Brad Aiken: Questioning the Tree

I peered at him over the rim of my glasses.

He waved his hands, and with a chuckle said, “Carma Johnson, your assistant.”

“Really. Ms. Johnson?”

He gave me a nod. “She’s one of us.”

“Us?”

“Let me explain.”

He went on to tell me that he’d been stuck in a clinic across town since we closed the practice, that he found it every bit as unrewarding as I found my job, and that the only reason he kept going in there every day was because he needed the money. Familiar story, but I still wasn’t sure where Carma Johnson fit in.

Doug glanced around the room, then leaned in toward me. “Look, there’s a group of us who get together every week. You know, people who feel the same way as you and me.”

“And Ms. Johnson’s one of them?”

He gave a single nod. “It’s mostly physicians, but some nurses and techs have joined in too. We call it The Old Codgers Club, though it’s been attracting a few of the more recent grads like Carma who thought they were getting into medicine for the same antiquated reasons you and I did.”

“What the hell can you do besides bitch and moan to each other?”

“We run a clinic out of the back of a strip mall shop in the Libertyville area.”

My eyes widened. The Feds didn’t take to kindly to black market clinics.

“It’s a nice blue collar neighborhood, not much crime, doesn’t attract a lot of cops. We steer a few patients there, the ones we know we can trust. It’s like the old days; we get to treat patients the way we were trained to instead of the way we’re legislated to perform now.”

“Jesus, Doug. What if you get caught?”

“Hell, it’s worth the risk. Gives me a chance to shake the rust off, feel useful again. You should try it. We could use someone like you.”

I knew exactly what he meant. You can only do so much pencil pushing before you feel like you’re starting to rot away. It was a tempting offer.

“How do you hide it?”

“Carefully. Don’t talk about it to anyone you don’t know, don’t mention it at work even to those you trust. The walls have eyes.”

“Tell me about it. Every time I get someone new in the office, I feel like I’ve got to spend all day looking over my shoulder. These kids coming out of school… they’re brainwashing them young these days.”

Doug laughed. “Carma got to you, didn’t she?”

“Damn straight. I’d have sworn she was a mole for the Feds.”

“Nah. Just feeling you out. Plays the part well, though, don’t you think?

I had to agree. She’d figured me out without even a hint at what she was up to.

“So what do you say, Jenks? Our next meeting’s tonight. Why don’t you come check it out?”

I rubbed at a stain on the table. I wanted to say yes, but I kept picturing Arnie Hirsch being dragged off in handcuffs.

“Well, at least think about it.” Doug synced the info onto my PDA phone.

That’s all I did do the rest of that day—think about it. Something he said had struck a chord. The idea of being part of a real clinic again made my blood flow in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time.

I drove by the address Doug had given me. A quiet neighborhood strip mall. The storefront said Fine Tailoring, which I supposed was provided by a relative of someone in the Old Codgers Club. The information he had uploaded to me included a password that would grant access to the clinic in the back of the shop.

I pulled up in front and sat there with the engine running as I stared blindly at the store. My car was relatively new, but no air conditioning would have been able to keep the sweat from soaking through my shirt. Office hours were from six till nine; I still had a few hours to make my decision.

I stopped by a Starbucks on the way home and grabbed a burger, cream soda, and chips; a carryout bag. By the time I got back to my apartment, the food was lukewarm, but I preferred the confines of my home to a fast food joint. I wolfed it down, then jumped in the shower.

Most people sing in the shower: I think. In fact, it’s where I do some of my best thinking. But even the hot steam swirling around me couldn’t clear the fog inside my brain.

It would be so easy, I thought. Drive to the strip mall, go to the clinic, and get a chance to be a real doctor again.

I pictured myself in handcuffs. What am I, nuts?

Hey, Doug’s been doing it for God knows how long. How dangerous can it be?

Then a terrible thought occurred to me. Maybe he’s just setting me up.

It’s Doug , for Christ’s sake.

Hey, I don’t know what he’s been up to for the last decade.

So what else are you going to do, rot away at Thirteen for the rest of your life? Show some stones, man.

I toweled off and glanced at the clock. Decision time.

At quarter after six, I left my apartment and headed back to Fine Tailoring.My heart pounded faster with each turn and as I pulled into the lot, the wheel slipped from my damp hands. Only the car’s proximity braking system saved me from plowing into a line of parked cars. I numbly listened to the electronic voice admonishing me for reckless driving until I had recovered enough to disengage the safety, then corrected course and crept along past the storefronts until I spotted an empty space directly in front of the tailor shop.

I hesitated, then tapped on the accelerator and turned out of the lot without looking back. A half hour later, I was home.

A bottle of wine kept me company that evening. I nursed it slowly, staring at the walls until finally deciding to go to bed whether sleep was in my immediate future or not. Dozing on and off, snippets of dreams flitted through my mind: med school, the old practice, nightmares of Carma Johnson walking in to my office with a team of uniformed agents. Doug had convinced me she was one of the good guys, but dreams don’t always ride on facts and emotions don’t erase that easily.

I was rattled out of my dreams a little after midnight by the shrill ring tone of an unprogrammed caller and stabbed out for the phone more in an effort to silence it than from any real curiosity about who was on the other end.

“Jenks? Jenks, that you? Why’s your vid off?”

“I keep it that way when I’m in the buff,” I rasped.

“Oh. Oh, yeah.” I could see the stress lines around Doug’s eyes as he looked down at his phone to check the time. “Jesus, I didn’t realize how late it was. Sorry.” He glanced back over his shoulder. “Listen, I don’t know how much time I’ve got.”

I squinted, trying to study his face through my blurry eyes.

“You were right.”

“About what?”

“Carma. She turned us in. The cops raided our place tonight, just before closing. I had stepped out to take a break and when I got back there were half a dozen police cars out front. I’ve been trying to lay low, but you can only troll the streets for so long. It’s just a matter of time…” I heard the sirens approaching his spot. “Jesus. Gotta go. Be careful, Jenks.”

I reached for the remote control on my night stand and flipped on the monitor suspended from the far wall, then searched the Web for local news. “Shit.” There it was, plain as day. A bunch of doctors and nurses being hauled outside in handcuffs through the same door I’d been staring at only a few hours ago from the comfort of my car, the same door I’d almost walked through in a moment of rebellious false confidence.

“God, how could I have been so stupid? What was I thinking?”

I was too stunned to make out what they were saying before the picture faded to a live chase scene: Doug’s car. I turned it off and tossed the remote back onto the table. I didn’t want to watch the inevitable conclusion.