Again, he refused to say anything. Tommy would be damned if he showed any weakness to this asshole. It became almost a game, to see who would break the quiet first.
Dr. Reischtal seemed not to notice. Thoughts bubbled up and he merely said, “It will be interesting to observe your condition in the coming hours.”
Tommy ignored the ominous aspects of this remark, and tried to push his luck. “You think you could turn me loose? I gotta take a leak fucking awful.”
At first, Dr. Reischtal refused to answer. He walked to the door and knocked. It opened almost immediately. “Mr. Krazinsky is in need of a Foley catheter,” Dr. Reischtal told the tech. “See that it is done and soon. I would hate to think that he is in any discomfort.” He stopped and looked back at Tommy. “One more thing. Upon further review of his case, Mr. Krazinsky will not need any further sedatives. I want him . . . alert.”
“God is not in the details,” Mr. Ullman was fond of telling his subordinates. “I am. And if you want to remain employed with this hotel, you will do well to remember me.” This was true. Employees had found themselves in the unemployment line with a suddenness that made their heads spin for something as seemingly simple as an unshaven chin, an unequal portions of risotto, or missing a single pubic hair on the black tiles under the toilet.
In the six months since the grand opening, it had become clear that the name of the building had irrevocably become The Fin, and although the owners had initially balked at the simplistic nickname, they had since come to recognize the value of such a branding. In the first few months, they had quietly co-opted the name, trademarked it, and now they embraced it.
The incident involving the homeless and the resulting bedbug infestation had nearly ended Mr. Ullman’s own career. After an unpleasant discussion with the CEO and board of directors, he had been allowed to keep his position, but he been placed on probation. Grateful for his second chance, he redoubled his efforts in making the Serenity the cleanest hotel in Chicago, if not the nation. He was merciless. His eyes would zero in on details such as a scuff mark on the inside of an elevator, a stray thread on a pillowcase, or a smudged fingerprint on a vase of flowers in the lobby. Every single employee in the building knew his name and feared his wrath.
In addition to the unprecedented levels of sanitation, he also went to war on the insect population. An army of contractors went through the skyscraper, injecting a silicone sealant in every gap, every crack. Entire floors were repainted to hide these efforts. Each room was then sealed off in a rotating basis and blasted with highly pressurized steam. Professional-grade insecticide was now standard issue along with the rest of the cleaning products. The union didn’t like it much, but after one short meeting with the general manager, the hotel now included new heavy-duty rubber gloves and a surgical mask for the staff.
With Mr. Ullman in charge, the bugs didn’t stand a chance.
Back in the car, Ed turned left onto Wacker immediately after crossing the bridge. They cruised along the emergency side of the hospital, noting the shadows of soldiers within the doors. He circled the block, slowed down, timing it so he’d hit a yellow stoplight, then red. That way, they could take a full thirty seconds to watch the hospital.
But they saw nothing.
They kept circling, weaving around a five-to-seven-block radius several times before they saw any movement. A bus had pulled up in the empty emergency lane, discharging a group of tired, confused-looking people, all struggling to haul medical equipment and small luggage bags inside.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say that a bunch of doctors or scientists or folks like that just got off that bus,” Ed said.
“Good thing you know better,” Sam said.
Ed drove down Monroe a few blocks, then circled around to Adams, and parked in the shadow of the Willis Tower. “I’m getting sick of driving in circles.”
Sam nodded, watching the late morning commuters shuffle to work.
“We’re not gonna see anything from the outside. Not anything that they don’t want anybody to see.”
Sam nodded again. “You wanna go inside?”
“Not especially.”
“Me neither. Not yet, anyway.”
“Any ideas?”
Sam sat for a moment and didn’t answer. He shrugged. “Make some calls. Check email. Listen to the radio. Go for a ride.” They said together, “What the hell, I ain’t paying for gas.”
Ed plotted a course west out of downtown to Lake Shore Drive and turned south when he hit the lake. They passed the Field Museum and Soldier Field.
Sam yawned. It surprised him. He turned his radio off. “I think I’m gonna try to sleep,” he said.
Ed nodded, turned down his own radio, and found a talk-radio AM station on the car’s stereo, the frenzied hosts doing whatever they could to make everything sound like the world was about to crash into chaos and death. He turned the volume low, so it could serve as soothing white noise for Sam. Ed knew the truth.
Sam had never talked about his insomnia, but he’d never tried to hide it either. He adjusted his seat back, getting just enough of a incline to rest his skull against the doorframe, just out of sight of the side window. He held his notebook in his lap, and sunglasses so he could close his eyes and no one could tell he was asleep.
Ed drove while Sam slept. Since his partner was out, he tried to look at the world with both of their eyes. Problem was, Sam was more paranoid than a meth addict on a seven-day bender; but he still had this preternatural sense of who was dangerous and who wasn’t.
Ed never could find that fine line; almost always he was either too disbelieving or too trusting. He drove slowly, letting the motions of the car help Sam get some sleep. They passed hulking shells of empty project homes. This was August, and nature ran rampant through unkempt concrete. Trees, bushes, grass all exploded with life, as if the warm, thick air acted as a kind of steroid.
He kept the AC on for Sam, but rolled down the driver’s window. When he was thinking and driving through the city, he preferred to breathe the same air as everybody else on the streets. He wanted to hear everything, to feel the heat.
Nothing was happening, at least as far as this new threat was concerned, though. Oh, there was the usual shit, of course. Gangbangers swaggering down their blocks, itching for any excuse to prove their manhood. Certifiably brain-dead patients behind the wheels of vehicles. Public intoxication. Crack passing hands in the open sunlight. Zombies, almost always women, stumbling along, clear victims of domestic abuse, all bruised up. Some with blood still in their hair. If Ed felt like it, he could park the damn car on one corner and arrest five people inside of fifteen minutes.
But there was nothing concrete he could put his finger on, nothing that he could stop and wake Sam for, nothing that he could point to with clear conviction and say yes, there, right there is irrefutable evidence of the problem. So he kept driving. Up and down avenues along the South Side. Through areas that resembled nothing more than bombed-out wasteland where people eked out a living, once step ahead of homelessness and starvation.
The unwelcome cousins of paranoia and frustration started creeping into his thoughts and he decided that a possible solution was simply to become more paranoid, like Sam. So he found a quiet street lined with limp, lifeless trees and ravaged three-flats, pulled over, and fished in his sport coat for a blunt. He fired it up, took three deep hits. He stubbed the end out and stashed the blunt back in an inside pocket.
He drove to the end of the block, exhaling through his nose. Already, the air felt denser, the sounds were crisper, and the situation seemed more definable in his head. He turned off the radio, driving aimlessly, and tried to lay it out.