Jack O'Connell - The Resurrectionist

At this, Sweeney stepped forward and touched Nadia on the shoulder.

Nadia looked from Sweeney to Piglet and then back to Sweeney, before she asked, “You sure?”

“I’m sure,” Sweeney said.

Nadia nodded to her Abomination, who grudgingly shut off the drill and stuffed it in his back pocket. Sulking, he moved to the slab to start disassembling the brace and halo that held Danny’s head.

Sweeney stepped in front of Peck and said, “I never gave you permission to touch my child.”

Peck stayed silent but stared at the pharmacist.

Nadia slapped the doctor across the back of the skull and yelled, “Answer the man.”

“You don’t know what you’ve done,” Peck said.

“Yes, I do,” Sweeney said. “I’m leaving now. And I’m taking my son with me.”

“He’ll die,” Peck said and Nadia felt a little admiration for the stones on this elderly fucker. “Without the proper care, the boy will die.”

“I’ve made provisions,” Sweeney said.

“He’s all set,” Piglet called, tossing the last of the halo’s bolts over his shoulder.

“You report any of this,” Sweeney said, “and we’ll come back here. And the first person we’ll visit is your daughter.”

“Oh, fuck yeah,” Piglet yelled, as if already in deep fantasy about the many ways he would defile Alice Peck.

Then the Fluke popped the old man in the kidneys, twice, and Nadia let go of Peck’s bony arm and allowed him to slip to the floor.

The Elephant pulled a gurney in from the hallway and he and the Fluke gently moved Danny onto it. Sweeney reached into his pocket, pulled out his car keys and tossed them to Piglet.

“I’m parked at the rear exit, right next to the door,” Sweeney said. “Give us about a half hour before you head back to the Harmony.”

Piglet stared at the keys in his hand, squinted, looked from Sweeney to Nadia and said, “I ain’t driving no fuckin’ Honda.”

Nadia smiled and said, “Move your ass.”

Piglet heaved a sigh, started to turn, then, as if remembering something, pulled the surgical drill from his pocket and held it up defiantly, like a gun or a flag.

“I’m takin’ this,” he said to Nadia, who shrugged. Satisfied, Piglet led the way out of the theater and the Fluke and the Elephant followed, Danny on the gurney between them.

Nadia surveyed the room, motioned toward Tannenbaum with her head.

“That one will be out for a while,” she said. “But this one,” toeing Dr. Peck, “is still ambulatory.”

Sweeney went down on one knee and watched the doctor curl up, fetal.

“My son for your daughter,” Sweeney said, putting a hand on Peck’s shoulder in time to feel the tremble.

Rising, Sweeney said to Nadia, “Go on. I’ll be out in just a second.”

Nadia gave him an uneasy look.

“There are some things that Danny will need,” Sweeney said. “It’ll just take me a second.”

Nadia looked around the chaos of the room, nodded and departed.

Dr. Peck remained on the floor, knees bent up toward his belly, shoulders bent in toward the chest, both arms crossed and the eyes closed, as if in dream.

Sweeney moved to the surgical cart and lifted the shaving razor. Then he dropped it, gathered up Danny’s medical file and stuffed the bulging folder inside his jacket. He turned to leave, hesitated, and turned back to the cart once more. This time, he picked up and pocketed the marking pen. Then he put his hand inside the terrarium and lifted Rene out of the bowl. He placed the salamander in his shirt pocket and walked out the broken doors.

Sweeney rode to the Harmony on the back of Nadia’s bike, one hand around the nurse’s waist, the other cupping his own shirt pocket, making sure the newt was secure. And as the wooded hills surrounding the Clinic gave way to the city, he felt Rene begin to move. Felt the tiny, damp feet raking down softly over the heart.

They rolled at an even speed past the foundries and the chemical plants, past acres of ghostly housing projects and antique tenements long gone dark. Eventually, they cut into the city proper and made for downtown, a Mardi Gras in perpetual decay, this crowded hive of clubs and bars, noodle dens and arcades, strip joints and chapels of the apocalypse, all of them announced in red and blue neon. To Sweeney it looked like the last nightmare. And it smelled like a third world circus — sweet and rancid and toxic.

They approached the Harmony from the rear, through the blocks of ruined brick and stone. Halfway across the lot, they could make out Buzz, sitting alone in the rocking chair on the loading dock, waiting like some sea captain’s wife. Nadia parked the bike and killed the engine. They dismounted and climbed up onto the apron.

Buzz didn’t say a word and Sweeney sat down on the rail, blocking his view of the ruins. Nadia went inside the factory without speaking and after a minute they could hear her running water in the cafeteria.

Buzz looked as if he were staring through Sweeney, still focusing on the broken bricks in the distance.

“I’m not a solitary person, usually,” Buzz said and it sounded as if he were speaking to himself. “I like people around. I was alone a lot, growing up.”

Sweeney didn’t think the biker was looking for a comment, so he kept quiet.

“The thing is,” Buzz continued, “sometimes, when you really need to think, there’s no substitute for solitude.”

Sweeney allowed himself a nod.

“The boys are off on a run,” Buzz said. “And I don’t mind telling you, I miss every one of those fuckers already.”

“I’m sure you do,” Sweeney said, not rushing anything. Letting Buzz Cote do this in his own way and time.

“They drive me bugfuck. They really do, sometimes. But I’m like any parent. I’d be lost without them. And I like to think they feel the same way about me.”

“You’re a family,” Sweeney said and when Buzz’s eyes focused in on him for the first time, he knew he’d chosen the perfect word.

“I’ve been sitting out here for hours,” Buzz said. “I haven’t moved a fucking muscle. I been sitting here trying to figure out what it was you were gonna do. And I was trying to decide what I was gonna do once you made your decision.”

Sweeney took in air through his nose.

“I know sometimes I might seem erratic,” Buzz said. “Maybe even weak. But I’m neither one. I’m focused. It’s about being willing to become anything and everything to get what you need. To get what your family needs. To go hard or soft. Be sweet or sour. Eyes on the prize. Every fucking second.”

“It’s not easy,” Sweeney said, “being a father.”

“And I hope you understand how much I appreciate that.”

“The thing is,” Sweeney said, “I honestly do. I believe you get it.”

Buzz leaned sideways just a little.

“It changes you,” he said. “And not just in the ways you’d expect.”

Sweeney’s throat was dry. He wished Nadia would bring out a bottle.

“It’s about sacrifice,” Sweeney said. “To do the job right, you have to give up parts of yourself.”

“Fuck, yes,” Buzz said. “I swear to you, I’m not the man I used to be.”

“You’d give an arm and a leg,” Sweeney said, “to keep your child from getting lost. You’d give whatever was necessary.”

“You’d walk through fire,” Buzz said. “You’d kick God in the balls.”

“You’d give up your own life,” Sweeney said, “in a second. No hesitation.”

“No thinking at all,” Buzz said, “because that’s who you become.”

“But sometimes,” Sweeney said, “the kid gets lost anyway. And there’s not a thing you can do about it.”