Mercy 6

48

She tapped the hatch, one-two, one-two. Metal snapped and sprang; sunlight and wind fell over her, the scent of brush, warm. Ben-Curtis appeared in silhouette across the circle, then dropped beside her, pressed to her within the tube. She had two impressions: hovering above her, his body appeared small against the light, sheared, slivered, able to soar; cleaved to her in the narrow vent, chin over her shoulder, he was forced to hug her. His body felt wiry, jittery. She couldn’t help but take his pulse, which was slow despite the effort and pace of things, indicating athleticism and confidence. But there was something insubstantial about him, or unwrought, his body too inside itself. She couldn’t really hug back.

To speak, he tried to draw his face away, but this made things even more intimate, nose to cheek. He relaxed over her shoulder.

He wore a ball cap and smelled of whiskey and cocaine.

“In two minutes,” he whispered, “it should be clear.”

“You’re high.”

“You’re not my doctor.”

“But I’m relying on you.”

“Have I ever let you down?” He drew back, looked at her face, their breath mixing. He returned to the over-the-shoulder position.

“What can I say? I function like this.”

“You have enough on you?”

“I think I’m in love.”

“I don’t care about your health. I care about you blending in.”

“It’s what I do.”

“Okay,” she said. “So?”

He removed his cap and put it on her, pulled it low over her eyes.

“When I say, go.” He wrapped his arm around her neck to look at his watch.

She tapped the bill of the ball cap. “Is this supposed to make me look like you?”

“We’re dealing with blips and impressions. Too much and you’re noticed. That hat and its colors, the wrong team for this city, has been registered.”

She started to say more.

“A few more seconds,” he whispered into the side of her neck.

He crouched and fashioned a stirrup with his hands, lacing his fingers together. The side of his face was pressed to her stomach, his breath beneath her waistband.

“Good luck, Anna.”

She fitted her shoe into his hand stirrup, and he flung her into the warm light. She did one shoulder roll into a crouch and peered into the vent. He was looking up, but she could tell he could only see her outline. His eyes were blue and glassy, coked-up with empty sympathy. She flipped shut the lid.

It was easy for her to run.

One of her most common and gruesome cases, right up there with motorcycles and the DTs, was fishhook removal. Impaled in simple flesh, nothing deeper than epidural, the approach was to continue the puncture, to curl the hook along its natural curve until the barb came clear, then snip off the barb and point and reverse the curl, minimizing damage. But when more was involved — tendons, eye sockets, ear cartilage, scrotal sacs, lips, cheeks — the approach became counterintuitive. She would go in to get out. “Like a funhouse maze,” her mentor had said. “In, then back; in, then back.”

Some fishhooks were as big as silverware. But the tiny ones that came in clusters were the most stressful extractions, required intricacy, patience, willingness to hurt. She sometimes just wanted to yank these out.

She felt the same way as she began her run, her far aim to the canyon bottom, her near aim Mercy General. Five strides up the slope, through scrub, she was on the running trail. Two white vans were visible, one at each end of the building. Against all desire, she circled nearer the hospital, pacing a hard five, eyes on the track, with outward glances from beneath her lowered bill. Her ponytail struck an even rhythm on her nape.

Something atop the nearest van slowly spun, a kind of metal cup or ladle. In case they had sound, she began a song under her breath, a drinking tune, the refrain “I’m a man/you don’t meet/every day.”

The van appeared to rock, though it may have been sunlight tricks on the white surface. She curved toward it. It was clearly pitching with inside movement. She smiled and waved her arms, still keeping her bill low as possible.

“Hey,” she called, “can you tell me? Do you know?” She pointed toward the path ahead as she jogged in place, just a fighter’s dance.

“Does this loop around, or should I turn back?”

The driver’s-side window, black, slid down, revealing a guy in a plain black cap. He raised his chin for a better look. Somebody from the back of the van got his attention for a moment, said something Mendenhall could not discern. The soldier glanced into the back, then returned to her.

“You’re gonna have to turn around and head back.” He waved toward the hospital. “It’s restricted up there.”

She put her hand to her mouth and ducked. “It’s that hospital?”

He rubbed his nose. “It’s safe out here. But no closer.”