Long Term Care
By Rose Po and Mary Morris

The Christmas season is terrible. I'm increasingly snowbound, trapped within my body. I looked in a mirror yesterday and realized my skin is shrinking, tight and shiny, over my bones as my muscle mass withers away. I am beginning to look like one of the plastic Santa's elf sculptures. My hands no longer work well; I hate the chair despite the added mobility it gives me. I refuse to risk being seen by anyone I used to know, except Gage. So, instead of venturing forth, I spend most days sitting in the room.

I can't stand watching the holiday specials on the idiot box -- Tiny Tim turns my stomach. I refuse to buy into the happy cripple mythos. Gage has invented a new way to amuse me. He is freaking out the staff. They have a damn stupid plastic tree -- the only thing in the place that looks more pathetic than the inmates. Somebody got the bright idea to hang real candy canes on the tree -- these overlarge, glistening red and white twists. Some of the old guys have a real sweet tooth and comment on the candies every time they are rolled past. Well, the tree is behind the Nurse's Station desk but is at face level if you are in a chair. So John plucks the canes from the limbs with his teeth, sneaking down the hall to drop the candy into the beds of the bedridden.

Days are now punctuated by exclamations of confusion as more and more candy canes disappear, only to reappear within the mouths of the completely bedridden. I have heard the staff speculate on several occasions about how the candy is getting there. One guy is absolutely nuts about the evaporation of the candy. He is planning a trap. I'd warn Gage but I am too bored.

Today, I guess the staff tied the new batch of canes to the tree. I just heard the charge nurse yelling, "Mr. Gage, come back with our tree!" I sit staring out the window and imagining Gage with a lap full of artificial Christmas tree, attempting to steer a course through the corridor with a nurse in hot pursuit.

A crash comes from the hall. I think John dropped it. Good. I hated seeing that thing, reminding me that there is a happier world out there.

*******

Christmas Day itself is unpleasant. DeSoto actually came and got Gage, taking him to his home for the day in a rental van for a brief taste of family life. I wonder if it was his wife’s idea. I don’t think it’s something he would have done without prodding.

I am left alone to listen to disgustingly cheerful music on the radio and watch the visitors pull in and out of the parking lot. The window is much more entertaining than the television….usually. The sight of visitors crossing the parking lot with packages, trays of cookies, and determinedly cheerful expressions is more than I can take today.

Even though it’s only 9am, I wish I could take a sleeping pill and crawl back into bed. I am not sure which is worse, the possibility that I may get several visitors today – people who I haven’t seen in months, but who feel obligated due to the holiday – or the possibility that I will get none. I do not feel up to company…. I do not want to be seen, not like this….but neither do I want to spend the day alone. Some memory of happier holidays tugs at me still.

Only three more hours until lunch. I would rather not bother with it. I do not want to think what they are surprising us with today. They have already told me I must eat in the dining room today as they are short on staff and no one is available to bring my tray to my room. Maybe I’ll ‘pull a Gage’. I am not particularly hungry, and I do not feel like putting myself on exhibit for all the visitors to watch my clumsiness with my food, even with the special large-handled utensils I must now use…. I also don’t feel like listening to the Bing Crosby Christmas Album again. I have nothing in particular against Bing, but they have played it to death in the dining room and everywhere else in this godforsaken place for the old folks. The mere sound is now enough to make me nauseated.

So I skip lunch. I’ll decide about dinner later.

I end up getting a few visitors, after all. A group of guys from the station drop in for about fifteen minutes bringing some small gifts of books – crosswords, word games, brain teasers - and books on tape. Bellingham isn’t with them. Supposedly he’s ‘out of town’. He’s been out of town ever since I was diagnosed. They stay just long enough to make strained small talk and pretend not to be shocked over my appearance, and then leave before things get too awkward.

I don’t know what makes me angrier -- that my former coworkers saw me like this or that I feel ridiculously and pathetically grateful for the visit.

******

The DeSotos bring Gage back shortly before dinner. The strain of the day is written on everyone's faces. Roy lifts John onto the bed, settling Gage gently atop the blankets. The weight of John's injuries has snuffed out Roy's voice, too. He no longer speaks to Gage; the fears that torment DeSoto hang in his blue eyes, as easy to read as the banner headlines on my copy of the New York Times. The physical care DeSoto performs for his ex-partner is a tribute both to the paramedic's skill and to the friendship the two men once shared. Roy removes the heavy tennis shoes from Gage's feet and re-adjusts John's position, smoothing wrinkled clothing. He might have at least let his partner have one more decent meal.

Then Joanne bustles into the room, heavily laden with shopping bags. A heavenly aroma rises from her burden. "Sweetheart," she orders pointing to one bag, "go heat this stuff up." She turns, fills a basin with warm water, and pulls the drape around my bed. I can envision what DeSoto would do if he returned to find me alone with his wife -- particularly after that incident with Cheryl. I cringe at the imagined blows. She winks at my horrified stare. Gently, she washes my face, hands and arms. The warmth and the feel of her soft skin is soothing, I close my eyes and remember Cheryl's massages. Joanne combs my hair and digs among my toiletries, retrieving my aftershave. When she is done, I feel alive.

Then DeSoto's wife returns to her bags. We chat as she pulls out paper plates, cups and silverware. She dishes up homemade pumpkin pie, cranberry jelly, spiced cider and applesauce. On the bedside tables Joanne sets four places. Smiling, she spreads a napkin in my lap, a reminder of a world where civility and basic human dignity still reign. Roy returns, a nurse in tow, with the rest of the meal -- turkey and all the trimmings. The vegetables are of the creamed variety but it smells like real food. I haven't sat down to a meal like this since my mother died. When I place the first forkful on my tongue, my eyes prickle with tears, which the DeSotos tactfully ignore.

Roy feeds John. DeSoto sits quietly through the meal, watching Joanne. She leans forward and kisses her husband, who blushes self-consciously. We lock eyes in shared memory. He ducks his head, the flush turning to the color of old shame.

******

Gage stares into the parking lot, a stricken expression of his face. DeSoto must be here. John swallows hard.

"Hhhh hhhh," he says, turning away from the window. I can see the desperation in his eyes. For once I can tell what he is thinking -- here is a chance to convince his former partner he is still alive inside his crippled body. I look away.

"Relax, Gage."

"Shit." At the sudden outburst of profanity, John panics. From my reading I have learned, that for reasons no one quite understands, obscenities and other inappropriate words are often easily vocalized by aphasic patients even when other words escape them. And my experience of the past few months working with Gage, has shown that is certainly the case for John. He moves his chair away from the window. If I let him get near the door, he'll go hide until DeSoto gets bored and leaves. Hurriedly, I force myself upright in the bed and struggle with the pitcher. I fill a glass and thrust it in front of his face. "Drink."

He drinks thirstily. I hear DeSoto's wife talking to a nurse in the hallway.

"It'll be just like practice." I meet his eyes trying to reassure him.

"Hi." Gage's face twists as he makes a final practice run. "Roy."

"Yes." I wipe his chin.

DeSoto appears at the door. "Hi, Johnny." Joanne pauses behind her husband.

"Hi......" begins Johnny. Roy's eyes go wide, and he stares at John. Then I hear the stutter kick in. Gage hangs up on the breath before the name. Johnny's face turns red.

I can sense disaster and try to distract John. "Hello, DeSoto."

"Hi... A--hole." The obscenity tears free of Gage's throat. DeSoto colors a delicate purple.

I nearly choke on a swallowed giggle, realizing just why Gage's memory pulled up this particular word in reference to DeSoto.

Suddenly Roy's wife bursts out laughing. "Yes, sometimes he is."

Gage throws back his head and laughs.

Joanne is hugging John. And John is trying to say her name. I am the only one watching DeSoto. At the sound of Gage's laugh his eyes begin to glitter.

******

To the sweet strains of Chopin, Cheryl and I finish our picnic dinner and the wine. Tonight is something of an anniversary -- ten months. We are back at the site of our first date. In the gathering dusk, she leans across the blanket and kisses me. Her lips are warm on my chilled mouth. Ignoring the other couples in the darkness around me and my looming wheelchair, I return her kiss.

She snuggles into my arms, warm, heavy and alive. I breathe her fragrance, surreptitiously taste her skin, stirring a fire beneath my own. She nests her forehead against my neck and lays her hand lightly on my crotch, startling me and yet somehow reading my mind.

I regret my lack of privacy. After the DeSoto incident, I can not take her back to my room, even if I could dispose of Gage. There, I am a patient, an inmate, not a man, despite what my body is saying. I shift slightly, feeling my wallet beneath my hip. The ludicrous image of us signing in to a hotel as Mr. and Mrs. Smith pops into my head. I chuckle. Cheryl moves against me. "Let's go somewhere," I suggest.

******

The awareness strikes deep into the darkness of sleep. I am not alone. Feeling the weight and warmth of another human, I look down. Cheryl is sleeping, head resting on my chest. She smells so good -- perfume, soap, sunshine.... She must have felt me shift, for her eyes open, blue-green flecked with hazel, like sand in the surf. She lifts her head, pressing a milky, delicate chin against my collarbone. Her breath is warm and sweet on my face. Twisting, I kiss her.

"Craig," she whispers, straddling my hips, slipping her hands beneath my clothes.

I have always been proud of my self-control. But, this has nothing to do with self-control -- it is about loneliness, death and life. My body shakes and trembles, only half listening to my commands, but it doesn't matter. We are music. We are fire in a tinder-dry building. I was hungry and hadn't even known....

Cheryl showers. The running water reminds me I have to urinate but I am not ready to surrender my current role and ask for help back into my chair.

Self-discipline. It is my motto. I have practiced it since I was a boy, moving to a new home every two years. If you control yourself, then external events can not control you. I love marathons and the fire service because they are the purest expression of self-discipline, both requiring a careful conservation of strength and an application of restraint in the face of unfettered passion. I had exercised my mantra when the doctors explained my test results to me. The time others used to mourn the loss of their lives, I used visiting nursing homes and attorneys. I would not be a victim, helpless in the hands of others. I prepared and planned for the time when I would no longer be master of my destiny.

Now -- living with a man, who is at this very moment putting a new set of teeth marks on the stick I use to help me put on my socks while trying to pick apart the fastener on that damn alarm bracelet, and sleeping with my therapist to satisfy a selfish emptiness -- I mourn. I lie in the bed, on the still-damp sheets, feeling more out of control than I ever have before.

******

When she returned me to my room, Gage took one look at my face, took another at Cheryl’s, and gave me one of the nastiest glares he’s managed yet. He knew what we had been doing. I don't know how, but he knew. I believe he’s jealous that I am sleeping with a woman and he is not. I take a second look at his face. I know he is jealous.

Good. Maybe it will motivate him off of his numb ass and into doing something for himself.

******

Joanne came with Roy today. They kissed -- the sight filled me with a desperate longing. That simple act reminded me of my brutal reality.

A new nurse takes care of me. She spreads hand lotion on my dry skin, her hands rubbing the liquid into my neck. In a shocking moment I discover my mind has remapped my entire body onto those few square inches of still feeling skin. The experience is terrifying, erotic and very welcome. When she is done I blush, ashamed of what I have taken from her, and wonder if she felt anything at all.

******

My relationship with Cheryl has changed since we've started to make love, something that I suspected would happen, but that I find startling anyway. We are talking more...not that we didn't before, but the quality of our conversations has changed. I find myself telling her surprising things, astoundingly intimate things.... I have never talked to anyone like this before. Sometimes, I will think of the words we exchanged, snuggled in each other's arms, and shake.

She still visits daily for therapy sessions – gentle range of motion exercises, checking my braces to be sure they fit, warm packs to ease the pain of atrophy. After she is done with me and her other patients, we steal a few moments alone wherever privacy can be found in this place – the deserted shower room, the far corner of the patio, even sitting in her car.

The one place we do not go is her apartment. It's in an older building, on the second story with no elevator, and thus completely out of reach for me. At times I find myself wondering about this unreachable, non-nursing home, non-ALS world and wonder if she thinks of me there. I imagine her stretched on her couch, remembering our last meeting.

We rent hotel rooms a few more times. I can afford it within my limited budget if I cut back on my phone calls. I am sure Belliveau will wonder why I don't call him in Louisiana as often, but I crave the privacy and the intimacy, the long afternoons snuggled under the covers with Cheryl pressed warmly against me, while we doze and talk and make love without fear of interruption or being overheard and without the rattle of wheelchairs outside the door, totally alone for as long as we want to be.

"Craig," she whispers warmly against the back of my neck, "Does it scare you? Being sick, knowing what's going to happen?"

We have talked about music, art, books, life in L.A., many other things, but we have never talked about my illness. Despite the intimate touches and the fact that she knows my medical history, neither of us has ever brought it up.

I have never told her of my nightmares of lying awake and immobile, while the casket lid is shut down on me, or of the panic attacks that come in the middle of the night and leave my heart pounding, while I stare into the darkness trying desperately to master my emotions. I should act like a man, get control of myself. I lived with the possibility of death every day when I was working. I slept well at night. And I certainly never acted like this.

When I am with her I manage to reclaim some of what I have lost. For a few brief hours, I am a man again and in control of myself. Her presence is precious to me because of what she allows me to be again, if only briefly. I do not dare think about her knowing my fears, my anxiety, my weakness, about seeing pity in her eyes, about being once more a patient rather than a human being.

"No," I lie, and proceed to distract both of us as best I can, starting with a kiss.

******

I still feel unsettled, unresolved. With my back to door, I roll the vitamin bottle between my hands, listening to the pills slide over one another. I thought I had planned well – now I find myself stuck in a mire of indecision, unable to follow through with what I have prepared for so carefully, despite the fact that I can feel in my bones that I am fast reaching a point of no return, physically. I don’t want to hurt Cheryl…and I am unable to fool myself into thinking that she wouldn’t care, that she would understand my choice or even applaud it. She’s not that type of woman. Rejecting her would make it easier, but I can’t. Need – the need for companionship, the need for intimacy, the need to spit in the face of death – has left me too weak to do that, more dependant on her presence than I could ever have imagined before. I am so dependent on her continued company and companionship that I have even lied to her to keep it.

Gage doesn’t approve of my relationship with her, which I find ironically amusing. He glowers darkly from his chair or bed at Cheryl at every opportunity. He is certainly jealous. I don’t discuss it with him. I don’t discuss my plan with him either. He would be jealous of that, too.

******

Does that idiot in the other bed think I’m blind?

He’s developed quite the act. Brice should have gone out for community theater along with his other projects. He certainly has the staff fooled.

Every evening around ten p.m., the nurse pops in with the nightly sleeping pills. Usually, he’s absorbed in a book. He doesn’t even bother to look up. Curtly, he waves a hand at her, gesturing for her to leave it on the table.

Most of the time, they do. They’ve learned he gets nasty if they insist on him taking it right then. Besides, they are usually still frustrated from their nightly battle with me. They leave it on the table, avoiding the argument, and when they’re gone, he picks it up and hides it with the others he’s collected in the generic vitamin bottle in the back of his bedside table drawer.

There are variations, and he comes up with new ones now and then. So far I’ve noticed ‘I’m in the bathroom, leave me alone’, ‘I’m on the phone’, ‘I’ll take it while you get me a fresh pitcher of water, this one’s nasty’, and -- my personal favorite -- ‘My glasses are dirty’. Why the staff think he can’t take a pill with dirty glasses I don’t know, but they fell for it.

Sometimes he even pretends to take it. But he almost never really does.

I wonder if he would appreciate it if I sent my next sleeping pill flying his way, to contribute to the cause, as it were? That’s an interesting question – would YOU use a pill to kill yourself that had someone else’s spit on it?

Tonight, maybe I’ll try it and see what happens.

*******

So far, it has been a perfect evening. I am treating Cheryl out to a very good dinner at a very good restaurant. By calling in advance, I was able to make sure there would be no access problems and also make arrangements for a private table so I do not have to be stared at while I struggle with the silverware. The service has been smooth and completely non-intrusive, and the food has been excellent, millions of miles away from the institutional slop they serve at Brookside. I have even ordered a bottle of wine for us to share, and by the time dessert and coffee arrives, we have both gotten a little silly. It feels good to laugh and joke as if nothing were happening, as if time weren't all too quickly catching up to me.

Reluctantly, I pay the check when it arrives. I excuse myself while Cheryl gathers up her bag.

"Wait for me in the lobby - I shouldn't take long."

She smiles at me.

"Too much wine?" She nudges my chair playfully. "Is it legal for you to drive that thing after half a bottle? I wouldn't want you to get pulled over on the way back from the bathroom."

I grin, imagining an officer pulling up behind me in a chair with a flashing light bar and giving me a breath test. "I'll be fine. Don't run off with a cute waiter while I'm gone."

She kisses me on top of my head and makes her way to the front of the building. I get directions from a waiter, and roll myself to the men's room. A quick pit stop, and then I can be on my way for the rest of our evening out.

I miscalculate transferring myself out of the chair. My clumsy hands slip, my feet go out, and before I know it I am flat on my back on the floor looking at the ceiling and seeing stars. There is not one part of me that does not hurt, but my pride hurts more, and it gets worse when I remember that Cheryl will soon realize that I'm taking way too long and come looking for me.

I realize that since I have hit my head in his bathroom, the restaurant manager will want to call 911 to have me checked out by the paramedics -- and the restaurant is located well within L.A. County territory. I figure out which station will respond. Then I take stock of myself and realize that not only are my pants down around my knees, but that I am wet. And, no doubt, whoever responds will want to know just what and how much I had to drink. I can feel my face flush.

I stare at the ceiling and want to scream. I am embarrassed, I am hurting, but most of all I am angry at the unfairness of it all. Instead of lessening, my anger gathers and grows, fed by fear. Each of my falls so far has led to the loss of something precious....my apartment, my independence... I can feel my heart pounding frantically from both anger and panic.

Ten minutes later, I hear Cheryl's voice outside the door.

******

I stare at the ceiling of the exam room, furious with myself and with the world. Thankfully, I have been taken to St. Francis and not to Rampart, so I am spared some humiliation, at least. I have been examined, prodded, poked at, X-rayed and finally left alone for a little bit. Every fifteen minutes, a nurse comes in and takes my vital signs, assesses my level of consciousness and orientation, and shines a light in my eyes. In between these little medical interruptions, I close my eyes and try to nap. The lights in the exam room are much too bright for any real rest, though, so I am brooding instead - and becoming still angrier by the minute.

I know Cheryl is in the waiting room. The nurse has asked me several times if I'd like to see her. I ignore the question. I have no desire to see Cheryl now, no desire to see the pity in her eyes, to be looked at as a feeble patient rather than as a man. Something that was precious and true in our relationship has been forever ruined for me. At the moment, I hate her for having seen me weak and wet on the floor. And I hate myself for having been so desperate to feel alive and whole that I thought our relationship could ever go anywhere.

I can hear the doctor in the hallway talking about me to a nurse. The X-ray results are back, my private doctor has been contacted, and it has been decided that since I can be observed adequately at the nursing home, there is no need to admit me. They're going to send me home.

******

It is a long, late ride from the hospital back to Brookside. My head is throbbing despite the Tylenol they gave me in the ER, and I can feel my stomach churn as I stare out the window at the headlights of the passing traffic. Cheryl has been quiet while she concentrates on driving. I can't tell if my coldness in the ER has upset her, or if she is trying to take it in stride, putting it down to my being uncomfortable and embarrassed. If I don't do what needs to be done now, while I still have my anger to hold on to and give me the strength I need, I might never be able to. It's for the best, though there is no task I have ever wanted less in my life. I clench my jaw and try to find the right - or more precisely, the wrong - words. You never had a problem getting people to dislike you before, Craig, why should it be so hard now?

Later, I can't remember what I say to her. I don't want to remember. I don't want to think of the cruelty I have inflicted on someone whose only crime has been caring for me and treating me well. By the time she pulls up to the front door, I can see that Cheryl is holding back tears. She has had the grace and dignity not to cry despite my cutting words, and neither has she lowered herself into flinging back accusations or trying to argue with me, which only makes it harder.

In silence, she wrestles my chair from the back of the car. She opens the car door, reaches towards me to help me transfer, and then stops, unsure of whether or not her touch will be welcome. I have to look away. The inky shadows around the car are smaller versions of the black pit which has swallowed my heart. My throat fills with the taste of tears.

I hear her footsteps recede up the sidewalk to the door, and a minute or two later she is back with one of the night shift nurses. The nurse must have been waiting. I know the hospital called with treatment instructions, so the Brookside staff knew roughly when I was coming back. This is one I know slightly - an older Phillipino woman with a pronounced Southern accent who sometimes fills in for the night supervisor. Her name is Cathy, and she is forthright but skilled. She helps me into the chair while Cheryl stands to the side silently watching, her face invisible to me in the shadows from the parking lot lights.

If Cathy can sense the tension floating in the air, she says nothing about it. I allow her to push me, and Cheryl walks alongside us as far as the door. Before we can get through it, Cheryl bends down and kisses me gently; I get one good breath's worth of the cleanness of her hair and the light touch of her perfume before she straightens up and walks away without a word. She does not look back. There is nothing left to be said, nothing to hold on to but memories....all the rest is silence.

In silence I let the staff get me back to my room and ready for bed. Tonight I really do take the sleeping pill, craving numbness. I already have collected as many as I will need. I won't have to wait much longer.

******

It’s three am. The nurse has just left after moving me, and Brice is sitting on the edge of his bed again, staring at that bottle of ‘vitamins’ he’s managed to collect. He has forgotten how poorly I sleep. The light from the window carves deep shadows around his bed. This has gone on every night this week, and before, he has always eventually put them away and laid back down.

Something about tonight feels different.

Cheryl has not been here to visit since the incident a week ago, and she has not called. He does not mention her name. I have heard whispers of a fight. He has been quiet about it. I have learned he has asked not to have any more physical therapy.

I know he visited his doctor earlier today, a high-powered specialist who has a national reputation for excellence and a local reputation for bluntness. He came back grim-faced and silent.

He’s gone downhill much more quickly than he expected. His voice is starting to be affected, and I’ve noticed him struggling over his food. Soon he’ll be eating the same diet I am.

Abruptly the tapping sound of the pills rolling in the bottle stops. The soft rustle of the opening drawer does not occur. The silence makes the hair on my neck stand up. Water splashes in a glass. Brice has decided.

He has somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty or sixty pills in that bottle. It is more than enough. Brice has been thorough; he too has scraped up too many botched suicide attempts to risk failure. Given enough time, he will succeed.

Illuminated by the glare of the street light, I watch his hand tighten on the cap. His face is deep in shadow; I can not see his eyes, support his decision and promise my silence as he swallows. Repeatedly the smooth plastic slips beneath his fingers. Craig's breathing accelerates. He throws the edge of the blanket across the lid, endeavoring to improve his grip. Still the bottle will not open. He tries to hold the cap in his teeth, but the bottle slides between his palms. In frustration, Brice slams the container against the bedside table. The bottle spins out of his hands, flying through the air. It traces a glittering path to the floor beside my bed and breaks. Pills and glass scatter across the carpet -- hopelessly out of reach.

Defeated, Brice slumps against the mattress. I breathe evenly, feigning sleep as he turns to stare at the pills. I imagine unshed tears in his eyes.

Glass crunches beneath Nurse Sandy's feet as she comes to investigate the noise.

******

Brice is now more of an absence than a presence. He has been curled up inside himself for days. Not a word since the pills -- even when the staff, terrified by the prospect of a lawsuit, interrogated him. I wish I knew what to do to bring him back. If he quits fighting, he will shrivel away and die.

He sits in his chair by the window as he has for two weeks now. Silent withdrawal is MY act -- he is just sulking, trying not to survive. The sight fills me with irritation.

Carefully I line up and ram his chair. He jerks as I hit.

"Gage," he warns.

I slam the chair again.

"Get lost, Gage!"

I make a third pass.

His face flushes, turning red, then purple. Suddenly, he draws back his shaking arm; his watch catches me across the face as he slaps me.

He stares at the blood trickling down my check. I can tell he didn't expect to hurt me.

He crumples. "Gage," he begins, then stops. "John..."

I am afraid he is going to weep, so I grin triumphantly at him.

His face seals over, the perfect paramedic mask falling in place. "Go to hell, Gage."

"After..." I hang up on the word ‘you’ and sputter.

He turns his chair to his nightstand and puts on his glasses

******

Roy came to visit today, for the first time in weeks... for the first time since the day I called him an 'asshole'. He stood there and stammered out an apology, looking everywhere, as usual, but at me. I never knew the walls around here were so interesting. The kids were sick, he worked overtime, Joanne's car was in the shop – the usual litany. Never mind that I am damn sick of nurse-speak and that my radio/cassette player is broken.

He got his, though. Brice pulled him in for a private conference in the sun room, leaving me sitting in front of the TV with a curt ‘It’s none of your damn business, Gage, so wait here’ when I turned my head to get my chair started. He must have given him what for, because when Roy finally came back, after about ten minutes, his ears were burning red and his jaw had that tense set to it that always means he’s particularly angry and holding it in.

I’d love to have seen that lecture. Craig has developed a slur and the thought of hearing a slightly drunk-sounding Brice lecturing Roy DeSoto logically and thoroughly up one side and down the other gives me a certain malicious delight.

I can’t stay too mad at Roy, though. It’s counterproductive. Out of sheer guilt, he brought me a new radio, ten more tapes, and a full quart of double chocolate ice cream – most of which will probably disappear in the community freezer before I can finish it, but that’s fine. Don’t want all those calories anyway.

I hate the fact that I am using Roy’s guilt for the sake of a few little luxuries, but those little things are all I have right now. Damn him for being up and around and mobile and enjoying his life, while I rot here. Damn me for thinking this way about the only ‘outside’ friend I’ve got.

******

Brice had a visitor today. The first I have ever seen -- Bob Belliveau showed up. I hope he can snap Craig out of his current slump. Two days ago he could no longer get any food to his mouth. He was moved from his regular place in the dining room to the feedees' table. They tied a bib around his neck and held the fork in front of him. Brice refused to eat. He hasn't taken anything but his sleeping pill in two days. He won't get out of bed this morning. The nurses have threatened him with tube feedings, but he has an order prohibiting tube feedings and TPN on file, so it is an idle threat. He has decided to die.

Perhaps I am being selfish, but I don't think it is time yet. I have been trying to get him to raise a little hell, develop an attitude problem. Eat three mouthfuls, spit the fourth.... Maybe Belliveau can help; God knows why, but the man actually enjoyed working with Brice.

Bob chats with Craig, telling him about his new job with the Lake Arthur Fire Department in Jeff Davis Parish, LA. He takes in my presence with a airy, "How ya doin', Gage?" Then he turns his attention to Craig. To his credit, he manages to understand most of what Brice says and doesn't flip out when he sees his former partner's condition. He tells paramedic stories and Brice actually laughs despite his growling stomach. However, after a mere hour, Belliveau takes off. As he disappears through the door, Brice's pale eyes cloud over. I nudge my chair into motion.

"No, Johnny," Craig slurs at me.

I stop. In the hall I can see Belliveau leaning against the wall shaking. Brice has never used the diminutive form of my name. I wouldn't dare disobey.

*******

Gage is trying to distract me from my loneliness by indicating his willingness to work on his speech. He sits in his chair, repeating one of the drills I invented to help him get better voluntary control over his breathing. The effect is like a dripping faucet in the dark. I want to be sad.

I dread to think what I must look like. I have been avoiding mirrors; I can't stand to see myself looking shriveled and sloppy and unkempt. No wonder Bob fled.

Idly, I wonder how long it will take me to starve.

*******

Belliveau returns. He stands in the doorway, arms full of shopping bags. We make eye contact for the first time since he came. Give me some time with him, he pleads, silently. I retreat to my side of the room and stare at the wall, despite the fact that the smell from one of the bags makes me drool. I watch out the corner of my eye.

Bob sweeps Craig from the bed, propping him in his chair. With a roll of his eyes he dismisses Brice's protests. He pulls up the overbed table and spreads out half a dozen Chinese take out containers -- homestyle bean curd, Szechwan beef, steamed dumplings, two kinds of soup.... "Dig in," he orders.

"I'm not hungry." At that precise moment Brice's stomach gives a growl that would have made Chet Kelly proud.

Bob looks blandly at Brice. "Can't feed yourself?" he asks matter-of-factly.

Brice is silent.

"Sickness and death are part of life, too. Live a little, Brice." Bob snaps apart the other set of chopsticks and proceeds to hold a piece of dumpling in front of Craig's lips. For a long moment, Brice stares at the offering then slowly opens his mouth. In one of the all too rare acts of grace and caring in this place, they look at each other. Then Bob proceeds to feed his partner, never missing a beat in his story about two lovers, a redneck with a rifle, a canoe and an alligator, nor a mouthful of his own meal.

******

I am sitting in my usual spot, eavesdropping again. It’s entertaining, it’s cheap, and it’s amazing what you can find out – much better than television. I can see that Bob has taken the charge nurse aside for a talk. I do my best to look vapid.

"You have got to understand Craig." Bob’s voice is quiet but firm. "He has to be perfect. It’s part of who he is. He sees not being perfect as a failure."

I almost drowned out his next remark with my own choking. ‘Brice 101’ from Belliveau?

"Being fed like a baby isn’t perfect. Having to wear a bib isn’t perfect. Drooling food down his chest isn’t perfect. The man’s ashamed. Feed him alone."

The nurse protests a bit, weakly, but gives in. Bob is one of the most easy-going paramedics I ever met, so laid back he made Roy look tense, but he is hard to brush off when he speaks in that calm but edged tone. He glances my way and I carefully pretend to be looking at a speck on the wall.

"Heck, feed him with Gage. They can be dining buddies. Maybe both of them will eat better."

I try not to snort audibly. If Bob had to eat what passes for a soft diet around here, he wouldn’t be eating so well either. I supposed it’s fine for the old folks, but I hate it. It’s one of the few things Brice and I agree completely on. The food sucks.

Bob echoes my thoughts. "I’ll be bringing in some food, maybe that’ll help. You know the kitchen here doesn’t know how to cook for young guys." He smiles disarmingly. "I’ll bring you hard-working ladies some stuff, too. I’m pretty good at Cajun."

Bob has just scored a perfect ten on the nurse meter. Nothing appeals to nurses like food, especially food that doesn’t come from a hospital cafeteria or out of a brown bag. I learned that early on. The charge nurse smiles at him, and I can hear them talking about cooking as she walks with him towards the front door. How does he do it?

******

They are giving me a chance to be a good boy again and eat in the dining room, perhaps because a lot of the nurse's aides are out sick with some bug or other and feeding someone in their room is labor-intensive. In the dining room, they can sit three or four of us at a semi-circular table and one person can feed us all, each in turn. In theory, it sounds efficient, even cute, reminiscent of nature films about baby birds. In practice, it's messy and I think worms might even be more appetizing than the ground-up slop most of us get. Baby food would be an improvement on the regular meal that everyone else is eating, after it is run through a blender. I think longingly of the spicy Cajun food, the gumbo, the beans and rice, the other mouthwatering things I don't even know the names for, that Bob left in frozen storage on his last visit, in quantities that lasted for weeks. Both Brice and I actually put on some weight, finishing it off. It was too good to even consider spitting out. Unfortunately, it didn't last long enough. Since then it has been easier than ever for me to spit out the food here; the contrast has only made it taste worse in comparison.

Brice sits next to me. I am surprised he is even here; since Belliveau visited, he usually won't eat if they won't feed him in his room. They may have brought him here without asking - some of the staff have taken advantage of his increasing disability and his recurrent depression to do what they feel is 'best' for him, whether he wants it or not. I wish he would fight; I am not a believer in passivity. But he seems to lack the will needed for the battle.

Today's meal is particularly vile. There is meatloaf, gravy, green beans and the omnipresent applesauce, all of it bland and mushy. I think longingly of the bottle of Tabasco back in our room, out of reach and unused -- even the applesauce could use a splash. The bored aide shovels the food mindlessly from the bowls and plates to our mouths, while an oldies station plays in the background.

I pass on the spit and drool routine today. Brice needs to eat and I know my performance disgusts him.

I steal a glance at him. His face is expressionless, his eyes distant. I'm not sure he's even in his body.

The aide shoves the spoon in front of his face, waiting. He ignores it for an endless moment while she grows more impatient.

"Mr. Brice," she finally sighs, "Eat your nice lunch."

He fixes his gaze on her as if seeing her - and the hovering spoonful of swill - for the first time. Something dark and ominous flares briefly in the blue-gray depths of his eyes.

I crane my neck for a better view of the show.

"It's not nice and I'm not eating it." His voice is calm, but I sense -- something --under the quiet tones. In his words I catch a whiff of the Chinook, a pending spring melt and the promise of floods.

"You certainly are going to eat it. Let's not keep everyone else waiting, shall we?" The aide's tone is the same as that reserved by nursery school teachers for stubborn children. She jabs the spoon towards Craig's mouth again, determined to get it in come hell or high water. At exactly the right moment, he jerks his head away, and the spoon goes flying, spattering greasy gravy over his face and his glasses before the utensil heads to the floor.

Bravo!

There is a half-second of silence. They stare at each other, the air humming with the sound of over-stressed glass. Then Brice loses it.

With careful, well-chosen precision, he uses some of the foulest language I have ever heard to tell the woman just what he thinks of her, the food, her looks, her attitude, her feeding technique and her personal habits. He starts out quietly, but the volume escalates as he gathers steam. Since I have discovered that the vagaries of brain injury and the human nervous system have hidden most speech from me except for obscenities, I have become a connoisseur of profanity. What is coming out of Brice's mouth is an excellent example of the art.

Old Mrs. Bauer drops her spoon and murmurs a brief prayer. I can practically hear hearts skipping beats. Craig's reputation as a "nice, polite boy" lies shattered on the floor. I grin.

Before long, he has broadened his tirade to include anyone within reach. The nurse overseeing the dining rushes over to assess the situation. She gestures, and every staff member close by comes running. They wipe his glasses, his face, try to talk to him. He never misses a beat, but continues on regardless, his rage seemingly stoked even further by their attention.

The weather shifts, the storm clouds bunch, gather and whirl, promising destruction. I quit smiling. Someone switches his chair off and they begin to move him out of the room. They have heard what I have - a hysterical tone creeping into the ranting. As they turn the chair to back it away from the table, I get a brief look straight into his eyes. What I see is chilling -- this is more than anger. This is rage, terror and panic, spouting up endlessly from some deeply hidden, secret place.

I can still hear him shouting as they push his chair down the hall towards our room. I wait half a minute, and follow slowly. No one should be alone with what is going on inside Brice's head.

I pass the Nurse's Station on the way. The shift charge nurse is frantically dialing the phone, having Craig's doctor paged.

By the time I make it to the room they have managed to wrestle Craig into bed. He is fighting them spastically, but his movements are now nearly as limited as mine, and he is weak, besides. The covers on Brice's bed are completely deranged with deep wrinkles bunched up under his hip. This is something he won't ordinarily tolerate, but he is far beyond caring. As the young aide removes his shoes and braces, I can hear that his tirade is making considerably less sense, more hysterical now than angry or profane. Craig is gasping for the necessary air to continue and, with a jolt, I realize that he can't stop. This thing has taken on a life of its own -- a dark bird beating its wings against the bars of a cage. Every feeling he has buried since he's been here -- maybe even longer -- is rushing out and he is powerless to staunch the flow.

One of the RNs -- a shapely young brunette -- intrudes from the hallway, syringe in hand. She passes it to the charge nurse, who is supervising and assisting at the head of the bed.

The older woman takes it and holds it where Craig can see it. "Mr. Brice, " she states firmly, "I'm going to give you this medication. It's going to make you sleepy and help you calm down. Just try to relax and let it work."

Two of the aides manage to hold him still just long enough for her to get the injection in safely. Another deftly slips oxygen tubing over his ears and into his nose, places a pillow comfortably under his head.

He's slowing down, calming in stages, like night coming on. Both the lack of air and the medication are catching up to him. The brunette is talking to him, slowly, calmly, trying to give him something to focus on as she holds his hand. Gradually, the flow of profanity slows to a trickle and then stops. The RN lays his hand back down on the bed, straightening and stretching her back before blowing a wisp of hair out off her eyes. I take the opportunity to nudge my chair in closer, to see more clearly what's going on.

Craig is still making noise, a quiet sob that is almost inaudible. His cheeks are wet, though the drug is starting to hit him hard and his eyes are half-closed and unfocused. His clothes are still on, but he is covered only with a thin institutional sheet and that strikes me as somehow wrong; he is always so cold.

I open my mouth but nothing comes out. I imagine blankets, thick comforters, quilts, my grandmother's fluffy feather tick... The seconds drag into minutes. The nurse is headed for the door; time is running out. "Damn," I hiss. For a second she stares at me, I can tell she is wishing she had a second dose. "Blanket." The word finally tears free.

She smiles and then covers Brice. "Your friend will be OK in the morning."

Somehow, I doubt it.

******

I awoke to voices and the fading light of sunset streaming across my face. I was in my third day of my retreat from life and it was a pleasure to lie still and empty. No food and precious little fluid had passed my lips since the incident in the dining room and I am weak and tired. I keep my eyes closed, watching the red glow of sunlight through my eyelids and trying to identify the voices.

"Friend?"

Gage. Since my shameful outburst, he has sat by my side for as long as the staff would allow, talking or being quiet as the mood struck him. I have completely ignored him and the others who had come to my bed -- those who tried to force food into my mouth, sit me up in my chair or talk about my "feelings". I refuse to think about John's presence, as it disturbs my growing numbness.

"Yes, my very best..."

Belliveau!

"And my partner."

I can hear his shoes squeak as he shifts. I imagine him squatted on the floor next to Gage's chair.

"As strange as this sounds, John, the great tragedy of Craig's life is not this disease. It is that no one ever showed him how to love. He has a good heart, but he is too ashamed to use it."

I feel a stab of pain, an icicle running from my belly to my throat. Involuntarily, I make a straggled gasp.

Bob's knees creak as he stands up. "Gage."

I hear the whir of the motor as John leaves. A weight settles on the edge of my bed and a cool shadow falls across my face. I ignore him. Still Bob sits there.

The nurse comes in with her towels and basins. "Mr. Belliveau." A smile creeps into her voice. "How are things down in Louisiana?"

"Fine. I'll do that..."

"That's ok...."

"I know how. Took care of my father before he died. Let me, please."

"Mr. Brice?" she asks. In the silence rises the bitter protest of one of the other patients. I can feel her eyes on me. She takes my silence as an affirmation. "Push the call button if you need help."

My mind insists on providing an image of his smile. Water splashes in the basin. While he bathes me, I remember a run we went on once:

I open my eyes. My face is wet with tears. Belliveau carries the bathwater to the sink. He rinses the basin and refills it, retrieving a clean dry washcloth.

Suddenly I am talking. "I wasn't ready for this. I had things I wanted to do. I am so damn helpless..." I sob. "Out of control!"

Bob dips the cloth into the water and wrings it out. The dripping sounds very loud, for an irrational second I think my tears are cascading onto the floor, revealing my weakness to all. Gently he sponges my checks and wipes my nose. His features are relaxed into his 'paramedic face'. When I met his gaze, his eyes are sad.

"Craig, if it took you this long to learn you are not in control, then you have been lucky."

"My life is worthless. I don't make a difference anymore. No one cares. I should die now." I sound like a petulant child. I am too weak to care, nothing matters any more.

Belliveau unfolds a clean gown. He slips it over my arms, rolls me on my side to fasten the ties, and removes the pad from the bed, before speaking. "I don't know how you can say that. You matter to a lot of people: Dixie, Bellingham, the guys at the station, Gage -- me." His eyes are moist. I find his unshed tears touching.

From the doorway comes the sound of Gage's chair. He rolls over to the side of my bed.

"John, keep an eye on him, for a minute." Bob heads for the door.

I look at Gage. "Thanks," I whisper.

He smiles.

Belliveau returns with two cans of the chocolate flavored nutritional supplement that the staff has been trying to force down my throat. He shakes the can, pours the contents into a glass and inserts a straw. Bob nods to John, who gives his two tongue clicks of acknowledgement and leaves. "Craig, your life still matters..." He holds the drink before me.

Slowly, I take the straw between my lips.

******

I've found a new hiding place -- an empty patient room, right on the main hallway. It's taken the nurses longer than usual to figure this one out, probably because they're used to hunting me down in more exotic locations. It's stripped bare for renovation. The previous resident was an elderly, but ambulatory and extremely demented, gentleman who was convinced that no matter where he actually happened to be, he was really in the bathroom. A myriad of cleaning products utterly failed to get the smell out of the carpet, so they've pulled it up and are preparing to repaint. The sour stench rising from the grate suggests they may have to replace the heating and cooling unit under the window, as well. Despite the odor, it's a good place to hide out and still be available, just in case.

I sit just far enough inside the door that they can't see me from the hall, yet as far from the heater as I can get. A position which allows me to listen to everyone passing by. Right now, I can hear Roy trying to find out from one of the nurses where I am. He sounds stressed -- I haven't seen DeSoto relaxed in a long time. If I weren't so desperate for his company, I would drive him completely away so he could heal. I push my chin against the throttle.

"Hey, DeSoto! How ya doing?"

It's Belliveau. This should be interesting. I stop and imagine Roy pasting a smile on his face, shaking Bob's hand. Despite Bob's earlier visit, this is the first time they're run into each other. They exchange pleasantries, small talk about the weather and life working in Louisiana.

"Roy, do you still have that truck? Do you think I could borrow it for a day?" Belliveau's tone is casual.

Roy hesitates.

"I want to get Craig out of this joint for a bit tomorrow. Get him out in the sun."

Brice on a picnic; Louisiana must be pretty boring for Belliveau to come out here for that. Then I remember the crawfish etoufee he made last time; maybe I can trick Bob into taking me. I practice looking like Brice.

"Sitting around here, moping, isn't good for him. The electric wheelchair won't fold up to fit in my rental car trunk," Bob sucks in a gulp of air between his teeth, "so I need either a truck or a van, and I can't get a van rented on such short notice."

Roy's answer is a long time coming. Sometimes I think he has developed aphasia by association. "On one condition..." His tone is soft, but firm. I sense something unpleasant about to hit the fan. "You talk to Brice about asking for another room."

DeSoto is still going on about that. He thinks Brice's 'condition' is more than I can handle; Roy has forgotten I have seen as much death as he has -- more, since coming to live in this place of final days. He struck out with the Director of Nursing, so now he's going to try with Bob.

I want to see Belliveau's response. Does he think I'm still an adult? I risk being seen by nudging the chair forward, closer to the door. There is no chance of either of them noticing me. They are squared off, facing each other in the hallway. High Noon in the geezer home! Bob looks shocked, but his expression quickly shifts into one of distaste. I can't see my former partner's face, but the lines of his back reveal his exasperation.

"DeSoto, Craig doesn't want another room -- neither does Gage. For that matter, does he even know you're asking?"

Yes he does, I think.

Roy shakes his head. "That's not important... Johnny doesn't understand." His voice breaks. "This is not good for him."

"Yes, it is. Gage understands a heck of a lot more than you give him credit for." He stares at Roy and his expression softens. "John has lost everything that made his life meaningful. He needs to have some way to be useful..."

"Watching Craig Brice die is not...."

Belliveau interrupts. "Helping Craig with dying. Sick as both of them are, neither of them needs to be alone."

Roy's shoulders slump. I can't decide whether he is more scared of my death or my continued life.

"What are you afraid of?" asks Bob, echoing my thoughts. "Frightened by the idea of John keeping company with a dying man?" Belliveau shifts, canting his head and studying DeSoto's face. "Or are you scared to look a long, slow death in the face in the other bed each time you visit Gage? " Belliveau does not raise his voice, but his words take on a sharp edge. "Are you asking for this for him or for you?"

Roy bows his head. I can see the livid flush of red, spreading from his face to his neck.

"What is he going to see that's so awful? How many deaths did the two of you see during the time you worked together?"

DeSoto's voice is tight and angry. "Brice's attitude. His refusal to allow any treatment that could help him.... Johnny doesn't need to see that."

He's afraid I will get some ideas for new ways to commit suicide. I taught Brice everything he knows on that matter.

Belliveau looks away for a minute. When he starts to speak again, his voice is a little softer, a little gentler. "Roy, Craig made his decisions a long time ago. He's got no family, few friends, and not that much to look forward to but more disability." Bob sighs. "You and I might not believe that not getting a feeding tube or going on a ventilator is the best thing to do, but it's his decision, not ours."

Roy averts his head.

"Yeah, I'd like to have my friend around a little longer. But I'd also like him to keep as much basic human dignity as he can. He's a good man." Bob looks Roy unflinchingly in the eyes. "You probably think, because of what happened earlier this week, Craig's losing it. I think what happened is entirely sane. If this were happening to me, I'd have some panicked moments, too. The nurses tell me Gage stayed with him, sat by his bed."

Roy turns his head. I can see the profile of my friend's face. DeSoto is chewing his lip. I am surprised he is so calm. Roy normally wouldn't accept anything which conflicts with his vision of me as a brain-damaged near-vegetable.

"I'm not taking that support away from him, no matter what the hell you think is right and proper."

I hold my breath for a long second. DeSoto eventually shifts, drawing away from Bob, unable to face Belliveau's bare words.

Belliveau leans in, raises his voice back to a normal conversational tone. "I'll be by your place to pick up that truck tomorrow morning at seven. I'll leave you my rental, and I'll fill the tank for you when I'm done." He moves on down the hall.

Roy remains, staring at the wall, his cheeks and ears flaming. I can see his jaw working. After a minute, he gives up and moves away.

******

In the morning, I sit by the window, staring into space. My anger, grief and pain are burned away, replaced by a dull aching hole, which traced the path of their passage through my soul. Last night's events are like so many discarded wrappers from medical supplies, littering the scene after a code.

"Argh! Watch where you're going, Gage." Bob stands pinned against the doorjamb, a victim of John's frantic attempt to hide before his physical therapy session. Belliveau holds a pair of shopping bags above his head. Gingerly, he steps over the foot pedals, disentangling himself.

Gage stops in the doorway, watching.

I sigh, remembering a time when my life was not a sideshow entertainment. "Bob..."

Belliveau starts rooting through my dresser, selecting clothing and ignoring me. "Don't you have any casual clothes?"

I roll my eyes. Bob's idea of casual pushes the limits of the definition -- like the outfit he has on: a faded and torn Hawaiian print shirt, baggy knee-length shorts the color of tobacco juice and sandals from which his white knobby toes protrude.

John loses interest and starts to leave.

"Whoa, Gage," calls Bob. "Shorts?"

John nods toward his dresser. Bob digs for a moment. "Found 'em, thanks."

I haven't worn shorts since I was diagnosed. Indeed, I had thrown them away in an attempt to sever all ties to my previous life. "Uh Bob," I begin again.

"We're going to the beach," he states firmly.

"No, we're not," I counter. "I can't go like this..." But Belliveau is gone, off to find towels. I realize I can only resist by surrendering my dignity and making a scene. Fine, I'll go to the beach.

******

I awake with a start. The steady rhythm of the truck on the interstate, combined with the soft pillow Belliveau wedged between the door and the side of the seat to keep me from falling over, lulled me to sleep. I am alone, in the cab of DeSoto's truck, in a nearly empty parking lot. The sky is a glorious autumn blue, touched with a hint of ocean haze. Seagulls turn lazy circles overhead and the air smells of salt. I look at the tumbledown old Victorian houses, many sporting fluorescent paint schemes, and the stone sea wall -- we must be in Venice. Cool, fresh air streams through the open windows. I stick out my tongue to catch its sweetness.

Bob returns, sweating, with sand clinging to his feet. "Oh good, you're awake." He reaches through the window and pushes me upright so he can open the door. He is silent as he lifts me from the truck. I close my eyes, shutting out the stares of a curious woman jogger.

The vinyl tubes of the cheap chaise lounge squeak as I am set down. Wordlessly, Bob opens the shopping bags he brought and the sweet smell of coconut oil fills the air as he smears sunscreen over my legs and arms. He perches my sunglasses on the bridge of my nose, and after a moment's thought he places his own weathered baseball cap with its ludicrous embroidered crayfish on my head. Smiling, he walks away.

******

Alone. I am alone for the first time in months. I can feel the wind washing away the antiseptic confines of the home. For the first time in my life, I am still. That part of my brain which rationed pleasure and reminded me of my need to accomplish, organize, contribute... is silent. I listen to the voices in the surf, imagining I could understand the ocean's message for me, if I could just speak its language. I try to name the thousand shades of blue I find in the sky and the water and study the patterns in the coarse sand. I watch an insect of some sort scurry across the grains.

Most of all, I listen to the voices in my head. It is strange to see your life as a finished thing. I compile lists of regrets and accomplishments, weigh them on my soul's balance, and relive each moment of pleasure. For a last time, I taste the bitterness of smoke, let myself feel the terrifying exhilaration of a good call....

A willet, emboldened by my immobility, lands and dines upon a hapless hermit crab, not more than a foot from my head. I can see each feather glistening with oil, hear the crunch as it rips apart its meal. For a long moment we stare into each other's eyes. The wild, sweet smell of its wings fill the air as it lifts away from the earth. My gaze and heart follow its flight. I say goodbye.

******

Bob returns with a thick, shocking pink beverage, a mix of improbable fruits -- passion fruit, strawberries, bananas and oranges. He holds the cup for me and the liquid sweetness fills my mouth. I am reminded of Gage.

We pass the day -- together and separate, talking and silent. He drags me down to the hardpan margin between sea and land. I sit with my feet slipping in and out of the cold water, subsumed in its ebb and flow.

******

Belliveau buys dinner at an open-air fish stand. The smell of hot oil, fish and sea air washes over me, as I hide from inquisitive eyes under the brim of Bob's cap. My stomach growls. I turn toward the horizon, watching the sun touch the waves and dreading the ritual of the bib and spoon. I have insisted I am not hungry, but I doubt Bob believes me.

Belliveau returns with a small cardboard box full of food. "Good eats," he grins, setting the tray on a weathered wooden picnic table.

"I'm not hungry..." I start.

Bob snorts. With a plastic knife and fork, he cuts a golden fried fillet of fish into flakes, adds a generous dollop of tartar sauce and stirs. He holds a forkful in front of my face. "Eat up."

Reluctantly, I let him shovel the mess into my mouth. I loathe tartar sauce under the best of circumstances and this is not the best of circumstances. The fish is hot, sweet and melts on my tongue and tiny, sour bits of pickle accent the flavor. "Mmmm," I fail to suppress a groan of pleasure.

Bob smiles again. "I think you missed your calling as a beach bum, Craig." He lifts another forkful.

I watch his face as we eat. The patch of white skin revealed by his receding hairline is reddened by the start of a sunburn. His eyes are sad, but he does not hide them from me. He is utterly unselfconscious before the furtive glances of a family dining at an adjacent table. His grace gives me the strength to finish the meal. Briefly, I consider what I could have done if I had been able to master the easy way his wears his life. But I no longer have the strength needed for regrets. Instead, I let myself fall into the sensations of the meal: the smoothness of the coleslaw, the sharpness of the Coke, and the warmth of the mashed potatoes.

******

After dinner, we wander along the seawall, watching the lingering traces of the sunset. Bob holds an uneaten dinner roll in his hand, shredding it as we walk. The time for words is long gone. Abruptly he stops and tosses the handful of crumbs into the air, a white flecked arc against the indigo sky. The omnipresent gulls whirl and scream, a cloud of white and gray.

"Mister..."

I turn my head to see a boy standing beside us, holding a stick of cotton candy. He stares at me but addresses Belliveau.

"Mister, is he a fireman?"

Suddenly, I realize the borrowed jogging shorts I am wearing are emblazoned with the white Maltese cross of the Department logo.

Bob smiles. "Ask him. Mr. Brice can talk."

The child stares at me, clearly frightened by the prospect of talking to a cripple. "Are you a fireman?"

My mouth goes dry. I haven't interacted with anyone outside the home in so long -- let alone a child. "Y - yes," I stammer. "I was. I'm sic... I'm retired."

The boy smiles. "I want to be a fireman."

I watch as he takes a huge bite of the cotton candy and then turns away, his curiosity satisfied. Slowly I tip my head back, resting against the smooth vinyl of the headrest. Looking at the red stained clouds, hanging low over the ocean, I remember when I spoke those words. Only I'd waited until I was twenty and a very unhappy sophomore in college. I had sat rooted at the table in the Officer's Club, unable to meet my father's eyes; instead, I had focused on watching his jaw muscles clench and unclench. "Nonsense," he had pronounced my desire.

I shake my head, driving away the memory. "His parents shouldn't let him eat that junk."

Bob laughs. "It's not junk, it's wonderful."

"Pure sugar."

"Have you ever eaten cotton candy, Craig?"

"No," I manage to squeeze my disapproval into one word.

"Criminal," announces Belliveau, bounding across the street toward a tiny weathered stand with peeling paint. He returns with a narrow paper cone, swathed in pink fluff. The smell of warm sugar fills the air. "Magic, pure magic, Craig." He holds the confection aloft. Against the red and purple horizon, it looks like he has captured a cloud. Bob tears a hunk free and shoves the wispy stuff in my mouth.

It melts on my tongue before I can quite determine its texture. The sweetness slides along my throat. I feel like I am eating a sunset.

Belliveau smiles.

We walk. I let myself join that little boy, enjoying one last beautiful day before winter comes.

******

For a time, Bob just drives around the city and the suburbs. I take a long look at everything, drinking it in. It's dark now, but L.A. is never quiet and even this sleepy night is no exception. He spends a long time cruising 16's territory for me. I had every street and turn memorized here and I discover I have forgotten none of it. I can even name rescues to myself as we pass familiar landmarks; as usual, my mind will let me forget nothing -- not even the smallest details -- once it has been jogged. Bob remembers, too. He points out the small park where we once rescued a child stuck between the jungle gym bars and responded to numerous other playground accidents. The swing sets there had been constructed too close to a footpath and were responsible for several call-outs for us each season. I had written a note to the Parks Commissioner about it, complete with statistics and details...eventually, they were moved to somewhere less hazardous. It's a small accomplishment, but one I'm proud of.

We drive by the station, too. Bob glances at me, but doesn't stop. Even a glimpse is more than I really want, but I don't look away. The bay door is open and I can see both the engine and the squad. The lights are on in the kitchen. It looks quiet. Bob drives on, his face untroubled, at peace with his own thoughts.

I think I am at peace with mine. We're sharing a comfortable silence, not a nervous or strained one. I'm tired in that particular way you can only be from being in the sun most of the day, and it feels good.

******

It's past ten by the time Bob pulls DeSoto's truck into the nursing home parking lot. He shuts off the ignition, but doesn't get out right away. The instant I go back in that building, I will lose every ounce of privacy I have again and he knows it. Besides, I think Bob wants to talk. I listen to the ticking of the cooling engine, waiting for him to find the words.

He appraises me for a long minute, sympathetically but without more than a faint trace of pity. When Belliveau speaks, his voice is careful. "Craig, this place is no good for you. Come back to Louisiana with me...."

I nearly jump out of my skin, but my failing nervous system transmutes my surprise into the barest shiver. I open my mouth.

Bob shushes me with a hand movement before I can object automatically. "Hear me out. I know what I'm doing and I've thought it through." His voice cracks with old pain. "I've got the room, and I know what to do. You deserve something better than this place." He studies my face.

I look away, praying the thickening mask of slack facial muscles is hiding my feelings. For a second I imagine the comfort of a home-cooked meal, a friendly voice, a house which is quiet in the dark of night.... Then I remember.

When Belliveau left Los Angeles to return to Louisiana, it was because his father was dying of cancer and needed someone to take care of him. It took close to a year for his father to die -- Bob was there the whole time. I would call him in the evenings and we'd talk about everything else but what was happening -- just to keep in touch, I always said -- but I heard the strain in his voice and the exhaustion in his silences. I would hang up and imagine his bland face quietly sad. I have no wish to inflict the hard work or sheer emotional hell on him a second time. And, there are other considerations that I feel are important...

Finally he breaks the deepening silence. "Craig?"

"I can't." I sound reluctant, even to myself. "I can't leave Gage here, alone."

"What about -you-?"

"I'm perfectly fine." Damn it! I didn't want to end the day like this.

"It doesn't seem that way to me. This week...."

"That was an aberration." I strive for some of my old detachment, but I have trouble summoning it. He doesn't buy the act. I know him so well I don't need to turn; I can hear his body language, the rustles and crackles that indicate the shift of posture, the frown. Sounds I learned in my first four years with the Department. Sounds that remind me... That was a different person, and a long time ago. If I turn toward him I will cry.

"And besides, everything here is already paid for." I call up the coolness of the balance sheet.

He sighs in the darkness. "You don't have anyone. It shouldn't be that way. You shouldn't be so alone."

"I'm used to it..."

"Well, maybe it's time for you not to be 'used to it'." He pounds the steering wheel with his open palm, his frustration with me clear. "It shouldn't be this way," he repeats.

"Bob...." I keep my face averted, even though it's dark and he can't possibly see the moisture gathering in the corners of my eyes. I blink, and gather my thoughts. When I can talk again, I can't seem to achieve my normal register. I hope he can hear me clearly. "It's kind -- and incredibly appreciated. But I'm being well taken care of, and I'm going to stay here. Please don't worry about me."

"I can't help it. You're my friend." A tremor mars his voice.

He would have to say that -- damn him. I stare out into the night for a bit, blinking even harder. Why is every emotion I own so close to the surface these days? I don't seem to be myself anymore...

Bob gives us a few minutes before speaking again. "Craig..." He hesitates. "There's another reason I asked." The sounds of the night fill the cab for half second. "I'm out of vacation. I used the last of it for this trip. And the department I work for's small -- I don't have anyone I can trade with. I won't have any more usable vacation time for months." I can hear the frustration in his usually calm tones. "I can't guarantee that if something...." he trails off. "When something happens, that I can get here. And I don't want you to be left alone."

I choke on my gratitude as he refuses to deny the reality of my death. Something stirs within my chest. The surge of emotions I have ridden for the past months sweeps on. I am exhausted. Enough, I decide. This is getting to be ridiculous; I never expected anything from the start of this other than being alone for the end of it. In the end, I can handle nothing else. Belliveau has proven to be a better friend than I deserved, but enough is enough. I'm not worth the guilt trip.

I laugh, startling him. "Bob, you've seen the inside of that place. There's no such thing as 'alone' in there. If anything, I'll be hard put to get some real privacy to die quietly." My words shift the forces, which have been roiling in the darkness around us.

He snorts. With that sound we are back in the cab of Squad 16. "That's not what I meant, and you know it."

"It's the answer you're getting." As steely-eyed as I had been when I tried to take the vitals of the bits of flesh that remained when a drunk mistook a bridge abutment for an exit ramp, I turned to him.

"Yeah...I tried," He pauses a bare second. "Don't come running to me about it later." The street lamps glisten in tears on his cheeks.

"Deal."

He stretches, and, after a second, opens his door to go around and get my chair out of the back.

******

A few weeks have passed since Bob's visit, and I can see that Brice has changed. Some switch has clicked over inside his head. He demands nothing, seemingly at ease to drift through whatever time he might have left. This isn't like his earlier episodes, this isn't the withdrawal of depression. He talks, he lets the staff care for him and get him up, he eats as best as he can manage. But he is somehow distant from all of it. He is letting life happen to him, but none of it is touching him any more.

What disturbs me most is that he is no longer demanding, and in this place you sometimes have to raise your voice to get what you need. No one is neglected, but it's just like any organization - you have to make a little noise to get the small luxuries and comforts. I find myself becoming pushy enough for the two of us, clumsily advocating for him because he won't do it.

******

Again, my stomach growls loudly. I continue to stare out the window, ignoring my body's protest. Dinner is in three hours.

Gage's scowl deepens with each rumble. For the past few days, he has been alternating between worried and angered by my behavior or, more precisely, my lack of behavior. "Brice," he says, jostling my chair with his.

"Yes, John?" I deliberately misunderstand him.

"B... B... B...," he stammers. I study his reflection in the glass, his brown eyes are filled with frustration and concern. "Damn it." Behind me, his chair whirs as he heads into the hallway.

For all my former eloquence, I lack the words to explain the passivity he finds so disturbing. Somewhere amid the fried fish, sea gulls, and cotton candy I broke loose from this world. Maybe it was the moment of childlike whimsy -- denied me first by my parents and later by my own self-imposed exile from life -- or Belliveau's genuine act of... love that completed the puzzle. I no longer need to fight or rage. I am wrapped in a strange peace. I can look back on my life's accomplishments and know that I have touched at least one person. I will not go unremembered.

"Brice." From the hall, I hear John's voice, rough-edged from disuse.

"What do you want, Mr. Gage?" The disinterested, impatient voice of Nurse Sandy answers.

"h... h... h..."

"Are you thirsty?"

Profanity greets her question. I imagine John red-faced with embarrassment and anger.

"There is no reason for us to be rude."

"Brice hungry!" The sentence explodes in the sleepy afternoon air.

I realize two people will remember me when I'm gone.

******

It is a struggle to get through dinner. I try to make the effort, but my appetite is off. Eating is hard work these days, anyway. Usually, I have to take a nap to recover from mealtimes -- running marathons was easier. The aide has wrapped a soft collar around my neck to keep my head upright. After placing a bite in my mouth, she pulls down my chin slightly, to help me swallow. Normally I find this handling invasive, but tonight I can't muster the energy to care.

After a bit, I turn my head slightly and refuse to take any more. The aide sighs and lays down the spoon. They don't push me about eating these days. She offers me the glass instead. It is apple juice, thickened to make it easier to swallow. They don't give me any fluids now that don't have calories -- every swallow they can get into me must be made to count for something. I don't mind that much, I am terribly thirsty and thickened water is downright disgusting. A sip at a time, I manage to get most of it down. Several times I almost choke and have to stop to catch my breath. When we are done, the aide offers me some vanilla ice cream.

I want it, but I'm so exhausted that it doesn't seem worth the work and I tell her no. I can still say that word and not have to struggle and repeat myself to be understood. I'm so tired. I wonder if I am coming down with something, not that I'd mind if I do. I have been waiting for it, hoping for it. If this is finally the time, good.

I almost fall asleep in my chair watching 'Nova'. Gage senses something is wrong -- he's hovering, sneaking glances at me when he thinks I won't notice. Despite myself, I am touched; my attempt to fight off the supreme boredom of this backwater, to remain useful, has yielded unexpected results. John's friendship has made the last months bearable.

I can't keep my attention on the program and it is over before I realize it. I am starting to feel like I have to cough. I stifle the urge. If the nurses find out, they will call my doctor. I hold on to that thought through being undressed, bathed, put into a gown, and lifted into bed. I concentrate as hard as I can manage to hold off, to not attract undue attention..

The urge becomes overwhelming once I am lying down, and when I am alone I give in to it, stifling my weak efforts with the pillow. For once I am too hot rather than too cold. I can't push the covers back myself anymore, and calling for the staff is the last thing I want to do right now. I can feel myself sweating, suffocating. Despite this, I drift off into fevered dreams.

I don't truly sleep; the peacefully numbness eludes me. Instead, I keep waking or fitfully dreaming that I am awake; I'm not sure which. My teeth chatter as I alternate between being stifling hot and chilled to the bone. My chest hurts and each breath is hard won. I fight to cough as little as possible. It sounds deafening in the quiet room, and I imagine the night nurse running in, drawn by the loud sound of it. I bury my face in the pillow, but it's too hot and smells sourly of my own sweat. I can feel perspiration trickling through my hairline, beading on my forehead. I cannot even raise my hand to wipe it away, not that I care. The panic of not being able to draw enough air into my lungs begins to compete with fever for control of my mind. I hate to think what my O₂ sat must be, or my temperature. I close my eyes and try very hard not to concentrate, not to feel, not to be. If only I can keep quiet long enough, if only the staff are a little late coming to turn Gage tonight, if only, if only, if only....

******

I wake up from a rare moment of sound sleep to find lights on, people milling about, and commotion on the other side of the room. Blinking, I angle my head as best I can to see what's happening. I'm on my back with my head up, which helps. No one has bothered to draw the privacy curtain, which helps too.

There are at least two nurses and one aide clustered around Craig's bed. One has a stethoscope and is listening intently to his lungs, the aide has an electronic thermometer, and is taking his temperature under his arm, and the second RN has his chart and is flipping through it rapidly. Brice isn't fighting them. He isn't doing anything, though his eyes seem to be slitted open. I can see his chest rise and fall, but he appears to be completely out of it, covered by a thin sheen of fever-sweat. Clinically, I note how badly and with how much effort he's breathing.

The aide with the thermometer looks over the bed at the nurse who has just slung her stethoscope around her neck. "He's 103.2, axillary," she says quietly.

"His lungs sound like crap. Did anyone get an O2 sat on him?"

"82% just a few minutes ago..."

The nurse with the chart looks up, her expression weary. "Get a concentrator in here and put a mask on him. We'll see if that helps. Doctor Conway's on vacation and Doctor Majors is covering and you know how he is...."

I gag. I know how Doctor Majors is, too. His cure for anything that happened to anyone in a nursing home was to call 911 or an ambulance and have them taken to a hospital.....no matter what the patient wanted.

"...If we can bring his sat up before he calls me back, maybe we can convince him."

The phone rings in the hallway, and she leaves to answer it, taking the chart with her. In the hushed nighttime quiet I can hear her voice raised tensely, arguing with someone on the other end. I catch fragments of the conversation while the other staff roll in an O2 concentrator and fit a mask over Craig's face. "....not what the patient wants.....end stage....express wishes....no, Doctor...yes, Doctor...." I hear the click of the handset being set firmly back in the cradle. There's a pause. "Goddamn jerk."

I listen to her dial again and all I can feel is sick.

Ten minutes later, a transport ambulance crew arrives, stretcher in tow. I spend the entire time they are there cussing them out loudly while they bundle Craig up and take him away. The nurses stand by, making no attempt to stop me; while they are polite enough to the ambulance crew, there is clearly anger in the air. The crew does their work and leaves as quickly as possible.

I lie awake the rest of the night, praying against hope that Rampart will send Craig back, or, at the very least, have the good sense not to treat him. Maybe Dixie will be in the ER, or Morton; both of them are aware of Brice's wishes and have the strength and good sense to stand up to a doctor with an attitude problem. I don't trust Brackett to do that. Morton was always the one fearless enough to speak up when he saw something going wrong, even when I disagreed with him....

I need to know what's going on. I need someone I can convince to tell me.

******

I enter the room and stop abruptly. The bed on the left is empty, the sheets stripped from it and piled in the center. The small radio sits abandoned on the bedside table. Brice is gone.

Johnny is still in his place in the bed on the right. The hiss of the air flotation mattress covers my entrance as I move towards the chair near the head of the bed, shoving the bedside table out of the way to get there. John’s eyes are closed, and I hesitate, swallowing hard.

I had been counting on Brice being here to help. I’m no good at this and John knows it. I consider calling one of the nurses into the room. Some of them are better at communicating with John than I am. I can also pump them for information, find out what has happened here. The empty bed could mean as little as a room change or as much as… The plastic covered, gray stripped surface seems suddenly sinister. I refuse to think about it. Brice is still fairly healthy. Nothing very much can have happened to him, yet.

I sit down. The noise wakes John and he turns his head unexpectedly, staring at me. I flush under the scrutiny. Damn.

"Uhh, hi." Why does this have to be so damn hard? How does Brice manage? I recall the lecture I got on the last visit. With an effort, I hold Johnny's gaze. I force myself not to shudder; I can't bear what I see there. I have nightmares about that desperation. "Watch his lips, watch his face, look into his eyes for once…" Brice's words return to haunt me. Sweat trickles down my back.

John nods, but his face is wary. I gesture to the other bed, fighting to keep my eyes from looking at anything other than my friend. The implied question is obvious.

******

Roy stares at me. He looks like a deer standing on the highway, waiting to embrace his chrome-grill destiny. I take a deep breath, run my tongue over my lips. For once, it looks like Roy might actually listen instead of not even trying. I know I will get one chance, he will panic and flee if this doesn't work.

"Rampart." It is best clarity I've managed yet and I surprise myself. All that practice is paying off. If DeSoto doesn’t understand that, I’m going to give him to Nurse Sandy for lunch. "Pneumonia." The scene from last night plays itself out again, haunting me.

******

I understand the laboriously pronounced sounds. Johnny names his probable fate. I lose the battle with my body and shiver. The air is suddenly virulent. I am near-frantic with the need to get Gage out of there.

"Why aren’t you up today?" I ask, digging in the dresser for a sweatsuit. I sweep the room, gathering the supplies I need. I glance at his wheelchair sitting in the corner while I roll Johnny, pulling on his pants. If it is broken again, I’m not sure we can afford to have it fixed. I wish the staff would be more careful. As I lift him, feeling John's bones sticking through his flesh, I can sense him rapidly losing patience with my intrusion. I'm supposed to use the Hoyer lift to transfer him, but I don't want to take the extra time, not today. I can't give voice to my fears. So I manhandle him into the chair, twisting his pants awkwardly, and whisk him out of the room.

It's a beautiful day and I want to have a nice visit, but Johnny will not leave me alone. He is absolutely fixated on one subject -- Brice. I find out from one of the nurses that Craig was taken to Rampart last night, unconscious and feverish, and has been admitted to the ICU, in pretty bad shape with pneumonia. From what she tells me, I don't expect him to make it. Apparently they don't, either. But I doubt John understands this -- or how close he is to the same fate.

I brought some new cassettes for his tape player and a pint of ice cream. Joanne sent some soft homemade cookies. I take him and his treats outside on the patio to sit in the sunshine -- he has gotten so pale. But Gage wants none of it. I offer him first ice cream, and then cookies, but he turns away and laboriously pronounces Brice's name. I twist the filmy plastic bag that held the ice cream in frustration.

"Brice!" John insists forcefully when I try to turn up the volume on the tape player. I sigh.

"Johnny, I've told you. They're taking good care of him." I find it nearly impossible to keep my voice calm and to speak slowly. It has been explained to me over and over again that John may have short-term memory problems. I try to be patient, but this is at least the tenth time I've had to repeat myself.

He glares at me, and I can see the frustration building behind his eyes. Johnny's anger is growing by the minute, and I don't understand why. I don't know why he gives a damn about Brice; he can't possibly understand the full implications of the man's problems -- that he will probably not return.

John glares at me again. I wish I knew what I'd done to earn the fury in that stare. Despite the heat of the day, I'm chilled.

Gage pins me with his gaze, holding me with an intensity I haven't seen in him for what seems like years. I watch him take what passes for a deep breath, and I force myself to ignore the possible consequences of his impaired chest muscles. Sighing, I prepare to repeat myself yet again in answer to his endless insistence. When he speaks, it is very slow and clear. I find myself compelled to pay attention.

"Roy..." he takes another breath. "See Brice." A pause. "Asshole."

I wish I knew if he means Brice or me. Judging from the challenging look in his eyes, I have a feeling I don't want to know. This is the longest sentence I have heard come from his mouth since the accident.

"All right." I reluctantly agree. "I'll go see him tomorrow."

He looks none too happy, but he nods. I put a new tape in the player, and this time he is quiet.

******

The smell hits me as soon as I wake up, before I even manage to open my eyes. I am in a hospital.

I blink and realize that not only am I in a hospital, but that I am intubated and have an IV. Hanging from the IV pole, just within my range of vision, is the little-bag/big bag piggyback setup that means that some damn fool has given me antibiotics.

I want to scream and rage -- tear the length of plastic from my throat. I stare at the needle in my arm, recite the steps involved in discontinuing an IV. But I am powerless to take them. I am powerless to do anything.

******

It is night, and the ICU nurses have rolled me on my side and propped me up with pillows. Agonizingly, I work my arm upward to my face. My atrophied muscles manage the movement only because I have been left unsedated, with the bed supporting the weight of my shrunken limb, and because of my rage over having my wishes denied -- no, not even mattering sufficiently to be denied -- just plain ignored. Each wrinkle in the sheets is a mountain, an Everest I must scale. I go slowly so my oxygen needs do not outstrip the flow provided by the vent, for if I set off the alarm, what little power I have to control my destiny will be smothered with drugs. Each jerk of the minute hand on the clock marks an incremental movement of my arm. When I am finished, my gown is soaked in sweat and the fire in my chest has re-ignited.

At last my hand lies before my face, appearing a pale fleshy blur to me without my glasses. I do not need to see it to know how repulsive it appears, atrophied and contracted by muscle wasting. My fingers twitch and wiggle powerlessly. Hands that once served me well -- starting IV's on the worst veins, wielding tools to open the most crumpled vehicles -- fail me. I can not grasp the tube hanging in a wide loop from my nose. Closing my eyes, I fight for self-control, reaching for a last scrap of the person I once was. I must not panic. Slowly, carefully, dispassionately, I succeed in tangling the tube around my fingers.

I inch my hand to the edge of the bed. The milky liquid being pumped through the NG tube fills my throat, surrounding the endotracheal tube in a warm, foul-smelling tide. My arm reaches the precipice at the edge of the bed and gravity does the rest. My stomach acid burns the inside of my nose as the tube comes free. The unwanted feeding drips on the floor. Good, it is done.

There is no alarm. If I had pulled out the ET tube or maybe even the IV there would have been, but the feeding pump is not that sensitive. It continues to operate, whirring and humming away, pumping nutrition merrily to where it can do no one any good. After a while the milky sweet odor of the tube feeding spilling onto the floor becomes overwhelming. I'd work on the IV next, but I'm not sure I have any strength left. For now, it's a small triumph but an important one - I feel strangely elated by it, though I know it can't last. I close my eyes and try to relax so the sweat covering my face can dry.

Half an hour later, the nurse comes in to check on me and finds the sticky liquid mess on the floor. She swears, sharply and briefly, before leaving the room to fetch a doctor. I can hear her making excuses all the way back up the quiet hallway, offering explanations.

The intern-on-call is very young and has obviously not dealt with a stubborn tube-pulling end-stage ALS patient before. He should consider himself lucky I'm not Gage. Right now, I know that if they try to put the NG tube back in me, they will have to use a sedative; I'm feeling angry and frustrated enough at the prospect to bite.

******

Taking the elevator up to the ICU brings back memories I'd rather not have. The last time I was here was with Johnny. I came day after day, sometimes rode up with supplies in my arms. It was a daily visit to hell. I have stumbled on the body of a pregnant woman burned alive in a flea-bag, fire trap of a motel. Seen the possibility for new-life split open like a rotten melon and sat quietly waiting for the coroner; then, after the body bag was gone, I drove to the station, washed my hands, ate a sandwich and joked with John.... I had learned to load the psychic trauma in the back of the rig and leave it in receiving. But here I had to tiptoe around it gingerly, moving like you do on blood-slick floors.

The elevator doors slide open. Nothing much has changed. It is my plan to pop in, peek through the door of Brice's room for about two seconds, then leave, go home and try to forget. OK, it's basically a dishonest way of keeping my promise to Johnny, but at this point, I don't care.

I know exactly where to go -- I became entirely too familiar with the ICU layout during Johnny's time here. The rooms are arranged in a semicircle around the Nurse's Station. Cardiac monitors beep and hum; there is no quiet for the ill and dying here. My heart races to keep up with the noise. Spare equipment stands ready in the hallway for any emergency. The rooms have no doors, for privacy gives way here to constant surveillance. Through one opening, I see a victim of a spinal injury, stretched in the metal embrace of a Stryker frame. I blink and shake my head to clear away the image of John's face.

I stop by the entrance of one of the very end rooms. At first I can see nothing but equipment -- a respirator, an IV pump, tubes snaking here, there, and everywhere. An unused feeding pump is shoved against the wall at the head of the bed. The noise from the respirator and the air mattress on the bed is loud in my ears. It takes a while for me to separate the human figure in the bed from the equipment. The body under the sheet is thin, and contracted. Brice's chest rises and falls evenly, pushed by the demands of the vent. His atrophied arms and legs are positioned with pillows.

I finally allow myself to look at his face. With a shudder I realize that he is staring straight at me.

I do not care for the man. I never have, and his illness has not changed that. I can respect his skills and his work, feel pity for his condition, but that is as far as I can go. I am sure the feeling was mutual.

Brice's gaze is alert and intelligent. Damn! I had vaguely expected him to be asleep or confused by drugs. Unfortunately he is not. His gray eyes coldly appraise me, reading more into my presence than he has a right to. He not only knows I am here, I really don't think he much likes the idea of my standing here, staring at him numbly.

I can't look away. His face is expressionless, but his eyes speak his anger, powerlessness, and exhaustion. Unconsciously, I step back. I must acknowledge what I have known all along, what I most objected to about his sharing a room with Gage; what he never failed to make clear to whoever and whatever medical person took care of him -- Brice demands the right to choose death.

Craig never wanted any of this. Yet it has been forced on him, in absolute violation of his wishes.

I want to turn away, walk out the door, leave, go lie to John, say that I saw him, and he's being well taken care of. But I can't. As much as I detest Brice, I can't abandon him to this. Something has gone wrong here. And now I will have to be the one to try and fix it. I turn around and go find a phone.

******

I cannot seem to stop fighting. They gave me a dose of Valium IV push, removed the ET tube and turned off the vent. I drifted off to sleep with a sense of relief at not having that damn thing in my throat and finally being able to get on with the end of my life. No one present, myself included, expected me to last for very much longer after that...a few hours, certainly no longer than a day.

Unluckily, I wake up, foggy and tired and unable to talk, but still very much alive. The antibiotics, IV and tube feeding have bought me more time. My body is going to fight for a little longer yet.

Not too much longer, as my doctor -- my real doctor, back from his vacation and obviously still angry with his temporary replacement -- takes careful pains to explain to me when he arrives. My respiratory capacity is shot; the muscles that I use to breathe with are in bad shape. I am in chronic respiratory failure, and it is not going to get better. He takes the time to explain that this is not painful, that he will make sure I am comfortable, and that my wishes will be followed and that I will not be sent back to the hospital. Then he shakes my hand, wishes me the best, and leaves to write the necessary orders.

I stare at the ceiling and feel a curious mixture of relief and fear.... Fear of the unknown, fear that there will be pain, fear that I have again been lied to and will be dragged back to the hospital to be tortured on the ventilator again and relief that things are finally almost really over. I will at last be allowed to go home.

******

They brought Brice back from the hospital today. I was surprised; I didn't expect him to come back at all. I didn't even realize it was Craig, until I saw the EMTs from the ambulance service take the stretcher into our room. I'd been sitting under the air vent again and listening to the gossip leaking from the nurses' lounge. They still don't know you can eavesdrop on them that way and I hope they never find out, or there goes the most fun you can have around this place.

I head for our room as fast as I can, clipping a respiratory therapist as I go. There are so many people in the room, I can't see him. I can hear a nurse speaking in that special clear, loud and slightly condescending tone reserved for the mute. "Get some rest, Mr. Brice." They pull the drapes tight around the bed. After the staff leaves, I roll over by his bed. The damn curtain tangles around my head. It takes three minutes of incremental advances and retreats, to get my face clear. As soon as I get a good look at him, I knew why he is back so quickly. He's been returned to die.

I almost don't recognize Craig. I had gotten so used to seeing him on a daily basis I never noticed the physical changes… or perhaps I was able to ignore them more easily. The muscle wasting is very apparent now. His breathing is labored and shallow, and I can hear the fluid in his lungs even without a stethoscope. He can no longer even hold his head up easily and it lolls to the side. This seeming relaxation is a sharp and horrifying contrast to his eyes, which are completely alert and reflect both fear and tiredness.

This impersonal and powerless end was what scared him so from the start. It is why he hoarded pills, day by careful day, and then almost wept in sheer frustration when he found that he could no longer open the bottle and get them into his mouth. He is trapped, able to feel and hear everything, but do nothing. He has lost more, too. Frightened as he is, he is no longer fighting. The hospital left his IV line in so the nurses can give him drugs, to deaden the feeling of breathlessness. He is on oxygen. The staff will no longer get him out of bed and into his chair at all. He will be professionally tended, but he never made any friends with any of the staff here, so they will give him no extra effort. No one has time but me.

We make eye contact. He makes the faint snorting sound I have heard from my own throat, a sharp exhalation through the nose. It is what passes for a laugh when you lack the ability to control the muscles in your chest and throat to make a real laugh. The drape is still trailing down the back of my head. I look like a nightmare out of Lawrence of Arabia. For a split second the terror lifts.

"Brice."

******

I sit by Brice's bed and pass the time by telling him what is happening outside the window -- "bird", "doctor", "plane"... His lips pull into a faint smile and I wish I could do more. I do what little I can. He still reads for a few minutes every night. So I stay quiet and still, careful not to disturb him. No nightly battles over the pills hidden in my applesauce and pudding. I don't punch the radio buttons with my stick, trying to find good music, despite the fact that my constant headache makes some of his choices nearly unbearable.

Most of all, I watch the staff. I make sure he is not allowed to suffer. I nag about wrinkled sheets, often until they change my bed in frustration. I check that his IV line is not infected -- some of the people around here are less than hygienic when they get rushed. I listen at night when he wakes and cries -- wait until I'm sure he not hurting in any way they can help. And I keep my silence about his tears.

Roy doesn't understand. Sometimes, I think that I am lucky; at least I know what broke that day. Roy has come to fear death in a way I find surprising, at least until I think about it. Remembering our conversations, I recall dodges I was too self-absorbed to hear -- Joanne and I talked about it some, but mostly I don't like to think about it. Now DeSoto has to think about it. He has made a life out of beating death, outracing it. Now, he realizes, he can not run; it waits on every rope, tangled in every knot, dangling just out of reach. I understand more about dying than he does -- I understand that it is not always the worst thing that can happen.

******

I have finally descended into the hell I have so feared. The months of tending Gage, trying to make peace with that incarnation of powerlessness, have not truly prepared me for this moment. The slide to this place was a slow and nearly invisible loss, at least until I got sick. When I was extubated, I found I could no longer speak. My transformation from paramedic to patient was complete.

John has declared a truce with the staff. The first day I was back, he ate his dinner and took his meds. The combination of these two activities sent the staff into a panic. The student nurse who had drawn the short straw, and was assigned to get the nightly medicated spit shower, ran down the hall to fetch the charge nurse. She came, took his temp, listened to his lungs, questioned him at length about his health.... They still are acting like they expect some new battle to erupt. I miss the antics.

I am lonely. Somehow, despite the constant intrusion of the nurses and doctors, the never ending round of care, I am hungry for human contact. I miss Cheryl, even though it is for the best that our relationship has ended. My body aches for one of her massages. I receive no touch that is not medical.

Gage sits by my bed and talks. We listen to NPR and watch PBS, now. One night, an aide props up a book for me, but she is called away before I complete a page. John holds his stick in his mouth and turns the pages for me, a task I can no longer perform, while I read. I see an old battle-ax of a nurse, who has grown fat, gray and bitter in this job, watching us. Unaccountably, her eyes mist up. I cry too, discovering now, perhaps, why Gage rages rather than grieves; tears are very messy when you have no hands.

******

Craig is finally dying, slow as the process is. The irony is that people are at last coming by to visit, to see him one more time and say goodbye. Many of them haven't been here in months, many much longer. It is just too much for most of the people he knew to deal with. This makes me furious. He could have used the companionship when he could still talk, move -- enjoy their company. Most of his so-called 'friends' had no idea of the horrible reality of Brice's situation and few can bear more than a couple minutes. They blanch, stare at his urine bag, look at the IV... Then they stammer forth some words of small talk. All the while they try not to look at his wasted body or see his struggle to breathe. They deny his suffering reality and steal the final scraps of humanity from his life. Few of them even make the effort to try and communicate, though there is a sign over the bed that details how.

Bob Bellingham comes with a bunch of damn flowers in his hand. He mumbles into his mustache. Within five minutes he flees.

I expected better from Bellingham. I know that he has not visited in a year. As bad as Roy has been about coming, he has never abandoned me for more than a few weeks. DeSoto's guilt and his strong sense of responsibility won't let him.

I followed him into the hallway. Bob's face is white.

As I slammed into his bony legs, all the obscenities I have fought to keep from my lips, all the profanities rained down on my head over the past fifteen years in the field burst forth. "Bastard! F---ing son of bitch!" He tumbles to the floor, tangling in my wheels. I back up.

"Gage!" he shrieks, scuttling across the floor. I can see him trying to recall the protocols for dealing with the insane.

I press my chin to the throttle. I chase him down the hall on his hands and knees. "You! You..." The words lodge in my throat.

"Gage," Bellingham bleats. "What is your problem?" He staggers to his feet. His pants leg is hiked around his calf. I can see the ugly bruise I left on his shin.

"Abandon." I am momentarily stunned. I haven't managed that word since the accident. He takes advantage of my distraction to get behind a cart.

A nurse drawn by the noise runs down the hall. She grabs my chair as I am maneuvering around the cart for another blow. She switches off the motor. "Mr. Gage! Do not hurt the visitors!"

I am dragged away still spouting profanity.

******

I find myself pushed into the Director of Nursing's office, and left there, alone. During the over a year I've been here, this is the first time I've done something that was apparently bad enough to warrant Mean Jean's personal attention. 'Mean Jean' is what the staff nurses call her, half in fear and half in admiration. From what I've seen, she's a force of nature, stamped out of the same mold as perhaps half a dozen other 'in charge' type nurses I've seen. She's not here yet - she's probably out in the hallway convincing Bellingham not to sue the place for letting a crazed quadriplegic run loose with a deadly wheelchair. Maybe I'm being given 'quiet time' to settle myself down - the nursing home equivalent of being banished to the corner to sit. I don't feel settled and have no desire to calm down. Instead, I take the opportunity to look around, mentally selecting which objects I would throw at Bellingham's head if I could, keeping angry.

The room is small. A crowded desk takes up most of one wall, blocking the window. Filing cabinets, a bulletin board overflowing with notices and papers, a coat rack behind the door and two chairs for visitors fill the rest of the space. On the window sill is a small coffeemaker. Apparently, rank has its privileges, because the smell coming from the pot sitting in the machine is pure heaven. A big bright mug on the desk says 'This Nurse Calls The Shots' in big letters. I believe it.

After ten minutes or so, Jean enters. She squeezes by me without a word, plopping herself down into her chair. With a sigh, she leans back and regards me steadily. There is a long minute of silence before she speaks.

"Let's get this straight right now," her voice is very calm and very firm. "I'll do you the favor of not assuming that you're an idiot if you do me the favor of not pretending to be one."

I feel my eyebrows rise involuntarily. She's still looking at me, waiting for a response. I should have known that she was someone who couldn't be snowed; this woman is Dixie squared. Her expression demands an explanation. I manage to surprise myself.

"Bastard never visits," I manage to blurt out. This is the first complete real sentence I've managed since my accident.

To her credit, her demeanor remains calm and unruffled.

"And this is justification for attacking him?" She shakes her head slowly. "I've managed to convince him you're not quite in your right mind. Is that what you want?"

I shrug as best I can manage, a kind of jerk of the muscles around the base of my neck. I'm well aware that Roy's managed to convince everyone I worked with or knew of his personal belief that I'm now half-idiot. Frankly, I don't care anymore.

"Mr. Gage, please consider that people have different ways of coping. At least he's here now, when it probably would have been easier for him to stay away," her lips twitch upward with a suppressed smile. "That having been said -- while I don't exactly approve of running down all our remiss visitors -- it was fun to watch. That doesn't mean I want to see a repeat performance - you got me?"

I almost laugh out loud. I settle for the broadest grin I can manage, quietly regretting that I haven't gotten to know this woman a little sooner. She smiles back while she swivels around in her chair to pour herself a cup of fresh coffee. She's got the pot in her hand when something stops her and she gives me a shrewd, sudden look.

"Don't think I don't know Mr. Brice was sneaking you coffee on the sly..."

My mouth goes dry. 'The caffeine isn't good for your bladder function' speech is coming up.

"...when he could still manage it. Good for him, and good for you."

After half a moment's consideration, she gets up, takes the empty water bottle from its Velcroed spot on my chair, and dumps half the pot into it. She screws the lid back on firmly and adjusts the straw.

"It's still hot, so give it some time to cool," she cautions. "You firemen and your coffee. Do you know your friend Mr. DeSoto just about drains our pot every time he comes? I'm going to start charging him for the aggravation."

She settles back into her chair and her face changes.

"I know it's not easy sharing a room with someone who's dying, even when they're not someone you know or have gotten close to. It's hard now, and it's only going to get harder. Hang in there."

All I can do is nod in answer.

I feel suddenly tired, and I don't object when she gets up and pushes my chair back to my room. Brice is sleeping. His face is slack, and he doesn't seem to be in pain or distressed by whatever dreams he might be having. I sip at my coffee and sit watch.

******

The flood of visitors has died down somewhat, and there is a certain peacefulness in the quiet. We watch TV, mostly. Craig has gotten worse over the last few days, and drifts in and out from one moment to the next, unable to focus long enough to pay any real attention to what's on the screen. So, we skip Nova and Face The Nation and watch Bugs Bunny cartoons instead. He seems to enjoy them, and I do, too. The nurses don't bother me about spending all my time in the room, and they don't force me out to the day room or hallway to 'socialize' with the old folks. I think they've been talked to.

One late afternoon, the phone rings, interrupting Bug's dispute with Daffy as to whether it is Rabbit Season or Duck Season. As if expecting it, a nurse walks in from the hallway and picks up the handset, turning her back to speak in low tones with whoever's on the other end. This is one of Craig's alert and awake periods, and we raise questioning eyebrows at each other before she turns, covering the mouthpiece of the phone with her hand. I feel a brief flash of protective anger. Craig isn't up to an extended phone conversation, especially not one where he can't answer back.

The nurse moves in front of him, making sure she has his attention and he can see her face. I'd love to tell her it isn't necessary - there's not a thing wrong with his hearing. But it is written in stone somewhere that those who are speechless must also automatically be assumed to be deaf. I was guilty of the same careless assumption myself, more than once. Now I know better, from painful experience.

"Mr. Brice," she enunciates carefully, "Mr. Belliveau is on the phone and says he'd like to talk to you. I explained you can't talk back. Is that OK?"

Brice looks startled only briefly and nods, his expression wary. The nurse speaks a few more words into the phone, and then I watch as she untangles the cord and uses a pillow to wedge the headset firmly up to Craig's head in the bed. When he could still talk, but could no longer hold the receiver, he had a fancy headset he used for a bit with the phone. It was messy and complicated and needed to be taken on and off his head. This is by far easier, especially now. The nurse makes sure he's comfortable and then turns down the volume on the TV before she leaves.

I watch Brice's face carefully and imagine Belliveau four states away, trying to find the right words to say to a dying friend. I don't know that this is something I could have done. I always seemed to have more words I needed for the things that weren't important and far too few for those that were.

I think Bob has found the right words. All I can hear from the receiver is the faintest murmur, but I can see clearly in the late afternoon light as Brice smiles just a little....and then closes his eyes in a look of enormous relief and peace. Some kind of permission has just been given, some kind of reassurance that all will be well.

I have to look away.

******

I am sleepy all the time. My doctor was right, hypoxia makes an excellent narcotic. I no longer have the desire or attention span to read and my glasses sit unused in their case on the nightstand. Nothing hurts, but it takes an effort to concentrate on anything for more than a very short while, and I find I am becoming less and less inclined to do so.

I could stop all this right now, if I wanted to, end up attached to a portable ventilator, feeding tube in my stomach, communicating in blinks and eye motions, a wraith in a wheelchair for another two or three years. I decided a long time ago that I didn’t want that -- a literary reference pops at random into my head, the Nazgul in Tolkien’s classic trilogy, disembodied spirits robbed of all their humanity.

People come and go, staff, visitors…. Bellingham actually visited, with flowers, yet. What did he expect to do, stick them between my hands? While I am sleepy, I am not totally out of it and almost choked myself trying to laugh when I overheard the nurses talking about the ensuing commotion with Gage. Apparently, while he has called truce with the staff, he hasn’t done so with the visitors. Good.

The evening after Belliveau calls, Dixie shows up. I thought she had come to visit Gage, but she whispers in his ear and he disappears. She proceeds to chase off the regular nurses. She fills a basin with hot water, spreads towels, lotion and soap.

When I first came here, I read about death and dying. I studied what different cultures did for their dying, trying to find some meaning in what was happening to me. I even read what the tribe Gage is from does.

I stopped reading when it started to become painfully obvious that most of what different cultures do were inapplicable to me, being dependant on the vital, active presence of close friends and family. I had neither; I realized early on what was in store for me, alone in nursing home or hospital. Or so I had thought…

Dixie has come to enact some ritual to ease my passing. She bathes and massages me. This simple act is profoundly touching. Rather than withdrawing, she acknowledges what is happening. We ‘talk’ a bit, and I end up falling asleep under the gentle touch of her hands on my skin.

*******

I am running down the beach. It’s early morning, and the day is showing promise – the air and sky are perfectly clear, it’s just a little bit cool, and the beach itself is quiet and calm. The only sounds I can hear are the waves and the birds.

This is wonderful. Each step is falling in place perfectly, I’ve got a good rhythm and I think I could just keep running up the beach forever, it’s that effortless. I love hitting that groove where everything is right and perfect and peaceful. It’s a moment worth hanging on to.

I lose it. I wake up to find myself being turned, cleaned, pulled up in the bed, my body manipulated like a sack of potatoes. If I could protest, I would. This is not where I want to be.

I hear a voice from close by, rough but carefully enunciated. "Here."

It’s Gage. I still don’t know why he stays. He is always here when I wake, though I fear I am no longer decent company. The nursing aides have turned me on my side, and I hear the hum of his wheelchair as he moves around the bed where I can see him. I can move my head with effort, but it’s kind of him to make that unnecessary. The head of the bed is jacked up to a Fowler’s position, supposedly to help my breathing. I wish they wouldn’t do that. I end up sliding to the bottom in no time at all and then they come in and move me around some more…

I’m getting sleepy again. Time to go to bed, Craig, never know when the tones might go off. A good night’s sleep would be nice. Maybe Bellingham won’t snore this time….or is it DeSoto? If Gage is here, am I at 51’s? Does it really matter? Maybe I can go running on the beach when we get off, if we don’t get called out tonight. That would be perfect. Back to the beach….

*******

I am frantic. Where is Roy?

I sit beside Craig's bed and listen to his failing breathing. Since Bob's phone call a day ago,I have watched him slip rapidly from sleepiness into confusion into complete stupor. I talk to him, although articulation and meaning fled hours ago, so I hum and hiss and moan at him to let him know he is not alone. My throat aches. I am watching the worst death I can imagine. I have seen total strangers, their bodies inextricably melded to the metal of their automobiles, shown more compassion. I am seeing what will happen to me.

Someone should hold his hand.

I pray DeSoto is not on duty; I no longer know which shift is on at 51's. Hours ago, I drove the staff nuts sitting in front of the nurses' station chanting his name over and over until they called Joanne. Now, I listen as they strip my bed, throw my belongings in a box, and prepare to move me. A nurse kneels beside my chair, explaining that his brain has been damaged by the worsening hypoxia. The paramedic I was knows she is right, but at this moment I am an Oglala who knows that Brice's soul sits watching his body die, unloved and unmourned. She firmly takes my chin forcing me to look at her.

"We're going to take you down the hall."

Every scrap of autonomy has been torn from me. I'm a breathing piece of furniture, rearranged to suit the needs of others. The sanctity of my body has been violated so many times, I no longer feel connected to my flesh. But this is beyond my ability to endure. "No!" For the first time since I fell, I scream. So does she. I have done lots of nasty thing to the staff, but I have never bitten one before.

Roy bursts through the door at a dead run, his eyes wide and face ashen with fatigue. Even from ten feet away I can smell the smoke of a bad fire in his hair. He assesses the situation with the same quick sweep he uses at accident scenes.

Since no one thinks I am still a man, myself included, it does not matter if I weep like a child or woman. Tears slide down my cheeks.

"Johnny?" asks Roy. Then he grabs the bitten nurse's arm, leading her into the hall.

I can hear the low hum of their voices. The behemoth from transport stares at me, calculating safe angles for grabbing my chair. Craig's respirations no longer follow an even pattern.

Roy comes back. The nurse gestures to the attendant.

"Roy. Hand." He does not understand me. Then he moves to stand beside us. Slowly he reaches down and removes the splint that forces my fingers to lie flat. He lifts my arm, places it over Craig's hand, and holds it in place. The uneven pull of my useless muscles tighten my fingers around his limp hand. In a rare moment of understanding DeSoto touches my hair, remembering I can't feel a pat on the shoulder. We stand that way until Brice's body is still.

******

One of the nurses took the time to read Craig's obituary to me. Someone paid for the longer, detailed column instead of the usual dry listing. It included the standard Department press release detailing his work and accomplishments. I had known in a vague way, but had never bothered to tally, all the various work-related causes, committees, charity drives, etc he was involved in. No relatives listed, no flowers, private service with the Department chaplain. Everything prearranged and pre-paid so as to cause no fuss to anyone. "Donations to the ALS Society of California."

After she left, I sat -- eyes closed -- listening to the mental echo of her voice. I imagined Brice's spirit lingering in this place, waiting for the tones to call him to the other side.

Roy is fighting me about the service. He knows I want to go. It would involve getting hold of a van with a wheelchair lift. That shouldn't be a problem. Brookside owns one and doesn't mind providing a little taxi service; it's how I get to my doctor's appointments. He has any number of reasons -- too tiring for me, access problems, no clothes… And he's right on the last. I have nothing but casual clothes, some for warmer weather, some for cooler. I don't own even one outfit suitable for a religious service of any kind.

However, I am wondering if he is embarrassed by me. He still clings to the notion that I am half-idiot, unable to either appreciate or miss going to the memorial service. This belief may allow him to sleep better, but I am not a child to be placated with candy or ice cream. Fudge ripple isn't going to buy him peace this time. I am tempted, the next time he is here with visitors, to flop my head around and drool and show him what a real vegetative patient looks like. It would serve him right.

It seems I have an unexpected ally in Joanne.

One day when Roy was on-shift, she showed up with her sewing machine and a couple of shopping bags. She sets up the machine, shuts the door, and starts to work. She spreads the supplies over Craig's bed. I imagined the fabric picking up the shape of Brice's wasted frame. Joanne takes measurements of my body, pins things carefully, and talks to me as if I were still a real person.

It takes almost all of the afternoon. When she is done, she holds up what looks to be a perfectly normal dress suit. Joanne then proceeds to dress me -- by herself -- which is amazing enough. The easy, practiced rolls and lifts remind me that I have shrunken to a shadow of myself. Everything fits. She has worked miracles with Velcro strips and an off-the-rack suit two sizes too large. The shirtfront is false, the seams of the pants and the jacket come undone easily, and the pants do not hike up to my nipple line.

Joanne leans over to adjust something at the collar and I kiss her. We both freeze in a moment of surprise. She smells a little like powder, a little like hairspray, and a little like cedar from the pencil she has forgotten she has tucked behind her ear. For a minute, I remember Mama and home, seeing the gray ramparts of the Badlands above Coyote Creek. Transported, I inhale. She straightens.

"Thanks." I manage to say the word very carefully and clearly.

She blushes, finishes her adjustments. "I did some sewing for Jennifer's high school drama department." She steps back, admiring her work. "I learned a lot of tricks that way - it's easy to get on and it looks good on you. Now you'll have something to get dressed up in."

"Roy?" I ask. I have learned to make words count.

"Let ME handle Roy." Joanne shakes her head, grumbling to herself under her breath. She undresses me.

When she is done, she puts a towel around my neck and gives me a haircut. She is gentle and skilled, despite her protestations that Roy doesn't give her much chance to practice anymore. Her smooth fingers in my hair feel good. I find myself laughing, despite all that has happened the last few days. It delightful to spend time with a woman who doesn't treat me like an vegetable, who isn't interested in me only as a patient, but is a good friend and nothing more. The pressure is off.

When she is done, my hair looks good too. Even the gray has its place and seems to belong. I wish I had a way to thank her for making me a human again for one short afternoon.

******

Brice's funeral is better attended than I expected. It's held in a small chapel at the cemetery - convenient. The casket is closed. Despite the request in the obituary, there are a few flower arrangements, and there is a restrained spray of mums and carnations on the casket -- nothing ostentatious, nothing in the least feminine - Brice would have approved.

I recognize many faces. There are people here today I haven't seen in two years -- most of the crew from Station 16, other paramedics and their families, Department officials, staff from Rampart.... There are a few people from the nursing home as well. I am parked quietly in the handicapped-accessible area at the back next to Joanne while Roy joins the group in dress blues up front -- he must be a pallbearer. He's still angry at me about being here; he didn't say more than five words to me on the trip over.

I hold my head up straight, keep my mouth shut, and try to look intelligent in my new suit and haircut. I'm used to Roy thinking I'm an idiot, but I'll be damned if I give anyone else a reason to agree with him. I sense eyes on me, and I know I'm being glanced at and whispered over. I stare ahead and concentrate as everyone settles into their seats and the service begins.

It's nondenominational, and brief. I get the feeling the chaplain is delivering 'standard service #4' or some such. The entire time I shared a room with Brice, I never saw him express any religious sentiments of any kind. Various pastors, chaplains, priests, nuns and other assorted visitors of that type would come by, and he would always politely refuse their services. He always refused for me as well, something I was thankful for more than once. I hate being preached at.

******

Afterwards, everyone slowly drifts off to their cars to leave. There will be a gathering at Roy's house, and I am both anticipating it and dreading it -- if Roy decides I'm allowed to attend, that is. He loads my chair into the lift-van in silence, his face frozen. He is still not talking to me, apparently. I spend the trip staring out the window while Joanne makes a half-hearted effort to make small talk and Roy replies to her in monosyllables.

By the time we arrive, some of the other wives have already gotten there and are starting to set up. I've seen this before at these post-funeral gatherings -- back when I was still working -- this mutual-aid agreement they have. It reminds me of home. And for a fleeting moment, I am back on the rez. My people may miss weddings, graduations, birthdays... but not funerals. I have seen this uniquely feminine form of mourning many times, a quiet bustle of grief that affirms the continuation of life. In the past, I was always comforted by this, but not today.

Food is laid out buffet-style on the dining room table -- a baked ham, green bean casserole, fruit salad, bread, chips, condiments, cookies.... nothing I could eat, even if I were hungry for it. But I'm not; my mouth tastes of ashes.

Joanne moves my chair to a good spot in the family room area, one I liked while I lived here because of the view. I can see the backyard, kitchen, dining room and living room all easily. It's not too central and not too secluded. People begin to trickle in as I watch, and their voices fill the house. Soon the smell of fresh coffee coming from the institutional-sized percolator set up in the kitchen begins to drift through the room.

They tell Brice stories. All about his days in the Department. It is like he died two years ago. I want to tell them about Brice and the plant, about Cheryl, about the fire map and his fight for dignity. But they will not understand.

They can not understand. They'd find the stories pathetic, not funny, romantic or brave.

I wish I had the words to describe his eyes the night he came back from the beach, the day he learned to be happy. In the end, they never knew Craig Brice; only in his final days, did he know himself.

******

Outside the window, the stars are bright. Amazingly, despite L.A.'s lights, I can see the same patterns I watched at home as a boy. It seems that if I could just move, I could touch them.

Tonight, I lie awake in bed, throat aching and bitterly lonely. That seems to be the defining word in my life lately. Brice helped fill the gaps, and now there's no one left. The room is too quiet. I got used to the rough sound of his breathing and now its absence is palpable. The air is filled with ghosts. There must be many in this place.

I want someone to talk to, someone who will make the effort to understand what I'm saying; not like Roy, who either tunes me out or makes assumptions about what I mean before I'm even finished. Brice had time….and nothing else to beat back the boredom, which must have been horrific for someone with his intellect. It started that way. I'd like to think we ended up as friends.

I know I'll lose most of the speaking skills I've worked on so hard if I don't keep using them. The problem is, I have no one to talk to and nothing to talk about. I cannot imagine conversing casually with the Alzheimer's patients about the quality of the slop we had for breakfast this morning or the soap operas on TV.

I want someone to spend time with me. I want someone to touch me. I want things I don't dare name, even to myself. I want to get up out of this bed and walk. I want my life back. I want this life over with.

I want to be able to wipe my own tears away when I cry....

******

I finally got the phone call I have been anticipating -- and dreading. The nursing home calls to tell me John has been taken to Rampart. I freeze, my mind filling in the details of all the scenarios I had been imagining. Joanne pulls the phone from my hand, gathers the relevant details from the nurse on the other end, and steers me to the car.

The flu -- a likely death sentence for a weakened and malnourished C4. I slump in the passenger seat, staring into the headlights of oncoming cars, each flash an explosion of memory. Until today, I had most dreaded the tone out for a high angle rescue; now, my greatest terror was my own heart. For I have so betrayed John, I no longer fear his death.

All the way up in the elevator, I try to find some compelling reason to want him to survive. Joanne touches me, whispering words of reassurance. I turn away from her, not wanting her to read what was in my soul, on my face, in my eyes.

An intern corners me just inside the Unit. He wants to be aggressive, fluids, antibiotics, a ventilator, whatever it would take. I stare at him wordlessly. He says John was still young, that this is treatable. Then he mentions concerns about his kidneys. Apparently Johnny's bloodwork is off. Would I try and convince him to consent to dialysis? Joanne glares and pushes me past him. One of the nurses grabs his arm, distracting him with another patient’s problems.

Johnny lies in a private room on the intensive care floor. His respirations are more shallow and rapid than usual. His face is flushed and feverish and his eyes moist and bright. He watches me as I enter. I block the part of my mind which continually assesses the physical condition of those around me, isolating myself even as I see the familiar probing look he had used in the field.

"Johnny, you need to lick this thing. It's just the flu." Sometimes I want to rip out my tongue to prevent stupid comments from escaping between my lips.

His face contorts with that look of intense concentration he gets before trying to talk. Since Brice died, he has slipped slowly into his former silence. Increasingly, I have to anticipate his words. This time, though, I can not imagine what he was going to say. This time I listen.

"Freedom," he says, smiling and closing his eyes.

I choke on my pounding heart. "Johnny...." But he won't look at me; he just smiles.

There isn't a whole lot more I can do then, other than actually be the friend I have only pretended to be for a long time. I leave Joanne to sit with him, stroking his hair gently, and I go and completely and absolutely refuse to consent to anything the Intern wanted. I owe John that much. Afterwards, I return to his beside, displace Joanne and sit with my partner.

Four days later, John Gage finished his long fall to earth.

**********
(Return to Part I)