Her body tenses and then she bolts. She flies out into the corridor, around the corner and out of sight.
The man spins at the movement and yells out after her but she’s gone. Suddenly vulnerable and feeling the exposure of his situation, he looks around him for the closest thing he can use to protect himself when security arrives. He lunges toward the nearest patient bedside cabinet and grabs a ribbon-festooned gift bottle of whisky. He grasps it tight, knuckles whitening as he raises it like a club, its warm caramel liquid gleaming as it sloshes inside.
The duty nurse takes a step back. “Please, try to stay calm, Mr. Garrett….If we could just—”
But Mr. Garrett turns from her, disinterested. He steps farther into the ward, squinting intently to read the small whiteboards above the beds. Looking for a specific name. Rhoda shifts forward ever so slightly in her chair. Somebody should call out. Shout for help. Perhaps she should, but that could just escalate things. She darts a glance out into the hall, for someone, anyone.
She needs to act, she thinks. She takes a breath and starts to rise from her chair—but a movement comes from the bed next to her. Her patient is sitting up; he looks at her not panicked, not concerned, and shakes his head.No. Not you.
She frowns. He is telling her not to intervene.
Mr. Garrett has reached their end of the ward. He scans the names, the faces below them. Rhoda and her patient look to each other as his gaze falls on them. Rhoda’s patient looks her serenely in the eyes and she doesn’t move. She heeds his advice and Mr. Garrett turns away. He turns and starts to walk away.
Suddenly someone breaks through the small crowd of people by the door, a young male nurse, making a run at the armed man. Other bystanders move back to clear his path. Mr. Garrett’s eyes flare and unthinkingly he reaches out, snatching at the nearest body, a man in his seventies, frail, wearing a Fair Isle sweater many sizes too large for him. The whisky bottle crashes to the floor, shattering, splashing glass and richly scented alcohol across the ward. The old man drops his shiny new magazine with the shock of it and it lands with a loud slap on the wet hospital linoleum. Mr. Garrett holds him roughly in front of him as a kind of shield, and the approaching male nurse stutters to a halt.
“This isn’t what I wanted, you know,” Mr. Garrett tells the ward. It comes out shakily, off-key. “I just, I just want—argh!” He squeezes his eyes shut hard to think. “He killed my little girl. She was fifteen,” he tells no one in particular. He’s crying now, fat wet streaks down his anguished face. The old man trapped in his arms scans the surrounding faces searching for a clue to his fate, still held tight in the hold.
“He killed her. And what? He gets to survive? No, he doesn’t get to go home! I have to bury her! No, he doesn’t get to survive, and go home and live his life! You tell me where he is. Or I’ll find him myself. SHE WAS FIFTEEN, FOR CHRIST’S SAKE.”
The duty nurse looks across to the male nurse. She shakes her head.
The male nurse swallows, straightening his shoulders before speaking carefully. He’s new and young and totally out of his depth. “It looks like the man you might be talking about has already been discharged, sir. Earlier this morning, so…” He doesn’t know what else to say but it doesn’t matter. Mr. Garrett seems to crumple inside.
He releases the old man, who falls forward onto the wet glassy floor, shaking. Mr. Garrett sinks back onto the edge of an empty hospital bed as the male nurse cautiously bobs forward to help the terrified old man from the floor, pulling him back to safety.
Mr. Garrett slowly reaches down to the floor and picks up a long thin sliver of broken whisky bottle glass. He studies its razor-sharp edges thoughtfully before raising it up to his throat. His face gleams with tears.
A gasp from somewhere in the ward. Rhoda realizes she’s holding her breath. Next to her, her patient pulls back his bedsheet. He has quietly removed his own IV and mask and now he gently gets out of bed.
Rhoda’s gaze flashes swiftly to him, her eyes wild with concern. He gives her a soft smile.I know what I’m doing.
Mr. Garrett looks up at the movement. A patient, out of bed, making his way toward him. He presses the sliver more firmly against his throat, his quivering hand breaking the skin enough to release a thin line of red. But the patient keeps moving toward him, undeterred. His eyes locked on the quaking man, his gaze placid and steady. Confusion suddenly furrows Mr. Garrett’s brow. “Was it you?” he splutters. “Did you do it?” He stands now, turning the glass blade on Rhoda’s patient.
But Rhoda’s patient shakes his head. He is not the man Mike Garrett is looking for. Mike lowers the glass ever so slightly, perplexed by the advancing man. This isn’t what’s supposed to happen, he thinks, this man doesn’t look scared, he looks kind. A fresh sadness seems to burst over Mike and he slowly sits back down.
Rhoda’s patient is feet away now. The room watches mesmerized. There’s an assurance to the way Rhoda’s patient moves, a calmness. He seems to know what he’s doing as he approaches the increasingly confused man. Close enough, Rhoda’s patient stretches out a hand, palm up. Mike studies him, then lets out a deep ragged breath, something inside him breaking under the strain—he begins to sob, in wretched gasps.
The patient takes another step toward him. Then, gently, almost tenderly, he takes the shard of glass from Mike’s unresisting hand. He places it on the bedside cabinet and sits down next to him. The patient reaches out and Mike lets himself be taken into a strong masculine hug, his body loosening limply into that of his new friend. His eyes squeeze tight shut, and remembering of all that he has lost, he lets himself fully surrender.
—
After Mike has been led away to another room, Rhoda makes her way over to her patient. “That was very brave but you should have let me help, you know. I could have helped.”
The patient shakes his head mildly.
No,his eyes say.
He brings a hand up to her head now by way of explanation. Careful not to touch her skin and the angry comma of scar tissue near her hairline.
No, not you, not again,his eyes seem to say.Not this time.
Rhoda’s eyes widen and her breath catches.
He knows,she realizes. He knows.
What happened to her. How she got her scar. The scar that hasn’t fully healed yet. Inside and out. Her eyes fill.He knows and he was protecting me.He protected us all.
She smiles up at him. He gives her a smile straight back.
