John Barnes - Directive 51

“Yeah, but I can spend the rest of my life doing that.” She sighed. “I see the point. I really do.” She wiped her eyes. “Lenny. You’re not doing anything to me that I’m not also doing to you. You know I’m not going to sit this whole thing out behind a desk; any time, Cam or the president might send me where I could come down with a bad case of shot or stabbed. Even if you’re here for ten more years, there’s no guarantee I will be. So I think you better take your chance to really live.”

Lenny nodded. “I told Dr. Lee you’d say that. There’s one thing you can do that would be great.”

“Name it.”

“They can’t open me up and get to work till midday tomorrow. I can’t safely go back to our place, so I’m in the hospital for tonight, but if you’re willing to let them do a full scrub on you, we could be in the same bed.”

“A full scrub is like the one we had on arrival, where they shave my head and exfoliate me?”

“That’s the one.”

“I’m glad you like your girls bald and bright pink.”

“I like my girls you . Bald and bright pink is just a side benefit.”

Her skin was rubbed raw, and Lenny suggested that next time she ask them to use finer-grain sandpaper, but they forgot it all in the pleasures of one more night with each other. “I’m glad you’re good at in-the-moment and for-right-now,” Lenny said, “because I sure needed you to be tonight.” His powerful hands were gently pulling and tugging at her scalp muscles, enough to force them to relax, and the release of tension was wonderful. “Does this feel good?”

“Mmm. The best.”

“I’m kind of liking it myself.” He rubbed and tugged firmly, and she let herself get lost in the sensations, being just here, just now. “Got the energy for another round, or is it time to sleep?”

“I’m not sure I want to sleep at all, tonight.” She moved him gently into a better position and kissed him.

Coming up briefly for air, he said, “Well, they’re going to knock me out for a lot of hours tomorrow; why sleep now?”

The next morning, they were turning toward each other, cuddling and touching, not sure whether to be awake yet, when Heather smelled a combination of rotten cheese and flyblown meat.

Lenny saw her expression and sniffed. “Fuck. Oh, shit. Where do I have it?”

The new piece in his plastic kidney drain, which Dr. Lee had sculpted so carefully from surgical cement, had brownish ooze around its edges. Heather kissed him once more, and said, “They’ll be rushing you through everything from here on. You make it through and come back, ’kay?”

“I will if any of it is up to me. Whether I do or not, I love you.”

“And I love you.” She pushed the call button that would start the chaos, and dressed all but instantly in the scrubs they’d given her; Lenny asked her to help him into the awkward hospital wheelchair, and she was just making sure he was comfortable, even if it was only for the short trip down the hall, when the nursing team arrived.

They had put her at some distance from the operating room; Dr. Lee had said, “I don’t want your instincts kicking in if there’s some running and yelling.”

Heather admitted it made sense, but still, she wished she were close enough to be sure of knowing whatever was going on. She knew they’d be taking a lot of extra time, working with extra-sterilized instruments and giving everything much more than the usual scrubbing, doublechecklisting everything to make sure that nothing was contaminated inside; caution would take time, and so would working as systematically as they would have to.

She was bored after a while, sitting in the waiting area, so when she saw Sherry passing by, she flagged her down and had the dullest and most tedious paperwork files brought over and sterilized; she sat with her legs up on the bench, scribbling out each new document, accumulating a tidy heap.

They offered her lunch just before the hospital kitchen closed to start fixing dinner; she couldn’t have told anyone, afterward, what it was. Pretty typical hospital experience, that’s what I’ll tell Lenny, because he’ll scold me for hanging around here and fretting. She kept working because it was easy to put a few words down on a form, stare off into space for a few minutes, then put a few more words down on the form.

Late that afternoon, Dr. Lee came in, sat beside her, and put an arm around her; she was already weeping when the doctor finally said, “His heart just stopped—even with the pacemaker going—and nothing would restart it. We don’t know if it was a toxin from the infection, or something wrong in his artificial systems, or it was just time; but he just stopped, and we couldn’t start him again.”

They sat together for a long time, but neither of them seemed to have anything to say.

That night, back in their quarters, she packed Lenny’s things, because she didn’t expect to sleep, and if she didn’t do it then, she might not for a year. His clothes went into a box for decontamination and distribution; his books and papers would go to his colleagues to look through, to try to pick up the threads of his work; the few mementos he had carried in his pack from his apartment to across DC, when he’d made the trek with Heather and Sherry, went into her own keepsake box. Maybe someday I’ll meet his family, and they can explain the ones that I don’t know about. I wish I’ d thought to ask. I guess people always think there will be time.

Heather remembered every detail of Lenny’s funeral; for safety’s sake, he was cremated. She remembered blubbering something briefly about how much he’d meant to her; it hadn’t been exactly what was on the little typed sheet she’d written, because she couldn’t read through the tears. She remembered more about the other speakers—Arnie, warm and fond, helping everyone smile with gratitude that Lenny had been in their lives; Graham, brief, stiff, too dignified; Cam, reading a short message from President Norcross, and then adding his own few sentences.

“Taps” had always torn her heart out even before now; there were no firearm salutes because guns that definitely fired were still too scarce. Norcross had requested that Lenny’s ashes be stored on the base until it was practical to inter them at Arlington.

Afterward, Allie walked Heather back to her now-too-lonely quarters “just to make sure you get to bed okay tonight.” She hung around, giving Heather orders—“Now into your pj’s, now turn the covers back—”

“Are you going to read me a story?”

“If I have to. What I’m not going to do is leave you here sitting up for days, or wandering around, till you’re sick and exhausted.”

“You’re a good friend.”

“I’m a good staffer. Strict orders from Graham and Cam both: Make sure she’s okay.”

“You’re also a good friend.”

“Yeah. Get into the bed; I’ll turn the light off on my way out.”

Heather stretched out and shut her eyes. Not sure about sleeping, but I’m certainly tired. “Thank Arnie for me. His eulogy was… well, it was Arnie that made me remember Lenny .”

“Sometimes he has a pretty human touch,” Allie said.

That seemed odd but Heather was sleepy. “Okay, you can go. Really. Turn out the light. I’ll try to sleep.”