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“Shut up, you whining punk.”
Seven-year-old Michael looked up, his eyes tainted with fear. His stepfather was leaning over the tub. His blue work shirt, the name Marty sewed on the breast pocket in red script, was unbuttoned, revealing a ripped white T-shirt underneath. Marty’s face contorted into a look of pure, dumb anger and hate. His breath reeked of liquor and tobacco.
“Get over here, Michael!”
“Please . . .”
“If I have to chase you, boy . . .” He never finished the sentence, allowing Michael’s imagination to do it instead.
Michael tried to run, but his feet felt glued to the floor. He could not move. Marty reached his hand out and took Michael by the hair. He tugged him forward and then down, forcing Michael’s head under the water.
“You gonna mess around in my room again?” Marty shouted.
Michael could not answer. He could not breathe. He flailed his head back and forth, searching for air. But there was none. Water went down his throat and he began to choke.
Marty’s grip tightened. His hand held firm. “I didn’t hear you, boy. You gonna mess around in my room again?”
Pressure built up in Michael’s head. His lungs felt like they were about to burst. He could hear the water splash around him . . .
Michael shot up out of bed. Sweat coated his skin.
Just a dream.
He looked around, almost expecting to see Marty’s face in the corner of the darkened room. But his stepfather was not there. Michael was alone in the clinic. The AIDS clinic. He had AIDS. From the hallway he could hear water running. Someone washing up. Someone cleaning out something. No reason to be scared.
He swung his legs out of the bed and stood. His body still trembled from the power of the dream, but at least he didn’t feel any of the SR1 side effects yet. He wrapped his arms around his chest and moved toward the window. He looked out. Not much of a view. Just a dirty alley. Garbage strewn everywhere. Two homeless men playing cards. Overturned tin cans. Cats chewing on a chicken bone. The only thing that hinted at the sanitary conditions within the building was a startlingly clean white truck with the inscription “Recovery Corporation of America—Medical Waste Disposal” painted across its side. Michael continued to stare.
Random thoughts and emotions ricocheted through his mind. They moved so quickly that he could not make complete sense of them, like trying to read a license plate as a car speeds by you. He tried to slow them down, but it was impossible. He caught just glimpses. In the end, one word became clear, blocking out all others:
Sara.
Funny, but Michael was not afraid of dying. Leaving Sara frightened him more. Alone. With the baby. The future meant something to him now. He had a stake in it, responsibilities. He wanted to stay with Sara, with the baby. So why did this happen now? Why show him what could be only to take it away?
Enough self-pity, Michael. You’re making me sick.
He thought about the press conference he would have to give tonight on NewsFlash and wondered what he was going to say. He could just imagine the questions the reporters were going to hurl at him gleefully:
“Have you always been gay? . . .” “Did your wife know? . . .” “How about your teammates? . . .” “How many boyfriends have you had? . . .”
And oh God, Sara, what am I doing to you? he asked himself. All I ever wanted to do was protect you. Now I’m throwing you in the middle of this. I wish I didn’t have to. I wish I could just ignore it, blind myself from the truth. But I can’t. Why should you have to suffer anymore? Part of me wants to push you away, to shield you from going through this whole AIDS shit with me.
But Michael knew he could never. Sara would never allow it. And he knew that if the roles had been reversed, there would be no way Sara could have persuaded him to let her go. None. She would want to be there, and selfish as it might be, he wanted her there. He knew he would never make it without her.
He just wished he wasn’t so goddamn scared.
“Michael?”
He turned. Sara stood in the doorway. She was so beautiful, so goddamn achingly beautiful . . . He felt tears come to his eyes, but he forced them back down again. “I love you,” he said.
She limped to the window and hugged him tightly.
He closed his eyes and held on. “We’re going to beat this thing, aren’t we?”
She pulled back and looked up at him. A smile flirted with her lips. “We’re going to whip its ass,” she said staunchly.
She embraced him again, trying so very hard to believe her own words.
THAT morning Lieutenant Bernstein found Dr. Harvey Riker in the lab, checking through his private files.
“Anything missing?” the lieutenant asked.
Harvey shook his head. “But someone went through them. A couple of them are out of order.”
“Michael’s?”
“Yes. Have you heard from the coroner yet?”
Bernstein nodded. The fingers of his right hand busily twisted a paper clip into shapes it was never intended to achieve. “There were traces of cyanide. Someone injected it into his right arm.”
“So it was murder.”
“Looks like.”
Harvey let go a long breath. “Did you speak with Kiel Davis yet?”
“Yes. He saw nothing. He heard nothing. He knows nothing.”
As Harvey was about to respond, Winston O’Connor stepped through the doorway. “Good morning, Harvey.”
“Hi, Winston. Win, I want you to meet Lieutenant Bernstein.”
Winston O’Connor stuck out his hand. “Pleasure, sir. Ain’t you kinda young to be a lieutenant?”
Bernstein ignored the common question and busied himself studying the man. Fortyish, thick Southern accent, blond-turning-to-gray hair, average height, open smile. “You’re the chief lab technician?”
“That’s right,” Winston twanged. “What brings you all around these parts, Lieutenant?”
“Someone broke into this lab last night,” Bernstein said, purposely not saying anything about Martino yet.
“You’re kidding! A break-in here? What did they take?”
“Nothing,” Max replied. “Dr. Riker walked in on them.”
“You all right, Harv?”
“Fine.”
“Where were you last night at around three in the morning?” Max asked.
Winston’s face registered surprise. “Am I a suspect?”
“No one is a suspect. I’m just trying to figure out what happened.”
