Page 65 of Wrong Mail

I want it to be recognition so badly that for one second I almost make it recognition. I lean toward him, holding the phone between us, trying to read whatever has surfaced through the drugs and the pain.

Is it fear or confusion?

Or only the animal panic of waking to a stranger's face and a light held too close to his eyes.

I can't tell. I'm right over him and I still can't tell.

He makes a sound that isn't a word.

His head falls back against the couch, and his eyes roll up white. For one second I think he's looking at the ceiling. Then his breathing changes.

It turns shallow and wet.

It’s wrong.

I grab his shoulder and shake him.

"Hey, buddy.”

Nothing.

"Hey."

His mouth opens, but no sound comes out.

"Shit."

Has he overdosed?

I look toward the front room, toward the people slumped in the brown light, but nobody is moving. Nobody is looking. Nobody here is going to help him.

I’m not a nurse.

I am a liar with a photograph on my phone, and the fear that goes through me is entirely for him.

"Shit," I whisper again.

I should leave. I should call someone. I should do almost anything except what I do next.

I put two fingers into the pocket of his jacket.

The fabric is greasy and damp. I try not to think about what I'm touching as I search him, quick and clumsy. My heart is beating so hard it makes my hands stupid. The first pocket gives me lint and an old receipt. The second has loose change, a lighter, and something sticky I don't look at.

Then my fingers close around a phone.

I pull it free.

It's cheap. Black. Cracked at one corner.

I press the power button. Nothing happens. I hold it down longer. Still nothing. It's dead. Or locked. Or both.

I turn it over in my hand, as if the back of it might tell me anything. It doesn’t.

I take it anyway.

I put it in my pocket like it's worth something. Like a dead, locked phone taken from a dying man is evidence. Like it can answer the question he no longer can.

Who sent him?