walls. The filing cabinets are overstuffed, the metal-frame desk is crowded with stacks of folders. Behind it, opposite me, is a guy in his thirties with dreads and a soft smile. He’s holding a file, my file, and he asks me—the words in slow motion at first but picking up speed—if I have any questions. Yes, I have questions. What the fuck do you think? My results. I want to know my results.
“Oh. Fine. All good. They didn’t tell you over the phone?”
“No.”
Turns out I’m clean, as is the patient. She’s had so many children spread out over so many years that the hospital has an ongoing record of her medical history. Every birth, every illness, every hiccup. Not one communicable disease has ever been found.
I let out a sigh of relief and a small grateful laugh at having been sentenced to death only to receive a last-second pardon.
As for whether the job is worth it, I have only this. When I leave, I make two calls—the first is to Sabrina, saying I’m okay. The second is to my supervisor, asking him to put me back on the schedule.
19
The Perfect Call
It’s my first shift back, and Chris and I have been dispatched to a pedestrian hit by a car. He’s facedown when we find him, dead in front of Red Lobster. Even as we’re pronouncing him, a cop lazily strings yellow police tape around us. It’s dark, and people have begun to wander over, but the crowd isn’t big yet—not pushing on the tape, straining to catch a glimpse.
In the relative peace, we have time to stop and consider the dead man’s teeth, which have come out—like fleshy dentures—nearly in one piece. How this could happen, I have no clue. It’s just one of those inexplicable things that happen when something big and heavy and fast slams into your fleshy parts. There’s nothing for us to do here, so I’m heading for the ambulance when I see a flash go off behind me. I turn. Chris has the camera in his hand, and he seems almost surprised. He looks at me, the body, the camera. Neither of us says a word, but the message is clear: We’ve spent so much time looking for carnage and taking pictures of oddities that the two have merged. He hasn’t taken a picture of the body, just the teeth—perfect and disembodied, lying in the road like a windup gag toy. What would we even do with such a picture?
No time to think. Our radios light up again.
Our lights flash red off the passing buildings. The strobes flicker in the night. Chris is speeding. The dispatcher’s voice crackles over the radio. A high school dance has just let out, and all hell’s breaking loose. When the call first comes, it’s for a single person shot, but they’re still shooting and the number increases to two. Then three. We get there almost before the shooting stops.
We park, get out, and take in the scene—dozens of panicked students screaming, dozens more pulling up in cars, a gas station attendant locking his doors, police trying unsuccessfully to cordon off the area, a news helicopter already buzzing on the horizon, and in the middle of it all, three patients, our patients, bleeding and alone. We grab our bag but leave the stretcher. With each step, we crunch spent shell casings—cops are reporting over ninety shots fired, a number that doesn’t seem possible.
When we reach our patients, two are standing and one is sitting quietly on the ground. There’s a tall kid, nervous and jangly, who’s been shot through the right shoulder and left leg. Next to him is a kid who took one bullet through the tip of his nose and another through his upper lip; that bullet passed through his teeth and lodged in his hard palate. He doesn’t say a word, just stares at us with big open eyes. The third patient is a big mass of childhood obesity who’s been shot through the arm. He’s the calmest, the least critical, and nods to each of our questions. We call him the Buddha.
We’re waiting for a second unit, but the scene is an absolute madhouse. A fire crew has arrived, and they’re panicking—one of them steps on the Buddha, and the captain, who never gets closer than five feet, keeps screaming pointlessly into his radio for a transport helicopter. High school kids are arriving by the carload, each group more agitated than the last. A second news