Ridley Pearson - The Angel Maker

Tegg knew they couldn't screw this up. Wong Kei was unlikely to be a man with a predisposition toward forgiveness. He had a mobster's reputation. If Tegg failed this harvest, it might be his last. His moral salvation commanded a high price.

Tegg finally threw a lever, and a gust of dusty air dislodged the condom wrapper from the defrost vent. He swatted at it frantically.

Maybeck slowed and turned into Freemont Lane, a dead end servicing a pair of apartment buildings to the right and, to the left, the back doors of houses on Lyden Avenue, including the green one, thirty-six thirty-nine and a half. "Bring the laptop with you-it'll make you look more official. And remember to keep your mouth shut," Tegg reminded. He meant this literally: those teeth were enough to terrify anyone.

Sharon Shaffer had spent the last twenty minutes in terror. She had tried to drown out her recollection of that phone call by cleaning up, by running the vacuum. Public Health. The blood supply. It could only mean one thing … She answered the knock on her back door.

Two men. The bearded one was well dressed and looked distinguished, especially compared to his assistant, who reminded her of an aging James Dean. He carried the Toshiba laptop computer in his right hand. "May we come in?" the distinguished one asked. She knew that voice from the phone call.

She felt afraid. If she refused them entry, would the reason for their being here leave with them? There were men she had been with during her years on the streets, complete strangers. There were things she had done that now, a few years later, she could hardly believe possible. She had not blocked them out, for she had no desire to forget her past; it was memories of her past that inspired her present work, that enabled her to so easily relate to the women who found their way to The Shelter. In an odd way, she was even proud of her past. But the characters she had encountered during that time were behind her now. She felt terrified. Was it true that your past always catches up with you?

She stepped back and admitted them. She knew what this was about. It was about dirty needles. About sex. About a different life, a different Sharon Shaffer. These two were about to ruin her new life. She felt faint. She waved them toward the dining table, for the place was small and there were only two stuffed chairs over by the television, and she wanted them all to sit. She had to sit no matter what.

The bearded man said, "Bloodlines Incorporated maintains an active database of all of its donors, past and present." James Dean patted the laptop and set it down. The bearded man explained, "The donated blood is tested prior to distribution for disease."

There was the word she had dreaded. Fear turned her palms icy.

Her eyes threatened tears. As hard as the streets had made her, as welcome as death would have been back then, she felt weak and terrified now by this one word. "What has happened," the man continued, "is that the state's department of health, in a routine audit, discovered a glitch in the software that drives the Bloodlines' database. With that glitch removed, certain donors appear in an at-risk category, as concerns certain diseases."

"HIV," Sharon said. It was no guess. They didn't come to your door on a Saturday morning over measles. "Yes, but we needn't jump to conclusions."

"AIDS," she whispered softly.

"What we need," the man continued professionally, "is a fresh blood sample. There's no need to jump to any conclusions until the results of those tests are in. No need at all," he emphasized. "The computer has been wrong once. It could certainly be wrong a second time."

"i/in shown as positive," she stated. "It's only a computer. We need to run the tests again. I'm a doctor. We can take your blood now, or you can come downtown later in the week. It's entirely up to you." The doctor added, "it won't take us five minutes, if you'd care to get it over with now."

"Are you expecting anyone?" James Dean asked.

She shook her head. She found it difficult to speak.

The doctor said encouragingly, "One thing in favor of doing this now is that you will get the results much sooner."

"Let's do it now," she said. "How long until I know?"

"A few days. Four or five working days, usually."

"Oh, God. That'll seem like forever."

The doctor addressed his assistant, "I've left my case in the van. Go and get it for me." It was an order, not a request, and it struck her that there was no love lost between these two.

James Dean stood and left through the back door, leaving the laptop computer standing on the carpet. "Our apologies for coming to your back door," the doctor said. "We've found most people would just as soon not explain anything to the neighbors. We try to park in the back and keep a low profile."

Again, she couldn't find any words. She nodded, just barely holding on. A lifetime lost? "It's probably nothing more than a computer error. Really."

"That's what your voice says, but that's not what your eyes say," she wanted to tell him. He knew something, all right. He was as nervous as she was.

His lips tensed and his eyes hardened, and for the second time she felt a nauseating fear. She put her hands into her lap so he wouldn't see them shaking. "I wouldn't worry," he said. "Yes, you would. If you were me, you would." She stared at him. "You frighten me," she said without meaning to. "It's the possibility of the matter that frightens you, not me," he explained in that harsh, grating voice he seemed stuck with.

James Dean returned with a small soft-plastic case and handed it to the doctor. It had tiered shelves, like a fishing tackle box. He tore a plastic bag off of a disposable syringe and took hold of her wrist to time her pulse. His fingers were ice cold. He did some more preparations below the lip of the table, out of sight from her, and then slipped on a pair of surgical gloves.

He's afraid of contamination, she thought. She felt dizzy.

He swabbed her upper forearm with alcohol and then wrapped surgical tubing tightly around her upper arm. He asked her to make a fist. She looked away. These days, she hated the sight of needles. "I'll need to take three samples," the doctor explained. "But just the one needle. it shouldn't hurt too much."

He pricked her arm then. She jumped with the sensation. All the ramifications, all the possibilities of what had been said here in the last few minutes swam through her head. Her life was finished. Contaminated. Contact with anyone at The Shelter would be minimized and eventually terminated. Worse than a leper. Society would shun her. She would eventually fall victim to the virus. They all did. There would be AZT-at a few thousand dollars a month! There would be counseling. There would be tears and lost friendships. There would be a long, grueling illness, weight loss, and death. She started to cry.

As she blinked away her tears, she focused on the contents of his medical case. She noticed an electric shaver, some leather strapping that looked more like a muzzle-a dog's muzzle? Next to it, a choke collar chain! This man wasn't a doctor, he was. "A veterinarian?" she asked.

At that same instant a stunning warmth surged through her system.

It flooded into her like hot water. She knew that feeling only too well. Valium and some kind of narcotic. A slam like codeine. They weren't taking her blood, they were drugging her.

She snapped her head around in time to see the last of the injection administered. She looked up at the doctor-the veterinarian! — whose full concentration remained focused on the injection. She glanced up at James Dean, realizing now, for the first time, that they had not given her any identification. He was smiling at her. He had a mouth full of the worst teeth she had ever seen, like a rotten picket fence.