Nightshifted es-1 Page 28

  “Tired,” I whispered, but I wasn’t sure I made a sound.

  “Human, do you want my blood?”

  I blinked my eyes open. There were two Y-connected IV sets over me, draining red fluid in. “Blood?”

  “That’s mortal blood. I am offering you more.” A skinny wrist blotted out the emergency room lights. A red gash appeared on it, and then blood on this, bright red, like a seam.

  I closed my lips firmly.

  “I will not force you.” Anna’s strong fingers grabbed my chin, twisted my head, and made me focus my attention on her. “But if you die, I will be very upset.”

  My vision faded, and she disappeared. “Ti?” I asked. “Anna?” I looked around. County’s emergency room was full; I could hear screaming children, crying mothers, the clamor of twenty different languages, all the hustle and bustle of life and death around me.

  And I was just another stab wound on a Saturday night.

  I flagged down a nurse by attempting to crawl out of bed. “Call Meaty. On Y4.”

  She looked unsure. Of course she was, I’d just given her the name of a person she’d never met, and a location she’d never been to.

  “Extension six-sixty. It’s important. Tell him Edie Spence is here,” I pleaded.

  She could have ignored me, but she didn’t. I saw her go for a phone as I relaxed back into bed.

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  I woke to the smell of cleanser and floor wax. I knew Ti was gone. Through half-lidded eyes, I could see red nails.

  “Edie Spence?” a nurse I knew was day shift said nasally. I pretended to be asleep. Apparently I’d lived, or this was a very authentic hell.

  She didn’t care enough to roll my eyelids back and check for pupil responses, which was good, because with her acrylics she might have taken out my cornea. Instead she poked me in the chest a few times, and I did my best to lie there like a lump of unresponsive meat. I heard her leave and knew she’d chart: Withdrawal to pain? Negative.

  After that, I shifted around in bed like a sleeping person might. I was sore from stem to stern, had two peripheral IVs in my left arm, and there was an abdominal binder around my midsection. Other than that, I didn’t really hurt.

  Not physically at least. But now that I was awake, memories came rushing back. Ti, saying he was going away. How long had I been out for? Long enough, some part of me knew. I had to fight the impulse to curl up in bed; it’d be a dead giveaway. So I lay there limp and ragged, waiting for sleep to come again. One of the drips going into my arm was a narcotic—I could see the bright pink “Dose Check!” warning stickers on its bag.

  Wait a second. I knew how IV pumps worked. I could—

  “Way to get the most out of your County-sponsored health insurance policy,” said a familiar voice. I started, caught with one arm reaching for the IV pole, and turned to see Gina’s smiling face.

  “Gina? What’re you doing here?”

  She grinned down at me. “I saw you move some when I walked by outside. I thought I’d come in and check.”

  “But why’re you on day shift?” I strained to look past her shoulder. “If that day shift nurse comes back, I’m still dead, okay?”

  “It’s nighttime. She’s working a double—covering for you. Hang on.” She made a silly face at me, then ran out the door.

  “Like I have a choice,” I said to her departing form.

  She returned with a bouquet, and arranged it on my bed table, handing me the card with an expectant smile. I took it from her, inhaled and exhaled slowly, and then opened it with shaking hands.

  It read Congratulations, from Asher in purple ink with a heavy slant and a heart over the i. Tears threatened. I closed the card again and looked up at her.

  “I don’t suppose I had any visitors while I was asleep? The tall, dark, and zombie kind?” I tried to keep my voice light while I asked, and failed.

  I had obviously not had the reaction Gina expected. She looked from the card to me and back again, then shook her head.

  “Okay, then. Okay,” I told myself more than her. I hugged myself, my arms tracing the binder’s course across my torso. It would take more than its elastic to hold in my breaking heart. I pointed with my chin at the flowers. “Take those to someone who deserves them, down the hall.” I shook my IV lines with one hand. “And if you don’t mind, I’ll take more of whatever’s in bag number two.”

  Chapter Sixty

  Time in the hospital passes slowly.

  I knew this, as a nurse, but as a patient—it’s like being in jail. There’s nothing to do but watch the clock and suffer through the vast wasteland that is daytime television.

  I was trapped on Y4 under bowel rest from the surgery they’d performed to stop all the bleeding inside of me, allowed only sips of water and other clear fluids, until my GI tract performed to their satisfaction. I knew all the technical reasons for being here, but actually being here sucked.

  I clicked on the evening news my first night.

  “There’s been no explanation for the outbreak of mass hysteria at Providence General on Saturday night,” a female news anchor announced, standing outside in the snow. I closed my eyes. “It’s possible that forgotten tanks of nitrous oxide in the older part of the hospital rusted through,” said someone who sounded like a hospital spokesperson. “Investigations are continuing, but we can assure the public that Providence General is completely safe and open for business.”

  “Assuming you can pay,” I muttered.

  “Meanwhile,” a male voice segued, “the brutal mutilations of three drug dealers have led police to suspect a gang war is ongoing. I warn you, the photos we’re about to show you will be graphic. These photos are not suitable for children.”

  I opened up my eyes to see the man who’d originally had the rest of Ti’s new face. I leaned over the top railing of the bed as my stomach heaved. Luckily you don’t throw up much if you haven’t had anything to eat in three days.

  * * *

  “You’re sure you don’t want to talk about it?” Meaty asked. It was really hard to tell Meaty no, but I managed. It was the end of my fifth incarcerated night shift, and the morning was edging up on dawn.

  “Maybe when I get back, you know? I need to gain some perspective.” The truth was, I wasn’t interested in rehashing anything with anyone just yet. My scars from surgery were healing nicely, but the rest of me felt like it had a sucking chest wound that no one else could see.

  Charles had his arms crossed, in an imitation of Meaty. “I suppose the important thing is that you lived.”

  “Exactly.” I forced a smile. I was wearing four pairs of scrubs, layered for warmth under Gina’s extra coat, and my work shoes, which I’d left in the locker room what felt like ages ago. “Which one of you has a bus pass for me to make it home?”

  Meaty produced one. “You’re sure?”

  “Later. I promise.” I took the ticket. “I’ll be back. You’ll see.”

  * * *

  The bus ride was uneventful, even if it seemed like every pothole the driver went over was meant for me. I got off at the station, and walked down the street to my apartment, comforted that there weren’t any strange footprints on my stoop in the recent snow. I tried the handle and it gave, just like I’d left it. I walked in with a sigh, and set my bag down.

  The first thing I noticed was that the faucet was off. And my apartment didn’t smell like a litter box. Grandfather was still sitting by the doorway—I scooped him up.

  “Minnie?”

  No sound.

  I walked through my apartment, holding Grandfather like you would hold a knife or a frying pan. The kitchen and living room were clear, the hallway was empty, the bathroom was empty—I went into my darkened bedroom, where the lightproof sheet was still over my blinds. I looked under my bed—no Minnie. And then I turned toward my closet, which was open just a hair. I peered inside and saw Minnie, curled up on Anna’s lap.

  I sat on my bed for a long minute, gathering strength and
trying to figure out what I ought to do next. Then I took the sheets off my bed, walked them down to the laundry, and came back.

  * * *

  I took a nap once my sheets were done, but made sure to get up before nightfall. Anna emerged from my closet like a fairy-tale Sleeping Beauty, all stretches and yawns, greeting the night instead of dawn. She wore a shirt I didn’t recognize, but scrub pants I was sure were my own.

  “Good morning,” I told her, when she was done. She nodded, and sat on the bed beside me.

  What was between us now? The tenuous connection of people who’d been through tragic circumstances? I’d felt like this with patients at the hospital before, after emergencies with them, or when I was left with their surviving loved ones. I never knew what to do with myself then, and I certainly didn’t know what to do with myself now.

  “Thanks for taking care of my cat,” I said, when I couldn’t stand the silence any longer.

  Anna nodded. “She’s nice. I’ve never had a cat before.”

  “Her name’s Minnie,” I said.

  “I read her tag.” Anna sat still, with her hands holding one another between her knees. “You would have healed faster if you’d swallowed my blood.”

  “Yeah. And I know you could have made me, but you didn’t,” I said. “So thanks, but no thanks.”

  She nodded again, while looking at her hands. I bent my head down to better see her. “What are you doing here, Anna?”

  “This was the only place where they couldn’t reach me.”

  She could probably take any daytimer. And no other vampire could come in without an invite, as long as I was alive. She had fought so hard to escape her former life, and for what? Just to hide out with me and my cat? It was so sad it made me want to cry.

  “Is there a plan?”

  “I need you to contact the Rose Throne for me.”

  “No. You can stay here. Screw them.”

  She gave me a sad look. “I can’t live in your closet forever, human. No matter how much I like your cat.”

  “I can’t just turn you over to them, Anna.” I stood up and began pacing my small room. “Doesn’t being a nochnaya come with a palace somewhere?”

  “What does being a nochnaya even mean? I do not know what that makes me yet. I was raised by humans. I have not met another like me before and neither has anyone else. The Rose Throne has kept the best records. They might be able to help.”

  “But at what price? They’ll have an angle if you go to them.” I had scars now from the angle that they’d had on me.

  A rueful smile slid across her face. “I believe almost everyone does. Their interest plan seems easiest, however. Please call them now.”

  I wasn’t sure she was making the best move. But what other options were there? Not very damn many, at least not ones that wanted her alive. “All right.”

  My dead cell phone was in my belongings bag. I charged it up enough to write Sike’s number down and take it to the landline in my kitchen.

  “Hey, it’s Edie. Come over, please,” I told Sike’s voice mail.

  I turned around and Anna was in my hallway, looking at my family photos on the wall. She spoke without turning toward me. “That night in your room, when I crawled right up beside you and listened to you breathe. I wondered what it would have been like if my life had been different, if everything had gone according to my parents’ plans. A safe life with Yuri, without all the pain.”

  I hung up the phone. “I’m sorry I killed him, Anna.”

  “I am too.” She turned back toward me, to look me in the eye. “But I forgive you for it. And that’s what is strange in me.” She put her hand to her chest. “Vampires do not grant forgiveness. I know—I asked enough of them for it. I begged them for forgiveness, for my imagined crimes.”

  Minnie ran out of my bedroom and twined around Anna’s ankles. Anna knelt and gently knuckled her head. “Anna—” I began.

  “I can forgive you, and know it. Where I could not forgive them.” She ran her hand in long strokes along Minnie’s back. “When I left to find Pascha and feast on him, I was strong enough to defeat them there where they found me.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “No. I went with them willingly. I fought enough so that they did not know that—but I went with them. I knew of their plot for you—but I was tired of being angry. Anger is exhausting. Maybe that is another thing different between me and other vampires—the things that are human about me can become tired, and that exhaustion makes me weak. I thought, what if I went along with them? What if I did just let them sacrifice you, your soul grant them the power to create their Tyeni, and then they make me forget? I could have been one of them, never knowing any better—and I have so many memories that I do not wish to keep.

  “There was a time when I was ready to forget, I think. The betrayal of my kind, the loss of my parents, the hatred of my own brother—these are things one longs to lose, to pretend one never knew. But then you appeared, and I could not let you be killed by them.”

  “Because you made a promise not to hurt me or my cat?” I guessed aloud.

  “Because the blossom of your outlandish hope that somehow, some way, good would rule the day—I could not take it from you, no matter how often it had been stolen from me.” She stood, and she seemed taller than she had been before. I wondered if it was a trick of the light.

  “I fear this is what it is like to be the nochnaya. Not an all-powerful creature, but one limited by emotions. Trapped by things like mercy and hope.”

  “I’m glad you did what you did, Anna.”

  She nodded to herself. “I think, so far, that I am glad too.”

  We were saved from any further thinking by a knock at my door. Sike tried the handle, found it open, and came in.

  “Are you ready to go? Get your things.” Sike brought an empty bag with her and gave it to Anna. At her appearance, Grandfather made mumblings from the bedroom. “You should get that appliance of yours checked out,” Sike said, handing me a sealed envelope.

  “You knew she was here?”

  “All along. But it would have been presumptuous to force her to come with us.”

  I opened the envelope, and inside found an itemized bill. “You’re kidding me.”

  “Our services do not come free—”

  “Or cheap,” I said, looking at the final amount.

  “We offer easy installment plans for indigents, such as yourself.”

  I folded the paper up and tore it in two. “It seems to me that you lost my case. That negates any contract we once had.”

  “There’s the small issue of a retainer—” Sike said.

  I pushed the two pieces of paper back toward her, thumping them against her neck, where her injury had been. “I should bill you all for services rendered. Bite me.”

  She took the papers from me. “We just might.”

  Anna returned with her bag. I peered a little bit, to make sure she wasn’t smuggling out my cat. “There will be no bill, and no biting. She is mine.”

  Sike looked from Anna to me, one cool eyebrow raised. “Then it will be as you say.” Sike opened the door and gestured, but Anna hesitated and looked to me.

  “Who are those people?”

  It took me a second to realize she was asking about my family photos on the wall. “My mother and brother, mostly.”

  “Are they alive?”

  I nodded.

  “Have they ever tried to kill you?”

  “Not precisely.”

  “Be good to them, then.” She gave me an awkward hug—and it wasn’t till I saw the blood on her cuff that I realized she was wearing one of Yuri’s old shirts.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  For a week I earned no-questions-asked disability and, through Jake’s use of my car and five bucks at a time, made an extensive survey of pint-sized ice cream flavors available at my local grocery store. I pretended not to notice that he never gave me change.

  * * *

  And then the
time came that I had to go back. I couldn’t say that I was looking forward to it. But I hauled Gina’s extra coat and wore my own on the train in.

  I nodded at the night security guards at the front desk and they nodded back—I doubted they recognized me and I didn’t have a badge to prove I belonged there, but I was dressed in green and looked like I knew where I was going. Me and my sack lunch tromped down corridors and stairways till I found myself outside of the elevator down to Y4, without any badge to open it up. I pressed the buttons beside the door, but they’d never worked without a badge before.

  I stared at the closed orange doors. “Open sesame,” I commanded. They stayed closed. “Winner winner chicken dinner?” I tried, without much enthusiasm. I leaned forward and beat my hand on them once. “Oh, come on!” The metal gave a satisfying thunk, and somewhere inside, gears came to life. The doors opened, the smell of were piss wafted out, and I stepped inside. I pressed the button for Y4, and started counting seconds.

  Nine, ten, eleven—the elevator came to a stop.

  “Hello, nurse,” said echoing voices I was disheartened to recognize. My badge dropped from above to land at the floor near my feet. I looked up in spite of myself. There was a webbing of Shadows across the top of the elevator, flowing around its deep-set lights. They were stretching out into the corners, like roots seeking fresh soil.

  “Are you going to pick that up?” they asked solicitously, while creeping down the wall to block the elevator’s door. I looked down at my badge. The lights began to dim.

  “Do I have to?” I tapped at my badge with a toe. God only knew where it’d been since I’d seen it last—assuming I believed in Him—and anything that fell on the floor anywhere in the hospital was always suspect. Somedays there wasn’t enough hand sanitizer in the world to chase after a dropped pen.

  “That is what we’re here to discuss,” the Shadows said, obliterating the elevator’s entire orange door. “Because you do not have to pick up that particular badge again.”