Chuck Logan - Absolute Zero

Jolene wrinkled her nose.

“Look, I, ah. .” Allen stammered. Immediately he recovered, overcompensating with a technical barrage: “When Hank’s body reached a crisis it had to choose between supplying oxygen to his brain or to his core organs-the heart and lungs. Peripheral functions lose to core functions. Unfortunately, in that scenario, the cerebral cortex is a peripheral function. And brain cells die within four to six minutes without oxygen. So along with consciousness, the voluntary motor fibers that control the face, the arms, and legs were wiped out. The involuntary muscles continue to function, intercostal muscles and the diaphragm survive to support the lungs which powers the heart.”

“All I know is that he looks at me,” she said as she went to the bed and fluffed the pillow behind Hank’s head. As she stepped back she fingered his thick hair. “Okay. I fed him and changed him. He doesn’t need turning for two hours.”

“I’ll be just fine,” Allen said.

“Well, I have to get dressed.”

Out of habit, Allen threw back Hank’s gown and checked the incision. There was no sign of infection, it was healing normally. As was the feeding-tube insertion. Then he opened his bag, removed a blood-pressure cuff and a stethoscope, took Hank’s blood pressure, and listened to his lungs. The vital signs were regular. One hell of a resilient lizard fought for life within Hank’s human husk.

Then he took a pencil light from his shirt pocket and moved it back and forth in front of Hank’s eyes, which blinked rapidly as the pupils tightened normally to the light. Allen dismissed this lizard reaction, more attuned to the rustle of material on skin and the lily scent of body lotion coming through the open doorway to the bedroom that adjoined the studio.

Hank’s blue flotsam eyes sloshed from one side of his head to the other. His hands spasmed, clenched, and dropped. Just the lizard again, some nerve pathway twitching.

Allen heard heels strike hardwood. She stood in the doorway wearing a simple gray dress, panty hose, and half-inch heels. The white-faced widow.

“I’m not sure exactly when I’ll be back. Milt mentioned having lunch after we meet.”

“Go,” Allen said. “You need to get out of the house.”

She turned and disappeared and Allen overheard some muted conversation as Earl ascended, troll-like, from the basement. The door closed and Earl’s van started, and a moment later Allen heard the tires spit gravel against the tree trunks as he swerved down the long, twisting driveway.

In the more immediate vicinity he focused on the music playing in the background: Bob Dylan singing “Blowin’ in the Wind.” Allen walked to the radio and punched the off button.

They were alone.

Not they. It was a curious gray area. The definitions were inexact. Hank was more an it . Legally, he was dead. Clinically, it was alive.

He walked up to the bed and-Jesus-a needle of pain pierced his right ankle and snagged in his sock. Allen lurched back and kicked at the husky gray fur ball. The goddamn cat had snuck back in the room and had been hiding under the bed and had lashed out a paw.

The cat evaded the kick, which infuriated Allen who aimed another powerful kick. Missed. The animal skittered in a scramble of claws on the polished oak flooring and disappeared into the hall.

Allen pulled down his sock, inspected his ankle, and found a thread of blood and a scratch. He rubbed the spot and hoped the cat had its shots. Then he turned his attention back to Hank.

“She’s gone into town to talk to Milt. He’ll flirt with her over lunch, I expect. We all do.” He patted Hank’s knee. “But you knew that. I think you even enjoyed it. Remember the first time you showed her off? You’d discovered her at the AA group and brought her to the poker game. You were still married to Dorothy. The fact was, we all thought she was a hooker.”

He’d started talking to Hank the last time he was here alone, doing an examination. Now the sound of his voice didn’t seem so odd. It was almost natural. And it was a little like being in a confessional.

There’d been no provision for confession in his Lutheran education. Just him and God. No intermediate buffer of priests to barter sins into doing rosary laps. The older he got the more the notion of indulgences made sense. Right now he could use a spiritual litigant to plea-bargain his dilemma.

How many commandments had he broken?

The one about coveting your neighbor’s wife for sure.

“You shouldn’t have flaunted her, Hank,” Allen said. “You shouldn’t have made a game out of it.”

Allen eased Hank’s leg aside and sat down on the bed.

“You were always so sure of yourself, you figured you were the only one who could take risks. We were all just-what did you used to call us-college boys.

“Well, Hank, I really want to thank you for upgrading Jo from X-rated to PG 13. You won that little wager.”

Allen got off the bed and paced to the bank of windows overlooking the river. He leaned forward, hands on the sill, and peered at the dusky color on the far Wisconsin shore. Then he turned.

“Hank, you know, at first I was certain it had been an accident. I was fatigued and hypothermic. Paddling out with Broker damn near killed me.”

Allen clicked his teeth. “Oh, he’s coming to visit. Phil Broker, the canoe guide. He’s bringing your Ford down from Ely. I’m surprised Earl overlooked it. I think the green van’s days are numbered.”

Hank’s head slumped forward and his brow furrowed. The lizard perplexed.

“For fifteen years I’ve trained myself to be immune to fatigue,” Allen went on conversationally. “Except for small details, I’ve never had a major slip in the OR.” Allen paused and stared at Hank who rocked sightly and whose throat made a slight hiss.

God, it was so sad. Like talking to a corpse with living eyes.

“I mean, I’d just pulled off a very clean procedure under less than ideal conditions. I was working with a strange scratch team in a podunk surgical suite. I pulled you through.

“And then. .

“You were in recovery and I talked to the anesthetist and she said you were awake and strong and I thought, okay, let him rest a minute, and I dropped my guard and the fatigue was really coming on then. But they got this new patient, the snowmobile accident, and I saw everybody run out the door and I thought, oh shit-this hick nurse has gone off and left you alone.

“So I went into the room and I saw this loaded syringe sitting there on the cart next to your bed. And that’s when the fatigue locked up my brain because I couldn’t remember-had the nurse given you the Demerol?

“So I picked up the syringe and shot it into the IV and then, looking at the syringe again, I saw the anesthetist’s red stick-on label and-my God-I had just given you a shot of succinylcholine from the anesthetist’s intubation tray. It’s impossible to mistake that syringe for Demerol. But that’s exactly what I’d done.

“Believe me, I was shaking more than you were and you were shaking plenty when that muscle relaxant hit your bloodstream.”

Allen replayed it. His first instinct should have been to reintubate, to administer oxygen. To save the patient.

But Hank was the patient. Jolene’s husband.

He’d been battered by shock and self-preservation. It had been his first major mistake as a surgeon and now he realized it had been a turning point in his life.

“The fact is, Hank, I don’t make mistakes . And now I wonder if my fatigue had freed my inhibitions.” Allen’s voice shook with sudden passion. “Maybe I was doing what I really wanted to do. Maybe I never wanted to save your life. Maybe, standing there, watching your muscles shake and then go flaccid, I realized how much I wanted you gone.