Thirteen West

by Jane Toombs

  She grinned at him. "Find any masses?"

  He blinked, rising on one elbow to look at her.

  "Thought maybe you automatically checked for abnormalities when you were fooling around like this."

  He put his hands over both her breasts. "Nothing abnormal about you."

  Later he walked with her on the damp sand, the waves icy as they licked his bare feet. He found her just as enticing in a red jogging suit, the hood tied under her chin. Evidently this wasn't going to be a single bam-thank-you ma'am thing for him, a pacifier to satisfy simple lust. He wanted more of Alma. He'd now have to see her at work, wanting her, and there was Luba at home. How long before an intolerable situation became impossible?

  Barry hunched his shoulders and walked faster. Accept the day's offerings, he told himself. Don't try to examine tomorrow. Sufficient unto the day the guilts thereof.

  The ocean heaved gray-green under a lowering sky, the faint scent of brine borne on the dank wind off the water. Damn, it was cold—his feet ached and the dampness struck through his jacket. More rain on the way.

  "Had enough?" Alma asked.

  "Of the weather, yes. When do you have a day off?"

  "Tomorrow. And Tuesday. But I—"

  "But me no buts. I'm MOD tomorrow night, free Tuesday after five or so. Is there a decent place to eat around here?"

  "Several. Cheap but good, expensive but good, so-so and so-so. But I—"

  He stopped and pulled her around to face him. "I intend to take you to dinner Tuesday evening."

  "I'm going to L.A. Sorry."

  "Why can't you be back by then?"

  She stared at him, laughed and touched him lightly on the cheek before freeing herself. "Why is it so important?"

  "Would you like a personal demonstration here on the sand?"

  She slanted him a look. "Dare you."

  When he reached for her, she ducked and ran, getting a head start and almost making it back to the cottage before he caught her. He held her against him, but was too winded to kiss her. Getting out of shape, damn it, too little exercise the past couple years.

  "Okay," she said, flinging back her head to look at him, the hood slipping from her hair. "See you Tuesday about seven. And, no, you can't come in now. I'll have to rush to get to work on time as it is."

  * * *

  After she'd retrieved Barry's shoes for him and shut the door, Alma stood a moment, smiling to herself. She'd get back Tuesday night. Charlie wouldn't like it, but—Alma thrust up her middle finger in an inelegant gesture. Serve him right.

  Charlie'd kept her waiting enough times, to say the least. Besides, over and above the good sex, she liked Barry. Wonder how he was explaining this to his roomie? Have to find out more about her. Did the woman know? Care? She wouldn't want some female pounding on her door, making trouble. No way.

  Alma dressed quickly, drove a little faster than usual and was on time when she reached Thirteen West. Midway through the evening, as she sat charting, she suddenly realized this was the Sunday night she'd been dreading.

  Frank was off and Willie Rhone was on. Thank God the combination only happened once or twice a month. The evening supervisor who replaced Frank two nights a week was not only a woman but a bitch you couldn't talk to. No way would or could she fill in for Frank by walking Alma to her car.

  Alma thrust it from her mind and tried to concentrate on the charting, on the ward details. She found herself glancing again and again at the clock, though, as twenty-four hundred hours came closer.

  She gave a brief report to the night charge tech, Mr. Thompson, who relieved her. Night shift had no nurses on the wards, only the night supervisor was an RN. Joe Thompson, correct but chicken-shit, was technically Willie Rhone's boss on this shift but he was no match for Willie, who'd be waiting for her by the door.

  "Well, if it isn't Momma A," Willie said, making a big deal of unlocking the door for her. He let himself out, too, and walked along the corridor to the outside door with her. "Still saving that hot black ass for old Frank?"

  Don't say anything, she reminded herself. It's always worse when you do. She quickened her pace.

  "You weren't always so uppity," Willie said, his arm brushing hers. "You know you liked it fine from old Willie. You begged for it. Now you a big shit charge nurse, black meat's too trashy for you. That it, Momma?"

  She jerked away from his touch and held out her key to thrust in the outer door.

  He blocked the door with his body. "Old Frank don't like girls. You ain't gonna get nowhere with him. All you got to do is let me know where you live—gonna find out sooner or later anyhow. Pretty cool how you got that fake address on your records. Ain't gonna stop me, Momma, you oughta know by now nothing stops Willie." With a sudden lunge, he thrust a hand under her uniform skirt.

  She jumped back. "Don't touch me!"

  "Aw, Momma A, you know you like it."

  "I swear I'll report you."

  He stopped smiling, his eyes narrowing. "You know better'n that."

  She did, of course. Willie was no one to threaten. He was one mean dude. So far he hadn't followed her home. She made sure she wasn't being followed the nights he was off. The address on her records wasn't actually fake. She'd stayed with a girl she knew—who'd moved before Willie arrived—when she first started working here. She'd never bothered to update her records after she found the cottage. Her mail went to a PO Box in Calafia, so that was no problem.

  Angry because she was frightened of him, she snapped, "Why don't you just leave me alone? There hasn't been anything between us for years and there never will be again."

  "S'what you say." He grinned at her.

  She glared at his insolent black face, wondering how she ever could have been attracted to Willie Rhone. Uneducated, an arrogant macho male who thought all women were only walking cunts. She'd been a green kid back then, for sure.

  "I have friends in L.A. you don't even know." She spit the words between her teeth. "Some of them are good friends with Cousin Roach. You've heard of Cousin Roach?"

  Willie scowled at her.

  "You know what happens to those suckers who get in his way, don't you?" she asked, pushing her advantage.

  "Shit, you're just jiving."

  "I happen to be going to L.A. tomorrow. Now let me by." For a moment she thought he wouldn't move. Then he shifted abruptly, allowing her to unlock the door, glowering at her as she did so.

  "See you again, Momma A," he said as she slipped out, his voice regaining its insolence.

  He really doesn't give a damn about me, she told herself as she hurried to her car. It's only because I won't have anything to do with him that he keeps threatening me. If it didn't taper off soon and she couldn't find a way to deal with Willie, she might have to think about transferring to another state hospital.

  She hadn't told Frank about Willie, just that she was afraid to walk alone in the dark to her car. When he was on duty Frank not only saw her to her car but waited till she drove away—which is why Willie thought she had something going with Frank. Fat chance.

  How had Willie gotten his tech license? Lied about the time he'd been in jail? Or were they training ex-cons to be psych techs these days?

  * * *

  Back on Thirteen West, Willie Rhone swaggered into the lounge where Joe Thompson was having a cup of coffee. "Who's taking first shift?" he asked.

  "Zenda's out on the floor. She might as well. I'm beat." Joe ran a hand through his thinning brown hair.

  "Any guy works two full-time jobs got to have a slipped gear," Willie told him. "Man, you trying to kill yourself."

  Joe finished his coffee, rose and made his way to the day room where he pulled two plastic lounge chairs together, seat to seat, sitting on one and putting his feet up on the other. He closed his eyes.

  Willie followed him with a blanket and pillow and stretched out on the floor. He lay on his back, arms behind his head. That little cunt really got some contact with Cousin Roach? He shook his head, dismi
ssing both Alma and the L.A. gang leader.

  Never mind, he had his own agenda, as old Nellie would say. Gonna get himself some after Zenda woke him up to take his turn on the floor.

  Old fat Zenda puffing around changing wet beds. Had to be pushing sixty but she was no dummy. Given him a funny look the other night like maybe she suspected. Willie shrugged and felt in his pocket for the foil condom packet. Zenda was safe enough less she actually caught him—no way that was gonna happen. She snored like a cow when it was her turn to sleep. No worry over Joe, he didn't want to know nothing, just wanted to be left alone.

  * * *

  Inside her room, Laura Jean moaned in a drugged sleep and Zenda paused in the doorway, peering in. The girl didn't move, so Zenda turned away.

  Little hippie brat, look where it got her. All that make love not war and the drugs and what it got you was dead or locked up in a place like this. Zenda made up her mind she was going to haul that smart-ass grandson of hers with his ponytail right on up here some night and make him look at Laura Jean. Or maybe over to C West where some of the kids just sat and stared, day in, day out.

  Growing that marijuana right in back of her house. Used to be nobody but Mexicans ever fooled around with such stuff. Pot, her grandson called it. Lucky she hadn't gone to jail when that cop came.

  Yes, she'd show him what happened to young smart-alecks who thought they knew it all.

  She glanced back at Laura Jean. That Willie spent too much time in this room. But it wasn't any of her business and, anyway, he wouldn't dare do much for fear he'd get caught. The girl looked so young and helpless asleep. Too bad kids had to grow up and get into trouble.

  Things weren't like they used to be. Wasn't right that a black man should be allowed in a white girl's room. Maybe all he did was feel her up but that was bad enough. He shouldn't get the chance to do anything.

  Zenda clamped her lips together and walked away. None of her business. She had all she could do to manage her own life, what with trying to raise her ungrateful grandson. Things had been better in the old days but no one believed that, no one paid the slightest attention to how a woman her age thought things should be run. She didn't know what was going to happen to the world but she figured it wouldn't be anything good.

  Chapter Ten

  The next evening on Thirteen West, Connie was trying to take care of one of the patients assigned to her. "Please, Mr. Jones, put your arms down and come with me," she begged, tugging ineffectually. He made no more response than a statue. The day shift reported he'd gotten out of bed by himself in the morning but now here he was frozen into one of his grotesque catatonic positions again.

  "Simpson," she said loudly. "Simpson Jones."

  He gave no sign of hearing his name.

  That little woman calling you, one of the voices that lived in Simpson's head reported. The idea filtered through his body slowly, like mud silting up a river mouth.

  Simpson E. Jones, that's who he was. She left out the E, but the E was for nothing. Fat catfish E lying there on the muddy bottom. Caught that E one day, tacked it on, wasn't no given name.

  The E drifted from him, a piece of him swimming away. That little woman didn't say no E. Said the rest though, didn't leave him with only Simp. She didn't mean him no harm.

  "Simple Simon," the other voice in his head said. He knew it wasn't her talking. "No good bastard."

  The red eyes were there above his head, looking and waiting. They didn't belong to either voice.

  Connie stepped around the gray-haired black man, thinking again how much he looked like the pictures of Uncle Remus in the stories she read to her children.

  Disparate, her husband called the stories she chose. Nonsense. Basura. Garbage. In vain she'd tried to explain about legends of the world, how other places had magic tales like those they both remembered being told by their Mexican grandparents. The Uncle Remus stories, she'd said to Ramon, were variations of old African folk tales.

  He wouldn't listen, insisting she'd make the children supersticioso and ordered her to stop. Wasn't the TV he'd bought with his own money enough?

  There was no way to convince Ramon that the more their children knew of other cultures, the more they learned of everything, the greater chance they had to escape from field work. Education created a desire—she knew that. But Ramon wouldn't go to night school even though he was not stupid. Hadn't he learned to drive the big machines in the fields so he brought home more money than the dirt men, he'd say to her. Wasn't that enough? What did she want of him for the love of God?

  She loved him, she loved their children, but she felt like two people. The Conception who was wife and mother and the Connie who'd graduated from the community college, who had also taken the psychiatric technician training and now earned as much money as Ramon.

  "You ought to go on to a four year school, Connie," her political science instructor had urged. "I don't hand out many A's, as you know. You have an unusually quick mind." With the children, with Ramon, that could only be a dream—for now. Ramon refused to discuss the possibility of her getting her RN by working and going to school, too. It hurt his pride that she worked at all.

  "They shall bring thee down to the pit, and thou shalt die the deaths of them that are slain in the midst of the seas," Simpson Jones declaimed suddenly.

  Startled, Connie stared at him.

  He'd broken his catatonic stance and was waving his arms as he spoke, eyes glittering.

  "...and shall set thee in the low parts of the earth, in places desolate of old, with them that go down to the pit..."

  "The Preacher's off again, I see," David said, coming out of a room into the corridor. "Into his snake pit sermon."

  "He did used to be a minister," Connie said. "I read his history. A Baptist minister."

  "Figures. He must've really hyped up his congregation."

  "Yet I had planted thee a noble vine," Simpson intoned, "wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?"

  "If we let him run down he'll get quiet as a lamb," David said. "Ready for a break?"

  "I told Sally I'd help her," Connie said.

  Left alone, Simpson struggled to make the words spew forth, to stand between him and the red-eyed demon, Macardit, the Great Black One, his old grandma's god, come to taunt him, to enter into him and cause him to commit evil.

  "I come against you, most unclean damned spirit—" he began, but the rest of the incantation faded from his mind and was lost. He brought up his hands to ward off Macardit's approach, freezing once again into catatonia.

  * * *

  Laura Jean clung to her clothes, fighting off Sally's attempts to coax her into pajamas.

  "No," she cried, "no, no, I don't want it to be night time."

  "It's the dreams," Sally said to Connie in a low voice. "Her nightmares."

  "No, no," Laura Jean begged. "Don't take off my clothes. The man comes in the night, in the dark. I'm afraid of him. I hate the dark."

  "What does it matter if she sleeps in her shirt and jeans?" Connie asked.

  "Alma—Ms Reynolds says Laura Jean must be brought back to reality as much as possible."

  "Pajamas are reality?" Connie smiled. "I think they may be for you but Laura Jean lived in a commune for over a year. We don't know that she wore pajamas at night—maybe nothing at all."

  Sally nodded, seeing the logic of Connie's approach, yet a part of her insisted pajamas were important because they were a part of hospital routine.

  "Do you wear pajamas?" Connie asked.

  Taken aback, not at the question but at her skittering thoughts, Sally managed to mutter an affirmative while she tried not to remember the times she hadn't put them on, when she'd worn nothing to bed, when Em...

  "I won't stay in this room," Laura Jean shouted. "I won't stay in this shithole any longer. Get me out of here, please let me out." She pushed past the two women, dashed out the door and ran down the corridor screaming.

  Sh
e passed through Simpson's narrowed field of vision like a pale ghost fearing Macardit's evil touch. Her screams roiled in his body, stirring up muck like a spring torrent.

  I have sinned, Lord, he prayed silently. Wash me clean as snow. In the blood of the lamb. Show me the way to Jesus. Sweet Jesus, who died for our sins. And all our sins shall be washed away.

  "Behold the storm of the Lord!" he shouted, breaking his frozen stance. "Wrath has gone forth, a whirling tempest; it will burst upon the head of the wicked..."

  Sally and Connie hurried past him, running after Laura Jean, who'd flung herself against the locked ward door, still screaming.

  "Therefore their way shall be to them," Simpson intoned, "like slippery paths in the darkness, into which they shall be driven and fall..."

  Ms Leveret, the relief evening charge nurse, injected the tranquilizer into Laura Jean there at the door while Sally and Connie held her. Soon they were able to lead her back to her room, her eyes glazed, steps shuffling.

  "I hate to see her like this," Sally said.

  "You'd rather she was terrified?" Connie asked.

  "No, but she's like a—a zombie."

  "A zombie may have inner peace," Connie said. "Who knows? At least she'll be able to sleep."

  Sally tightened her lips, saying nothing. She liked Connie and didn't totally disagree with her, but a note in Laura Jean's old chart had suggested that drugs might have precipitated her schizophrenia. Of course that meant street drugs. Still, it seemed paradoxical that she was now being given other drugs to keep her quiet.

  "Yes, she'll sleep," Sally said after they'd put Laura Jean to bed. "But then she'll have the nightmare."

  Connie shook her head. "You can't allow yourself to absorb the suffering of others. They'll destroy you. Come on, we're due for a break.

  "I'll be along in a minute," Sally said. Left alone, she blinked back tears. Connie was right—feeling sorry for Laura Jean was no help to the girl. Was it empathy she felt, knowing how she teetered on the brink after Em died? For awhile she'd actually believed Em was talking to her, believed she could see her beside the bed—with Em already cremated, her ashes thrown into the ocean.