Chương 36: The Fire Went Out

The windows faced north and could not be opened. Past the three Lombardy poplars, Robin could see the rise of Sandia Peak, where he'd ridden the teleférico (cable car) with his mother so long ago. In the trees, grackles clashed with crows. Every so often, a raven flew over and scattered them all. As the watermelon dawn washed over Albuquerque, Robin watched the blackbirds squabble in the boughs. He peered out at the hills and daydreamed of another world just over the mountains.

Some hawk-eyed ranger would smile and spirit him through an ancient forest. In a sacred glade, a pure-hearted paladin could lay on hands and take his pain away. He could lead his ragtag army to an impossible victory, in a realm where no one had ever heard of a bedpan or an IV machine. The rescue never came. Una was there instead, in her yellow paper gown, every second of visiting hours. The nurses warned her not to hold his hand. She had to sit six feet away, just to be safe.

It was strange at first, but they quickly grew used to it. When they ran out of things to say, they would both read. Magazines were forbidden. Books had to be sterilized with ethylene oxide in a little oven. They were baked just hot enough to kill mold spores, but not melt the binding. His diario was the same. They took it away and ran it through the oven. Robin worried about the singed smell, but it seemed fine otherwise. When his absolute neutrophil count dropped, the real isolation would begin.

They would have to take everything away. It seemed crazy that things would still get worse. The three days of daunorubicin were so awful, Robin was afraid to think about them afterward. A few times, his mind wandered to the wrong place and he got caught. His whole body locked up and he had to push the thoughts away, a bill he couldn't pay. The only safe thing to think about was the campaign. The three blister packs of reinforcements were still unopened.

Robin had arranged the miniatures in a line along the windowsill so he could look at them whenever he wanted. After the second treatment, Abaxios Oslune was joined by Sufferen the Mastersmith. On the third day, Una gave him Charinge the Bard, a horseman with a lute and a dashing cape. Each new model fit perfectly into his army. Robin couldn't wait to paint his new troops and see his friends again. Two days after the daunorubicin ended, he felt clear enough to play chess again.

The chess board wouldn't fit in the ethylene oven, so the nurses gave them a laminated sheet of paper with the grid printed on it. Robin called out his plays and Una made the moves. He lost the first three games, badly. He got his head together, and won the next three in a row. Una still punished his weak openings and all the moves he hadn't thought through. Near the end of the week, his eyes started to itch all the time. His vision grew blurry and saline drops crusted his lashes.

Eventually, Robin had to give up on seeing. He shut his eyes and tried to fix the positions in his mind. Playing blind, Una could clobber him, but he got stronger every game. He needed to enjoy this while he could. The crash was coming. The room had a good view, but Robin was never awake to see the sunset. The drugs hit him hard. Slowly, his dreams syncopated to the thump of the IV pump. He would wake up and feel trapped.

He'd learned he couldn't fidget too much or the occlusion alarm would go off, and someone would come. All he could do was turn his head to look out the window at the stars. The stars were bright, even through the conjunctivitis. Vega and Altair joined with Deneb to make the Navigator's Triangle in the northeast. Polaris rode low in the north and Algol flickered at the edge of the northwest horizon. A ruby line of radio towers winked along the mountains, just as unreachable as the stars above.

The lights burned into his memory. He was stuck in this ward for a whole month. Fever days bled into hollow nights. The medication rolled Robin in waves and left him floating in dull-yellow doldrums where nothing mattered much. When he tried to read, his eyes rolled off the page. He looked at the unpainted birds in the shoebox and wondered why he had ever tried. Why was there so much time? The days were glaciers. The stars were drifting apart in a drawn-out heat death.

He wrote about it in his diario but could only manage one line at a time. When he looked over his words, he couldn't understand himself. After the cytarabine was complete, it got harder and harder to sleep. Robin could only truly rest when Una was there to watch over him. She was there every day, without fail. The sores in his mouth burned when he tried to talk. Una grew tired of the silence. The next day, she brought in a fresh-baked hospital Bible. She began to read aloud, at Genesis.

It had been a long time since she'd worked as an announcer, but her voice was still strong. Robin waited for her to slip up and stumble on a phrase. If she ever made a mistake, he didn't hear it. Robin wished she would read him something else, but he didn't have the will to ask. It seemed important to her. Soon enough, he didn't even hear the words, just the sounds and the cadence. Each verse was a step down a long spiral stair. At the bottom of the well, he fell asleep.

Una would have never left if the nurses didn't make her. Visiting hours always ended too soon. When they were through, the nights dragged forever. Some commotion always arose—a blinking light, a clattering tray, once a scream that woke up the whole ward. No one would tell him what it was. The nurses were everywhere, always pressing him, checking him, chiding him if he tried to do anything. Unkind thoughts sprang up constantly, but he was too weak to spit them out.

They smoldered inside his chest, of no use to anyone. On the tenth day, he crashed. The drugs burned away everything in his marrow and left a wasteland of profound aphasia. At the nadir, his neutrophil count was almost nil. He woke in an isolation room, burning up inside. Una wasn't there and his diario was gone. The room was bare. No birds, no brushes, nothing. Robin hit the call button in a panic. A nurse swept in. His face was hidden in a mask but his eyes were annoyed.

"What happened? Where's my grandma?" Robin rasped. His throat was raw. His mouth felt like it had been scalded. Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

"You need to rest. She'll be back soon."

"Por favor, mi diario (Please, my diary)," Robin groaned. They would not give him back his diario. Instead, he got an injection that closed over him like a fist. When he shut his eyes, he was sure he would never open them again. * It was a close thing. For two days, the fever was so high that Robin hovered above himself as a semi-present projection. Pain tried to shiver up the silver astral line, but it was no more than a telegraph from a far away war. Una wasn't allowed into the isolation room.

She sat on the other side of the visiting window and spoke to him through the telephone. Robin wanted to reassure her, but the drugs blunted his tongue. The pain was bad, but being helpless was so much worse. He couldn't talk, or stay awake for more than an hour, or even go to the bathroom by himself. The nurses did everything and treated him like an overgrown baby. If there was any way out, he would have taken it. It was days before he started to feel like himself again.

Visiting hours were in two sessions: 1—3 PM and 6—8 PM. Una was always there, even when he was asleep.

"You look a bit better," Una said.

"I feel a little better." The words ground together like a mouthful of olive pits. Robin pushed through. He needed to talk.

"How is the food?"

"Awful. Everything tastes like it was strained through a sock. All the cups and plates are Styrofoam. I guess they just burn them up when I'm done. Can you see a blue card on my door?"

"Yes."

"That's for protective isolation. This room is under positive pressure to protect me from the environment. The regular isolation rooms are under negative pressure, to protect everyone from the patients. The yellow card is the most dangerous. It's for stuff like pneumonic plague, which is both airborne and infectious through contact. The brown one is for cholera, ha ha."

"Very funny. The nurses say you're talking everyone's ear off."

"It's lonely in here."

"I can see if some of your friends can come visit you," Una offered." ¡Ni hablar! (No way!) I don't want the guys to see me like this. Please don't let them come here."

"You'll change your mind in a bit," Una assured him.

"Tita, I mean it. Promise me you won't," Robin pressed.

"I promise. I only want to help."

"Thank you. Can you do me a favor?"

"Name it."

"Could you check at the nurses' station and make sure my diario is ok? I keep worrying that someone will throw it out."

"Of course. I already told that head nurse: it's doomsday if they lose your diario. I'll check and make sure it's safe."

"¡No lo leas! (Don't read it!)" Robin insisted.

"Claro que no (Of course not)," Una promised. She brought his composition book and showed it to him through the window. There was a note taped to the front: DO NOT DISCARD. ROBIN MARTILLO ISO ROOM 2. Robin sighed with relief and mouthed gracias at the glass. Before he knew it, he was asleep. * The days marched on. The fire sputtered out, but the smoke between his ears was slow to clear. Robin and Una had long since run out of things to say. In a long patch of silence, Una asked if he felt up to a chess game.

"Not today, I'm sorry." Robin shook his head.

"Oh, are you tired of winning? I suppose we could continue reading the Bible. We're halfway through Chronicles."

"Perdón, Abuela... me pesa mucho la cabeza. No puedo entenderle al Libro Sagrado ahorita. (Sorry, Grandma, I'm too foggy. I can't give the Good Book the attention it deserves)" Una's laugh barked from the receiver.

"¡Ay, Pajarito! Ponte las botas, ya hay mucho lodo (Ha! Put on your boots, little bird. It's getting deep in here)." Caught out, Robin raised his palms. He was careful not to tug out the IV.

"Remember, tomorrow is Sunday. I'll be at San Felipe for Mass, then I need to run an errand after. I'm not sure if I'll be finished in time for the 1pm. I'll still be here for the second session."

"I remember," Robin said. Sundays were when Duncan called.

"I feel bad leaving you alone." Una frowned.

"Tita, you've been here every day. It's fine, I'm not going anywhere."

"Well, I wish I could do more. You're fighting so hard and I can't bring you food, or books, or anything. All I have to offer is my company. I'll be so happy when this part is over."

"One more week in this room. It's weird, my hands almost ache to have something useful to do. I would wash dishes if I could."

"¡Ay! I'll remember you said that when we're back home. Remember, your numbers have to be good for them to let you out. You need to rest and obey the nurses."

"I'm trying."

"I know." They spoke a bit more. Una warned that Mrs. Silva would visit soon, and Robin needed to be polite. The medical social worker was very important. She was the reason why the telephone fee for Robin's room was waived. Without her, it would be a dollar-fifty per day. She'd requested a free television too, but they didn't have a working set to spare. Una and Robin agreed that six birds a day to use the phone was highway robbery. Mountain Bell only charged Una eight dollars per month.

In the middle of their collective outrage, Robin was caught by a big yawn.

"Sorry," Robin apologized.

"Please, don't leave."

"Rest. I'll be here when you wake," Una promised. It wasn't even three PM. Robin drowsed and dreamed of tiny armies.