In any case, the discovery, and the possibility of visiting Winter, sent a fresh jolt of adrenaline through Rob’s veins. He would indeed grab a bite at the tubes, then catch the train to Yonkers. As he headed for the train, he tried Sunali again.
She was still completely blocked; he couldn’t even leave a message. Since Cryomed had been unwilling to answer questions about the policy on “salvage,” he was running out of options. The thought of having to contact Lorelei and ask for a favor made him cringe.
Winter didn’t comment about Rob forgetting his lute, which made him feel better about forgetting it.
“How long has it been?” she asked.
“Believe it or not, less than three weeks. Some kind soul deposited the fee into my account anonymously. Isn’t that incredible?”
Winter tried to smile, her stiff lips trembling. “Unbelievable. Do you have any idea who it was?”
He was tempted to mention Sunali, but didn’t want to eat up precious time explaining who she was and how Rob knew her. “Not really. I don’t know many people with that kind of money.”
“Well, if you find out, tell them thanks for me.”
“I will.”
“For a second I thought it might be Nathan, my ex, but then I remembered he doesn’t even know you.”
“Yeah, probably not him.” Rob felt unsure whether he should tell Winter he and Nathan were now friends. She might think it was weird that Rob had sought out her ex, even if it was only to try to convince him to visit her.
“I guess Nathan isn’t coming back,” Winter said.
“He hasn’t visited again,” Rob said, half statement, half question. The topic gave him an opening. He tried to sound casual. “So, have you had other visitors?” He swallowed, hoping his nervousness, his eagerness to hear the answer, didn’t show.
“A few. Two dates.” She grunted. “Dates. What a strange word for it.” She studied Rob’s face for a moment. “They’re not like your visits, though. I have to let the client lead the conversation. I have to act all warm and peppy and fake. This is the only time I have to think, to talk about what I want to talk about.”
Rob suspected Winter was worried he might visit less often if he thought others were visiting. Maybe she even sensed that he was having moments of weakness, when he thought of abandoning her altogether. He promised himself he would never give in to that weakness. “Well, I’m glad my visits help, because I have no plans to stop.”
She seemed to relax. “I appreciate that.”
A few seconds ticked by; Rob was distracted trying to decide whether two visitors, plus his visits, was enough.
“You know, I don’t know anything about you,” Winter said. “Where do you live?”
“With my dad.” He didn’t add that it was a new arrangement.
“You must get along with him okay?”
“I do. He’s a barber, out in the suburbs.”
“How far out?”
“Not too far. New City.” Of course the name of the town itself wasn’t the issue; asking how far out someone lived was a way to gauge how poor they were.
It felt like a frivolous waste of time, to be talking about himself, but it made sense that Winter wanted to learn more about him. He was a complete stranger. “Mom died ten years ago. Dad has a simulation of her running all day long. All day.” Rob shook his head. “It’s like her ghost, wandering the halls, sitting at the table with us, eating invisible food.”
“That’s beautiful, in an unsettling way. He must have loved her so much. How did she die, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“Cervical cancer.”
“Head nod. I’m sorry.”
There was no need for Rob to elaborate. She’d died of a curable disease. Winter would know they did the usual desperate things people do to try to raise money when a loved one gets a curable terminal illness. Both Rob and his dad had worked second jobs, they’d appealed to friends and relatives, posted a donation site on the web, sold everything of value. By the time his mom died, they’d raised close to fifty thousand dollars. They were seven hundred thousand short.
“Your profile said both your parents are gone?” Rob asked.
“In the ground. Dad in a construction accident. Mom died in her sleep.”
Rob nodded. Autopsies cost money.
“Although it’s more complicated than that makes it sound. My mom was married seven times, if you count the four times she married my father.”
Rob winced. “Sounds like a rough childhood.”
“Shrug,” Winter said. “Not as bad as some. How much time?” Winter asked.
“Two minutes.”
“Can you do something for me?”
“Anything.”
“One of the men who visited said I would be a costly bride, but he wouldn’t elaborate. Can you tell me what injuries I have?”
Rob felt like he’d been socked in the stomach. He still remembered the first few items on the list, the ones he reached before he had to stop. “Are you sure you want to know?”
“I do.”
He tried to think of some way to say no, to run out the clock, but he could think of no polite way to do that.
Reluctantly, he read off the profile set in the screen on the wall. “Severed spine between the third and fourth lumbar. Crushed kidney. Crushed liver.” Winter’s eyes got huge, her mouth an O of surprise. Rob took a breath, tried to run through the rest of the long list as quickly as possible. “Forty percent of large intestine gone. Shattered pelvis, broken left femur, broken left knee, shattered—”
“Stop,” she shouted. “Oh my God.” Her eyes darted left and right. “I have to get out of here—”
“It’s all right,” Rob said. But it wasn’t all right, it was the exact opposite of all right.
“I can’t—” Her eyes went blank, her face slack. Air hissed between lifeless blue lips.
“We apologize for cutting your time short,” a disembodied woman’s voice said. “You had twenty-one seconds left. We’ve reimbursed the prorated amount. You’re welcome to visit Miss West again at your convenience.”
“Thank you,” Rob said, not knowing what else to say. He rose on wobbly legs, feeling suddenly tired beyond words. He had no idea how he would make it home, let alone to work in seven hours.
26
Rob
Rob’s handheld woke him at five a.m. for work. Even as he struggled toward consciousness, he was accosted by images of Winter, terrified, pleading to get out.
He had to find a way to get her out of there. Dragging himself out of bed, Rob pulled on the same flannel pants and shirt he’d worn the day before. At the recycling center, no one noticed any one particular foul odor.
In the Business Room, his dad was giving a haircut to an ancient guy in weathered frankenboots. The man had no arms. In all likelihood he was, like Rob’s own long-dead grandparents, one of the ten-percenters. That must have been some time to be alive, when ten percent of the children born were deformed, and grew up to be a very angry generation indeed when the cause of their suffering was discovered to be a food additive—a chemical that coagulated ice cream so it could more easily be eaten off a stick without melting. Through the mirror, the old guy saw Rob standing in the doorway. He nodded, and Rob nodded back.
After a night of little sleep, he was beyond tired; he was in that wired, headachy zone that was becoming so familiar, between the long hours of work and the relentless anguish.