The Bargain - One man stands between a destitute town and total destruction.

by Aaron D. Gansky

  Something struck me as odd. “Mason’s a reader. He’d know something like that. Why suggest him?”

  Aida opened her eyes and tilted her head toward me. “I’m marrying him, but I can’t read his mind.”

  I stood up. “Guess I’ll go talk to him then.”

  “Don’t forget your toothbrush.”

  Taking Aida’s advice, I showered off quickly, brushed my teeth, and put on my same clothes from the day before. I didn’t like the arrangement, but had few options. If I had the time, I’d drive down to Target and buy a couple changes of clothes for myself and Aida.

  I walked through the hospital hallways, refused to look in other patients’ rooms. I’d slept better than I had in days, but fatigue still wore me to extremes. My emotions ran high, and I doubted I could handle seeing the overwhelming suffering of those in the oncology wing. I ignored it because I could think of no better strategy.

  When I got into the elevator, I finally breathed. I went up two floors, exited the elevator, hung a right, and went down three doors. I knocked, and this time Alex answered. “Come on in.”

  “How we feeling today?”

  “Can’t speak for you, but I feel like crap.”

  I grinned. “Sorry. Stupid question. Mason, how ‘bout you?”

  “Sore as a horse, but hanging in there.” The television played an old Chuck Norris movie.

  I sat down between the beds. “Oh, come on now. Norris wouldn’t complain.”

  “Norris wouldn’t have been shot. He would’ve snatched the bullet with his teeth and crushed it on his forehead like a beer can.”

  Alex chimed in. “I’ve seen him do it.”

  As much as I enjoyed the banter, the sense of relative safety, I wanted to get to business. The sooner I’d done the interviews, the sooner I could get back to Nadine.

  “Mason, you wanted me to interview Doctor Slate.”

  “Sure did.”

  “You know he’s in prison?”

  “Sure do.”

  “Doctor Druggie?” Alex said. “Man, wish he were on my case.” He laughed and coughed and spat in the pink basin.

  Mason squirmed in the bed. “Everyone’s screwed up at some point. Doesn’t mean they haven’t done some good along the way.”

  “You think his good outweighs his bad?”

  “I’m not sure God puts them on a scale. If He did, we’d all be in trouble.” He muted the television.

  I crossed my legs and turned in the chair to better face him. “Are you saying the bad things we’ve done don’t matter to God?”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t say that.”

  Alex looked at us. “Now I’m confused.”

  Mason turned the television off. “It’s like this. Everyone does bad things, but they can do good things too. I think the point of this whole thing is to find the good in the bad. Yeah, there’s a lot of evil stuff out there, but we have to dig through it until we find something positive.”

  Alex blinked. “What are you, Buddhist?”

  “Christian, actually.”

  “Oh. One of them,” Alex said. He drew in a ragged breath and grimaced. “What about me? Am I a bad person?”

  Mason cracked his knuckles and rolled gently toward Alex. “You’re asking the wrong guy. I don’t get to decide.”

  “Who does?”

  I knew where Mason was headed; I’d heard this line of thought before. Still, I wanted to see how Alex might react to it. I cleared my throat and answered for Mason. “God decides.”

  Alex’s breathing heavied. I saw his chest rising and falling slowly. “How do you know what God decides?”

  Unlike most of the other patients, Mason was no longer tethered to an IV tube. He had more freedom to position himself in the bed, but moved gingerly. Nurses slipped in and gave Mason paper cups full of pills. They checked his blood and his wound, but left him alone otherwise. My guess: they wanted to ready him for discharge.

  He put a hand on his bandage and said, “That’s where Jesus comes in.”

  “Now you sound like a preacher.”

  “Yeah, maybe I do,” he said. “But I’m not making it up. Just telling you how it is.”

  After a pause, eyes fixed on the ceiling, Alex said, “I’ve heard the whole Jesus thing before.”

  Mason didn’t flinch. “We don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want to. Wanted to make sure I answered your question.”

  I leaned in close to Mason. “Doesn’t that make this whole assignment rather pointless?”

  “How so?”

  “Finding five righteous. If the only requirement to be righteous is accepting Christ’s sacrifice, then I’ve been asking the wrong questions.” I kept my voice low, hoping Alex wouldn’t overhear us.

  “What kind of questions have you been asking?”

  “Biographical kinds. Just about their lives, who they are, their greatest accomplishments, things like that.”

  Mason matched my whisper. “Those are all works-based questions, Connor.”

  “You wanted articles. It’s tough to write an article on the answer to a yes-or-no question.”

  He sighed. “So you don’t know anything about the spiritual sides of these people?”

  “I know one, but that’s it. The rest, I can tell you about their hearts, their motivation, all that, but not whether or not they’re Christians.”

  Mason arched his eyebrows. “If that was the only thing God needed, I imagine He could have just asked me or Caleb to do it. With a phone, we’d have been done inside an hour. Could have talked to a lot more than ten people too.”

  “So you think we’re on the right track?”

  “I don’t know. We can only do what we’re asked. God will have to figure out the rest.”

  “Feels like we’re gambling with a lot of lives. What if we’re wrong?”

  “Like I say, we can only do what we’re asked. We’re doing that. The rest is hope and prayer.”

  I stood back up and stretched again. “So you think Slate’s our best chance?”

  “He’s all I can think of for now.”

  I would have preferred a more confident answer, but none came. “Hailey State Pen?”

  “Remember how to get there?”

  “I can manage. Think he’ll talk to me?”

  “We can hope. You can swing by my house on your way. Check it out, make sure it’s okay?”

  I nodded as I walked toward the hall. “I may do that.”

  * * *

  Angry, tenebrous clouds congregated near the horizon and marched over the sky like a determined army. Within minutes, rain surged from them. The golden sand browned to mud in minutes. The various potholes and uneven nature of the road made for numerous puddles of uncertain depth. The rapidity and sheer force of the rain surprised me. The change of weather, though unsettling, strangely comforted me, stilled my concerns. I thought of the rainbow I saw on the way to the hospital, thought of God’s promises.

  I turned onto Mason’s road and navigated among the creosote bushes and under the golden cottonwoods. The rain accumulated on the sparse leaves and came down in fat, determined drops.

  At some point, the drops froze and became hail. They fell heavy on my roof, pinged off my windshield. The Mojave riverbed swelled with water. How had so much water come in such a short time? Mason once said something about water acting like a magnet and pulling up the underground river in times of heavy rains or when the mountains to the south opened their dams to regulate water levels for the communities built around the lakes. Tornadoes no longer seemed far-fetched.

  Mason’s gate stood open, as it had the day I arrived. I parked near his blackened patio. I sighed and dialed the hospital, asked for Mason’s room. When he answered, I said, “I could use some good ne
ws right about now.”

  “Doctor likes the way I’m healing up. Says I can pack up and go home today.”

  “What about Nadine? Heard anything about her?”

  “Tests all came back. They look better than expected. She’s got good color, and they said she can go home tomorrow morning.”

  “We’re going to want to wait on that. Right now, there’s no home to go to.”

  “I figured we could stay at my place.”

  I sighed. I hated giving bad news. “You don’t have a place. Not anymore.”

  “Are you kidding me right now?”

  “Nothing left but blackened sticks and charred patio.”

  He whispered something, but I didn’t catch it. He repeated himself.

  “Call Caleb. Tell him to meet us here at the hospital quick. If they came after me and Aida, they’ll go after him, too.”

  “Gotcha.” I hung up, flipped the car around, and drove out the same way I came in. I dialed Caleb’s number and held the phone to my ear with my shoulder. “Caleb? This is Connor. You okay?”

  “Fine, why?”

  “Mason wants to see you at the hospital.” I tried not to sound panicked.

  “Everything okay?”

  I laid it out for him. “Bernard’s kids are on a mayhem spree. Ryan tried to kill me in Sue’s yesterday morning, and then someone burned Aida’s and Mason’s houses.”

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Pack up whatever’s not replaceable,” I said. “Just to be sure.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’m on my way to the prison. I have two more articles to do. Once that’s done, we’ll figure out what to do after that.”

  “Got it.”

  * * *

  Guards patrolled the prison yard from the top of their towers, though they had no prisoners to supervise in the hail. I rushed inside, coat over my head to deflect the angry hailstones.

  Frank, the man behind the glass, looked hard at me. “Mason’s friend, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Back to see Greg?”

  “Thought I might talk to Doctor Slate.”

  He smirked. “You got a prescription to fill?”

  “Just a few questions.” I wondered what those questions would be. I hadn’t thought of a story to tell the good doctor either. I’d have to make it up as I went along and hope he wanted to talk.

  Frank buzzed me in. “You remember the routine?”

  “Very well.”

  I walked through the door, brushed the stray hail from my coat and clothes. The guard patted me down before I took off both shoes for him to inspect. Once he was convinced I wasn’t a threat, the guard ushered me along. I hurried down the hall to the visitor center, where another guard nodded to me. “He’ll be here in a few minutes. Take a seat. Far left is fine.”

  “Thanks.” I sat down. Minutes later a tall, balding man walked in the other side. He looked like an old-time basketball player, thin but athletic. His light blue eyes contrasted starkly with his bronzed skin. Unlike Greg, Doctor Slate wore an orange jumpsuit. He’d rolled up his sleeves. When he saw me, he wrinkled his brow and picked up the phone. “Do I know you?”

  “Connor Reedly.”

  He pushed his lips together. “Of World News Weekly?”

  “One and the same.”

  He smiled. “I’d not expected such distinguished company, especially this far out in Hailey? What brings you here?”

  Awkwardly flattered, I allowed myself a smile. “A lot of things, really.”

  He leaned forward. “I don’t expect most people to understand me. But you, I bet you’d get me.”

  I adopted a similar posture and leaned toward the glass. “One reason why I’m out here. Everyone talks about the bad things in Hailey, but no one mentions the good. You’ve never had a chance to give your side of the story.”

  “And you want to tell it?” His voice sounded like papers sliding over a desk.

  “I do. And people want to hear it.”

  Another smile. “Excellent. Must be my lucky day. How do we begin?”

  Luck had nothing to do with it. God’s hand was in this conversation. I leaned back and tapped my pen to my notebook. “Take it from the top.”

  Chapter 29

  GOOD MEDICINE

  By the time Malcolm Slate saw Nichole, she’d grown dangerously thin. Anxious, her father brought her in and listed her symptoms: rapid weight loss, excessive exhaustion. She’d go to bed at eight and sleep until eleven. Teachers complained about her sleeping through classes. This morning, he found these strange purple spots on her skin.

  Doctor Slate ran the tests to confirm his suspicion, but he knew what the blood tests would say. He asked her father to step outside into the hallway for a few minutes so he could speak to Nichole alone. As he closed the door, he tried to quell the unease rising in him. He’d had to ask these questions of adults before, but never a thirteen-year-old girl.

  He took a breath. “Nichole, I’m going to ask you some questions, and it’s very important that you answer them honestly. That’s why I asked your dad to wait outside. I don’t want you to be embarrassed or afraid, but for me to treat you, I need to know a few things. Do you understand?”

  Nichole fixed her eyes on the floor. “Okay.”

  He leaned up against a counter and readied his pen over her chart. “Have you ever taken drugs?”

  She shook her head.

  “I need you to answer me verbally, please. Out loud. Okay?”

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  “Have you ever taken drugs?”

  “No.”

  He scratched his eyebrow. “Really? No pot? Heroine? Meth? X?”

  Her head lolled forward as if she might fall asleep on the exam table. “Drugs are for losers.”

  Slate kept his voice quiet. “What I think you have, you can only get two ways, and that’s from IV drugs and sex.”

  She folded her hands in her lap.

  “Was it drugs?”

  “No.”

  He folded his arms. “So if it’s not drugs, someone else is involved. Someone else has the same thing you do.”

  Nichole’s age made him grapple to find the right words. How did one deliver such news to a child?

  Her shoulders hunched forward, and she took slow, deep breaths. “Are you going to tell my parents?”

  Thirteen years old.

  “I have to, Nichole.”

  He wanted to reach out to her, to scoop her up in his arms and tell her everything would be fine. Slate had a daughter about the same age as her, but he hadn’t seen her in years. His wife had packed her up and driven away. He’d called everyone he could think of to find them, but she’d vanished, and taken his daughter with her.

  She’d be about Nichole’s age now. His mind transposed his daughter’s face onto Nichole’s frail body, and it terrified him.

  “You don’t have to tell. We can make something up. Tell them it’s something else.”

  “That’d be a lie, and it’d be dangerous.” He paused, and squatted down to eye-level. “If you don’t get help, you may die. And it won’t be easy.”

  She shrugged.

  “Either way, I’m going to tell him. You have a chance to help someone else. Maybe a lot of someones.”

  She shrugged again and lay back on the exam table.

  * * *

  Nichole’s father, a beast of a man with arms as hairy as his head, took a seat across Dr. Slate’s desk. Slate extended his hand. “Thanks for coming in.”

  Nichole sat beside her father. He didn’t shake Malcolm’s hand. “Tell me what’s wrong with my daughter.”

  Right to business. Sure. “I wish I had good news for you. Your daugh
ter tested positive for HIV. Her blood work shows her CD4 count at 183. We classify anything under 200 as AIDS.”

  Her father put his meaty hands up. “Hold on. You’re saying she has AIDS? AIDS is for hookers and homos and addicts.”

  Dr. Slate didn’t flinch. “I wish I was wrong, but I’m not.”

  The father gritted his teeth. “One call to my lawyer and I can have your license, pal.”

  Malcolm turned Nichole’s chart around. He gestured to the CD4 count. “The tests and the symptoms back it up. You should be thinking about where she got it.”

  Nichole squirmed in her chair, put her face in her hands. “Please don’t tell him.”

  Malcolm’s heart broke. He pushed the image of his daughter from his mind and turned to her father. “She’s assured me she hasn’t taken drugs, which leaves intercourse.”

  Nichole’s father stood up, put his hands behind his head, and paced the back of the office.

  Doctor Slate closed the chart. He slid a pad of paper and a pen to Nichole. “We need to know who she got it from. I need a list of names, ages, dates, anything. Be as specific as possible.”

  The father’s anger melted into disbelief, and finally to grief. “My little girl,” he said.

  * * *

  Days later, Nichole delivered her list of six names to Malcolm Slate. She’d scrawled a note on the bottom.

  Can’t remember the others

  He pushed himself back from his desk, leaned back and crossed his legs. Thirteen years old. He could prescribe her drugs and, so long as her father could afford the co-pay for prescriptions on their insurance, she might be able to have a decent, almost normal life. With luck, she might live to see twenty. But he’d seen too many families in this situation bankrupt themselves buying medication. In some cases, the sick asked to be taken off the meds. They couldn’t bear the stress on their family, even if it cost them their lives.

  If he’d seen her a month ago, a year ago, whenever she’d contracted HIV, he might have been able to do more. The list of names might have been kept down to two, or ideally, one. Now, figuring two partners per name, and then two more for their two, the list would grow exponentially.