Connie Willis: Passage

“You were on the way back to the office—” Joanna prompted.

“Yeah,” Greg said. “It’s snowing, and the road’s really slick, and this idiot in a Jeep Cherokee tries to cut in front of me, and I end up in the ditch. I’ve got a shovel in the car, so I start digging myself out, and I don’t know what happened then. I figure a piece of ice off a truck must have hit me in the head and knocked me out, because the next thing I know, there’s a siren going, and I’m in an ambulance and a paramedic’s sticking these ice-cold paddles on my chest.”

Of course, Joanna thought resignedly. I finally get a subject Maurice Mandrake hasn’t already corrupted, and he doesn’t remember anything. “Can you remember anything at all between your—between being hit in the head and waking up in the ambulance?” Joanna asked hopefully. “Anything you heard? Or saw?” but he was already shaking his head.

“It was like when I had my cruciate ligament operated on last year. I tore it playing softball,” he said. “One minute the anesthesiologist was saying, ‘Breathe deeply,’ and the next I was in the recovery room. And in between, nothing, zip, nada.”

Oh, well, at least she was keeping him in bed until the cardiologist got there.

“I told the nurse when she said you wanted to talk to me that I couldn’t have had a near-death experience because I wasn’t anywhere near death,” he said. “When you do talk to people who have died, what do they say? Do they tell you they saw tunnels and lights and angels like they say on TV?”

“Some of them,” Joanna said.

“Do you think they really did or that they just made it up?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “If I ever do have a heart attack and have a near-death experience, you’ll be the first one I’ll call.”

“I’d appreciate that,” Joanna said.

“In which case, I’ll need your phone number,” he said, and grinned the wolfish grin again.

“Well, well, well,” the cardiologist said, corning in with Vielle. “What have we here?”

“Not a heart attack,” Greg said, trying to sit up. “I work out—”

“Let’s find out what’s going on,” the cardiologist said. He turned to Joanna. “Will you excuse us for a few minutes?”

“Of course,” Joanna said, gathering up her recorder. She went out into the ER. There was probably no reason to wait, Greg Menotti had said he hadn’t experienced anything, but sometimes, on closer questioning, subjects did remember something. And he was clearly in denial. To admit he’d had an NDE would be to admit he’d had a heart attack.

“Why hasn’t he been taken to CICU?” the cardiologist’s voice, clearly talking to Vielle, said.

“You’re not taking me anywhere till Stephanie gets here,” Greg said.

“She’s on her way,” Vielle said. “I got in touch with her. She’ll be here in just a few minutes.”

“All right, let’s have a listen to this heart of yours and see what’s going on,” the cardiologist said. “No, don’t sit up. Just stay there. All right…”

There was a minute or so of silence, while the cardiologist listened to his heart, and then instructions that Joanna couldn’t hear. “Yes, sir,” Vielle said.

More murmured instructions. “I want to see Stephanie as soon as she gets here,” Greg said.

“She can see you upstairs,” the cardiologist said. “We’re taking you up to CICU, Mr. Menotti. It looks like you’ve had a myocardial infarction, and we need to—”

“This is ridiculous,” Greg said. “I’m fine. I got knocked out by a piece of ice, is all. I didn’t have a heart—” and then, abruptly, silence.

“Mr. Menotti?” Vielle said. “Greg?”

“He’s coding,” the cardiologist said. “Drop that bed and get a crash cart in here.” The buzz of the code alarm went off, and people converged on the room, running. Joanna backed out of the way.

“Start CPR,” the cardiologist said, and something else Joanna couldn’t hear. The code alarm was still going, an intermittent ear-splitting buzz. Was it a buzzing or a ringing? Joanna thought irrelevantly. And then, wonderingly, that’s the sound they’re hearing before they go into the tunnel.

“Get those paddles over here,” the cardiologist said. “And turn off that damned alarm.” The buzzing stopped. An IV pole clanked noisily. “Ready for defib, clear,” the cardiologist said, and there was a different kind of buzz. “Again. Clear.” A pause. “One amp epi.”

“Too far away,” Greg Menotti’s voice said, and Joanna let out her breath.

“He’s back,” someone said, and someone else, “Normal sinus rhythm.”

“She’s too far away,” Greg said. “She’ll never get here in time.”

“Yes, she will,” Vielle said. “Stephanie’s already on her way. She’ll be here in just a few minutes.”

There was another pause. Joanna strained to hear the reassuring beep of the monitor. “What’s the BP?” the cardiologist said.

“Fifty-eight,” but it was Greg Menotti’s voice.

“Eighty over sixty,” another voice said.

“No,” Greg Menotti said angrily. “Fifty-eight. She’ll never get here in time.”

“She was just a few blocks away,” Vielle said. “She’s probably already pulling into the parking lot. Just hang on, Greg.”

“Fifty-eight,” Greg Menotti said, and a pretty blond in a blue parka came hurrying into the ER, the nurse’s aide who’d been in the room before right behind her, saying, “Ma’am? You need to wait in the waiting room. Ma’am, you can’t go in there.”

The blond pushed into the room. “Stephanie’s here, Greg,” Joanna heard Vielle say. “I told you she’d get here.”

“Greg, it’s me, Stephanie,” the blond said tearfully. “I’m here.”

Silence.

“Seventy over fifty,” Vielle said.

“I just left my cell phone in the car for a minute while I ran into the grocery store. I’m so sorry. I came as soon as I could.”

“Sixty over forty and dropping.”

“No,” Greg said weakly. “Too far away for her to come.” And then the steady flatline whine of the heart monitor.

“Are you sure you told her I was looking for her?” Richard asked the charge nurse.

“I’m positive, Dr. Wright,” she said. “I gave her your number when she was here this morning.”

“And when was that?”

“About an hour ago,” she said. “She was interviewing a patient.”

“And you don’t know where she went from here?”

“No. I can give you her pager number.”

“I have her pager number,” Richard said. He had been trying her pager all morning and getting no response. “I don’t think she’s wearing it.”

“Hospital regulations require all personnel to wear their pagers at all times,” she said disapprovingly and reached for a prescription pad as if to record the infraction.

Well, yes, he thought, and if she had it on, it would make his life a lot easier, but it was a ridiculous rule—he turned his own pager off half the time. You were constantly being interrupted otherwise. And if he got Dr. Lander in trouble, she’d hardly be inclined to work with him.

“I’ll try her pager again,” he said hastily. “You said she was interviewing a patient. Which patient?”

“Mrs. Davenport. In 314.”

“Thank you,” he said and went down the hall to 314. “Mrs. Davenport?” he said to a gray-haired woman in the bed. “I’m looking for Dr. Lander, and—”

“So am I,” Mrs. Davenport said peevishly. “I’ve been having her paged all afternoon.”