Passage

It happened slowly, slowly, the intern rearing backward, his mouth opening in alarm, the boy’s maroon sleeve coming around and up, the satin catching the light from the fluorescents overhead, Vielle’s arm, still in its white bandage, reaching forward to grab at his sleeve. They all moved slowly, stickily, as if they were mired in molasses.

The Great Molasses Flood, Joanna thought. But time dilation was caused by the surge of adrenaline that accompanied trauma. And this wasn’t a trauma situation.

But time dilation was what it had to be, because she had plenty of time to see it all: the intern’s face, nearly as frantic as the teenager’s, turning to call the security guard, who was already lumbering to his feet. Vielle’s hand, not reaching for his maroon sleeve, reaching for his hand.

To hear it all: Vielle’s voice, coated with syrup, too, shouting, “Joanna! Don’t — !” The chart the resident was holding clattering to the floor. An alarm going off.

She had time to wonder if the time dilation might be some kind of side effect of the dithetamine. Time to think, I have to tell Richard. But if it wasn’t a trauma situation, why was the guard, still lumbering to his feet, reaching for his gun?

Time to think, The boy must have a knife. He was holding a knife on them when I came in. That’s why they didn’t look up when I called, that’s why they didn’t see me till it was too late. That’s what Vielle grabbed for.

Time to think, I told her the ER was an accident waiting to happen.

Time, finally, for the fact to penetrate: He has a knife, though she still didn’t feel any fear. That’s the endorphins, she thought, cushioning the mind against pain, against panic, so she could think clearly.

He has a knife, she thought calmly, and looked down at her blouse, down at his striking hand, but even though time was moving even more slowly than the security guard, she was too late. She couldn’t see the knife.

Because it had already gone in.

40

“This is terrible! This is the worst of the worst catastrophes in the world… the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring mast… oh, the humanity!”

—Radio reporter Herb Morrison, broadcasting the crash of the Hindenburg

There was blood everywhere, which didn’t make any sense because where the knife had gone in, there was hardly any, just a little ooze of dark red. “We’ve got an emergency here!” the intern shouted, reaching out to keep Joanna from falling, but she had already fallen. She was lying on the tile floor, and Vielle was kneeling next to her, and there was blood all over her cardigan, all over the hand Vielle was holding.

Vielle grabbed for the knife, Joanna thought. He must have stabbed her hand. “Are you hurt?” she asked Vielle.

“No,” Vielle said, but Joanna thought she must be, because there was a kind of sob in her throat.

“We’ve got a stab wound here,” the intern said to the resident. Good, they’ll take care of it, Joanna thought, but the resident didn’t even glance at Vielle. He looked at the little line of oozing blood in Joanna’s chest and then turned and started putting on a pair of latex gloves. “Get her on the table,” he said, pulling the glove down over his palm, “and get me a cross match. What’s her BP?”

“Ninety over sixty,” someone said, she couldn’t see who. There were all kinds of people around her, hooking things up and drawing blood. How funny, Joanna thought. Why do they need more blood? There’s already more than enough.

“Get a cardiac surgeon down here,” the resident snapped, “and get me two more units of blood. Vielle, go get some direct pressure on that hand of yours,” and Joanna was afraid Vielle would leave and let go of her hand, but she continued to kneel next to Joanna.

“Don’t try to move, honey,” she said, looking worried. “Just lie still.” Joanna had always wondered whether Vielle’s worried expression frightened her patients, but it didn’t. It was comforting.

I wonder why, she thought, and tried to see what it was in her face that was reassuring, but she couldn’t see it. She could only see the top of Vielle’s head and the resident’s, both in their green scrub caps, and the top of the security guard’s head, standing over the boy in the Avalanche jacket. The boy lay sprawled on his face on the tile floor, and she could see the blue-and-white logo on the back of the maroon jacket, and maroon under the boy’s face, too, where the guard had shot him.

The top of the guard’s head was bald and shiny, reflecting the overhead fluorescent light as Joanna looked down on it. “Just hang on, Joanna!” Vielle said, holding her hand, which was funny, because Joanna was up here, and Vielle was down there.