He detected an unusual scent, one that he felt held some special meaning for him. It’s called… The word began with a T, he was pretty sure. Turp… tarp… trip. No, not… Turkish, Turkey… Dammit.
Something warm and wet slid down his forehead. I’m sweating, and… I’m feverish. I can feel the heat. I have a fever.
The next thought came together easily—I have to get help. I’m an EMT and I know these things. You have to get the patient to the hospital as soon as possible. You have to get the patient to the…
Turpentine!
The image of an elderly man flashed through his mind. Grandpa. Yes… but also no. It was him, but it was someone else as well. An overlay, like in those CGI time-lapse transitions where the face of one person morphs into that of another. Who…? The man was wearing navy blue coveralls, dusty at the knees. A kind face, round and soft. Glasses, wire-rimmed and inexpensive. Always round.
A ferocious beat boomed in his head and the bodyquake that followed awakened injuries both large and small. Emilio moaned and cried out. There seemed to be something everywhere — arms, legs, chest, shoulders, knees, elbows, neck…
What happened? Why am I—
Vomit charged up his throat, and he turned his head as quickly as he could. It splashed onto the floor with a horrific sound. Now his stomach felt as though it’d been kicked by a horse. He lay motionless for a time, breathing and moaning in equal measure.
The janitor. The high school janitor, Mr. Tilton. “TT,” they used to call him.
This was the blockage in his thoughts, and now that it had cleared, the details began marching in.
I’m in the janitor’s workroom, where the boilers are… I was on a ladder and I fell… I was trying to close the windows because of the storm… because… because…
A luminous terror took up residence inside him.
The radiation!
And the sound. That sweet sound — a text message from Sarah!
The phone was somewhere in his suit, in one of the pockets. He wasn’t sure which — when he was walking, he kept it in a back pocket. When he was sitting, however, he transferred it to the front. He had to find it.
He still couldn’t see much, but now he realized that was because the sun was beginning to set on this nightmare of a day. The checkerboard pattern that seemed to be floating overhead was the plane of ceiling windows, he saw. The dying light made the windows pale and faint, and soon they’d disappear altogether. Pitch-black, he thought. I’ve got to get my phone before that happens.
His EMT training chimed in—Don’t move the patient until help arrives. The irony was not lost on him. How many times had he said that to someone over the phone? How many times had he sped to the site of an accident thinking, Please, God, don’t let anyone be stupid enough to move the patient.
He focused on Sarah again — on her infinite kindness, the remarkable strength that surfaced no matter how formidable the situation, and the smile that never failed to launch a flutter in his stomach. I’m going to do this. I’m going to do it.
Emilio was fairly certain his left shoulder was either broken or dislocated. He lifted his right arm, which was a struggle because it felt like it was filled with concrete, and slowly worked his hand under the long flap that protected the suit’s vertical zipper. Pulling the slider down was ridiculously agonizing; he had to stop every few inches to catch his breath. When it was finally low enough, he slipped his hand into the right pocket of his jeans.
The phone was not there.
Cursing in a croaking whisper, he girded himself for what he knew was coming.
Twisting his torso to reach his back pocket launched fresh currents of torment. He screamed without caring if anyone heard. He had to make repeated attempts, each one stretching his damaged muscles and tendons a little further. By the time he finally anchored his thumb on the pocket flap, tears were running down his cheeks.
The phone wasn’t there, either.
It had to be in one of the pockets on the other side.
Oh no…
25
Marla burst into Corwin’s office not really expecting to find him there; it was simply where she’d decided to begin looking. Yet there he was, sitting at his computer, typing away serenely.
He turned to her in a casual and unhurried manner, as if her arrival was entirely expected. She was stunned by his sallow appearance. He’s aged ten years since this morning, she thought. He was still wearing the navy blazer with the gold buttons that underscored his privileged pedigree, still had the glistening Rolex. But his eyes, so bright and lively before, now had dark bags beneath them, and his single-sweep Ivy League hairstyle was no longer anywhere close to immaculate.
“I know about the plan to stop the leak,” Marla said. “By reopening the sluice gate manually.”
“It’s not a sluice gate, it’s an alternating gate. Similar in operation to that of carburetors in older cars. But you’ve got the basics of it. There’s no other option. We’ve explored them all.”
“And you’re going to do it. You, by yourself. That was the gist of your text message to Ted Ellerton as I understood it. Am I right?”
He put his hands up in a gesture of surrender and said, “I certainly can’t ask someone else, can I?” Then he returned to his typing.
She couldn’t decide at this point if he was being melodramatic or sincere, if he really was planning to go through with this or just playing her in some way.
“It’s a suicide mission.”
Corwin’s fingers stopped again, hovering over the keyboard.
“Possibly.”
“Possibly? How can any protective equipment keep you alive in there?”
“I don’t… I have to try,” he said wearily.
Marla got into the chair directly across from him. “Are you serious about this, or is it some kind of PR thing?”
She saw his jaw tighten just slightly, and for a moment real anger danced in his eyes. Not enough, though, to eclipse the resignation that had settled there.
“It’s bad enough that it has to be done, please don’t make it any harder.” He went back to typing once again. “Now, please, let me finish this.”
“The thought of dying doesn’t bother you?”
“My life’s been over for a while,” he said, giving her one of the most miserable smiles she’d ever seen. “Since the lightning strike, really. The people who have already died, those who will survive but whose health will be permanently compromised — how could anyone live with that burden? Not to mention the years of lawsuits and the public outcry and hatred that are headed my way.” He shook his head. “This has to be done, and it has to be done by me.”
The finality in his voice lingered between them as the typing went on. From all outward appearances, he could have been preparing some banal memorandum. Marla watched for a time without a word. She had encountered just two other people facing imminent death before — a Native American on death row for killing two men in a bar fight, and a soldier on sentry duty in Fallujah. The latter had been chatting amiably with her about his parents’ deli back in Akron, when a bullet zipped out of the darkness and punched a hole through his heart. He died less than two minutes later, after choking his final thoughts into the voice-memo app on her iPhone.