Fine by me. I’m getting double pay here—my nursing wage along with a per diem fromStormline. I’ll get Murray the facts he needs on what’s going in and out of here. I’ll do a good job. Work my way back.
Each of the ten nurses under Zara oversees the medical care of ten patients. They all seem to know I have Patient 34. I suspect I got him because I’m new, and he’s the dangerous one nobody wants.
I was surprised when Zara called him an escape artist. The layers of security here are insane—how could anyone escape? “So how many times has Patient 34 tried to break out?” I ask. “Has he actually gotten close?”
They glance at each other the way people do when there’s juicy gossip. Soon the stories are flying.
It seems Patient 34 once used a ballpoint pen to wear down his canvas wrist restraint. Another time he got free and tied up orderlies and nurses. He has smashed through the supply closet door and two walls. He has jumped through safety glass. He once beat up five stun-gun-wielding orderlies.
Twice Patient 34 has made it to the parking lot. The electrified fence stopped him once. For the most recent attempt, he created his own rubber mitts with art materials. He smashed Donny’s head on a wall, knocking him out, and almost made it, but the guards around the perimeter took him down with tranquilizer guns.
It seems the Fancher Institute has implemented quite a number of new features thanks to Patient 34. The general consensus is that he won’t be trying to escape anymore, but people are a little voodoo about him.
“Why doesn’t he have a name?” I ask.
“Because he’s a John Doe,” one of them says, like I’m stupid.
“But surely he knows his own name,” I say. “He could’ve told you it before he was so sedated.”
“Patient 34 cooperates with nobody.”
“What was his original conviction?”
“We don’t have that,” Nurse Zara snaps, like it’s an outrageous question, which it definitely isn’t.
It’s important to know whether a patient is a firebug, whether they have women issues, various triggers, all of that. All they know about Patient 34 is that it was some sort of violent assault around a year ago. “A year and some change” is how Zara had put it.
“The rumor is that he’s in WITSEC,” one of the guys says. “That the stuff is sealed for his own protection.”
I nod like this sounds reasonable. It’s not. If he was in witness protection, he’d have a fake name and a fake history. “Who handles his board hearings?”
“Fancher,” one of the nurses says. “You could ask him about it,” she adds with an innocent shrug. People’s faces are carefully blank. Which tells me that going all the way to the top of the Fancher Institute—to Dr. Fancher himself—is a bad idea.
Still, I think about it. I pass Fancher’s office on my way to HR to drop off my insurance forms. His door is cracked. I pause. I tell myself not to get curious. I tell myself Patient 34’s story is irrelevant.
And I knock. And then I think,fuck fuck fuck.
A booming voice: “Come in.”
Dr. Fancher is a man of about fifty with a military haircut, strangely wet lips, and frontally placed eyes just like Donny. In fact he looks a lot like Donny. Possibly a relative. Great.
“I wanted to introduce myself. I’m Ann Saybrook—I just joined the team on the MI&D wing.”
“Welcome.” He taps his pen. He doesn’t get up.
“Are you and Donny—”
“He’s my nephew,” Dr. Fancher says. “So far, so good?” He asks this in a way where you know the only answers he wants to hear is “yup-thanks-bye!”
“Yup.” I smile. I should go away. I’m not here to draw attention to myself. At least that’s what I’m repeating over and over in my head. But I keep picturing Patient 34 in his crazy restraints, and Donny’s hatred of him, and the way he looked at me.
The way hefelt. So intense. So alive.
I suck in a breath. “Patient 34 is one of my cases, and I noticed there’s not much on him in terms of family history or incident history. The more I know, the better care I can deliver.”
Fancher levels his gaze at me. “If we were at liberty to add that information to his chart, we’d add that to his chart, don’t you think?” He says it as though I’m just a little slow-witted. “I don’t imagine you could have any issues with him already…”
“Everything’s going great.” I give him my best “no-threat-here!” smile. “I just want to deliver the best care possible.”