After a moment she stood up again and began walking toward a tall, green building that was made almost entirely of glass. As she entered, she glanced at the directory: neurology, first floor; dermatology, second floor; medicine, third floor. She got into the elevator and pushed the button with the bright, bold number three on it. The old woman next to her clutched her cane tightly and refused to look in Hanna's direction.

An hour later she was slumped on a paper-covered examination table, draped in a blue paper lap throw and open-backed paper shirt. Dr. Lee knocked discreetly and walked in.

"Your symptoms aren't very serious," the doctor said. "No fever---"

"I have a fever," Hanna said. "My normal body temperature is ninety-six. Right now it's ninety-nine point nine. For me, that's a fever."

The doctor shrugged slightly and pulled his thin lips into a smirk. The smirk was habitual rather than personal, Hanna felt, not that that made it any less irritating. He wore thick glasses that made his eyes look more distant than they were, bugs trapped in paperweights. "Not according to the medical association guidelines, you don't. A fever is anything over a hundred degrees. According to them, Ms. Sole, you don't have a fever."

"Look, I can barely move. Three weeks ago I was walking five miles a day. Now I can barely walk from my car to your office---"

"You have some fatigue. A little sore throat. These are normal, flu-like symptoms. It's nothing serious. As far as I can tell, there's nothing physically wrong with you. Just to make sure, though, come back and see me in a month."

A Greenpeace solicitor stood outside, clipboard and tin can in his hands. "Hello," he began.

"I can't talk today," she whispered. Whenever she tried to speak the back of her throat burned and pulled painfully. "This really isn't the best time."

"This will just take a minute," the man said. He was wearing khaki shorts and a tee shirt. He had a harelip, and his words came out slightly blunted, bent out of shape like soft metal. "As you know this is a critical moment for the environment--"

Somewhere someone was smoking. The faint smell of burning tobacco made her stomach lurch. Any hint of tobacco or perfume made her want to pass out these days. The room was starting to spin. She considered sliding to the floor, but didn't. Today she must have a fever. "Really, I'm sorry. I can't talk now."

The man gave her a silent, poisonous look, his damaged lip pulled taut over his front teeth. She shut the door. To hell with the environment, it had already poisoned her and there was nothing she or Greenpeace could do about it.

"I've never been sick this long," she said. "It's been over a month." Her dark curls were matted against the side of her head and without life: dead, dry things. She glanced at herself in the mirror and saw a face that was too old for thirty-two, with dark circles under her eyes and bruised-looking cheeks.

"Not so long for a viral syndrome," the doctor said, writing something down on a clipboard. "Your symptoms still aren't that serious, and all of the tests are normal. But there's nothing I can do for you. It will just have to burn itself out."

"I can't go on like this for much longer," Hanna replied. "I've called in sick so much I think I may get fired." While her job teaching GED classes at the local high school did provide paid sick leave, teachers were never encouraged to take theirs. She'd called in sick at least three days a week for the past five weeks; now the only response she drew from Julie, who found substitutes and handled absences, was stony silence or a too-light, "Are you ever going to work a full week again, Hanna?"

The smirk returned to the doctor's face. "You won't get fired," he said as he walked out the door. "Get dressed."

After she had put on her sweatpants and college sweatshirt, the doctor poked his head in again. "Have you ever tested positive for tuberculosis?" he asked.

She stood up, but tripped over the small footstool in front of the examination table. "Yes, once. A long time ago."

"Oh my God, tuberculosis. That was a big deal in my day. You had to go to the sanatorium and everything."

"I wish to God I could go to a sanatorium," Hanna replied bitterly. Any kind of facility seemed better than her little apartment, which smelled like dead skin and sick breath. "Now they're called spas and you have to pay a hundred dollars a night, which I sure as hell can't afford." She hadn't felt like eating much for the past week or so, but her supplies were running low anyway. The grocery store seemed impossibly far away and complicated, an Arctic expedition. All she was able to cook for herself were black beans and frozen corn. At least she still had tea bags.

"I didn't know you were that sick, darling."

"I don't know why," Hanna replied. "I told you I was sick. You didn't call me for three weeks, but if you had I would gladly have told I'm friggin' half-dead."

Her mother paused tactfully, probably weighing whether to say something or save the ammunition for later. Obviously she decided to wait until Hanna was less pitiful and better able to feel guilt, because her next words were, "Do you want to talk to your brother?"

Her only brother Dan still lived with their mother at the ripe old age of thirty-six even though he had a full-time job as a computer salesman. He was balding, fond of watching sports on television, and generally without a clue. Having a conversation with him was like pouring water through a sieve, fast and pointless. He had answered the phone when Hanna called, but only said, "Hi, how'ya doin'?" before passing her on to her mother. "No," Hanna said, "That's okay. I already talked to him."

"I'll get him," her mother said. "Dan! Dan! It's Hanna."

Dan took the phone. "Hiya sis."

"Hi."

"So howya doin'?"

"Not so good."

"No? What's wrong?" A television was droning in the background. Her mother's voice flared up, then died down.

"I've got tuberculosis."

"Uh-huh." Hanna had already lost him. Dan was not terribly interested in other people. Hanna often wondered what was real for him; possibly the figures on the assorted sports fields or wild visions of wealth and grandeur that stayed locked tight in his own head. "Oh yeah? That's too bad. Listen, take care and thanks for calling, okay?"

Now that she had an official label for her illness, the forces that be at work actually wanted her to stay home. The school nurse had called a couple of times, concerned about "contagion." Even though Hanna had explained that tb was an airborne virus and her own lungs were clear, ergo she was not contagious, the nurse had some problems believing that and began demanding a series of notes from her doctor, which the doctor was unwilling to waste his time writing, as any fool who knew anything about medicine was supposed to know that a clear chest x-ray meant she was not contagious.

She was supposed to start feeling better about a month into her antibiotic regimen. She was two weeks into the meds, and still weak and the nodes in her neck were so swollen they felt like sharp sticks poking into her throat when she talked.

All she knew about sanitoriums were what she'd read in 19th century novels and seen in movies. She pictured herself lying on a soft white hospital bed between clean, cool sheets. Perhaps a nurse would bring her glasses of orange juice to sip through a straw. Then she'd be wheeled out on a bed into the sunshine to "take the air." In the winter sunshine she'd read quietly or just sleep in the sun, still comfortable between the crisp sheets.

The reality of her recovery was quite different. She had to drag her own sorry self to the HMO after driving around for half an hour looking for parking. She couldn't bear the thought of sitting around the laundromat for hours, and she never seemed to be able to find enough quarters or the energy, so her sheets were stale, stained with hot chocolate, and soft with cat hair. Her inbred Persian cat, Tallyrand, still depended on her for attention and regular feeding, even though he was content to sleep curled around her head most of the time.

Worst of all, she had to see Dr. Lee every week. Sometimes he remembered who she was and what her problem was, sometimes he didn't. Last week he had told her to stop lying around so much and go back to work before she reminded him she had full-blown tuberculosis. He had sighed impatiently and said, "Oh well then, get some rest and the meds will kick in soon. Any questions? Good. Make an appointment to see me next week."

She considered rattling off her medical record number. "Hi, I'm 443759," she said to the pharmacist's assistant, the advice nurse, and the woman at the lab desk. With the number they knew everything important about her, without it, she didn't exist at all.

"I'm here to have my tb medication monitored--" she said.

"Of course," he said, cutting her off. "Just a minute please."

As he walked out, Dr. Lee placed her chart on the tiny desk near the sink at her feet. A good deal of it hung over the ledge, threatening to fall. All of the fixtures in the room were not undersized enough to make their use impossible, just small enough to make them uncomfortable, cheap seats on an airplane that sacrificed comfort for getting there at a reasonable price.

Hanna looked at the chart apathetically, then reached over absently to touch it. Small pink pages peeked out from the corner. What did they say about her? She picked the file up and put it in her backpack, which was full of reading material for the time she usually had to wait before she saw Lee.

After about fifteen minutes, he reentered the room. He looked at the sink, a vaguely displeased expression on his face.

Would he yell at her? Boot her out of the HMO all together?

"Well, you're all taken care of," he said instead. "Come and see me next week."

There was no clean water by her bedside, and getting some was a task that was beyond her, as was getting up to empty her bladder. There was no nurse to fluff her pillows or smooth her sheets. She had taken her air for the day, but it had been filled with the smell of carbon monoxide and lingering trash. She slipped the file under the bed, head heavy and ready for sleep. Her cat curled around her head as soon as she lay still.

Once she entered the examination room and removed her sweatshirt, there was a knock at the door. She hastily put on her paper gown. The file lay in the half-unzipped backpack, ready for transfer to the sink.

Before she could reach for it, Lee bustled in, his white coat very clean and unwrinkled. "Hello, Ms. Sole, how are you today?"

"F--fine, thanks."

He sat down on the small stool in front of the computer. "Let's take a look at your lab results." He reached for a folder she hadn't noticed before on the sink. It was fairly thick, and contained a number of pink sheets. He typed something on the keyboard. Bright green lines flashed up on screen. "Yes," he said, in what for him passed as a jocular tone. "Your bloodwork looks good. No kidney problems, no liver problems. Soon you'll be feeling better. Have you noticed any improvement?"

Hanna leaned over and examined the folder with interest. What did it contain? "Yes, I'm feeling a little better." It was true. Talking was no longer so difficult, though when she swallowed it still felt as if there were a toothpick stuck into one side of her throat. But she was still dogged by a fatigue that had no respect for her, left her helpless and voiceless in her bed.

He leafed through the pages in the file. "According to your records, you've been on the medication for three weeks, correct?"

Was he making fun of her? "Correct...."

"Okay. You should feel more like your old self in a week or two. Soon you won't have to come in every week. That's good news, isn't it?" He smiled, not his old smirk, but something a shade warmer and more excited. "Okay. See you soon."

He left the room and his footsteps began to click in the hallway. She pulled on her sweatshirt and left as well. In the corridor, she noticed a basket filled with piles of medical records. A nurse or pseudo-nurse brushed by her and disappeared into a door up ahead. Hanna stopped and grabbed the file that was on the top of the first pile. Her name was on the tab. She glanced behind her. Somewhere a voice that could be Dr. Lee's rumbled. She stuffed the file into her backpack with the first one.

Once she was safely back in her bed, she opened her backpack. From it, accumulated credit card receipts and candy bar wrappers scattered like large, light hail. She looked through the new medical record. It was, for all intents and purposes, identical to the old one, though not as thick. The pages impersonally mapped out her illness, the cold language leaving no room for her. She shrugged, then put it under the bed with the other chart. It was yet another mystery she didn't have the energy to solve.

The phone rang, but she ignored it in favor of her own rest.

She'd return to work on Monday. Idly, she reached under the bed and pulled out a couple of medical records, then lay down, her fingers just touching them. After a moment, she sat up. Opening the records, she began to tear the pages one by one. When she had a pile of pink scraps, she grabbed two fistfulls and, lurching forward, headed off toward the toilet.

The toilet clogged with the first few scraps. The rest she put in the kitchen sink. Pulling a match from a drawer, she tried to burn them. However, her smoke alarm began to beep demandingly, even after she closed the door between the kitchen and the hallway. She ran cold water on the feeble flame, which had just barely singed the top scraps, and threw the miserable, limp mess into the garbage can.

Later, when she again lay on her bed, she dipped her head down and glanced in the dark space between it and the floor. In the corner, a medical record lay, its pink pages hanging out like a tongue.

She'd just finished work for the week. So far she'd been able to work steadily for two months, much to the school's relief. She felt more like her old self, though a small, core piece of her was still missing, chewed up by the illness. She turned and walked down the steps into the bowels of hospital, toward the HMO pharmacy. Though she felt better, she had to take medication for another month at least.

She handed her membership card to the woman behind the counter, who was petite, with long hair and a surprising lack of chin. The woman swept it through a machine, then studied the screen carefully.

Would this be the time? Had they finally caught her? Hanna wondered. Her pulse sped up. She opened her mouth to protest.

"I see you've taken this medication before," the woman said. "You've got just one refill left, so you might want to call your doctor and have him renew it. I see you're taking some heavy-duty stuff, and you don't want to get caught short."

"Oh, that--" Hanna let out her breath. She had two stacks of her own medical records underneath her bed. Yet somehow essential information about herself still remained intact, accessible to everyone except herself. "I'll be sure to remember that," she replied, an image of Dr. Lee's unnaturally calm, smiling face crowding out her thoughts. The doctor's attitude had changed toward her; as her thefts became more daring and angry, he became nicer, as if she'd finally learned a language he approved of. He had even called her at home once "just to check up on her."

The bag on her shoulder, Hanna started toward home. As she walked, her pace quickened and the steps grew easier for her tiring legs.

She would make tea, and then, if she had the energy, boil some ravioli and heat some tomato sauce. She'd survived her illness alone, and now she treasured the aloneness as something solid, complete, until it diluted and then dissolved her dreams of kindly strangers. The mundane details she'd always despised now had new importance; they were the very things that gave her life.