Arsenic for the Soul (19 page)

“
I’m putting that behind me
lately. I guess you could say I’m growing up.”

“
Glad to hear that. A nice
change of setting would suit you, a little less of the face paint
and garters. Personally, you’d look more irresistible in a red
dress while you sip from a glass of Sauvignon at Restaurant Divina.
Perhaps I’ll see you there this Thursday, say around at
eight?”

He walked away with a teasing smile.
Vivian glowed at this victory handed to her. At last, she had her
second date. If only Thursday wasn’t so far away.

FOURTEEN

Vivian was sleeping soundly in bed
when she bolted awake in the middle of the night. 4:53 A.M. glowed
from her alarm clock, shattering any hope of sleep before dragging
herself to the shower and slipping into scrubs.

“
God, not again…” For the
third night, she dreamt about Bryan rising from the autopsy table
like a portent of doom. She couldn’t help but wonder what he
learned about the outbreak that ultimately led to his demise. The
quintessential question remained: How could a non-airborne version
of tuberculosis spread from one unrelated patient to another?
Perhaps her mind was firing off too many ideas at once at this late
hour, but in the midst of her sleep-deprived brain, one half-formed
theory stood out among the rest.

For the first time since beginning
nursing school, she was anxious to rise from bed for 7 A.M.
clinicals.

Once she reached the University
Hospital, her fears were confirmed one patient after another. Her
stomach churned as she reviewed each patient’s medical
chart.

“
Vivian? Is everything all
right?” She glanced up from the reports as Milo approached. One
look at her face probably spoke volumes about how well she rested
last night.

“
Milo, I need you to take a
look at this. Every patient who came down with symptoms of
tuberculosis has one thing in common. They’ve undergone a surgery
of some kind within the past two months. That’s roughly the
incubation time for tuberculosis. Not everyone comes down with a
post-op infection but it’s becoming a pattern!”

She didn’t share the rest of her
thoughts with Milo. In order for this theory to hold up to
scrutiny, Camilla’s mother would have to work in the hospital as a
surgical technician or a nurse. Casting more shadows over this
mystery, how would such a profession come easily to someone locked
away in an asylum for over twenty years?

“
Who else have you told
about this?” Milo asked, taking her aside.

“
No one, just you. But I
can’t keep this to myself. I should go straight to the new head of
the nursing program and share my findings.” The expression on
Milo’s face soured immediately.

“
You didn’t hear, did
you?”

“
About what?”

“
Your least favorite
surgeon is coordinating the program between the hospital and the
university now.” Vivian might have laughed if the notion wasn’t so
ridiculously cruel.

“
Crenshaw?
As if commanding the emergency room wasn’t good
enough for that man’s ego. Oh God, he’d never believe me! If I name
surgery as a common factor in the outbreak, he’ll burst a blood
vessel.”

“
I’m afraid you’re right.
Sadly, even if he did believe you, it wouldn’t change anything.”
Milo’s tone gave her pause.

“
Why?”

“
You can’t put a halt to
every scheduled surgery based on a hunch. Think of the havoc it
would cause for the hospital and the community. You need some
concrete evidence to make your point. Even then, how could we
possibly go without surgery when people are injured or
dying?”

“
There’s not much of a
choice for the patients. There must be another hospital where
surgeries can be performed. I know it sounds ludicrous but I think
that’s how the tuberculosis is spreading.”

“
Just think it over before
you rush to any decision. You should also be aware that every
employee needs to submit to a TB test in light of the outbreak.
We’re not taking any chances with exposure. Needless to say, this
mandate applies to students as well.”

“
It seems kind of pointless
after you gave me the vaccine.”

“
I know, but what can I
say? I promise it’s the last time you’ll see a needle in a long
time.”

Vivian sighed and marched off to the
blood lab.

“
Very well.”

* * *

Vivian stroked the raised bump on her
arm as she ambled home. Per the usual TB test procedure, a nurse
inserted a small amount of tuberculin under the skin, causing a
bubble to form. She wasn’t the least bit concerned with the results
of her skin test, but she would still report to the hospital in two
to three days after the injection.

Her ears perked up at the sounds of
protesters as she neared her neighborhood. More people seemed to
gather each day outside apartments that catered to immigrants,
clenching their fists and protesting their inclusion in
Prague.

“
Immigrants brought this
filth into our city!”

She discretely slipped her hand into
her pocket, feeling the smooth handle of her pocketknife. She had
only purchased it yesterday for extra protection. Of course, Vivian
didn’t particularly need a weapon to be considered
dangerous.

She sincerely hoped she wouldn’t have
to use it. She didn’t relish conflict, though it might come easily
to her. Too often it seemed like force was the only way to make
people respect her existence.

She watched the crowd undulating in
front of the apartments. She presumed foreigners lived there and
this was the public’s way of intimidating them to leave. They
weren’t waving torches and pitchforks but their radicalism was
arguably the most formidable of their weapons.

Suddenly, a heap of trash landed at
Vivian’s feet. She staggered back from the smell of rotten fruit
mixed with human waste.

“
Look! Another one of them
has come out! They’re like cockroaches—once you think you’ve seen
the last of them but they’re just too cowardly to show their
faces!”

“
Stay back from the foreign
girl! You might catch something from her if she touches
you!”

Eyes flickering with rage, Vivian
regarded the offending group of men. They smirked and slapped each
other on the back as if there could be no better pastime than
throwing trash at a fellow human being.

“
Fuck off,” she
growled.

“
What did you say to me?”
One man took a lumbering step toward her.

His hate manifested so grotesquely on
his face that Vivian barely registered him as human. He shared more
qualities in common with a monster as he salivated for blood. He
balled his hands into fists as primal violence consumed his
brain.

“
We’ll see how tough you
talk when I’m looking down at you,” he said, lips peeling back over
his yellowed teeth.

The crowd swelled forth with seconds
to spare. Civil order was well past its expiration date. Vivian
wouldn’t back down from a single man or a group. Still, she
couldn’t shake her surprise that the crowd was complicit with the
affair. They clamored at the prospect of a street brawl instead of
intervening for peace. She didn’t need their saving anyway, but it
unsettled her all the same.

After all, she was just a foreigner in
their eyes.

The man seized her by the arm while
another came in fast with a jab. Vivian tore her arm free and
pumped her foot into the assailant’s gut, staggering him. Clearly
he wasn’t incapacitated yet and he rushed in again. Vivian was
occupied with two other protestors so she stood no chance when
someone kicked her in the back and shoved her to the ground. Even
before the dirt could find its way on her face, she pivoted her
hips and aimed a kick for his knee, where she was rewarded with a
satisfying crunch.

He howled and went down, but not
before his chin bounced solidly off Vivian’s fist. The crowd
continued to jeer and hurl racial slurs as four men took turns
trying to take on the Red Widow. The entire spectacle bore an
uncanny resemblance to gladiator games. There was something
indisputably primal and savage about their lust for
destruction.

Suddenly hands grabbed her from
behind, but it was mingled with a gentle touch. Instead of fists
battering her, she was pushed out of harm’s way. To her surprise,
Milo stood before her like a shield.

Four men shifted anxiously around the
newcomer. They reminded him of rabid animals drinking in the scent
of their prey before executing the kill. The tension exploded and
Milo moved impossibly fast to fend them off. Vivian was mildly
taken aback by how aptly he broke through their punches and
whittled them down one man at a time.

Not content to be a spectator, Vivian
charged back into the fray. She managed to hold her own and trip up
an attacker who came chillingly close to putting her in a
chokehold. Another man barreled into Vivian and threw her to the
ground.

Her eyes flared as one of them pulled
a knife on the unsuspecting Milo.

“
No you don’t!” Vivian
snarled. She reached into her pocket and whipped out her
pocketknife. She couldn’t believe this was what human society
looked like under the surface. Strip away the illusion of laws and
common decency and they were merely beasts in human
skin.

Just as she rushed toward the armed
thug, an elderly man stepped out from the crowd. Vivian barely saw
him raise a weak arm with a gun clutched in his hand.

A sound like no other ripped through
her mind. Blood misted the air like a flower bursting into bloom.
Vivian’s existence knew only pain.

She didn’t even scream. She clapped a
hand to her side, where her shirt felt soaked with liquid warmth.
Time slowed to a crawl as she fell to the concrete. Her world faded
into a black and gray quagmire.

* * *

Vivian faintly construed shapes
passing in front of her. She reached out to the void and something
reached back, clasping her hand.

When her sight returned, she found
herself in a room ornamented with worldly trinkets, statues, maps
plastered on the walls, and shelves brimming with books on every
obscure subject. A fireplace in the corner breathed new life into
her skin and chased after the shivers in her bones. Handwoven
tapestries from Nepal hung on the walls, glistening in the scarlet
caress of the flames.

“
You’ve finally come to
your senses. Welcome to my home.” Milo stood over Vivian, relieved
to see her green eyes pop wide open.

“
Your home?” she
murmured.

“
You’re somewhere safe,
that’s all that matters. I brought you here after you fainted. I
didn’t have much time to tidy up the place so I hope you don’t
judge me too harshly.”

“
What happened to me?”
Vivian massaged her sore head as she reared up from a couch laden
in pillows. She barely remembered the fight with violent radicals
in the streets, nonetheless being kissed by a bullet. Instead of
burdening her with the details, Milo handed her a steaming bowl of
soup.

“
Here, this should make you
feel better.” Even as she protested, he wrapped a blanket around
her shoulders.

“
I’m not sick, you know,”
she chuckled. “How long have I been out? What happened?”

Milo stirred the coals in the
fireplace, releasing a fresh gasp of heat into the dim but
otherwise exotically furnished chamber.

“
You’ve been unconscious
for five hours. You were shot in the scuffle outside the
apartments. Your memories might seem a little jostled while you’re
still coming around, but everything will be okay. You’re safe
here.”

Vivian looked down at the bowl of soup
in her hands.

“
We have to stop meeting
like this, where one of us is injured or passed out. I take it this
is date number two?”

“
I’d say this is a hell of
a lot better than our first date. You had a nice nap and woke up to
a warm home-cooked meal from yours truly.”

He winked.

“
Well, you have a point
there. This is better, I’ll give you that much.”

“
Fortunately the bullet
only nicked your side. The most it will do is a leave a scar, but
the pain must have sent you into shock. I did my best to dress the
wound and disinfect it.”

Vivian couldn’t muster the words to
speak. He was bold enough to undress her and clean her wounds? Milo
only smiled, but his expression darkened for a moment as he
remembered the circumstances that led to their meeting.

“
They think immigrants
brought tuberculosis to Prague. They’re thinking the same thing as
the rest of the public.”

Vivian bunched her fists in rage at
the thought of the rioters frothing in the streets. Of course they
would blame immigrants for their problems. Anyone different was
always to blame for situations they couldn’t accept or understand.
Her anger dissipated when she looked at Milo’s soothing
face.