Jodi Compton - Sympathy Between Humans

Now my problem was this: Cisco might take one look at me and see, if not an undercover cop, a middle-class individual who didn’t need to seek doctoring in a housing project late at night. His clientele probably ran to people with little money and few options in medical care- the poor and disenfranchised, illegal immigrants, maybe criminals.

Maybe hookers, too.

That’s how I ended up, on a Sunday night, wriggling into my vice-decoy clothes: this time, a shiny, sleeveless pink top and tight calf-length black pants. After applying the usual makeup, I looked at the mirror, at my artificially pale face, and felt a chill of anxiety down my spine.

A SWAT veteran had lectured my Sheriff’s academy class about on-the-job nerves. When you feel fear, try to determine its source, he’d said. Sometimes it’s not coming from where you think it is, and sometimes if you know what the fear is really about, you can defuse it.

Was I afraid of Cisco because he was, supposedly, a doctor?

My medical phobia was a specific one. I wasn’t afraid of paramedics, and I gave blood when the blood bank set up shop downtown, in a reassuring nonmedical setting. But I hated going to the doctor: that powerlessness as you waited behind the closed door, with the overhead light bouncing off the instruments and the creepy anatomical posters hanging on the wall. Down to the second, I could identify the worst part: the moment when you heard the door handle start to turn.

But Cisco’s as-yet-unseen apartment wasn’t that place. According to Prewitt, Cisco probably wasn’t even a real doctor. To us, he was a suspect.

Was that in itself frightening? This was undercover work, which is always potentially dangerous.

I nodded, as if someone were here to share my revelation. I’d located the source of my nerves: I was afraid of the unknown Cisco, of being alone with him in his apartment. Maybe I should ask for some kind of backup.

All Prewitt asked you to do was check this guy out, I reminded myself. You don’t even have to identify yourself. You’re just going to go over there and see what’s what. You want help for that?

What I was doing needed to be done. Whoever Cisco was- a med-school washout or a con artist faking it from having worked in a medical office- he was clearly fooling enough people to have a small clientele, which meant he was bleeding money off the poor and uneducated just when they were at their most vulnerable. If he hadn’t screwed up badly enough to cause permanent injury or death yet, well, it was probably just a matter of time. This guy needed to be taken off the playing field, and Prewitt had trusted me to get the job started. I couldn’t go back to my lieutenant now and tell him I wanted backup to go see a suspect armed only with a stethoscope.

The elevatorin the north tower took a long time to come. There were no lighted numbers above the doors to mark its progress downward, and I whistled quietly as I waited. Such behaviors were Method acting for cops, keeping the nerves at bay.

A faint ping sounded, but for a moment nothing happened. A long moment. Then the single-panel door slid to the side. I stepped into the car and pressed number 26, for the top floor. After a moment the door slid shut, and again, nothing happened.

I pressed the 26 again. The car lurched upward. From above me, the other side of the elevator’s roof, came an odd groaning sound I’d never heard an elevator make, and underneath that sound, a squeak of cables working: screek, screek, screek. Inside the car, there were lighted numbers to allow passengers to watch their progress. For an inordinately long time the 2 stayed lit. Then 3. More rumbling from above; 4… 5… 6…

If I’d known it was going to take this long, I’d have brought something to read, I thought. The mental complaint was bravado. I rode elevators all the time at work, but this one was bothering me.

At 26, the car lurched to a halt. But for a moment, nothing happened. The door stayed closed.

“Come on,” I said under my breath. The elevator’s balky performance seemed like a bad omen for my whole visit here.

The door slid open and I stepped out into the hallway, walked down to the second door, and knocked.

What if Ghislaine misremembered which apartment this guy lives in? I thought, in the wait that followed.

The door opened about two inches, just to the end of a security chain. A slice of masculine face appeared in the gap, but about two feet lower than where I expected it. When I understood why, I found myself momentarily at a loss for words.

“Can I help you?” the man said, finally.

“Are you”- I coughed to clear phlegm from my throat-“Cisco? Ghislaine Morris gave me your name. I need to get looked at.”

Cisco closed the door in my face. Behind the wall the chain scraped, and the door swung wide. As he let me in, Cisco rolled backward in his wheelchair to give me space.

Height was hard to gauge, but he was a long, lean form in the chair, dressed in a dark-gray sweatshirt that revealed a little bit of white from the collar of the T-shirt he wore underneath. The same white T-shirt peeked out from under the sweatshirt at his hips, over his dark-blue workman’s trousers. His feet were bare. He had a lean face, with black hair that brushed his shoulders, feathery at the ends.

He certainly wasn’t hiding what he did. Beyond him, I saw low shelves lined with texts on medicine and anatomy. On the wall was a framed diploma, and where most people would have put the couch stood a long table lined with a sheet of tissue paper. It looked almost like a doctor’s examining table, except that it was lower, reflecting the level from which Cisco had to approach the world. The table was positioned just under a hanging light fixture. At the foot of the table was a chest, like a footlocker, and a little beyond that was a two-drawer filing cabinet.

“What’s troubling you?” Cisco said.

“I have a bad cold,” I said, “or the flu.”

“Mmm,” Cisco said noncommittally.

“How much do you charge?” I asked him.

“Let’s not get to that just yet,” Cisco said. “Most colds run their course within a week,” he said, “even without any kind of treatment. I’m not sure why you’re seeking help.”

Maybe this guy had the most sensitively tuned radar for cops I’d ever run across. Still, it was hard to be scared of him, given the situation. Unless he had a gun tucked under that fringe of T-shirt.

I sniffled again. “I’m never sick. That’s why this is tripping me out. I want to be sure nothing’s behind it.”

“Did your friend Ghislaine suggest I could prescribe something for you, something stronger than over-the-counter meds?” Cisco asked.

“No,” I said honestly.

“Because I can’t,” Cisco went on. “I expect Ghislaine didn’t pass along what I told her when she came to see me, so I’m going to tell you what I tell everyone. I don’t know what brought you to me in a city full of doctors’ offices; I don’t ask people that,” Cisco continued. “But this is not the ideal situation in which to get your medical care. If you have another option, you should seriously think about taking it.”

If he thinks that little speech is a disclaimer that’ll protect him from criminal charges, he’s got another thing coming.

“Understood. How much do you charge?” I said flatly.

“To look at you?” he said. “Forty.”

That’s all? I thought. It surprised me that he’d put himself at risk by doing something this illegal, and then charge relatively little for it. On the other hand, his clientele probably didn’t have much money to spare.