at least in a glance.
When the sheet whipped off her, she stabbed both men in the femoral triangle, her one clear decision.
They opened their mouths with the pain, made no sound. They both reached for Silva instead of her, an odd gesture that gave Mendenhall confidence. She maintained needle pressure, eyed the colors. The bigger man was getting Demerol. But the plunger there was kicking back against the grip of thumb. She was in the artery.
She gave an extra thrust to counteract the blood flow, to get the dose in and through before the gush. He staggered back, snapping the needle, leaving the empty syringe in her hand. Blood spurted in pulses from the needle. Silva dodged the spray and it speckled the wall.
The smaller guard was getting a dose of adrenaline in his femoral vein. He froze. His arms and legs went rigid, his eyes wide. The fate of his partner terrified him. She hoped he had a strong heart. The bigger guy went down and out. Silva tended to him. She removed the broken needle and applied pressure with two fingers. She pressed with enough force to roll the man flat. His arms flopped.
“Any tear?” asked Mendenhall. They were staring at the rigid guard, waiting for him to fire loose.
Silva shook her head.
Mendenhall removed the needle from her guy. She scrambled off the gurney, stood by him, touching his shoulder. She assessed Silva and her guy.
“Main?”
Silva’s hair was falling loose from her ponytail. “No,” she replied.
“Inferior epigastric.”
“Good.”
“Good?”
“We can stash them. Really push. Tuck the vessel. Count to forty.”
With her fingers pressed to the point of the man’s pelvis, Silva looked at Mendenhall. Then her eyes questioned the guard who was still standing. His jaw was clenched, and he was breathing quickly through his teeth.
