“Stop with the medical doublespeak. I can’t die, can I?”
“I’m not sure. It’s not the kind of thing I can set up an experiment for.” Well, those were terrible words to hear from a doctor.
“How about an educated guess?”
“It could be very difficult for you to die. Yes.”
“But you can’t stop the decomposition, can you?”
He stepped back to me and began to check the lymph nodes in my neck. “As I said before, the work you and I are doing is—”
“I’m not doing any work, I’m being experimented on. That’s a lot different than work.” My voice was louder than I wanted it to be. I was angry. Angry in a way I hadn’t been for a long time.
He sighed and tried to continue, I pushed his hands away.
“Please calm down, Jake. You knew this was a research facility when you came here.”
“This isn’t what I signed up for.”
“But it is. It’s exactly what you signed up for. The risks were outlined in the agreement you signed and sent in before you even came here.”
“That was with the non-disclosure agreement?”
“It outlined—”
“Yeah. My mom forged my signature. I never saw any of it.”
“Oh. I see. The agreement outlined the risks involved up to and including death. Your mother said—”
“Don’t worry about what my mom said. Did the agreement mention that I could get caught between life and death?”
“Not explicitly.”
“Then it doesn’t matter what my mom did or didn’t tell me, does it? We know she didn’t tell me that.” I was quiet, then said, “We’re in uncharted territory, aren’t we?”
The beginning of Star Trek popped into my head. I heard Kirk going on about boldly going where no man has gone before. All those times I watched the show, it never occurred to me that being the first to go anywhere might be a really, really stupid idea.
“You’re right, Jake. I don’t know what will happen next.” Quietly he went on, “I wanted, I hoped…can you imagine a world without loss? A world without grief? It would be a wonderful place, don’t you think?”
Something fell into place. “The pictures in your office. That’s what this is all about. You lost—”
“What? Wait— How do you know that? You’ve never been in my office.”
“Oh, I, um, snuck in once after my PET scan.”
“No. You didn’t. I keep the office locked.”
I don’t know why I thought it but I felt like telling him the truth was going to make things so much worse than they were. I scrambled to think of something to say, but came up empty.
“How did you know about the pictures?” His voice was flat, hollow.
I didn’t have another lie, so I told the truth. “I have these kinds of dreams.”
“Dreams? You dreamed about the pictures in my office?”
“Maybe vision is a better word. I had a vision. I thought I maybe I was imagining them. But they’re there, aren’t they?”
He nodded.
Actually, it was a relief to tell him about the dreams. I had the fleeting thought he might be able to stop them. “Sometimes it’s like I’m sleepwalking, and sometimes it’s like I’m traveling outside my body.”
“Astral projection.”
“Is that what it’s called?”
“It’s pseudoscience.” Tentatively, he went back to examining me. Checking my pulse. Reassuring himself by collecting true scientific data. “Apparently, people in deep meditative states feel their consciousness leaves their body. There’s no scientific support for these types of experiences.”
“But isn’t that what you’ve done to me? My consciousness is alive while my body is dying. You’ve separated them.”
“Perhaps. They’ve done studies in rats that indicate brain activity increases near death.”
I flashed on the white mice he had hidden in a cage. Did they have weird dreams, too? Poor dreaming, rotting mice.
“So, I’m telepathic because I’m dying?”
“Not dying exactly. More like in a persistent state of dying.”
That was too big to think about. A persistent state of dying. I can’t tell you how bad that sounded.
“The therapeutic cloning of your cells has shown some success. Our partners have been grafting your fixed microtubules to living cells that have the capability to regenerate. It works in some—”
“You’re talking about Dr. Callabray?”
He stopped and stared at me, afraid. I’d frightened him. I’d frightened my doctor. That was weird. I’d seen pity, compassion, and distaste but never fear. I didn’t like the way that felt. His looking at me with fear in his eyes, his looking at me like I might explode, would explode, at any moment.
Then he continued, “So far it depends on what type of cell we’re talking about. Corneal cells, for instance. We’ve been very successful with those. When a body decomposes, the eyes quickly become opaque as the corneal cells decompose. That’s never happened to you.”
I’d had about as much as I could deal with, so I got down off the table. Even though I was starting to have an earache I wasn’t in the mood to be poked and prodded. As I pushed by him, Dr. Harry asked, “Where are you going?”
“You need to go out to the double-wide. The lock on the refrigerated unit got broken. You don’t want anyone to get out.”
“You were in there? You saw...?”
“Yes. I saw the girl. Who is she?”
“She’s the child of one of the neighbors. I heard she’d died and then two days later— Things went well for a while, they really did, I was hopeful. But you see what happened.”
“Where do her parents think her body is?”
“They don’t know anything about the work we do here. No one does. Ray and I took the girl from the funeral home in the middle of the night. It’s his family’s business. It’s quite the scandal locally.”
“I’m sure that’s comforting to her parents.”
“It’s not. I know that. I tried to do something kind, and it turned out badly.”
“She opens her eyes. She moves.”
“Yes, that’s all she does.”
THIRTY-SEVEN
Late Saturday afternoon, my parents arrived. Together.
Which was kind of odd. Okay, understatement. It was super odd, stupendously odd, epically odd. I could not for the life of me remember the last time I’d seen them in the same room. Seriously, my parents only spoke to each other on the phone. Yeah, they spoke often. But always about me—my health, mainly, occasionally about my happiness but usually only my health—and that was it. They never asked about each other. They didn’t have coffee to catch up. They didn’t get together on my birthday. They kept their distance. Seeing them in the same place at the same time wasn’t normal. And I could tell from their body language, they agreed.
Even though he now works for law firms, my dad looks pretty much like what he really is: a musician. His hair is too long, and he has a tattoo of a Gibson Flying V electric guitar on his forearm. It’s just like the one Jimi Hendrix used. My dad was born after Hendrix died, so the fact the he even knows who Hendrix was is weird. And the fact that I know is even weirder. Well, my dad talked about him enough, so maybe it’s not that weird—okay, I looked him up on Wikipedia like three times.
My mom came over to the bed and kissed me on the cheek and then my dad came over and said, “Hey buddy,” trying to do a funky handshake he’d taught me when I was a kid. But after he gripped my hand, he stopped.
“Holy shit. You’re ice cold.” He turned to my mom and said, “He’s ice cold.”
“Bobby, it’s fine. The doctor knows all about it.”
“You knew about this?”
I rushed in with, “It’s not a big deal. It’s a side effect of the treatment.” I didn’t need my dad getting all worried about me. Didn’t need him pulling me out of the Institute and taking me to a real hospital where I’d just—
“Jake, introduce your father,” my mom said, nodding her head toward Goth.
“That’s G—”
“What’s your temperature?” my father demanded. He wasn’t going to give up. Poor Goth couldn’t take his eyes off us. Probably because we were this total train wreck. I wanted to pull the covers over my head.
“My temperature is just a few degrees below normal.”
“A few? How many?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Four maybe.” It was more like seven.
“That’s hypothermia.”
“Oh, good God, how do you even know that?” My mom was annoyed, though to be fair she was probably annoyed the minute they got into the same car. I couldn’t imagine them driving up from Chicago together. What a nightmare.
“I know that because I read a book on mountain climbers. Half of them died of hypothermia.”
“Well, Jake is not dying. Look at him.”
My dad gave me a good look. “He looks pale.”
“Pale is not dying. He hasn’t been outside in ages. Of course he’s pale.”
Not exactly true. I had been outside a couple of times, but I wasn’t going to tell her that.
“And—” my dad started.
“And what?”
“Well, he looks a little…greenish.”
“Oh, he does not. The lighting in here is terrible. That’s all.”
“What kind of doctor is this Dr. Hairy?”
“Ha-rry!” My mother practically yelled. “He’s an oncologist.”
Except he wasn’t. Dr. Harry wasn’t an oncologist and from what Goth and Edmond had said about his website he’d never claimed to be.
“Now will you stop this, Bobby?”
Looking over at Goth, my dad said, “I’m Jake’s dad, Bob.” He looked like he was going to try and shake hands but then he didn’t. “Which sort of leukemia do you have?”
“I don’t. I have cystic fibrosis.”
“Oh.” He looked a bit confused but recovered quickly, “Well, I hope you do as well as Jake.”
“That’s Edmond on the other side of the room,” I said.
My mom turned and took a peek, but my dad had taken out his phone, studying it intently.
“Is he sleeping?” my mom asked.
“Yeah. He’s been sleeping a lot.” I said.
My mom nodded. I didn’t mind so much that Edmond was sleeping through my parents’ visit. I could just imagine him trying to hit on my mom. I didn’t need him telling her how much he liked ‘cougars.’
“There’s no coverage here. I need to call Amelia.”
“You called her an hour ago from the car, Bobby. And I’ve told you a half-dozen times there’s no coverage. Why don’t you ever believe me?” There was an edge to my mother’s voice. An edge that I could imagine ending their marriage.
“There’s a jammer,” I said.
“Oh, there is not,” my mom said. “That’s just paranoid. You’ve seen those maps on TV? None of the cell companies have complete coverage.”
“Bad coverage is one or two bars. This is no service. None,” my dad pointed out.
“Don’t get all conspiracy theory on us. It’s simply bad service. That’s the America we live in. Everything costs a fortune and nothing works.”
“It’s a failure of the entire country?” my father asked. “Why is that more logical than Jake’s saying there’s a jammer?”
They could have gone on forever, so I jumped in, “Look, there’s no wi-fi, there’s no cell coverage because they want to keep everything secret until the testing is over. I mean, he cured my leukemia, so there’s bound to be other doctors who’d like to get their hands on the cure.”
“So, they’ve done this deliberately?” my dad asked.
“I guess, yeah.”
He frowned as though it didn’t make sense. And it didn’t. Not really. It’s not like we were prisoners there. If anyone really wanted to leak secrets, they could just wait until they went home or walk a few hundred feet. I mean, those of us who could walk a few hundred feet—Edmond certainly couldn’t.
My mom decided to be polite to Goth and ask him a question. “Goliath, where are your parents? Will they be in later?”
“No ma’am. They were glad to see the back of me.”
“That can’t be true. No parent—”
“I think we should get another opinion,” my dad said out of the blue.
“What? Bobby, you can’t come here and try to con—”
“Mom stay out of it,” I said. She turned and stared at me like I was a stranger. Then I realized I’d probably never told her to stay out of anything. To my dad, I said, “Look, I’m not getting a second opinion. Everything here is fine. I trust Dr. Harry.”
Did I trust him? No. Not at all. But I didn’t have a choice.
“Can your mother and I meet with Dr. Harry?”
“Jake, that’s not a bad idea.” Seriously, my mom would have met with my doctors twenty times a day if they let her.
“No,” I said, sounding calmer than I was.
My parents stared at me, waiting for me to explain. But I didn’t. I wasn’t used to taking a stand against them and normally, since they were almost never on the same side, I didn’t have to. The whole thing made me nervous, and I felt my heart flip-flop. It stopped, and I held my breath waiting for it to start again. It didn’t. Apparently, stress was not good for half-dead hearts.
“That’s it?” my mom asked. “Just no?”
“It’s my decision.”
Yup, my heart had stopped. I needed to get rid of them and call Dr. Harry.
“This all seems hard to believe, son. It was just a few weeks ago you were getting ready to die, and now it seems like you’re not but things don’t exactly add up.” My dad said, far too rationally. “You’re obviously not well. You’re getting paler by the moment. It’s hard to believe you feel well.”
I wasn’t paying that much attention. Instead, I was subtly trying to find the call button which was somewhere in my sheets. When he paused, I said, “I feel just fine, Dad.”
“Why don’t the three of us meet with Dr. Harry?” my mom suggested. My parents were agreeing. That was bizarre. I wanted to lay there and freak out about that, but I really needed to get my heart started again before lividity set in. If my parents were suspicious now, I could imagine what they’d be like if I began to sport big purple spots on half my body. I found the buzzer and started hitting it over and over. “Jake, you’re not answering my question.”
“No. We’re not going to sit down with Dr. Harry as a family. We’re not a family.”
“Of course, we’re a family,” my mom said. “Divorce ends a marriage, not a family. We’re still your parents, and I know it may not always seem like it, but your father and I do care about each other. We’re still partners when it comes to you.”
My dad blinked a couple of times. Cheryl Rogers-Margate had not spent a lot of time voicing this opinion. Of course, with my parents agreeing with each other, I felt like I’d taken a trip to opposite world. I glanced over at Goth. He looked at me sympathetically which was humiliating in about six different ways.
Just then, Nurse Kelly came in. “You rang the buzzer?” she asked.
“I need to see Dr. Harry?”
“Wait, so we are going to meet with him?” my dad asked.
“No. I need to see him alone.”
“I’m sorry, but Dr. Harry isn’t available right now. He asked not to be disturbed.”
“I need him, and I need him now. He won’t be mad at you.”
She looked conflicted. But my mom didn’t wait for her to make a decision.
“Jake, what’s wrong? You’re not feeling well?”
“I just need to see the doctor.”
“Is there something I can—” Nurse Kelly started.
“No. I need the doctor.”
“If you’d explain the problem, this nice young lady is more likely to help you,” my dad said.
�
�The problem is I need to see the doctor.”
Goth sat up and put his legs over the side of his bed. From the way he was looking at me, I think he knew exactly what was going on. Well, not exactly but more than anyone else in the room. And more than he should. That wasn’t good. I didn’t need him figuring out what was happening to me any more than I needed my parents figuring it out.
Nurse Kelly finally decided to get Dr. Harry. My parents got closer to my bed. I had the terrible thought they were about to give me a physical exam to find out why I wanted to see the doctor.
Instead, my mom said, “I don’t understand why you suddenly can’t trust us. Is it something one of us did?” What she really meant was “did your father do something?”
“No one did anything,” I said. “It’s just time I take control of my own health.”
“Sharing information with us doesn’t mean you’re not in control, Jake,” my dad said.
“We couldn’t possibly talk about something else, could we?” I begged.
“What would you like to talk about?”
“How are the halflings and the steplings?”
My dad spent the next few minutes uncomfortably updating me on the doings of the grade school crowd. Then, Dr. Harry hurried onto the ward. Somehow, he managed to look even shabbier than he did the last time I saw him. When he got close to the bed, I said, “I need to see you alone.”
“Yes, of course.” Clearly, he’d guessed what was happening. He came right to the edge of the bed and helped me out of it.
“Dr. Harry, if possible, Jake’s father and I would like to sit down with you for a few minutes before we leave.”
“Certainly, as long as it’s all right with Jake.”
“It’s not all right with Jake,” I said.
My mom practically growled. “I don’t understand why you’re being like this.”
We were out of the ward and into the reception area, my mom and dad dogging our every step. As Dr. Harry opened the door to the exam room, I gave my parents a stern look and said, “Stay!” as firmly as I could.
I watched the door fall closed on their shocked faces.
THIRTY-EIGHT
Dr. Harry had to shock me three times before he got my heart going again. By the time he was finished, I felt like I’d been kicked around a corral by a herd of cattle. The burns on my chest were larger and stung, the skin beginning to peel. I noticed Dr. Harry had made sure Nurse Kelly didn’t follow us into the examine room, which was good and also bad.
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