As Riley sat on her bed, awaiting grand rounds and Dr. Munroe, the late afternoon sunlight streaming through the window scrunched the shadow of the wrought-iron parrot onto the narrow window ledge. It looked as if it had been pounded with a mallet.
I know the feeling, she thought.
Two weeks. I’ve only been in this place for two weeks and I feel like I’ve been here forever. How am I going to get through six months of this shit—or longer, depending on what they decide? I may not have been crazy when I got here, but if I have to stay here for six months I will definitely lose my mind.
She glanced up at a knock on the door as Dr. Munroe entered, followed by Biedermann, Kaminski, Nakamura, and two younger doctors Riley didn’t recognize—probably members of the non-ARC staff tagging along for the ride.
“Good afternoon, Ms. Diaz,” Julian said, then paused to see if she’d give the ‘Good morning’ distress call.
“Hey, Dr. Munroe,” she said.
He drew closer, flipping through her file on his tablet. “And how are you feeling today?”
“Great. Couldn’t be better.”
He paused at an entry in her file. “It says here that you’re declining medication.”
“It’s my right.”
“Why, yes, it is at that,” he said with a glance in Biedermann’s direction. “Isn’t it amazing that patients have that right?”
Biedermann nodded but said nothing.
Julian returned to the chart and began reading aloud. “‘Patient shows resistance to authority’—yes, well, apparently that’s why she’s here in the first place—‘and hostility to the staff.’ Well, I’d say that covers most of the ARC patients on arrival, wouldn’t you, Edward?”
Kaminski shrugged and looked away.
Julian skimmed further down, then frowned. “‘Patient has exhibited signs of obsessive-compulsive behavior.’ What’s this about?”
“Some of the orderlies saw her pacing back and forth in the halls,” Kaminski said, “like she was counting her steps, over and over.”
Riley held her breath. She wasn’t sure which was more dangerous: that Kaminski suspected she was measuring out the halls and wanted to send her a message or that he didn’t have a clue about what she was doing but decided it was a good way to bolster his argument that she was crazy.
“Is this true, Ms. Diaz?” Julian asked.
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me why you’ve been pacing the halls?”
“I’m having a really rough period. It’s how I distract myself from the cramps.”
“I thought there might be a simple explanation,” he said, but as he glanced back at her, she saw behind his eyes the words, Whatever you’re doing, be careful; the staff see everything.
“Riley is still reluctant to participate with the other patients in our group therapy sessions,” Kaminski said, “but we’re hoping she’ll start to open up a little. It would certainly go a long way toward helping the other patients feel more comfortable talking in front of her.”
“Chicken and the egg,” Julian said. “Yes, if Ms. Diaz talks more, the others might be inclined to do the same, but by the same token, if they talk more, it might encourage Ms. Diaz to be more open. Whether or not a group session is productive is really the responsibility of the facilitator more than any single patient, wouldn’t you agree?”
If Kaminski caught the underlying message—Don’t pressure her to do your job or try to blame her for impeding the other patients—he didn’t acknowledge it. He just continued staring at Riley in a way she didn’t much care for.
“I see you had a cognitive therapy session with Dr. Nakamura. How was it from your side, Eleanor?” Julian asked.
Riley saw several possible answers scrolling behind Nakamura’s eyes before she landed on, “Instructive.”
“Unlike that reply,” Julian said, only slightly under his breath.
He turned back to Riley. “Have you experienced any psychological issues since your arrival? Troublesome thoughts? Inclinations toward self-harm? Suicide? Any sense of depression?”
“Nope, I’m totally good.”
“All right then, Ms. Diaz, we’ll let you get on with your day,” he said, then turned to the rest of the staff. “Shall we?”
Everyone except Biedermann followed him out the door. When they were gone, she went to the storage cabinet above the bathroom toilet and pulled out a still-sealed box of tampons.
She tapped the box against her palm. “Since you said you were on your period, I was going to have some more sent to your room, but it seems you don’t need them.”
Then she returned the box to the cabinet, closed the door, and left to catch up with the others.
By now the pecking order was clear to Riley: Nakamura was useless; Dr. Munroe was an ally but lacked the authority to directly confront Kaminski and could only resort to pointed asides; Kaminski was a pig, but a weak one.
The real power, and the real danger, was Biedermann.
On the other hand, her brain shot back, maybe putting on that show was just her way of telling you to be more careful in setting up your alibis.
Possible, she thought. But honestly, what’re the odds?
Then she glanced at the clock. Shit! I’m gonna be late!
She reached under her bed, found the book hidden there, and hurried down the hall.
* * *
The ritual had begun several days earlier. When she realized that he could always be found in the solarium at four o’clock, eyes closed, standing silently before the window when the sun was at the right angle to warm his face, she began showing up at three thirty and taking her place on the bench. Once she saw his reflection appear in the window, standing behind her or off to the side, she would begin reading aloud, as if just for herself, without looking at him or inviting him to approach.
At first he seemed annoyed to find someone sharing his time alone with the sun, but the longer she read, day after day, the closer he came. Neither of them acknowledged the other until the day he sat on the bench beside her and she turned her head very slowly to risk a glance at his eyes.
And the mind behind them said, Keep reading.
And she did. Every day.
“All men hate the wretched; how then must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things! Yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only—”
She paused at the next word and looked to Frankenstein, seated beside her on the bench, body slumped slightly forward, hands dangling loosely between his knees, gaze fixed on a spot somewhere beyond the window to something only he could see. His expression, unrevealing as stone, gave no indication if he actually understood what she was reading, especially given some of the olde-school language.
But he wasn’t walking away, either.
She took her best shot at the word. “—ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us. You purpose to kill me. How dare you sport thus with life? Do your duty towards me, and I will do mine towards you and the rest of mankind. If you comply with my conditions, I will leave them and you at peace; but if you refuse, I will glut the maw of death, until it be satiated with the blood of your remaining friends.
“I was benevolent; my soul glowed with love and humanity: but am I not alone, miserably alone?”
She glanced over to see if the words were reaching their intended target, only to find him staring silently ahead, as if he’d heard none of it. But his reflection in the window showed a distant, locked-away gaze that hinted at hidden pain deep within.
“You, my creator, abhor me; what hope can I gather from your fellow-creatures, who owe me nothing? They spurn and hate me. The desert mountains and dreary glaciers are my refuge. I have wandered here many days; the caves of ice, which I only do not fear, are a dwelling to me, and the only one which man does not grudge. These bleak skies I hail, for they are kinder to me than your fellow-beings. If the multitude of mankind knew of my existence, they would do as you do, and arm themselves for my destruction. Shall I not then hate them who abhor me? I will keep no terms with my enemies. I am miserable, and they shall share my wretchedness.
“Yet it is in your power to recompense me, and deliver them from an evil which it only remains for you to make so great, that not only you and your family, but thousands of others, shall be swallowed up in the whirlwinds of its rage. Let your compassion be moved, and do not disdain me. Listen to my tale: when you have heard that, abandon or commiserate me, as you shall judge that I deserve. But hear me. The guilty are allowed, by human laws, bloody as they may be, to speak in their own defense before they are condemned. Listen to me, Frankenstein. You accuse me of murder; and yet you would, with a satisfied conscience, destroy your own creature. Oh, praise the eternal justice of man! Yet I ask you not to spare me: listen to me; and then, if you can, and if you will, destroy the work of your own hands.”
She closed the book and joined him in watching the sun inch closer to the horizon.
“This is what I was trying to tell you,” she said without turning from the view. “He’s so smart, not like the movie creature at all. He’s saying that if his creator, if the world, could understand what happened to make him the way he was, if he could just tell them his story, they’d feel compassion, and he wouldn’t have to be the monster they all thought he was.
“I know you’re in there. I know you can hear me or you would’ve stopped coming a long time ago. And since this is the part of the book where your namesake goes on to tell his story for the next ten thousand pages, I was thinking that maybe you could tell me a little bit of your story.”
He said nothing, his gaze falling to the floor the way it always did just before he left.
“Okay,” she said quickly, determined to hold his attention, “so how about I tell you my story first, and you can return the favor and tell me yours later. Fair deal?”
His gaze remained steady, but for the first time, his head moved slightly in an almost imperceptible nod.
“Done deal,” she said, her voice softer than she normally allowed, then turned back to the shadows that had grown long outside the window. “It’s actually kind of funny, because I was thinking last night about how you and I are alike in some ways. I think somebody in your life told you that you were a monster, and kept right on saying it until you started to believe it. And I know how that feels, because I did it to myself.
“I loved—”
She felt her voice catch, and paused, pushing her heart down until it reached a safe distance, then starting again. “I loved my mom and dad. They were like the best mom and dad in the history of really amazing moms and dads. I could talk to them about anything without feeling like I was being judged or shamed. They guided me but never tried to control me. My dad used to say that letting me go my own way was more about self-preservation on their part than being good parents. It was bullshit, obviously, but funny bullshit.
“He was just this rock-steady guy, the calm center between us and whatever trouble was coming our way. Everybody else on his side of the family was a mister-yelly-head, but I never heard him raise his voice. Maybe that’s what made him his own guy in that crowd, y’know? He was a big man with a big face that was always so serious, especially when he was being funny, so you had to pay attention to see if he was actually saying something important or just messing with you. I see him in my head like one of those big trees in the middle of nowhere that have been around a long time, a real tree, with roots that go all the way down to the center of the earth. No matter how big the storm was, you knew that if you went under those branches you were safe, that he’d never, ever let anything happen to you.
“Back when the protests started going year-round, my mom used to invite people from her old college to come by for dinner: professors, students, writers . . . smart people. They’d talk all night about how much the Struggle mattered to them, but even as a kid I could tell that it was just talk for most of them. They liked to hear themselves speak, puffing up all brave and strong even though they’d never been in a protest when the tear gas guns came out. My dad would usually just nod and listen, never getting in their face about it, because that wasn’t his style, but one night, after these guys had been going on a little too long about what they believed in and what they stood for, my dad finally just went off on them.
“‘You know what?’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter what you stand for while you’re sitting here all nice and safe in this living room. What matters is what you stand for when standing is the hardest. All the pretty words you keep firing off don’t mean shit if you turn to smoke the first time somebody puts a boot on your neck or kicks down the door in the middle of the night. The only time you ever really know who you are is when somebody threatens to take away everything you have. Once you’ve had that moment, then you can come back and tell me about what you stand for.’
“They got really huffy about it and left feeling insulted, but you know what? When the antiprotest laws got passed later on, and the preempts started, and their jobs, scholarships, or publications were on the line, they were the first ones to take back everything they said, that it was all just a big misunderstanding.”
She felt wetness on her cheek and batted it away with the back of her hand. “I miss him. Every day. I miss both of them so much.”
Frankenstein said nothing.
Riley let out a long, slow breath, knowing what was coming next: all the stuff she never talked about to anyone, but which had to come next if she was going to make the point that she wanted, no needed to make, for both their sakes. You can do this. Just take a deep breath, and as you let it out, say—
“And it’s kind of my fault my folks aren’t here.
“I’ve always been what teachers call ‘a discipline problem.’ Big shock, right? It’s not like I want to be a pain in the ass, but when someone expects me to do what I’m told, not because they’re right but because they’re wearing the Pointy Hat of Authority, I go the other way every time. If you want me to do something you think is important, then take two minutes to explain why it’s important. I’m not stupid and I’m not arbitrary; if it’s the right thing to do, then I’m absolutely on board and I’ll back you up if anybody gives you shit about it. But for me to do something just because some entitled asshat orders me to do it? No. Not a chance.
“Anyway, one day my problem with authority figures blew up into a huge argument with one of my teachers. It wasn’t the first time, and by now the vice-principle was pretty fed up with me, so she suspended me and told my folks I couldn’t come back until they agreed to meet with her after hours to talk about my ‘situation.’ So they showed up and listened and nodded and tried to say all the right things, but after a while even my dad got tired of the bullshit, told her what she could do with her ‘situation,’ and walked out. On the way out, my mom called from the parking lot to say not to worry about it, they’d find a new school with fifty percent fewer assholes, and told me to get ready to go out for pizza.
“They were driving home through the worst part of rush-hour traffic, when one of those big eighteen-wheelers they use to deliver new cars blew through the stoplight and slammed into the car and . . .”
The tears returned. She left them alone. “And they were gone.”
“I blamed myself for what happened because they wouldn’t have been on that road at that moment if they hadn’t been dealing with my shit. They would’ve been home, and we would’ve had pizza and maybe watched a movie and—”
She closed her eyes, pushing away all the yesterdays that would have happened had that yesterday not happened. “I went into a really dark place for a long time, and to be honest I wasn’t sure I’d ever come back out again. I started acting out big-time. If something was illegal, I did it. If it was drugs, I did it twice. I was just angry, all the time. And alone. I didn’t have many friends in the first place, because I was always the weird one, but when all this went down, poof, they disappeared.
“When I ran out of money, I started selling what little we had to make rent and buy more shit to slam into my veins. One of the last things left was my dad’s laptop, but I didn’t want to sell it with the hard drive still inside because that was his, you know? It was private. I’ve always been a bit of a computer nerd so I decided to pull the hard drive and pop in something cheap. But once I was inside, I got curious and fired up the drive to see what was there.
“You know what I found? No porn, if that’s what you’re thinking. Not even many emails or documents, mainly business invoices, receipts, shit like that. The rest was almost entirely pictures and videos of me, and my mom, and the three of us. I didn’t even know he’d taken half of them because he was always so quiet about that stuff. Gigabyte after gigabyte of birthdays, late nights at Denny’s, and the time we went to Disney World in Florida and my dad got sick on Cuban food and none of us ever let him forget it. And as I went through all that stuff, I knew my folks would want me to be more than what I was at that moment. They’d want me to fight my way out, to stand up, because like my dad said, it’s only when standing is the hardest thing that you know who you really are.
“It took me over a year to crawl out of the hole I’d dug for myself,” she said, suddenly feeling very tired, “and the road back led through some really bad places, but I made it. And now the only thing these asshole doctors want to talk about is my family, not because they give a shit but because they want to use what happened against me. But I won’t let them. They don’t own that pain, and I’ll fucking die before I let them use my folks like that.
“I’ve always hated it when people say, Oh, I know how you feel about this or that, because most of the time they really don’t. I don’t know what you went through, so I can’t say I know how you felt about any of it. But I do know what it feels like to look in the mirror and see a monster, because for a really long time that’s all I could see, until I finally realized that I had a choice, that I didn’t have to be that monster anymore. And neither do you.
“So anyway, that’s my story. Like I said, I don’t really talk about it much, but I guess it’s good for me to talk about it to somebody once in a while, y’know? And telling you is safe, right? Because seriously, who are you gonna tell?”
And for just a second, she thought she caught the barest flicker of a smile.
* * *
It was getting dark as Riley started back to her room to stash the book before dinner only to find the hall blocked by orange safety cones. Further down the hall, orderlies with mops were scrubbing down the floor.
“What happened?”
“Patient puked up from here all the way down to the corner. It’s Family Day Dinner for the regular patients, and sometimes they get a little too excited. Can’t let you through until we finish cleaning, then disinfect.”
“I have to get to my room before dinner.”
“Then you gotta go around,” he said, pointing to the corner.
“That’s the staff area. Henry told me it’s off-limits to patients.”
He pulled the mop from the bucket and began soaking down the tiles. “Just go around,” he said, frustrated.
Fine.
Dinnertime was end-of-shift for the doctors, nurses, and orderlies who worked days, so most of the offices were empty, dimly illuminated by desk lamps and the glow of password-locked monitors awaiting the arrival of the night shift. As she passed a conference room, she peeked in to see an orderly napping on a couch, barely visible in the pale white light of street lamps that filtered in through a window at the far end of the room.
Riley took two more steps forward, then abruptly stopped.
Did I just see what I thought I saw?
She backed up to the conference room and looked inside.
There were no bars on the window, animal-shaped or otherwise.
She kept going, glancing into each of the offices in turn.
None of the windows were barred.
Of course, she realized. This is a hospital, it wasn’t designed to be a prison. Yeah, that’s what they’re turning it into now, but that wasn’t the original intent. Prison guards expect to spend most of their time in rooms with bars, but the doctors who were here before the ARC program probably liked their views, and why not? After all, if you tell most hospital patients, ‘This area is off-limits,’ they usually just go along with it.
She glanced around to make sure no one was coming, then slipped into one of the empty offices to examine the window more closely. It was screened on the outside but could still be opened with a lockable handle on the inside. A narrow ledge beneath the window ran the length of the building before disappearing around the corner at the south end. Standing on tiptoes, she peered down a three-story drop to the parking lot, where trucks and heavy equipment were lined up next to racks containing rows of window-bars. White dust on the ground and the windows below showed signs of recent construction.
Must be working their way up floor by floor, making it more secure, she decided. No wonder they didn’t want patients roaming around this part of the hospital. From the look of the worksite they were still locking down the first two floors. It would take time to get this high, but there was no way she could know how much time. She examined the window lock more closely, but couldn’t find any signs of security wiring. Makes sense, why bother putting in window sensors three stories up a sheer drop?
Riley allowed an excited grin. There was a way out!
She was tempted to make a run for it right then and there, but pushed down the impulse. Getting out was only half the job; the other half was not getting caught and sent back. Now that she’d identified a weak spot, the next steps would have to be all about preparation, planning, and support, so she would be ready to move when the opportunity came.
Chance favors a prepared mind, her father liked to say. That means you don’t wait around for luck to happen. You put yourself in a position to take advantage of luck when it comes along.
Then an electronic beep! chimed behind her and she froze, sure that she had been caught. She turned slowly, but there was no one in the doorway. Get the hell out before someone finds you messing with the windows, her brain yelled at her.
Once safely out of the room, she heard the telltale sound of a microwave oven being popped opened and closed again down the hall, and curiosity overcame caution. Edging closer to the source of the sound, she peered inside the open door of a break room to see Biedermann sitting at a small table, nibbling at the edges of a freshly toasted cheese sandwich. Almost makes her look human, Riley thought.
Keep moving, said the sensible part of her brain.
Naturally, she didn’t.
“Hi.”
Sandwich in hand, Biedermann looked silently to the door. Waiting.
“Hi, Nurse Biedermann.”
“Ms. Diaz. Is there something I can do for you?”
“No, they just sent me this way because the main hall’s being cleaned up.”
“Ah. I see.”
She returned to her sandwich.
Are we going to move on now? the same part of her brain pleaded.
In a minute, she fired back.
“Can I ask you a question?”
Seeing that this was about to become a conversation, Biedermann resignedly set the remains of her sandwich down on a paper plate, brushed a few stray crumbs from her uniform, folded the napkin on her lap into a precise square, and set it down before looking back up at Riley. “I suppose that depends on the question.”
“Do you enjoy what you do here?”
“Is it your assumption that I shouldn’t enjoy my work?”
“Not judging, just asking.”
“I like helping people who cannot help themselves. I like being part of a process that returns them whole and hale to the outside world.”
“That’s the job description, the kind of thing someone puts on a résumé. I was asking if you actually enjoy what you do?”
Biedermann’s face showed not even a flicker of reaction. “That varies from moment to moment and patient to patient. The reason you were diverted this way—improperly diverted, I will add, and I will have words with someone about that— is because Nurse Sanchez was escorting one of the regular patients to a meeting with his family when he began projectile vomiting on his shoes, the floor, the doors, the walls, and not coincidentally, Nurse Sanchez. Do I think she enjoyed the experience? Almost certainly not. But that doesn’t stop us from doing what needs to be done to help the patients.”
“Smooth how you transitioned my question to Nurse Sanchez rather than talking about yourself.”
Biedermann smiled without a trace of humor, then noticed the book in Riley’s hand. “What’s that?”
Oh, shit!
“Just a book.”
“I can see it’s a book. What sort of book?”
“Nothing, it’s—”
“Bring it here, please.”
Riley stepped forward and handed over the copy of Frankenstein.
Biedermann brushed dust off the cover that apparently only she could see. “I read this back in college,” she said, her voice flat. “Led to a rather lively discussion about whether the book was pro-science or anti-science. What do you think, Ms. Diaz?”
Uh-oh! Trick question!
“Never really thought about it. I just like the story.”
“Mmmm,” Biedermann said as she riffled through the pages, glancing at random passages that caught her attention.
Can I just go now? You’re starting to creep me out.
“I suppose what I’m asking,” Bidermann continued—
Ohforchrisssakes.
—“is, do you consider Victor Frankenstein the hero of the story, the victim of the story, or the villain of the story?”
A parade of possible responses flicked through Riley’s mind. At the head of the line was, I don’t know. From your perspective, as someone who will almost certainly have a house dropped on her by a tornado someday, what do you think?
“Well, he says straight up that he wants to be like God, with the power of life and death. That sounds at least a little bit Doctor Doom–y, right?”
“Mmmm,” she said again, then closed the book. “Let me come at the question a different way. Do you know when the first adult heart transplant was performed in the United States?”
Is this gonna be on the test?
Shut up before you get us both in trouble.
Both? Who do you think this is, anyway?
“No.”
“December third, 1967. And do you know who was the most fervently opposed to the idea of heart transplants?”
Come on! Say it! Say “Is this gonna be on the test?” You know you want to!
“No, and what does this have to do with—”
“Religious groups were furious with the medical establishment for putting dead parts into living bodies, and frequently compared them to Frankenstein. They said these doctors were trying to take to themselves the power of God, to decide who lived, who died, and when. They believed that the heart was where the soul resided, so putting the heart of one person into another was the worst kind of sacrilege. But their complaints obscured a more important point. Any time a doctor saves someone’s life, he is playing God, and most people are fine with that. They want someone who can play God just long enough to save them from cancer, heart failure, or the latest virus.
“Was Victor Frankenstein a monster because he wanted to play God? No. He was just being a doctor, same as every doctor in every hospital on the planet, and their actions spring from the same desire: to change the world, to make it a better place—a healthier, saner, and more rational place—by controlling disease, infirmity, and yes, even death.
“You asked if I enjoy what I do, so let me give you my answer: yes, I do, because I get to be part of something bigger than myself. Here, I make a difference. Here, I am in control. And control is everything, Ms. Diaz.”
She folded her arms across the book. “My parents died when I was five. For the next twelve years I was shuttled back and forth between relatives who lacked the patience, the resources, and the will to look after me properly. I was a burden, an intrusion, an afterthought. My life was chaotic and outside my control, which made me susceptible to whim, to the casual cruelty of people who enjoyed seeing me helpless and in a box. In self-defense I learned to care for myself, cook my own food, wash my own clothes, and earn my own money. I did whatever was necessary to take control of my life and circumstances because having agency, authority, and control over oneself is the most important thing in all the world. It is the power to say, ‘I will go this far and no farther.’
“You aren’t who you think you are, Ms. Diaz; you are a subset of whoever you allow, consciously or otherwise, to control you. The worst of these are people who want everyone to line up behind their goal, their cause, their movement, their mission: users, losers, abusers, and the occasional martyr in search of a match and some oil. They get others to enlist in their cause, surrendering control and risking life and limb on their behalf, by spinning pretty words about what they’re trying to achieve and the new society they’re trying to build. But in the end it’s really all about them, and it always ends badly.
“I do not enlist in causes or campaigns, follow martyrs over cliffs, or give anyone else agency over my life. No one owns me. No one controls me. I go my own way, make my own choices, and stick my neck out for no one.
“Which brings us to you, and this book,” she said, holding it up. “You tried to hide it, then asked for it back, because you think it is yours. But this is your book only as long as I allow it to be your book. If I say no, if I take it away, if I say that as of this moment this is no longer your book, then it is no longer yours. Shall I do that, Ms. Diaz? Shall I, with a single word, take this away? After all, this is a horror novel, and we do not generally allow patients to have such books, because it can upset them. But you could ask me to allow it anyway.”
“Yes, please.”
“And by making that request, you tacitly admit that doing the things that brought you here had only one result: the loss of control. You have no voice and no choice. You have only what I choose to give you. Is that correct?”
Riley ground her teeth but didn’t argue. “Yes.”
Biedermann waited.
“Yes, Nurse Biedermann.”
“Then I will give this back to you,” she said, and handed Riley the book. “I hope you will take this as a teaching moment, because it’s not intended to hurt or embarrass you. There’s an old saying, There is no shortage of love in the world, only of worthy vessels in which to put it. You lost agency over your life because you invested yourself in unworthy vessels. If you want to regain that control, then you must begin to choose more wisely. Do you understand?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Then you can go,” Biedermann said, and went back to her sandwich.
Yes, ma’am? Riley’s brain yelled at her as she stepped back into the hall. Yes, ma’am? Why didn’t you tell her to shove her ‘teaching moment’ up her ass?
Because I need the book. Not for me, but for him.
Bullshit. You went all meek and mild because you know that in a place like this, the doctors can say whatever they want, but it’s the nurses who get it done. Because you’re afraid of her. Because she’s the one with the real power here.
Yes.
Because she can hurt us.
Yes.
And because she may not be wrong.
I don’t know . . . maybe . . . maybe . . .
* * *
The cafeteria was more packed than usual, with nearly every table taken up by non-ARC patients and their visiting families. Tray in hand, Riley was looking for an open chair when Steve waved her over to where he was sitting with Hector and Angela from the therapy group.
“Have a seat,” Steve said, but as she approached, she saw the other two exchange a worried glance that said, Maybe we should move.
“Thanks, but I’m still on double-secret probation. I can go back to my room—”
“No, it’s cool,” Angela said, ignoring the look she got from Jim two tables over. “Sit, please.
“Did you hear about the puking-for-points incident?” she asked as Riley took her place at the table. “I saw the whole thing. It’s always super crowded on Family Day, so I wanted to get here early and grab a seat, and it happened right in front of me. It was like someone shoved a firehose all the way up his ass and out the other end. Now I can’t see anything else.”
“That’s Alex Lafferty,” Steve said. “He’s being treated for a ton of schizophrenic disorders including his trademark problem: cyclical vomiting syndrome. He loves his folks, but whenever they show up it’s a break in his daily routine, and it totally stresses him out. Next thing you know, it’s boom-splat all over the place.”
“Do you know everyone’s problems?” Riley asked, impressed.
“Let’s just say I like to know who shouldn’t be sitting across the table from me.”
“Yeah, I know the feeling,” Riley said, pretending she didn’t mean what she meant.
“It was nothing personal,” Hector said, absently rubbing the back of his left hand. “It’s just a difficult situation, you know? Jim’s just doing his best to make sure we keep our eye on the prize: getting out of here.”
“Totally get it,” Riley said, then to deflect the awkward conversation nodded to a small circular red mark on the back of his hand. “So what’s that about?”
“What’s what about?”
“I noticed you rubbing that earlier.”
“Just something I do sometimes,” he said, lowering his hands.
“Is that the start of a tattoo?”
He shook his head. “It’s a burn mark. I was thirteen. I pissed off my old man one day, and before I know what’s happening, he’s got my hand down on the table, cigarette in hand. ‘This’ll make goddamned sure you never forget what you did wrong,’ he said, then bam!”
“So what’d you do?” Steve asked.
“I don’t remember,” Hector said, smiling almost shyly as he rubbed at the mark. “I remember only the pain. Ironic, right?”
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Angela asked.
“Never came up,” he said, looking at Riley with an expression somewhere between You know people have boundaries, right? and I think I’m glad you see enough to notice this stuff, but I’m still gonna need some time before I trust you.
“I’m so sorry,” Angela said.
“What about your father, Angela?” Riley asked.
“My dad doesn’t believe I’m here.”
“Well, sure, I’m sure it was a shock.”
“No, he doesn’t think anything’s real. He believes in simulation theory, that what we call reality is just a big computer program and we don’t know it.”
“Sounds like your dad belongs on my side of the hospital,” Steve said.
“He’s one of those guys who lives way deep in his head, you know? Even as a kid, he was never entirely sure anything outside himself was real. So he got into simulation theory big-time. The way he explained it to me is that the number one problem for any species that figures out how to live forever is going to be boredom, because once you’re immortal nothing’s really at risk. The solution would be to create a computer environment where you forget who you are and become someone with a short lifespan, which lets you experience all the danger that goes with mortality until you ‘die’ and wake up in your real body. Then you’re back to being bored until the next time you go in.”
“So, basically like every serious gamer in the world,” Steve said.
“Something like that. He says the only reason we sleep is so the guys who are in charge of running the program can debug the system and make sure everything’s running properly.”
“What about dreams?” Riley asked. “How do they fit in with all this?”
“Screensavers. Random thoughts to keep us occupied so we don’t notice the upgrades. He says vivid dreamers can ‘wake up’ in the middle of their dreams and take over because the program is in neutral, like a car, so they can just gun it and go.”
“What do you think?” Riley asked.
Angela pondered the question for a moment, then said, “I think my dad needs to get out more.”
“And what does your mom say about all this?” Hector asked.
“No idea. She split when I was nine, got divorced, then married a really rich guy in Dubai. Haven’t heard from her in years.”
“I’m sorry,” Riley said. “That must be hard.”
“It’s mostly okay. Ups and downs, you know? The hardest part was a couple of years ago when I realized I couldn’t remember what her face looked like. I mean, yeah, I had pictures, but there’s a difference between remembering what a picture looks like and remembering the person, you know? Living and breathing. I’d be in bed running all the moments we were together through my head instead of sleeping, and she just wasn’t there.
“Before she walked out, she used to take me to the park and I’d play on the swings for what felt like forever. There was a little kiosk near the playground that served coffee and snacks, and she’d sit inside with a latte and a book and keep an eye on me until I was exhausted from swinging and swinging and swinging. I always knew it was time to go home when I saw her coming around the corner of the coffee shop. ‘Had enough?’ she’d say, then she’d take my hand and off we’d go.
“It bugged me that I could remember the moment but couldn’t remember what she looked like, so about a year ago I went back to the park and sat on the same swing, trying to remember her. It wasn’t crowded, but people looked at me like, What’s her deal? But I stayed anyway, for one hour, then two. After a while everyone else left, and I was the only one still there. Sitting on that swing. Waiting for my mom.
“Then I looked up, and it was like I could see her coming around the corner of the coffee shop. She was wearing skinny jeans with dark-brown boots, with mud on them from the park, and an indigo blouse with little gold embroidered roses under a black leather jacket. Her hair was pulled back, and she was smiling at me—my mom was smiling at me—and she put out her hand and said, ‘Had enough?’
“And if I close my eyes, right now, I can see her standing there as clear as I’m seeing you right now. Is that enough? Will that ever be enough? Probably not. But at least I can see my mom in my head, and for now I’m okay with that.”
“Did she tell you why she left your dad?” Riley asked.
“No, but it’s probably the same reason I haven’t gone by to see him in a long time,” Angela said, her voice soft and sad. “You try saying ‘I love you’ to someone who’s pretty sure you don’t actually exist.”
“Maybe Kaminski’s right,” Hector said. “Maybe the road that put us in here really did start with our parents.”
“You don’t have to be crazy to have issues with your folks,” Steve said. “You just have to be alive.”