He paused, looked down at his boots and said, “But don’t tell him I said that.”
Sweeney was suddenly thinking too hard to stop and reassure the Sheep.
“Nadia was your nurse,” he said. “In Phoenix.”
The Sheep looked up and smiled and said, “Who says you’re slow?”
“And she knew the family needed a new chemist?”
“The guy before me, the Gerbil, he put his bike down in Oakland. Got run over by a Camaro.”
“So you move from clinic to clinic.”
“You got to go where the work is.”
“And what?” Sweeney said, trying to talk over the anxiety that was rising in his throat. “You do something to the coma patients? What do you do to the patients?”
“We do nothing but help them,” the Sheep said. “This is a total win-win situation here. And if you let us, we can help Danny too.”
“I’m not going to let you near Danny.”
The Sheep gave him a patronizing smile.
“What?” he said. “You’re going to kill us all? You? The pharmacist? Don’t be an idiot all your life, Sweeney. It isn’t necessary. You could turn everything around here if you’d just let go of the fear and let in the truth. I know. Because I did it.”
The stoner voice was slipping a little and Sweeney recognized something behind it.
“You don’t have to be alone,” the Sheep said. “You’re not supposed to be alone. None of us are. Buzz and Nadia and all of us accept you for what you are. You need some family, Sweeney. And we want you. Nadia wants you, I can tell you that. You got to make the leap. That’s all. You think it will kill you, but it’s the only thing that’ll save you at this stage. I don’t think you know how far gone you are. But you can turn the whole thing around tonight.”
“You’re not going to touch my son,” Sweeney said. But there was more panic than resolve in his voice.
“Someone,” the Sheep said, “already touched your son. And it wasn’t us. We didn’t put the boy in the coma, did we? Somebody else did that to him. Somebody else took him away from you. And all those fuckin’ doctors with their fuckin’ promises, they can’t do squat to bring him back.”
Sweeney stared at him.
The Sheep ran a hand over his skull. His head fell back and he closed his eyes for a while before he continued.
“I can help you and I can help Danny. I know I can. I can arrange for a reunion. You want to be with your son again, Sweeney?”
Sweeney sucked on his lips for an answer.
“You got to make the leap,” the Sheep said. “No one can do it for you. You got to be strong and you got to have some faith. I’m not sayin’ it isn’t hard. But you can’t go weak in the middle. This is going to be difficult. I won’t lie to you like those assholes back at the Clinic. It’s going to be frightening. Maybe terrifying. This is dangerous shit. And, yeah, it’s addictive as it gets. You’ve never known real want till you’ve come back from Limbo. But you keep the faith and you’ll make it. Out and back. You trust in Nadia and she’ll take you to the last clinic. That’s the real deal. And you better believe it.”
The Sheep did a little stretch, then he gave Sweeney a quick shoulder hug, stood up, and walked back to his bike.
“You’re not going to be alone anymore,” he said. “After tonight, you’ll be part of the whole thing. Just trust me.”
FROM THAT POINT ON, Sweeney was numb. Wordlessly, he climbed on the back of the Sheep’s bike. They bounced over rocks and bricks as they rolled slowly toward the Harmony, but the passenger felt nothing. Holding on was only a reflex. And so he had no understanding that this was the state toward which he’d been striving for the last year. That place beyond fear and rage. Beyond desire. At last, detachment had found him.
When the Sheep parked, Sweeney sat loose and limp and not quite there. His sensory equipment was working — he saw the Abominations tinkering with a bike, heard their calls from the dock. He smelled oil and beer. Could still feel the shift in weight as the Sheep dismounted. These sensations were registering but without any significance. Their meaning, the ability of their input to shape his reality, had been lost in the moment of the Sheep’s embrace.
Sweeney sat on the back of the bike and waited for nothing in particular, knowing that he could wait until his bones turned to ash.
And it was as if the Abominations sensed this, because after a moment of the usual celebratory uproar upon the Sheep’s arrival, they fell quiet and uneasy. Sweeney heard saliva being gulped over the hump in someone’s throat. He heard boots shuffle on gravel and slow flies circling someone’s beard.
Then Buzz appeared out on the loading apron and looked down on the Sheep and on Sweeney.
“Knew you’d come,” he said.
Sweeney shrugged and said, “Did I have a choice?”
Buzz shook his head.
When Sweeney didn’t get off the bike, Buzz gestured to the Fluke and the Elephant, who lifted him by the arms and dragged him across the yard and up the stairs to the dock. They propped him up in front of Buzz, who looked disappointed.
“You gonna be a dick about this?” he asked.
“I’m not going to be anything at all,” Sweeney said.
Buzz took a deep breath. Sweeney watched the chest fill.
“Shit, son,” Buzz said, “don’t make me bring the bad Buzz out again. Can’t you just believe I’m here to help you?”
“I can’t believe,” Sweeney said, “anything at all.”
The Sheep joined them. Buzz kept his eyes on Sweeney but spoke to the chemist.
“How about you?” he asked. “How’d things go in the cave?”
“I got what I needed,” the Sheep said.
But the comment didn’t seem to bring Buzz much pleasure. He nodded for a few seconds, then said, “So how long you figure this should take?”
The Sheep looked at the two men, then down to his boots.
“If Sweeney helps me—” he began and Buzz said, “Sweeney’ll help.”
“Then we’ll be ready before you know it.”
Another nod, then Buzz said, “You go ahead. I’ll send him up in a minute.”
The Sheep hesitated, but only for a second. He moved to go inside the factory, stopped, turned back to say something, then changed his mind again, and went through the loading bay.
“Nadia misses you,” Buzz said.
Sweeney asked, “Is Danny inside?”
“Danny’s back at the Clinic,” Buzz said. “Safe and sound. Under warm blankets.”
Buzz expected an expression of relief or at least confusion. But the druggist looked as if he’d been spiked with an assful of Thorazine. Maybe given a little electroshock for good measure. The face was slack. Boredlooking. The body was loose, as if a knee to the groin would bring nothing but a dull, slow slump. The guy looked as if he could be deposited on a free bed at the Peck and no one would notice for a week. What the fuck had the Sheep said to him?
“You hear me?” Buzz said, a little louder and faster than he’d intended. “I said your kid was okay.”
“I heard you fine,” Sweeney said.
Buzz leaned into him, dropped his voice. “What the fuck’s the matter with you? You want some food or something?”
“I don’t want anything,” Sweeney said.
Buzz turned to the Fluke and said, “Get him a drink. Then take him up to the Sheep.”