Connie Willis - Passage

“We’re not—” A thought struck her. “That’s what you called from the ER about, wasn’t it? And why you were acting so peculiar.”

“I called to tell you I couldn’t find any movies that didn’t have death in them and did you have any suggestions,” Vielle said, opening the refrigerator and getting out a bunch of green onions, “and you weren’t there, so I told him some of us were getting together for munchies and a movie and did he want to drop by.”

“Some of us!” Joanna said. “And when he gets here, and it’s you and me, you don’t think he’ll realize you’ve been matchmaking? Or were you planning to hand me the deviled ham dip and duck out the back door? I can’t believe you did this.”

“Don’t you like him?”

“I hardly know him. We only started working together two days ago.”

Vielle shook the bunch of onions at her. “And you’ll never get a chance to know him once the nurses of Mercy General get their claws into him. Do you know who asked me if he was single this afternoon? Tish Vanderbeck. You don’t see her waiting around because she ‘hardly knows him.’ If you don’t watch it, you’ll get stuck with somebody like Harvey.”

“Harvey? Who’s Harvey?”

“The driver for Fairhill Mortuaries. He asks me out every time he comes to pick up a body.”

“Is he nice?”

“He tells me embalming stories. Did you know they really like carbon monoxide poisoning over at Fairhill because it turns the corpses a pretty rose-pink, in contrast to the usual gray? He imparted that little gem Tuesday and then asked me out for sushi.”

Tuesday. The day Greg Menotti died. She wondered if his was the body Harvey had picked up. “Did you find out if there was a fifty-eight in Greg Menotti’s health insurance number?”

“Greg Menotti?” Vielle said as if she’d never heard the name before, and then, “Oh, right. Yes, I checked. No fifty-eights. I checked his address, office, home and cell phone numbers, health insurance number—”

“His Social Security number?” Joanna asked.

She nodded. “His license number was on the paramedic’s report. I checked that, too. Ditto his girlfriend’s address and phone numbers. Nothing.” She bent over to get a cutting board out of the cupboard. “Like I told you, people in extremis say things that don’t make any sense. I had a guy who kept calling, ‘Lucille,’ and we all thought it was his wife. Turns out it was his dog.”

“Then it did mean something,” Joanna said.

“That one did, but a lot of them don’t. A head trauma last week kept saying, ‘camel,’ which obviously wasn’t his wife or his cat.”

“What was it?”

“We didn’t get a chance to ask him,” Vielle said tersely, “but my guess is, it didn’t mean anything. People like your infarction aren’t getting enough oxygen, they’re disoriented, and they’re not making any sense.”

She was right. When he was dying, the author Tom Dooley had told his friend to go ahead to the airport and save him a seat on the plane, and prima ballerina Anna Pavlova had ordered her doctors to get her swan costume ready.

“Back to Dr. Wright,” Vielle said. “I’m not saying you have to marry the guy. All we’re doing is putting an option on him. They do it in Hollywood all the time.” She laid the onions in a row on the board. “You option the screenplay, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to make a movie out of it, but later on, if you decide you do want to, somebody else hasn’t snapped it up in the meantime.”

“Dr. Wright is not a screenplay.”

“It was a simile.”

Joanna shook her head at her. “Metaphor. A simile is a direct comparison using like or as. A metaphor is indirect. My English teacher spent my whole senior year drilling the difference into me.” She stopped, staring at the cutting board.

“Your English teacher should have spent time on more important things,” Vielle said, “like teaching you that when Mr. Right, or Dr. Wright, comes along, you have to—”

The doorbell rang. “He’s here,” Vielle said, but Joanna didn’t hear her. For an instant, standing there watching Vielle chop green onions, she had had the feeling, out of nowhere, that she knew what Greg Menotti had been talking about, that she knew what “fifty-eight” meant.

It must have been what she or Vielle had said. They had been talking about Dr. Wright, and—

“Come on in,” Vielle said from the living room. “Joanna’s in the kitchen. Sorry about the knife. I’m in the middle of making dip.”

Something about optioning a screenplay. No. It stayed tantalizingly there at the edge of her memory, just out of reach.

“Look who’s here,” Vielle said, leading Richard into the kitchen. “I believe you two know each other.”

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Richard said, handing Vielle a six-pack of Coke. “I got caught by Mandrake on my way out. Oh, and Joanna, I think I’ve got a nurse lined up to assist. Tish Vanderbeck. She works on third.”

Behind him, Vielle mouthed, “What did I tell you? Tell him no.” Joanna ignored her.

“She says she knows you,” Richard said.

“I do know her,” Joanna said. “She’ll be great. What did Mandrake want?”

“He wanted to know if—”

“Stop!” Vielle said, brandishing the knife. “This is Dish Night. No talking about work or the hospital allowed.”

“Oh,” Richard said. “Sorry. I didn’t know there were rules. This isn’t like Fight Club, is it?”

“No,” Joanna laughed.

Behind him, Vielle made an “okay” sign and mouthed, “Mr. Right.”

“It isn’t a club at all. Vielle and I got to talking one day and discovered we both liked discussing movies.”

“As opposed to bitching about the patients and the doctors and the cafeteria’s never being open,” Vielle said.

“It isn’t, is it?” Richard said. “It’s closed every time I go down there.”

Vielle held up a warning finger. “Rule Number One.”

“So we decided to get together once a week and watch a double feature,” Joanna said.

“And eat,” Vielle said, taking a package of hot dogs out of the refrigerator. “Rule Number Two, only concession-stand foods allowed—popcorn, Jujubees—”

“Deviled ham dip,” Joanna said.

Vielle glared at her. “Rule Number Three, you have to stay for the entire double feature—”

“But you don’t have to pay any attention to it,” Joanna said. “You’re allowed to talk during the movie and make rude comments about the movie or about movies in general.”

Vielle nodded. “ Dances with Wolves was good for all of the above.”

“Rule Number Four, no movies with Sylvester Stallone in them, no Woody Allen movies, and no Titanic. This is a Titanic -free zone.”

“And why is it called Dish Night?” Richard asked. “I thought Rule Number One was no gossiping.”

“It is,” Vielle said. “The reason it’s called Dish Night is—”

“Because my grandmother used to tell me about going to the movies in the thirties,” Joanna said quickly, “when they used to have Dish Night and raffle off a set of dishes, and this is an old-fashioned night at the movies. Vielle, where are the movies?”

“Right here.” She handed them to Joanna. “And because we’re a couple of dishes. Or at least Joanna is. Why don’t you two go start the movie? I’ve got to finish my dip.” She pushed them into the living room.

And could you be more obvious? Joanna thought. “I want to apologize for my idiot friend,” Joanna said. “And for the mix-up this afternoon. She forgot to tell me you were coming.”

He grinned at her. “I figured that out.”