Zombies in Paradise (Love in the Age of Zombies Book 2) (23 page)

Nadine got up and went to the woman’s table. They chatted for a few moments, then both women came back to the table.

“Kevin, this is Carolyn. She’s a pharmacist at the hospital and may be able to help you.”

She was a pretty blonde, on the petite side with a small frame.
Pretty eyes! Cute smile!
he thought.

“Hi, I’m Kevin,” he said. “I’m here to check out the hospital. My wife’s pregnant and may need medical attention. If the hospital can help, I’ll bring her here from Ann Arbor. I’m hoping you can give me the nickel tour.”

She looked Kevin up and down before saying, “Sure, I can take you there now. It’s about time to start my shift, anyway.” The five of them stood up to leave. Brian saw them and called Kevin over.

“Kevin, if you need a job, come talk to me. I could use another hand. The people I have are learning quick, but they’re not brewers.”

“I’ll do that. I even have a recipe idea to discuss. Have you brewed a spring beer using cilantro?”

“Cilantro  .  .  .  no, I haven’t. But I can see where it’d work. I’d love to hear your idea!”

Rick looked over from the other side of the bar and said “He’s the art side of Stormcloud. I’m the business side. Don’t forget you owe me for a pint.”

“Brian said the first one was on the house!” Kevin protested.

“It’s true, I did,” Brian confessed. Rick just shook his head as if admitting defeat. Nadine, Stan, and Arthur told Kevin it was nice to meet him and good luck, then Kevin and Carolyn started walking toward the hospital.

“Do you know where we’re going?” Carolyn asked.

“I couldn’t tell you street names, but I think you get on M-22 for a few blocks and then take a left and climb the hill.”

“That’s right. The hospital is on top of one of the bluffs. I wish the pharmacy had a window overlooking the lake, but we don’t have any windows, period.”

“How can you see what you’re doing? Do you have electric lights?”

“The pharmacy has one light fixture. It’s an LED strip. Quite nice actually. Jake loaned it to us.”

“But what is there to do? Surely you don’t have a lot of medicine left.”

“We don’t have much. We have groups who forage for anything the town can use. A lot of the pharmacies were hit pretty hard. People just took stuff, probably not even knowing what it’s for. And without the internet, how are they going to find out? They probably won’t. So a very nice antifungal drug, for example, will probably be wasted because whoever took it doesn't even know what it’s for.”

They headed north through a neighborhood bordering downtown. It was obvious how the standards for a well-kept yard had changed. Most of the lawns had ample growth of calf-high new spring grass. The only people in town who had working lawnmowers were those few with the old fashioned reel push mowers. A lot of people had tilled both their front and back yards for gardens. Kevin saw more than one house with people working the soil. Early spring crops were already shooting up. Other folks just let their lawn go, or maybe those houses were empty. Probably thirty percent of the yards were overgrown.

“I notice a lot of gardens. Where do people get their plants and seeds?” he asked.

“You know that old saying
necessity is the mother of invention
? Some folks figured out back in March that they might be able to earn some credits if they germinated vegetable and herb seeds and used them for trade. We had a handful of home gardeners who were also heirloom seed collectors, so we have quite a variety. Plus Jake has been very generous with his seedlings. He has the equipment to ensure a very high germination rate and he also takes cuttings and clones them. But he doesn’t have much of a variety. The seeds he had in storage were hybrids especially bred for hydroponic gardening.”

“Things really are going back to the old days—or rather the old, old days,” Kevin commented, “back before we had factory farms and cold storage and cheap transportation. My grandpa used to tell us about being a kid and how excited he was one Christmas when he got an orange and a dime. That was in Illinois. Getting fresh fruit in December was practically a miracle. I don’t suppose we’ll see any oranges or bananas or seafood for a long time.”

“You’re probably right. But I’ve noticed that people already appreciate what they have more. When you haven’t had fresh vegetables in a few weeks, getting some is a big deal. I can assure you nobody is letting food go to waste anymore.” Carolyn replied. “I don’t know about you, but I had to clean out my fridge once a month to throw away all the spoiled food, mostly leftovers. That will never happen again.”

“Because you don’t have a fridge?!” Kevin joked.

“That’s part of it, but mainly because I don’t have leftovers!” She stepped away from him as they walked and looked him up and down. “You seem to be in good health. You must have had plenty of stored goods. If you’ll notice, you won’t see a lot of overweight people in Frankfort these days. Except for people with hormone problems, like hypothyroidism. Six months ago we had plenty of Synthroid on hand, but I realized a couple of months ago that we’d run out soon. I called a meeting of all the thyroid patients. I suggested everyone skip every third dose. I also gave them a list of foods called goitrogens to avoid because they interfere with their thyroid. Some of them were not happy to hear they had to avoid broccoli and cabbage and cauliflower, because they’re easy to grow in our climate. But I made it very clear to everyone that it was only a matter of time before I ran out of thyroid medicine. Nearly everyone agreed to cut back. So most of them now are slightly under medicated and they’ve started losing energy and gaining weight.”

“Didn’t they used to make thyroid medicine from animals?”

“Yes, porcine in particular. For almost a hundred years it was the only treatment available. But then Synthroid was released and the pharmaceutical industry convinced doctors it was superior. The truth is, for many people the porcine thyroid extract was more effective with fewer side effects than Synthroid. But because doctors were convinced that natural remedies were practically barbaric, they would only prescribe the synthetic versions despite their patients’ complaints that they didn’t feel as well.”

“Is there a chance you could learn to make the natural versions? Can’t you make it the way they used to?”

“Yes, it’s possible, and I’ve already talked to cattle and pig farmers. When it’s slaughter time we’re going to be meticulous about removing their thyroid gland so we can learn how to process it. But it’s not just Synthroid we’re learning to replace; people figured out pretty quickly that they’ll have to grow some of their own medicine. We have a whole cottage industry now devoted to medicinal crops and even have a botánica in town.”

“What’s a botánica? An herb store?”

“Pretty much. People have embraced the idea of medicinal crops and herbs in general. Some of my patients who were on antidepressants are cultivating St. John’s Wort, for example. And, of course, there’s the nonsense Jake is promoting.”

“You’re opposed to what Jake’s doing?”

“I wouldn’t say I’m opposed to it; I’d say I approach it conservatively. We don’t know enough about the long-term effects of self-medicating with marijuana. It might turn out to be a great solution; it might turn out to cause a lot of problems. I especially worry about giving it to kids whose bodies and brains haven’t finished developing yet. Marijuana could interfere with their development, but that will take decades to determine. I think people rushed into it prematurely. And to me it sounds like snake oil. I’ve seen claims that it cures everything from cancer to tooth decay to warts. I think it’s an overhyped solution to an unresolved underlying problem: people want to escape reality. Getting high doesn’t change reality. It just tricks your brain. It lights up your pleasure receptors so you only think you feel better.”

Kevin didn’t tell Carolyn about Tammy using marijuana when she had cancer and how it eased her pain, and how her quality of life improved. But he noted her support for using an extract from dead pigs and her support for using an plants to treat depression. Her lukewarm support for marijuana seemed a bit of a contradiction.

Chapter Eighteen

Kevin and Carolyn walked up the hill to the hospital, past the signs pointing to the emergency entrance. The hill was a lot steeper than Kevin remembered, but he had always been in a car when ascending the hill. He was only slightly winded when they got to the top, but he could feel a slight burn in his calves.

“All the entrances are locked except the emergency entrance. The ER is the only part of the hospital with power. The rest of the hospital is empty. They’ve cannibalized as much equipment as they can from other departments. There’s no way to get in except through the ER.

“We have no more than fifty patients at a time. And they’re all in the emergency department or very close by.”

They walked by the reception desk and turned down one of the halls. Portraits of benefactors lined the walls. The corridors were fairly dim; every other light fixture was unlit, and outside windows had the curtains open to allow natural light in. They approached a station where a man and a woman were looking at a clipboard and talking. They had LED lamps attached to the clipboards, lighting their charts. “They’re transcribing notes from the doctors. We’ve had to resort to an old filing system—paper and folders and filing cabinets. Hi, Tracey; hi, Theresa. Where’s Doctor Nunn?”

“’T’sup, Carolyn?” Tracey asked, barely glancing at her. “He’s in the lounge. Mrs. Howard just had her baby.”

“Finally! Everything okay?”

“As far as I know, but I can’t tell you anything without a signed HIPAA form,” he said. Theresa snickered.

“Bite me, Tracey,” Carolyn said good-naturedly.

“No, thanks, I don’t want to turn!” Tracey shouted after them. Theresa laughed.

“You know, that’s one thing I don’t miss. We don’t have any government regulations any more. No five-page registration forms. No preauthorization or out-of-network providers. Sometimes I think the zombies did us a favor by getting rid of the government!” As she said this last part, they entered a room labeled
Private: Medical Staff Only
. Windows on let in light; there were sofas and tasteful furniture decorating the room.

A doctor reclining on one of several sofas overheard Carolyn’s last comment and, without taking his hand from over his eyes, said, “The government helped less fortunate people in more ways than you could ever imagine.”

“And hurt ten thousand times that many in ways I
can
imagine,” Carolyn retorted without animosity. “Hey, Dr. Nunn, how’d the delivery go?”

The doctor looked up with a weary face and said, “It went okay. Long labor, though. Baby and mom are fine, but mom will be sore for a while. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to deliveries without epidurals or anesthetics. I cringe every time I have to do an episiotomy.” Kevin wasn’t sure what that was and didn’t want to know.

Carolyn said, “Dr. Nunn, this is Kevin Williams. His wife is pregnant and is having some trouble. He wants to know if we can help. And with that,” she said, turning to me, “I’m headed to the pharmacy. Come say
bye
when you’re finished.” She briefly touched his arm as she spoke.

The doctor looked Kevin over with bleary eyes. “What’s your wife’s name? You don’t look familiar.”

“Her name’s Michelle. We don’t live here. I drove up from Ann Arbor.” Kevin gave a short explanation of Michelle’s pregnancy and Doc’s concerns, and of learning Frankfort may have a hospital.

“Why did the doctor suspect she may have preeclampsia?” Dr. Nunn asked.

“He said there was a genetic factor, plus she lost a baby a few years ago. She has increased risk because of her weight and she has some symptoms, like swelling. But don’t ask me more than that. I’m not the medical type and he used medical terms that didn’t stick. My wife is a nurse practitioner and she agreed with him. They told me the worst-case scenario is she could lose the baby and I could lose her.”

“Your wife’s an NP? We could sure use her here! So what is it you want from me?”

“My most important questions have already been answered: whether Frankfort is a safe haven and whether it really has a working hospital. If she were here and something went wrong, at least she could get some help.”

“You said you have a doctor living with you. Can’t he do anything?”

“He would help if he could, but neither of us shares her blood type. If she were here we could probably find a donor. How do you handle that sort of thing? How do you convince people to donate blood?”

“At first we made it one of the civic duties we expected of everyone. But then we just turned it over to the barter system. We offer hospital credits in exchange for blood donations. They save enough points and can cash them in when they need us. Somebody donates a few times, they have a credit on their account. If something happens, they can come here and get helped without charge.”

“What happens to someone who doesn’t have regular credits or hospital credits?”

“Most people donate themselves out of debt or earn enough credits on their job to come in and pay the balance. If someone doesn’t appear to be making an effort, we turn them over to the barter committee, and the committee starts withholding extra credits. This is a small town now, and it seems everybody knows everybody else’s business. Folks don’t want to get the reputation of not paying their doctor and nurses.