Robin Cook - Coma

“I’m an architect,” said Berman. “One of the million or so that haunt the Cambridge scene. But that is another story. I’d much prefer to get back to you. You cannot guess how reassuring it is to me to hear you talk like a human being in this place.” Berman’s eyes swept around the room. “I don’t mind having a little operation, but this waiting around is driving me up the wall. And everybody is so Goddamn matter-of-fact.” He looked back at Susan. “Tell me what you were going to say about your former roommate; I’d like to hear.”

“Are you putting me on?” asked Susan with narrowed eyes.

“Honest.”

“Well it’s not all that important. It’s just that she was smart. She went to law school and has maintained herself as a woman yet has satisfied her urge and capacity to compete and contribute intellectually.”

“I have no idea how you have been doing intellectually but there is no doubt about you being a woman. You couldn’t be any less than the absolute antithesis of neuter.”

At first Susan was tempted to get into an argument with Berman over the fact that he equated being a woman with outward appearance. She felt that was only a part, a small part. But she caught herself and refrained. After all, Berman was on his way to surgery and didn’t need a debate.

“I can’t help the way I feel,” said Susan, “and ‘neuter’ is the best description. Initially I thought that medicine would be good for a number of reasons, including the fact that it would provide the social insurance I needed; I didn’t want to think or worry about any social pressure to get married. Well,” sighed Susan, “it provided social insurance all right, and a good deal more. Actually, I have begun to feel excommunicated from normal society.”

“In that vein I would love to be of assistance,” said Berman, pleased with his pun. “Provided, of course, you consider architects normal society. There are some who don’t, I can assure you. Anyway…” Berman scratched the back of his head while he put his words in order. “I hardly feel capable of carrying on a reasonable conversation in this humiliating nightgown, in this depersonalized milieu, and I would like very much to continue this conversation. I’m sure you get accosted continuously and I hate to add to your burden, but perhaps we could get together for some coffee or a drink or something after I get this Goddamn knee taken care of.” Berman held up his right knee. “Screwed the thing up years ago playing football. It’s been my Achilles heel ever since, so to speak.”

“Is that what you’re scheduled for today?” asked Susan while she thought about how to respond to Berman’s offer. She knew that it was hardly professional by any stretch of the imagination. At the same time she was attracted to Berman.

“That’s right, a minuscule-ectomy, or something like that,” said Berman.

A knock at the door, followed by the rapid entry of Sarah Sterns before Susan could even respond, made Susan jump, and nervously she began to fuss with the stopcock on the I.V. Almost at the same time Susan realized how childish this action was, and it made her angry that the system could affect her to such a degree.

“Not another needle!” voiced Berman, dejected.

“Another needle. It’s your pre-op. Roll over, my friend,” said Miss Sterns. She crowded Susan in order to put her tray on the night table.

Berman glanced at Susan in a self-conscious way before rolling over on his right side. Miss Sterns bared Berman’s left buttock and grabbed a handful of flesh. The needle flashed into the muscle. It was over almost before it began.

“Don’t worry about the I.V. rate,” said Miss Sterns on her way to the door. “I’ll adjust it shortly.” She was gone.

“Well, I must be going,” said Susan quickly.

“Is it a date?” asked Berman, trying not to lean on his left buttock.

“Sean, I don’t know. I’m not sure how I feel about it; I mean professionally and all that.”

“Professionally?” Berman was genuinely surprised. “You must be being brainwashed.”

“Maybe I am,” said Susan. She looked at her watch, the door, and back at Berman. “All right,” said Susan finally, “we’ll get together. Meanwhile you have to get back to normal. I’ll live with being unprofessional but I don’t want to be accused of taking advantage of a cripple. I’ll stop in here before you go home. Do you have any idea how long you are going to be in the hospital?”

“My doctor said three days.”

“I’ll stop back before you go,” said Susan already on her way to the door.

At the door she had to give way to an orderly arriving with a gurney to transport Berman to the OR, to room No. 8, for his meniscectomy. Susan glanced back at Berman before turning down the corridor. She gave him the thumbs-up sign, which he returned with a smile. As she moved down toward the nurses’ station, Susan pondered over her mixed emotions. There was the warmth of meeting someone with whom she felt a rather immediate chemical attraction; at the same time there was the nagging reality of the unprofessionalism of it all. Susan couldn’t help but acknowledge that for her to be a doctor was going to be very difficult in every respect.

Monday, February 23, 12:10 P.M.

Like a slalom skier Susan wove her way down the hospital corridor crowded with lunch carts filled with an assortment of colorless food. The reasonably pleasant aromas emanating from the evenly stacked trays reminded her that she hadn’t eaten that day: two pieces of toast on the run hardly constituted a meal.

The arrival of the lunch carts added to the appearance of utter chaos at the nurses’ station on Beard 5. It seemed to Susan that it was a wonder indeed that the right patient got the right drug, therapy, or meal. To Susan’s pleasant surprise, Sarah Sterns had a smile and a quick thank-you for Susan before pointing to the resting place for the I.V. tray. No one else even acknowledged Susan’s presence and she left. It took her about three seconds to decide to use the stairs rather than wait for the crowded elevator. After all, it was only three floors down to the ICU.

The stairs were made of metal with an embossed surface like beaten silver. The color had been orange but now had become something approaching a dirty tan except in the center of each step, which was worn shiny by multitudinous footsteps. The walls of the stairwell were made of cinder block, painted dark gray. But the paint was old and peeling. Some previous plumbing catastrophe or accident had provided a series of longitudinal stains that descended from above along the wall to the right. The stains reappeared each time. Susan rounded the platform and started down another flight. The only light in the stairwell came from a bare bulb at each floor landing. On the fourth floor the bulb had blown, and because of the relative darkness Susan had to proceed with caution, advancing her foot to find the first stair on the next flight down to three. The distances between the floors seemed remarkably long to Susan.

By leaning out over the metal banister Susan could see down into the subbasement and up to where the spiraling stairs became lost in collapsing perspective. Susan felt slightly ill at ease in the stairwell. The decaying darkness of the walls seemed to move in on her, awakening some atavistic fear. Perhaps it reminded her of a recurrent dream she used to have as a child. Although she had not had the dream for a long time, she remembered it well. It did not concern a stairwell but the overall effect was similar. The dream involved moving through a tunnel of twisted shapes which would progressively impede her progress. She never made it to the end of the tunnel in her dream despite the fact that the goal seemed very important.