by David Walton
“Get away from me!” He batted at her with his free hand, then tried to reach his IV and rip it out of his arm.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“He keeps pulling out his IV,” she said. “Are you his family? Can you help?”
“It’s okay, Dad,” I said. “She’s here to help you. Calm down.” I caught his wrist and held it so she could fasten the strap around it.
“Who are you? What do you want with me?” he shouted.
“It’s me. It’s Neil, Dad. Your son. You’re sick. You need medicine.”
He rattled his hands against the side rails and strained against the straps. He wore a vest with strings that had been tied to the rails, preventing him from getting out of the bed.
“I don’t need medicine! What I need is to go to work. I’m late for work, and you’re keeping me here against my will.”
Paul stood in the doorway, not coming any closer. The IV beeped, but the nurse made no move to check it.
“You don’t need to go to work,” I said to my father. “You called in sick.”
That stopped him for a moment. “I did?”
“You did. They’re not expecting you. They’ve got it covered for today.”
I thought I had calmed him, but he gave a huge jerk, yanking his whole body to one side. The rails rattled, and the bed itself squeaked against the floor and shifted slightly to the right.
“We might have to sedate him if we can’t keep him calmer,” the nurse said. “Ten minutes ago, he managed to pull out his nasal cannula by rubbing his face against the side of the bed.”
“You can’t break me,” Dad growled. “I won’t tell you a thing. It doesn’t matter what you do to me. You can tell your boss that I’ll die first.”
I sat on a stool next to the bed and stroked his head, speaking softly. “You’re home now,” I said. “You made it. You didn’t tell. We’re going to take care of you.”
He calmed slightly, though his eyes still swung wildly back and forth. “Who are you?” he asked.
I whispered in his ear. “Neil Johns. I’m an NSA agent. I’m here to take care of you.”
“I didn’t tell,” Dad said. “I was strong.”
I stroked his hair, remembering times as a boy when I had been scared at night, and he had stroked my head until I fell asleep. “I know you were, Dad,” I said. “I know.”
The nurse left. Paul came into the room, then, but I glared at him. “No,” I said. “Get out.”
He ignored me. “I was trying to help him. Who are you to send me away? You’ve barely seen him since you started your job.”
“At least I didn’t try to kill him.”
“He’s been worse. A lot worse. He doesn’t even know who I am most of the time. Do you think that’s what he would want?”
I felt the muscles in my neck tighten painfully. I wanted to punch Paul, or else grab him by the hair and make him look, really look, at what he’d done. “Of course it’s not what he wanted. Nobody wants dementia. Then again, nobody wants a fungal infection, either. You could have killed him.”
“But if there was a chance! Even a small chance, that he might get better. Don’t you think he would want us to try? What does he have to lose?”
The IV pole kept beeping. “Did you even ask him first?”
Paul threw up his hands. “What good would that do? He wouldn’t understand.”
“You could have tried. You could have asked Mom. You could have asked me. We could have decided together.”
“Decided what? The choices were between a slow and horrible death, and a chance at something better. It wasn’t like he had a lot to lose.”
I stood up right into Paul’s face, the stool crashing to the floor behind me. My fist clenched, and only the awareness of our father lying next to me held me back from swinging it. “He had plenty to lose,” I said. “He had his life. He might have been sick, but his life was still worth something. It wasn’t yours to gamble away.”
Mom came into the room and saw us like that, facing each other down. “What are you doing?” she said. “Is he okay? You said you would call me!”
I stepped back. “I’m sorry, Mom.”
She saw Dad on the bed, restrained, oxygen tubes in his nose and a wild look in his eyes. She rushed to his side. “What happened?”
“He has a fungal infection,” I said flatly, with a dark look at Paul. “Looks like it’s the same one that Paul picked up in the Amazon.”
“How is he? Is he responding to the medication?”
I realized that with all of Dad’s agitated behavior and my anger at Paul, I hadn’t thought to ask. “They think his chances are good,” Paul said. “But he doesn’t know where he is or what’s happening to him. He keeps trying to get away.”
“You told them what it is?” I asked. “So they know how to treat it?”
Paul looked hurt. “Of course, I did.”
I righted the stool, and Mom sat down. She took his hand. “I’m here, Charles. It’s going to be all right.”
His violence seemed to have calmed, but he was still breathing hard, confused. “That’s not my name,” he said. “You’ve got the wrong person. I don’t know who you are.”
Mom’s eyes were wet, and she stroked his hair as I had done. “That’s okay,” she said. “I know who you are.”
As darkness fell, he became combative again, jerking at his straps and shouting at us. It was typical for Alzheimer’s patients to get worse when it grew dark outside. They called it sundowning, but no one really knew why it happened. At the end of visiting hours, the nurse told us that one of us could stay the night, if we wanted, to help keep him calm, but the others would have to return in the morning. Both Paul and I wanted to do it, but Mom insisted that she wouldn’t leave him.
I drove back to my parents’ empty house. Paul, despite the late hour, decided to drive home to his College Park apartment. I didn’t try to change his mind. When I got home, I realized I still had to pack for Brazil. I hadn’t even told Mom or Paul that I was going.
I put some clothes in a suitcase, wondering what I would need. If I was just meant to hang out with Celso, then casual clothes would be sufficient. If I was going to be invited to meetings with foreign diplomats or intelligence officers, then I would need something more formal. I packed some of everything.
I slept fitfully and woke early, wanting to check in on Dad before my flight. I hauled my suitcase out to the car and made it to the hospital by seven o’clock.
“I’m here to see Charles Johns,” I said at the front desk.
The receptionist looked back at me like I was a bug. “Visiting hours start at eight.”
“I have to be at the airport at eight,” I said. “I just want to see my father, make sure he’s all right before I go.”
Her lips thinned, and her eyes said she’d heard it all before. “Visiting hours start at eight.”
“Look, I know you don’t make the rules,” I said. I gave her my best smile. “But my flight leaves for Brazil in a little more than two hours. I don’t know when I’ll be back. All I want to do is see him before I go.”
Her facial expression didn’t change. “Visiting hours start at eight.”
I eyed the entrance, wondering if I could just make a break for it. A metal detector stood between me and the hallway beyond, but I didn’t think I was wearing any metal that would set it off. I remembered the way to my father’s room. I could just run through the door and be there before anyone could stop me.
The receptionist would call security, though, and I’d already given my father’s name, so they would know exactly where I was going. If they called the police, I’d have a hard time getting out of there to the airport on time. I needed a better way.
Back outside, I started to circle the building, which was enormous, with so many new wings tacked on over the years that no sense of the original shape remained. There were many smaller entrances, which I assumed required a card for access, as well as loading bays and ga
rages, all of which were shut.
Finally, I saw a truck backed up to an open bay, with three men walking back and forth, unloading boxes. The truck was white and read Gulph Medical Supply on the side. A security guard stood at the gate, watching them. I put my NSA badge around my neck on its lanyard—I had brought it in case I needed ID in Brazil—and kept the badge in my hand where it couldn’t be seen easily.
I walked up to the truck. “Finally,” I said loudly. “We’re running so low on specimen containers I was going to have to have my patients pee in my coffee mug.”
I rolled my eyes at the security guard and waved my badge at the guard, fast enough that he couldn’t read it. Then I rounded on one of the workers. “Make sure a box of those gets up to the third floor, will you?”
“We only drop them off here,” the man said. His accent was Australian. “And I’m pretty sure this lot is all sterile gloves and pads.”
I made a sound of frustration. “I’m surrounded by incompetents,” I said, and started to walk through the loading bay doors.
“Where are you going?” the security guard asked.
“I’m going to my office,” I said, “and if there’s not a pot of coffee ready when I get there, and I mean a full one, then I assure you, my staff is going to be looking for new employment.”
I marched past him, holding my breath, waiting for him to call after me. Nothing happened. I walked through the far door, and I was in.
Not that I was out of the woods yet. From there, I had to actually find the room. The hospital was a maze. I couldn’t ask for directions, or even appear to be lost, so I strode confidently from hallway to hallway, trying to study the signs when no one else was looking. Once I barreled into what might have been a surgery prep room, causing five men and women in surgery gowns and gloves to look up at me in surprise. “Has anybody seen Harry?” I asked.
One woman shook her head. I stalked away, muttering imprecations against Harry under my breath.
Finally, I found a recognizable sign and a familiar-looking hallway. I walked by the nurses’ station with the same air of confidence and marched into my father’s room.
The bed was empty. The sheet was neatly pulled up under the pillow. The restraining vest was neatly folded and the Velcro strap removed from the side rails. I gaped at the bed, a rush of adrenaline setting my heart racing. He was dead. He had died during the night. But if that had happened, wouldn’t Mom have called? Finally, I noticed the figure sitting in a guest chair in the corner.
“Dad?” I said. “What’s going on? Are you all right?”
He didn’t stir, and I realized he was asleep. I crossed over and stood next to him, watching his chest rise and fall with his gentle breathing. On the table next to him was a newspaper section folded to the crossword puzzle, which was completed. My father held a pen in one hand and a piece of hospital note paper in the other. The paper had the Brazilian Portuguese alphabet written on it—the older alphabet, before they had officially changed it for orthographic consistency with Portugal—with each letter crossed out. Under the alphabet was a sentence in Portuguese: “Um pequeno jabuti xereta viu dez cegonhas felizes,” meaning “A nosy little tortoise saw ten happy storks.” It wasn’t the meaning of the sentence that caught my attention, however. It was the fact that it contained every letter of the alphabet at least once. It was a pangram, the sort of wordplay that my father used to love to do in both English and Portuguese when I was young.
I realized someone was standing behind me. I turned to see Mom, a brilliant smile lighting her face.
“Is he okay?” I asked.
“Okay? Neil, he’s more than okay. It’s unbelievable.”
I turned back to Dad and found that his eyes were open. He met my gaze, clear intelligence evident in his look.
“Hello, Neil,” he said.
CHAPTER 15
I nearly missed my flight. My father was back. He was awake and alert and knew who I was and remembered everything he was supposed to know. He charmed the nurses with jokes and good humor and smiled at my mom so much I thought they would both burst from pleasure. It was as if the Alzheimer’s had never happened.
“So you’re working for the agency?” he said.
My chest felt warm with pride. “I’m cracking indecipherables,” I said.
“Any good at it?”
“I’m doing okay so far. I wish I could tell you about the one code I solved . . .”
“What department are you with?”
“It’s kind of a side group, out of the main organizational structure. I don’t know where Melody gets the funding, but—”
“Melody? Don’t tell me you’re working with Melody Muniz.”
“Yeah,” I said. “You remember her? She said she only knew you by reputation. As a talented colleague.”
He pursed his lips and shot Mom a furtive glance. “It was a bit more than that.”
“She’s great,” I said. “Really sharp, and she cuts through bureaucratic red tape like it’s soft butter.”
“Is she impressed with you?”
I gave an embarrassed smile. “I think. She told the director I was a rising star.”
“Watch it.” Dad shook his head. “You don’t want to be calling attention to yourself. Do good work, but keep your head down. If the brass starts to learn your name, you’re in trouble. They’ll never give you a moment’s peace.”
I smiled wryly. “It may be too late for that. I’m flying to Brazil with the director this morning at his personal request.” I listened to what I had just said and jumped up in panic. It was eight o’clock. The airport wasn’t far, but I was going to have a tough time getting through security before the plane left if I didn’t get moving.
I said goodbye and headed for the door just as Paul was walking in. His eyes were bloodshot and his clothes and hair disheveled, as if he’d been sleeping in his car. He stopped cold, staring over my shoulder at Dad, his mouth literally hanging open. I pushed past him. “You still shouldn’t have done it,” I said. I walked down the hall without another word. After a glance at my watch, I broke into a run.
I didn’t want to leave my mom’s car in airport parking, so I took a cab from the hospital. By the time it dropped me off at the gate, it was almost eight forty-five. The plane was scheduled to start boarding at nine and take off at nine thirty. I impatiently shuffled my way through the line to check my suitcase. The desk employee glanced at my boarding pass and shook his head. “You’d better hurry,” he said.
I pelted up the stairs and down the hallway to security, where I waited again, checking my watch every thirty seconds. I practically threw my shoes through the bag scanner and stepped through the metal detector before the official was ready, causing him to shoo me back and lecture me about waiting my turn.
“My flight is leaving!” I said.
He cocked his head at me. “Baltimore/Washington International recommends you arrive at the airport at least ninety minutes before departure.”
“Please?” I said.
He beckoned me through. On the other side, I grabbed my shoes and took off down the hall without bothering to put them on. The gate was, of course, at the far end. By the time I got there, I was gasping for breath and my watch said 9:27. A woman in a blue uniform shirt was just closing the door.
“Wait!” I called.
She stopped and looked at me. “Delta to Brasília?” she asked.
I nodded, out of breath, and waved my boarding pass at her. She shook her head. “You almost missed us,” she said. “Head down and take your seat.”
I rushed down the deserted ramp and climbed into the plane. Kilpatrick was seated in first class, looking comfortable in his uniform, a laptop on the table in front of him. “Thought you were going to stand me up,” he said. He glanced at the shoes still clutched in my hand, but didn’t say anything. I made my way back to coach and collapsed into my seat.
The flight was twelve hours long, with one stop in Atlanta. Long before we arrived, I was sti
ff and sore and exhausted. In my haste to pack, I hadn’t brought any books along, and the thriller I bought from a bookstand in Atlanta didn’t hold my interest. The in-flight movies were ones I’d seen before, and I hadn’t liked them all that much the first time around. It was hard to concentrate on anything for very long.
I didn’t want to be on this plane. It felt like such a detour. My life was back in Maryland, where I was just starting to figure out how to do my job, and where my father could fully remember who and where he was for the first time in years. Now, here I was, flying to my childhood home on the front line of some intelligence game that I didn’t begin to understand. It was all happening too fast.
I didn’t even know what to think about my dad’s recovery. On the one hand, I was ecstatic. It was miraculous, like bringing someone back from the dead. The dad I knew had been gone, and now he was back. I knew it wouldn’t all be roses and rainbows, of course. He would have to come to terms with the years he had lost, grow accustomed to the person he could be now. But the thinking, reasoning, remembering father I had known was there to interact with me again.
On the other hand, I was still furious with Paul for doing it behind my back. Not only could it have gone terribly wrong, but it might still end in disaster. There was no telling how long the recovery would last, or what would happen if it wore off. What would the long-term effects be? Would Paul have to continue to give him injections? Would the new injections continue to work as well as the first? I thought again of “Flowers for Algernon.” Had Paul given my father a cure, or just a temporary reprieve? Would Dad thank him if the drug meant experiencing a second slow decline into dementia?
It was the not-telling part that aggravated me the most. Paul was supposed to be a scientist. There were review boards and publications and animal trials and federal regulations for a reason. You didn’t just try a new drug on a human being to see what it would do. The fact that the human was our father and that it seemed to turn out okay didn’t make it right.