The Pain Nurse

by Jon Talton

  Suddenly this madman had appeared, vowing to take him for an MRI. It was midnight. Will had protested ineffectually as they slid him to a gurney and wheeled him like tardy cargo through the empty halls of the hospital. For the first time since waking from the surgery, Will was afraid. The nurses hadn’t heard about this trip to the imaging department. He overheard a hushed conversation. And the attendant seemed so careless, so quick to take a fast turn with the gurney that might have sent Will sprawling onto the floor. The corridors were empty. Could the MRI even be operating this late? Yet he was a prisoner, flat on his back, barely able to move below the waist.

  He felt profoundly vulnerable: part of his vertebrae was missing and a long, fresh wound was cut down his back, held together by sutures that could easily rip apart. The drugs and exhaustion had made him feel oddly disembodied. From the safety of his bed, he had studied the assorted tubes coming out of his arms and chest with an abstract disregard. Now they looked like menace, like death attached.

  He felt utterly alone.

  It didn’t help Will’s apprehension that he was at the mercy of a young black man who hated cops. The man had made that tendency clear to everyone he encountered. There had been another shooting of a black by a police officer, no doubt a white officer. Will Borders was a white police officer. He feigned sleep and hoped that his tormenter didn’t know his occupation.

  After an hour of being banged inside the futuristic coffin of the MRI—thank God, he wasn’t claustrophobic—he was again loaded on the gurney and wheeled to the elevator. This time they took a long, circuitous route, through bleak corridors that looked as if they hadn’t been used in years. Will was growing sleepy until the gurney jerked to a halt and he looked ahead to see a hallway blocked with yellow tape. It was crime-scene tape.

  “Can’t go this way.”

  “What? I can’t use the A-Main corridor. The cops blocked that, too. I got a man who needs to get back to his room.”

  It was the first time the orderly had shown any more concern for Will than for a cart of someone else’s groceries.

  “Wait.”

  Will strained to see in front of him. He could make out two uniformed police officers standing outside an open doorway, their regulation white shirts and badges glowing in the reflected light. Will was too exhausted to be curious. The thrill of being on the other side of police tape had passed years before.

  “Let him through…stay over this way.”

  The gurney moved again and Will opened his eyes, just in time to look through the door. It was an office and blood was on the walls and floor. A technician stepped carefully to take photos of the scene. The body was still there, a woman, nude, and badly slashed. Will studied the view with a trained eye, suddenly engaged. His stomach was turning to ice. His throat threatened to close.

  “Stop!” Will tried to pull himself upright, got his trunk a quarter of the way up, and fell back. “Stop!” he said again.

  “Are you nuts, man? You move around too much and you could reopen your sutures.” The orderly looked alarmed.

  “That woman in there,” Will said. “Look at her left hand.”

  “Yeah, she’s stone cold…”

  “No, look at her left hand. What do you see?”

  The orderly’s voice rose an octave. “Shit, man, somebody cut off her finger!”

  “Come on, move along.”

  Will knew the voice instantly and a tired, sour feeling enveloped him.

  “What, you don’t see enough blood in your job…what’s this?” A broad ebony face bent down and surveyed Will. “Well, well, Internal Investigations will do anything to sneak up on real working police.”

  Homicide Detective J. J. Dodds assumed his usual lordly stance. He was not merely big but downright fat. He grew fatter every year, regularly outgrowing his suits. Will didn’t know how he passed his annual physical. He did know how to dress, though. Tonight Dodds wore a blue pinstriped suit, starched dress shirt, and a burgundy tie.

  “What the hell happened to you, Borders? Having a boil removed from your ass?”

  “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

  “Oh, yeah, what? You look like shit.”

  The orderly asked, “You guys know each other?”

  “Yeah, I arrested him once,” Dodds said. “Morals charge.”

  Will ignored him and nodded toward the room. “That victim. Did you see her hand?”

  “I saw. Why are you here? Enlighten me.” A moment before the cops had been rushing them by. Now Dodds’ meaty hand held the gurney fast. The orderly sighed loudly and lounged against the wall. A few feet away stood the pretty nurse he had seen on the elevator going down. Her clothes were streaked with blood and her face was ashen.

  “What ailment, Borders? Surely not something in the line of duty.”

  Will’s throat was still sore from the intubation for surgery. He swallowed hard and wished he had some water. “A spinal cord tumor, okay?”

  “Spinal cord what?” Dodds’ exotic, cynical eyes widened. Then he blinked the moment away. “I’ve got a bad back, too.”

  “Her hand, Dodds. Her hand.”

  “I saw it.” He lounged nonchalantly against the rails of the gurney.

  “Dodds…”

  “What are you telling me, Borders? That you believe in ghosts? The Mount Adams Slasher died at Lucasville last summer.”

  “Maybe he wasn’t the Slasher.”

  Dodds lifted the sheet and studied Will. “Shit, you’ve got tubes coming out of you. That’s gross. You in pain?”

  “Who was this woman? Do you have a suspect?”

  “They’ll just go lay it on an innocent brother like they always do,” the orderly grumbled. Dodds ignored him.

  “This is none of your concern, Mister Patient.” Dodds carelessly replaced the sheet. “You’re the only one in town who ever had a doubt over that case, and as I recall you left the Homicide Unit. You make a living ratting out police officers.”

  “He took her ring finger, goddammit. Just like the Mount Adams cases.”

  “So it’s a copy cat.”

  Will hissed, “We never released that information about the crime and the media never reported it!” His back was starting to hurt, a low, spreading fire of pain. “I bet you found her clothes folded neatly, too. Dodds!”

  “Borders…”

  “You know who did this. You know it.” Will heard an unfamiliar pleading in his voice. “Look for the knife!”

  Dodds tapped the gurney. “Get him out of here.” The orderly pushed and the scene receded. Out of the gloom, he heard Dodds’ voice, “Hope your back feels better, Borders.”

  Chapter Three

  It was only safe to cry at home. She never cried at work, never broke that professional boundary. Only at home. But this time Cheryl Beth didn’t make it that far. A guard had walked her to her car, she had locked the doors, inserted the key into the steering column, but then sobs heaved through her body. She stayed like that a long time, trembling, wrapped in her trench coat, her arms clenched tightly across her chest, the halogen lights of the parking garage burning into her tired eyes. For a long time she didn’t trust herself to drive. The drive home only took three minutes if she hit the lights right. Her house in the Clifton district was so close that on summer days she often rode her hot-pink bicycle to the hospital. It made people smile.

  Her little bungalow sat dark at the end of the street. The porch light had been burned out for a week. It was only tonight that it took on a sinister dimension. Her stomach tightened into a cramp and her breathing kicked up. She clicked on the bright lights as she approached. They swept the empty yard and spindly winter bushes.

  Then, out loud, to herself, “Don’t be silly.”

  She parked at the top of the driveway and stepped out, the chill helping to center her. The street looked coldly benign in the moonlight. The moon looked like it had been shot out of a cannon.

  It came quickly from her left, shadow and blurry motion.
r />   “No!”

  “Cheryl Beth, it’s okay. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “Gary.” She felt her heart slowly withdraw from her throat. “What are you doing here?”

  “The hospital told me.”

  “Come inside.”

  She clumsily unlocked the door, led him in, and turned on some lights. When she turned around he was right there, pulling her greedily into his arms. At first she resisted, guilt and empathy fighting inside her. Then she let him hold her. After a moment, she even held him back. Dr. Gary Nagle stood a foot taller than she, but his body was hard with muscles, lacking even a careless hint of fat. He was a killer squash player.

  “Oh, Gary, I am so, so sorry.”

  With that she started sobbing again and cleaved against him until the coat made her oppressively hot, the heat reminding her of the impossible awkwardness of this. She broke away, tossed her coat in a chair, and went silently to the kitchen where she made herself a Bushmills on the rocks. He was already fixing himself a scotch. He knew where the bottle was kept.

  “They told me you found her.”

  He followed her back into the living room and waited, standing while she put a fake log in the fireplace, thinking the light and flame might be comforting. It bloomed into unnatural light as she told him what had happened. She was accustomed to telling the story now that she had told the police four times. The big black detective, she didn’t like him. He had aggressively questioned her every sentence, almost as if he suspected her of the crime. Several of her RN friends had married cops, but she had little personal experience with the police. If this was any indication, it was no wonder so many of those marriages had failed.

  “She was just cut so badly,” Cheryl Beth said. “There was nothing I could do. She bled out. He cut off her ring finger.”

  “If it was a he.”

  “I didn’t think she was even wearing a wedding band now. This makes no sense.”

  His voice seemed so matter of fact. By this time she was sitting on the small sofa in front of the fireplace. Gary sat next to her, the flickering flame accentuating his blue eyes and wolfish mustache. He started stroking and twirling her hair.

  “Stop, Gary. My God, your wife was killed tonight.”

  He pulled his hand slightly, to the back of the sofa, still resting on her shoulder. “Ex-wife,” he said. His face fell into a boyish sulk.

  “I’m surprised you’re not down there,” Cheryl Beth said.

  “The police want to talk to me. They left messages.” He took a deep pull on the scotch. “You know how they always suspect the husband. The ex-husband is even worse. You know how the police think. I’m considering getting my lawyer.”

  Cheryl Beth regarded him silently. She had several rules concerning Dr. Gary Nagle. They were designed to keep her clear-headed about him. One was already broken: he was sitting too close. Another was getting emotional. She resisted blurting out the obvious: man, your wife, okay ex-wife, somebody you loved enough to marry, was killed tonight, murdered, horribly murdered, what the hell’s the matter with you?… After a breath, she said, “I don’t know why you came here. It’s three a.m.”

  “I wanted to know what you told the police.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You might have been the last person to see her alive,” he said. After an impossible pause he added, “Other than the murderer.”

  She turned toward him, felt her face redden. “What do you mean?” But she knew exactly what he meant. “You were on Main Street tonight?” She realized it was last night now, but made no effort to clarify. She shook her head. “You were spying? Following me? That’s very bizarre.”

  “If an ex-husband sees his ex-wife and ex-lover having a drink together, he’s going to take notice.”

  “Especially if he’s stalking.”

  “You two were together around nine last night. Why in the world were you both back at the hospital later? Christine was working on a computer system, for God’s sake, not doing patient rounds any more.”

  “We did have a drink. I left. Then I got paged. I do have patients. She didn’t tell me she was going back to the hospital.” Oh, she hated his neurosurgeon’s arrogance. She couldn’t imagine the time when she had mistaken it for an edgy confidence and had been attracted to him. “I was on one of the floors when they gave me a message from her at the nurses’ station. She said she was in her office and asked me to come down. Then I went down and she was, she was…. Why…?” She felt herself getting angry. “Why am I explaining myself to you? I don’t owe you anything.”

  He ignored her mood and finished off the scotch. After a few minute’s silence, he said, “I warned her about that office. That hospital’s not safe. They ought to shut it down, and they would without the neurosurgery unit carrying everything else.”

  “Gary, you need to go see the police. Now.”

  “Chris was going through the postdivorce wilds. Having a great time being away from me. Playing with residents. They’re young and idealistic and horny. And playing with nurses, I hear.”

  “As I remember, you left her.”

  “It was over a long time ago, way before any judge ruled. As I remember, you once wanted me to leave her to be with you.”

  A wave of nausea swept over Cheryl Beth. “That’s not true.” She spoke quietly but heard her words echo off the walls and mantle. “What we had was a…fling. My bad judgment.”

  “Oh, the pain nurse, always making nice.” He stroked her hair again, ran one of his high-priced hands down the side of her face, down her neck. He smelled good. Damn it.

  “Stop, Gary.” She moved to a chair facing him and took a gulp of the whiskey. His face was strangely blank, the handsome planes of his cheeks, strong chin and sensual lips. He would look thirty-five forever. Then he leered at her, his dusky blue eyes morose and appraising. She knew her face was red and her eyes puffy, her makeup a mess, but he looked as if he hadn’t parted with one tear. Some days she hated blue eyes, swore she would never trust them again.

  “Well.” He set down the glass and stood. “I’m going to have to tell the police that you two were together before she was killed. But I assume you already did.”

  “I did.” Her mouth filled with cotton.

  “Did you tell them about us?”

  “No,” she said softly.

  “Cheryl Beth, always discreet. Always the good girl, even when she wasn’t.”

  “Why are you being such a jerk?”

  “Because I’m not going to let Chris get me from the grave.” He pointed adamantly down, as if she were buried beneath the house. “Like I said, the ex-husband is always the prime suspect.” The leering smile returned. “But so is Chris’ romantic rival. Who knows what she might have said to you tonight. But, you told the police everything, right? Well, almost everything.”

  He paused, then, “What else happened at the hospital tonight? Did Bryant come down there?”

  She said the chief executive had come down. He had been very solicitous and gentle with her, and had told her to take two days off.

  “Come here, babe, I’ll give us both an alibi.” His body language was all too clear.

  She edged him toward the door, afraid of all the raging things she might say. “I don’t need an alibi. And you need to call the police, talk to them. I can’t even believe you were alone tonight, spying. What about Amy, that child physical therapist you were fucking.”

  “Oh, I love to hear you talk dirty, Cheryl Beth. Gets me so horny.” He smirked. “But your mother would disapprove of that language.”

  She knew he was pushing buttons. He was so good at that. But the words still lashed her. Why had she ever let him into her life, especially into the deeper parts that could wound?

  “Please go.”

  “Maybe I was with Amy tonight. You don’t know. And she’s hardly a child. She’s twenty-two.” He looked around the familiar room.

  “I need you to go now.”

  “I ho
pe you close those curtains after I leave. Those big windows. You should really be more careful.”

  “Gary, you’re really…” She didn’t finish the sentence. She just held out her hands defensively and he slipped out the door. When she had locked it, she spoke to the door. “Gary, you’re really creeping me out tonight.”

  Chapter Four

  “You’re a hard man to find.”

  Will Borders sat in the wheelchair, against the wall in a hallway behind a cart with red drawers, an EKG machine and menacing-looking defibrillator paddles, and there was Scaly Mueller walking toward him. Captain Steve Mueller was the commander of the Internal Investigations unit.

  “But good men are hard to find.”

  He talked that way, lapsing into motivational clichés. It was just another Scaly Mueller joke. All the cops made fun of him behind his back. Will said hello, but the unspoken answer to Mueller’s question was that Will’s only peace was anywhere but inside his room. After a week in the neuro-rehab unit, he had barely slept. Moving meant pain. Even raising his arm to dial his cell phone meant excruciating torture. Immobility meant pain to come. Once he was down for the night, he was strapped into what looked like vibrating socks—prevent blood clots, they said. They also killed his ability to sleep. But the biggest problem was three feet away from his bed.

  His roommate was a quadriplegic from a car crash. He was trussed up in a contraption of wires and tubes. Every few minutes a nurse or technician would come in with a different, invariably noisy treatment. The commotion and stench made rest impossible. Hospitals were noisy places. When the poor man was conscious, he only wanted to watch back-to-back episodes of Judge Judy, with the volume on high. The room itself offered no view. The neuro-rehab unit was located in a first-floor addition that shot off the main part of the hospital. But Will’s window looked back into the old blond-brick building, across a small stretch of hibernating grass. The heliport was located on top of the neuro-rehab wing, and late at night medevac choppers would land, causing the windows to shake as if an earthquake were happening. The night-shift nurses joked darkly with him about the likelihood that one day a helicopter would crash on them. “The first thing you’ll see is the aviation fuel running down the walls, before it ignites and we’re all toast,” one said merrily.