Selling Scarlett (10 page)

I’m also curious about Hunter. Wildly curious. I’m practically craving him, although all fond feelings vanish as I drive through a dreary patch of East L.A. I pass a familiar-looking exit, then the one that's mine, and I know—I know for sure—that this is going to be that same hell-hole where Mom served a court-mandated week two years ago.

I pull off onto a run-down road, then hang a right onto a dead-end street, and there it is: Sunshine Acres—the building right next door to Sunshine Rehab, where mom was sent by court order. Both buildings are tall and Soviet-esque—completely void of frill; all function. The parking deck is dark and dank, even by parking deck standards. I tell myself my imagination is exaggerating, but I swear there’s a thick layer of grime on everything.

The lobby, accessible from the third floor of the deck, is a vast space under a low-lying ceiling, filled with plastic chairs and smelling of stale carpet. There's a cut-out in the wall where two women and a man sit behind a counter top.

I stop in front of a stick-thin woman with short black hair, and ask for the charge nurse. I'm not nervous, because I know that if she says “No,” I'll come back in a few hours, and I'll find a way to sneak inside. I'll wait for Cross's nurse to take a bathroom break. I'll decide for myself how well he's doing.

The person I think is in charge has a name tag that says OLIVE. She's wearing bright green, sweat-stained scrubs that hug her spare tire and compliment her creamy chocolate skin. She looks me over, from my Ugg Moccasins to my jeans and discount designer sweater and she folds her arms across her chest. "It's Saturday," she says, sounding tired. "What do you want with me?"

I can tell she's a straight-shooter, so I match my tone to hers and cut right to the chase. "My friend Cross Carlson just got here, and I'd really like to see him. I know it's a Saturday, but I'm going out of town tomorrow for a week. I'm asking for a favor. Just this once."

She blinks at me. It's an exaggerated blink, almost comical, and after that she bugs her eyes out, like she's just heard something sensational. "Do you know who's running this place today?" she asks me in a dead-pan tone.

I shake my head, and she says, "Frankie, and Frankie's not here right now. I can let you in this once, but you've got fifteen minutes before Frankie gets back from lunch. If Frankie catches you, you're shrimp."

I frown as she turns, and hustle to follow her down the wide, gray-carpeted hall. "Um, just out of curiosity, what's shrimp mean?"

She shoots me a menacing look. "It means you'll get your head bit off."

I follow her around two corners, and at this point, my heart is pounding. The hall has started smelling more like a nursing home—that smell of soiled linens, cleaning chemicals, and sweat. We pass a row of tiny metal doors, Chiclets punched into the drab, white wall, and I want to turn and run away. Cross can't be here. It was bad enough when Mom was in the psych ward next door, but Mom had earned that.

Olive stops before a small metal door and says, "Better hurry.” I nod and thank her. I push through the door without taking time to calm myself, and the sight of a stained blue curtain dividing the room shocks me. There's barely enough space for a hospital bed between the curtain and the wall, and as my eyes move over the bed's metal rails, I know it can't be Cross because this patient is lying flat on his back with his—or her—head wrapped in gauze, and he or she is intubated. The breathing machine looming beside the bed makes a noise that brings back memories of a childhood full of ICUs.

I'm headed for the curtain, hoping against hope that Cross will be sitting up in his bed, when the curtain parts and a freckle-faced nurse appears. She's frowning like she's confused, and her shirt is tugged halfway over her head, exposing a lacy, black bra.

My heart leaps in elation.
Cross...you wicked thing.

Then I smell the vomit. The nurse is holding a garbage bag, I realize. I quickly notice that her pale pink scrubs shirt is flecked with orange bits. Did Cross puke on her?

I frown as she pushes down the shirt.

"What happened?"

"Mr. Russell, next door." She frowns, and I realize she's holding another, clean shirt in her left hand. "What are you doing in here? You subbing for Nancy?"

I nod behind her. "I'm here to see my friend, Cross Carlson."

Her face scrunches, unreadable. "Oh."

I try to see past her, but she's blocking my view.

"Hun, this is the professor." She leans her head back. "Dr. Dottswold."

I look from left to right. "So this isn't Cross's room?"

"He's right behind you."

My chest is filled with anger as I whirl to face the bed. I can’t wait to tell Miss Black Bra she’s wrong.

The second I really look, I see Cross's face. A cry rises in my throat, and there it dies. There is too much gauze around his head. There’s a tube running from a ventilator to his chapped lips, bent in a stiff snarl.

It's like a giant is stepping on my sternum as I whirl on Black Bra, finding the curtain in place. I can hear a rustling sound as she changes behind it. I don't care. I snatch it open.

I hear her swift intake of breath, and then she's there in front of me, reddish hair rumpled, eyes wide and alarmed.

"What the hell happened to him? Why is he intubated? Who’s in charge here?”

I can tell by the way her eyes widen that she's clueless, even before she smooths her mouth into a line and says, "I don't know, ma'am. You know, it's a Saturday and we don't—"

"No." I grit my teeth. "I don't care what day of the week it is, I want to know what happened to him." My voice is raised, almost to a yell, but I don't care. "If you can’t tell me what happened find me someone who can."

She’s looking at me like I belong in the psych building next door, but I don’t care. "What has he been like today? Has he moved or anything?" I glare at the gauze around his head. "Did someone drop him when they moved him here?"

The nurse scowls at me. "I can't share details with you. You're not family. You’re not supposed to be—"

I whip out my phony license, the one that says Elizabeth Carlson, and shove it in her face. Her eyes harden, and it's like she
wants
to say the words she says. "He had a bleed."

"He had a what?"

She nods, folding her arms. "He had a brain bleed during the transport over." Her gaze on mine hardens. "He had a stroke." A small sigh escapes her lips, and she gives me a tired look. "I don't know much about it cause I wasn't here. They said he might have been experiencing some pain."

"That caused a stroke? How the hell does that happen? Like, his blood pressure went up really high or something?

The nurse is moving closer to the door and I am moving with her, fully prepared to block her way if she tries to leave without giving me the long explanation.

"I don't know ma'am." She shrugs. "I'm not the one in charge. The doctors are."

Her hand is on the door, and I step in front of it. "What's he been doing today? Are you weaning him off the ventilator?”

"No. He needs it."

"Has he moved or anything? Squeezed anyone's hand? Like, a visitor's?"

She blinks. "I don't know. We can't sit in here with them all day."

I know I promised to be in and out, but now that I've seen Cross, I just can't do that. "What nurse is watching him this shift?"

She’s defensive now. "I am."

Obviously. I swallow, putting my hand on Cross's bed railing. Suddenly I'm feeling faint. I glance at Cross. He looks so pale and...dead. He looks dead. Helplessness floods me, and I want to scream, but I can barely whisper. "So he's just...pretty much lying here?"

It's a stupid thing to say, but I'm holding back tears.

"That's what they do mostly."

My blood boils. Did this woman go to nursing school? He’s not some vegetable! He had a stroke, apparently, but he's going to be okay. She doesn't know jack. No one here does.

"He's been getting N-therapy. He opened his eyes and talked to me the other day." Tears fill my eyes, and I do my best to blink them back as her frown deepens. "He's not in a persistent vegetative state. He's responded to stimuli, just this week. He's doing some kind of therapy here, like N-therapy, right? You have something similar?”

I look at the dark-haired guy in the bed, still wide-shouldered, still handsome, even with his chapped lips and the tube stretching his mouth.

The nurse dips her head again, and when she raises it, I can see the pity in her eyes. "I'm sorry," she says. "I shouldn't have said it like that. I don't know about him yet." She shifts the bag, holding her soiled shirt, from one hand to the other, looking contrite. "Why don't you stay here a minute. Talk to him. You can come back Monday, when hours are open again."

"I can't come Sunday?"

She shakes her head. "Tomorrow we're closed for therapy."

"What do you mean?"

"We have a physical therapist come twice a month. She's coming to this hall tomorrow."

"Only twice a month?"

The nurse shrugs. "I have to go but I'll be watching on a monitor." She points to something over my head, and I struggle with the urge to grab her arm and hold her until she tells me something I want to hear.

Somehow, I force myself to turn around and face Cross’s bed. I step over to it, starting to quietly cry as I scan the machines, analyzing the numbers I came to know so well during the first few weeks after the accident.

I check his blood pressure—136/95—and then his pulse—102. The ventilator is taking 24 breaths per minute for him, which means he's hardly breathing on his own at all. I wonder why that is. Maybe they gave him sedatives, so his body can rest and recover.

I stretch out my arm to touch his face, vowing to do something to make this situation better. As I do, the door behind me opens and I turn.

Standing in the doorway is a middle-aged Hispanic woman with her hair pulled into a tight French braid. She's shorter than I am, but everything about her exudes power. "You must be Pushy." She sticks her hand out. "I'm Frankie. And I know this SOB doesn't have a sister."

I balk. "Did you just call him a son of a bitch?"

She shrugs. "Governor's son, hurt himself riding a motorcycle drunk. I could call him worse things, but I'm sorry all the same. You need to get off my floor. Visiting is closed today."

I shake my head. "Not until you tell me what happened."

"I can't do that. What I can do is promise that if you don't leave now, I'll be sure you see the inside of a jail cell."

I put my hand over my chest, unable to believe that this is happening.

"I'll leave," I rasp, "but I have one last question."

She presses her lips together, like a disapproving teacher.

"Do you have N-therapy?" I sound composed, and Frankie's expression loosens a little as her mouth turns down.

"N-therapy?" She looks like she's never heard of it. Of course she hasn't.

"They call it N-therapy. I don’t remember the full name. It stimulates the brain and makes them want to wake up.”

"Neurostimulation therapy." She shakes her head, still brisk but not quite as stern. "I know it helps, but we can't afford to purchase those machines. This is a county treatment facility. Just the basics."

I nod, looking at Cross, and I can feel her hand close around my elbow. "I'm sorry, but visiting is closed. You need to leave."

I nod absently as I step into the hall, vowing Cross will leave soon, too.