Admissions (8 page)

“Thanks. The rest is kind of a blur … He was on me before I knew what happened,…slapped me around …”

“Oh, my gosh,” Beth says.

“This happened all the time when we were married. Jim beating the living shit out of me. The bastard.”

“Go on.”

“I feel like I’m back there. Look at my hands shaking. I …I don’t think I can go on. Sorry.”

“That’s okay, Autumn. Before we schedule your children for a visit, I’ll help you prepare. Who else has something they would like to share?

“Me. I have something,” Heidi says. “Whew …okay …well …oh, never mind.”

“Go ahead, Heidi,” Dr. Murray says.

“Well …Something really bad happened to me when I was doin’ drugs.”

“It’s okay, kid,” Isabel nudges Heidi with her shoulder.

“I don’t have any eyebrows ‘cuz they shaved off all my hair. My eyebrows didn’t grow back.” Heidi bites her lip.

“They?”

“The guys who attacked me.” Heidi brings her hands to her face.

Dr. Murray reaches out and squeezes Heidi’s arm. Beth snatches two or three tissues out of the box and hands them to Heidi.

“Jesus Christ. Did you call the cops?” Isabel asks.

“Hell, no. You kiddin’? They would’ve busted me for drugs. I didn’t tell nobody.”

“Men are pigs,” Autumn says.

“Yeah.” Heidi wipes her eyes with a wad of Kleenex. She takes a deep breath and tries to smile.

“Can you talk about the attack, Heidi?”

“No, no …not …I’m not ready.”

“Whenever you’re ready, we’re here to listen.”

“Yeah, thanks. Anybody else want to talk?”

“Well, I just want to say I love you,” Isabel says. “I’ll be your mother.”

“Damn it. Don’t make me cry again,” Heidi says. “Gimme a break.”

Chapter 14

I
press my forehead to the glass around the nurses’ station. “She swallowed something again.” Nurse Judy Reinbold and two attendants hustle through the door toward the dayroom.

“Agnes, what did you swallow this time?” Nurse Judy asks.

“My spoon. From lunch.” She lifts her state-issue, pokes around on her stomach. We all keep track of how many items Agnes swallows, even make bets on what she’ll eat next. In the month of December alone, she swallowed fifteen coins, several pop bottle tops, a screw, a crochet hook, a needle, twenty-five beads from OT, bulletin board tacks, and one of the rings off the draperies. Now we can add a spoon to the list. I heard that since Agnes arrived at the hospital a year ago, she’d been in surgery five times. I figure surgery is reserved for the large or particularly pointy and dangerous items she swallows. Castor oil and stomach cramps escort the less damaging items through her system.

“A spoon?” Nurse Judy tips the patient’s head, fishes around in the back of her throat.

“Did it go down?” She runs her fingers along her neck.

Agnes coughs. “Uh-huh. I feel it right here.” She presses her sternum, coughs again, gags.

“You’ll need x-rays, Agnes.” Nurse Judy guides Agnes to her feet, and with her arm around the patient’s shoulder, leads her out of the hall.

“There she goes again,” Isabel says.

“Why does she do that?” Estee asks.

“Agnes just likes attention.”

“Maybe she’s trying to kill herself,” Beth says.

“There’s easier ways to kill yourself,” Heidi says.

“Tried it?”

“Yeah, once. I O.D.’d. My dad kicked me out and I had no place to go. I screwed a guy for some quaaludes. Ate ‘em down as quick as I could, chased ‘em with cherry schnapps. The puke stain’s probably still on the sidewalk in front of the bank.”

“Do you think I’m trying to commit suicide? Like Agnes?” Beth looks down at her feet. “You know, the eating problem? I know if I don’t eat, I’ll …I could …die …but … I …just have to get off Hall 5.”

“You
want
to eat?” Isabel asks.

“I don’t know.”

“Luanne, you tried to kill yourself, right?”

“Yeah. Like I said, I can’t really remember.”

“My mom’s coming this weekend,” Autumn says. “They won’t let me see my kids yet. Mom said they made me some gifts in school.” She sniffs and wipes her nose on her sleeve.

“I don’t want to see nobody.” Heidi picks at the skin along her hairline. Her eyebrows, drawn on by an attendant, are crooked. “I wrote a letter to my boyfriend, but I don’t have his address.”

“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend,” Estee says, scratching her arms and legs.

“Tripper. He’s nineteen. He’s lookin’ for work, so he probably won’t visit me. But he loves me like crazy. I met him in the park one night, and he let me stay with him in his trailer. It was a really nice place, had heat, real cozy.”

“Were you out on the street?” Beth asks.

“Yup. I kinda’ made the rounds with my friends, but I slept in the park a few times, had to.”

“Thought you were living with your dad,” Isabel says.

“Yeah, I was, but …I just couldn’t stay there anymore.”

“Why’s that?”

“My dad was getting weird …I don’t know.”

“Weird?”

“He was drunk or high a lot …just weird.”

“Beth, are your parents coming this weekend?” Isabel asks.

Beth pulls her turtleneck over her knees, sits like a crow on a wire. “Yes. But I have to talk to them about visiting so often. Dr. Murray thinks their visits upset me.”

“Yeah?”

“They ask about my weight …she …ah, the doctor …thinks that’s harmful to my progress. My mom always cries.”

“Maybe the doc doesn’t know what she’s talkin’ about. Ever think of that?” Heidi says, “I haven’t had one fuckin’ visit from nobody. Neither has Estee.”

“I’m sorry. You’re right. I’m lucky to have my parents,” Beth says quietly.

“I don’t really want to see my husband. I don’t know why,” Isabel says. “I guess I’m ashamed of how I treated him.”

“When you were drinking?” Autumn asks. “Dr. Murray says it’s a disease.”

“Disease or not, I’ve got a lot of apologizing to do.”

“To who?”

“My kids, my husband. Everybody, really. My parents, they don’t understand …Jesus, I almost said my foreman.”

“Foreman?” Heidi asks.

“At work. The guy who supervised us. But I don’t owe my foreman an apology. He’s still an asshole, whether I’m drunk or sober. Which is beside the point, I guess. I was the one who screwed up. They fired me. I was a complete fuckup for three years. A big fat drunk who didn’t think about anybody but myself. My oldest boy told me I ruined his life.”

“But you quit drinking, right?”

“I’m trying this time. I love my kids.”

“I wish I had somebody to visit me.” Estee’s mouth sticks together at the corners as she talks. “My grandmother would come, but she lives so far away. She writes me every week.”

“What about your folks?” Beth asks.

“My dad left when I was six, my mom is crazy, certifiable.” She arches her back and kinks into a contortion, her clawed fingers slide back and forth across her spine. By this time everyone in our group has earned the privilege of wearing street clothes. Heidi and Autumn’s come from the emporium of donated clothing in the basement of the patients’ library. Estee is back in state-issue after her breakdown a few days ago. I’d been sitting in the dayroom reading my letters again when I heard the racket from the hallway.

“Who put this up? Who put this up here? Who put this up here?” Estee stomped her feet, pointed up at the bulletin board where a patient had put up a knitted peace sign she made in OT.

“Settle down,” the attendant said.

“Heretics! Devil worshippers!” Estee shouted. “That symbol is blasphemy, drawn by the devil himself. Take it down, take it down immediately.”

I hustled into the hall, placed my hands on Estee’s shoulders. “Estee, come on now. The peace sign is a good thing, means peace.”

“Can’t you quiet her down?” Heidi looked toward the nurses’ station.

“Peace symbol, my ass. Don’t you see it? The communists love to see this crap spread all over the place—people sticking up their fingers in a vee—don’t you see? Russia loves this shit, proves we’re being taken over by atheists and dark angels.”

“All right, all right, calm down now.” The attendants took Estee by the arms, shooed Heidi and me back to the dayroom.

We stood at the door, watching. “Damn it. She’s wigged out again,” Heidi said.

The attendant stripped off Estee’s clothes, bent her over a chair. After they injected her hip with a tranquilizer, they slipped a state-issue over her head, and sat her down. I was worried. Estee hadn’t been making much sense lately, but at least she was quiet about it. Now she was ranting and raving. Within seconds, Estee’s head began to bob.

When Autumn and I pick her up for dinner, she’s lying on the floor, legs splayed, out like a light. We each take an arm, lift her, steer her down the hall to the dining room. Autumn guides Estee by the arm, pulls out her chair, and helps her sit down. A small stream of saliva runs down Estee’s chin.

“What’s wrong, Estee?” Isabel asks.

Estee shifts in her seat and scratches her arms, then jabs her hands under her thighs, and rocks back and forth. “The itching . . .”

“Can they give you anything for it?”

The kitchen workers set trays on the table.

“Why is the meat always gray?” Heidi pokes her meatloaf.

“Don’t start. I’m trying to pretend it’s Mom’s,” I say.

“I make a good meatloaf myself,” Autumn says. “Estee, can I open your milk?”

Estee rocks on her chair as if she doesn’t hear her. Autumn presses back the sides of the carton top and squeezes until a spout pops out. She hands the carton to Estee.

“Potatoes are fake.” Heidi slides a tan lump from her fork. “Beans are mushy.”

“Just eat for God’s sake, Heidi.”

“Eat your food, Estee.” Autumn hands Estee her fork.

“I’m itchy. Can’t …”

“Jeez, Estee. Sit still.” Heidi uses her finger to push the beans onto her spoon. “Can’t she sit still?”

“No. She’s miserable. And stop talking about her like she’s not here.”

“Is she?” Heidi asks.

“Is she what?”

“Is she here?”

“Fuck you,” Estee mutters.

Chapter 15

I
huddle in the courtyard with the rest, over six hundred men, women, and children evacuating Building 50 in the worst blizzard of the winter, eighteen inches of new snow, winds howling off the frozen bay.

Autumn shouts directly into my ear. “Where’s the fire?”

“It must be here in Building 50,” I holler. Sirens cut the night. The attendants yell directions above the wind. I look around—all these crazy people out in a blizzard. No wonder there is no tap and count as we leave the building. Now attendants mill through the crowd, counting, sticking adhesive tape on each patient’s forehead as they cut us from the group. “Lift your face.” An attendant slaps the tape against my forehead. When the last patient is marked and released into the counted, I hear the attendant screaming at the top of her voice.

“Nurse Reinbold, I think we have one missing.”

“Who?”

“We don’t know yet.”

“Find out.” She leans close to the attendant, shouts into her ear. “Where is the fire?”

“It’s definitely in 50. I saw flames over the patients’ library. Men’s wing, I think.”

I push through the crowd. Patients scream and wave their arms. Attendants wrestle to turn the faces of the patients, identify them. I hear one of the nurses yell, shake Nurse Judy’s arm. “How long can we last out here?” She pulls her cardigan shut over the front of her thin uniform. “Some of the patients are in slippers or just socks. We’ll freeze to death.”

“Where’s Estee?” I shout to Isabel. She shrugs and frantically swings her head around, searching the crowd.

“I thought she was right behind me,” Beth cries.

I motion to an attendant. I yell, “We know who the missing patient is.”

The attendant takes the news to Nurse Reinbold. “The lost patient is Estee Weisman.”

I duck as an explosion shakes the ground, flames shoot up from the library roof. Patients standing in the courtyard scream and wail. Fire trucks round the corner of Cottage 21. As they pull up, shiny black figures spill from the doors like ants, shouting orders, running to their posts.

“We need more manpower, more hookups.”

“Willy, grab any extra coats or blankets we got. These women are half naked.”

“There’s a patient missing. Ground floor, Hall 9.”

“One missing.”

“Del, we got at least one rescue. First floor.”

“Get the squad in there.”

“Any missing? Any missing? Any missing?”

“Another one, second floor, back.”

“Any missing, any missing?”

“We need more men, more equipment.”

“All we got are volunteers, Benzie, Antrim and Leelanau counties, that’s it.”

“Get ‘em here. Call the station. Tell them to put out a 410.”

“Storm’s pretty bad.”

“Get ‘em here! We don’t have room for no pussies. Get the damn help. Now.”

“Jack, where’s the rescue team?”

“We got three men in the north wing.”

“Start them pumps.”

“Start pumpin’, for Christ sakes, get them pumps started!”

Nurse Judy puts her arm around my shoulder.

“Luanne, when did you last see Estee?” I try to tell her we were all sitting in our place by the window when the alarm sounded. I thought we went down the stairs together. It’s hard for her to hear me above the voices of the firemen and the screams of the patients. A man runs up to her. He brings his face close to hers.

“Judy, are you okay?”

“Carl! Thank God.”

He grabs her forearms. “We got people coming from all over the hospital, bringing coats and blankets.” He looks out over the group. “Some of these ladies don’t have shoes, and them thin smocks…” He wraps a blanket around Nurse Judy’s shoulders, briskly rubs her back. “Your uniform is like tissue paper.” He shouts to another attendant, “Joe, where are them blankets?”

“Plows and trucks can’t get through. Fire trucks got the roads blocked. I just got word we’re evacuating this group north to Cottage 21.”

“On foot?” Carl asks.

“Only way to do it,” Joe says. “We can’t wait—these gals won’t last much longer out here. With the spray coming off the hoses, they’ll turn into icicles.”