Aruba Mad Günther

by T L Yeager

  “Let’s go,” says Reuben. He pats me on the shoulder and heads for the room where the nurse disappeared. I reluctantly follow; feeling chills from the old man’s stare.

  We make it to the door and establish eye contact with the nurse. “Excuse me, we’re looking for Cheri and Jeff Cosgrove,” Reuben says.

  “No visitors allowed. You don’t want to be here. We’re under isolation protocol… You’ll be exposed.” She turns to a choking patient. There are two beds in a room that only looks suitable for one. The choking man’s bed is separated by only a few feet from another holding the still form of a thin, uncovered woman. Her clothes are soaked in sweat.

  “Listen, I’m a local. These folks were passengers on my boat and came down sick on my watch. You mind if I drop by for just a minute to check on them. I tried to call.” The nurse takes a spit tray from the coughing patient and dumps a red slime into the sink at the side of the room. Chills run down my neck and the smell of the place hits me. Mucus and blood, I think.

  The man in the bed is stuck in a rhythm of three coughs, then a wheezing inhale. “Here you go sweetie.” The nurse tucks the pink spittoon back along the man’s side. “Cosgrove is two rooms down. Opposite side.” Her tone has an air of surrender. We turn to walk away. “Wait,” says the nurse. “You really don’t want to be here. It’s a nice thought but stay out of the room. The wife is delirious and the husband is gone. She won’t let us take him.”

  I stare at my feet as if walking a path along a steep cliff. On either side of me I can sense patients in the beds along the corridor. They’re staring. They’ve got to be staring. But I can’t look up. I watch one foot fall in front of the next. He’s gone? What did she mean by that?

  The smell grows heavier as we walk. I pull the collar of my shirt up over my nose to keep the nausea at bay. I don’t look up until we make it to the second door on the left. “Cheri?” The captain frames it as a question. He raises a hand up over his mouth and nose.

  Jeff is gray in the bed. His head is turned to the side away from Cheri who is sitting in a chair by his side. Jeff’s mouth is hanging open. The white top sheet is pulled up to his chin and it’s spread flat like he was tucked into a perfectly made bed. The lower half of the sheet, toward the foot of the bed, is stained in an oval with rings of brown deepening in color toward the center.

  Cheri lifts her head from her husband’s side and strains to make us out. Her eyes are a ring of irritation and red tinged snot is dried in a line from her nose down along her cheek toward the ear.

  “Jesus, he really is gone,” I say.