The Nirvana Plague Read online

  One woman takes out a knife and flicks it open. She presses the point of it against his ear as she swears at him. “I think I’ll just cut your throat, you sonnabitch.”

  His head moves as he gasps for breath, and the fine blade cuts his ear.

  “What you think about that?”

  The man looks up at her.

  She looks at him. “You think I never killed no man before you?” she says.

  He says nothing, does not look away.

  “That what you think? You think I don’t know how to cut a man’s throat?”

  He looks at her hard. His face is tense with pain, and yet, in his eyes, in his look, there is no suffering, no fear, and no deception.

  The woman with the knife stands back from him, grimacing, almost snarling at him.

  “Do it!” says the other.

  She draws back the knife, as if to plunge it into his open eyes.

  “Do it!”

  He does not look away as her hand comes down on him. She cracks him on the crown of his head with the butt of the knife.

  The kneeling man begins to lose his balance then. His calm bright eyes dimming, his look wanders now from her face. He wavers and slumps down on the sidewalk.

  The women in their pointed shoes start kicking him viciously in the ribs. At first he flinches, but they keep kicking him until he no longer reacts.

  Karen settled into her nest-chair with wine, crackers, phone, and remote control, and turned on the news. It was somehow immoral to be comfortable at home when Roger was God knew where, but she needed the television to get her mind off a situation she couldn’t do anything about. With any luck, the wine would soon put her to sleep.

  The news was typically horrific: All transportation of any kind into and out of India had been shut down. All transportation inside the country was also suspended, except for government vehicles, no trains, no cars, not even bicycles, were moving. The Ebola outbreak was known to have killed over thirteen-thousand people so far. The US continued to slug it out with all comers, politically and militarily, and all to no effect. The three feet of snow dumped on the eastern states was slowly melting while the non-experts debated whether global warming was now inducing the next ice age or not. Meanwhile, out in Hollywood, the latest silicone siren was playfully denying any romantic interest in her handsome leading man—

  The phone rang with the doorcall tone, startling her straight to her feet. She ran out of the apartment without even answering it, bolted down the stairs three at a time, and yanked the door to the foyer open.

  It was Marley. “Karen,” he said. “I just got a call from the police.”

  Her heart stopped.

  “Roger is in the hospital.”

  “What?” she said. “What?”

  “Roger is in the hospital.”

  “He went back?”

  “No. He’s not at Joplin. He’s in the emergency room at Hudson Regional.”

  “Oh no.”

  “I just spoke to the admitting physician. He told me Roger’s not too bad. Why don’t you get your coat, and I’ll drive you?”

  She turned around and started back upstairs. Marley followed her. Over her shoulder, she said, “Why did they call you?”

  “It was the police. Because I’d called them earlier this evening about Roger.”

  “Why haven’t they called me?”

  “I told them they didn’t need to call you. I’d take care of it.”

  She came back out with her coat and jerked the door shut behind her. “What happened to him?”

  “I gather he was mugged.”

  “How bad is he?”

  “Several simple fractures — ribs and metacarpals. Superficial cuts and contusions. Mild hypothermia. Some stitches, maintenance IV, codeine. Nothing serious. No apparent internal injuries. They’re admitting him for the night at least — just to make sure. He’s conscious and alert.”

  “Fuck,” she said. “What next.”

  It was nearly 1:00 a.m. before Karen finally saw her husband. She had obtained Roger’s room number by phone on the way, and walked past the nurses’ station on the fifth floor trauma unit without even breaking stride.

  One of them demanded, “Who are you?” but Karen didn’t even look back.

  Somebody said, “You can’t go down there!” — somebody else, “Call security!”

  But Marley, tagging after her, stopped long enough to flash his credentials and quell the panic. He didn’t have privileges at Hudson, but a doctor is a doctor.

  Though all the lights in his room were off, the door was standing open and enough light spilled in from the shadowy corridor that Karen could see that Roger was awake — lying flat in the bed, uncovered, all the sheets and pillows on the floor, an IV pump hanging from the wall. She could see that his face was swollen and bruised. He had a line of stitches through his upper lip and another down one side of his forehead, and his right arm was in a cast. She was already crying by the time she reached his bedside.

  He stared straight up, not looking at her.

  She sat down on the edge of the bed.

  “Roger?” she sobbed.

  His head turned toward her. One eye was swollen almost shut, but the other focused on her in the gloom. She noticed he had another line of stitches across his right ear.

  “Oh, honey!” she said, and bent over him.

  “Karen,” he said, slowly, his voice cracked.

  She kissed his face gently. “Honey, why didn’t you call me?”

  “Call you,” he said.

  She sat up again. “Why didn’t you call me when you left Joplin this morning?”

  His gaze drifted away. “Why?” he repeated, as if unfamiliar with the word.

  “Are you hurting very bad?” she said.

  “There is pain,” he said. “There is, it is — I mean, here there is pain. I mean, not there. I mean. I mean. Mmm. That’s the meaning.”

  She looked him up and down. “Where, honey?”

  “Here,” he said. “Not there.”

  “Not where?”

  “Not there.”

  He made a slight gesture, and she realized he meant her. Not her. That the pain was not her pain. “No, honey, I’m fine. I’m not hurt.”

  “No,” he agreed.

  She heard a footstep behind her as Marley came in from the corridor.

  “Nice to see you again, Roger,” he said. “I let the staff know that I’m your psychiatrist, and had a look at your chart. I’m sure they’ll be releasing you in the morning. I won’t keep you awake now, but I’d—”

  Roger looked at Marley and extended his good hand toward him, and the doctor took it spontaneously. Roger gripped his hand firmly.

  “And I’d —” Marley stammered, looking down at their joined hands. “But I’d like to talk to you again soon.”

  “Yes.”

  “Tomorrow.” He felt Roger’s grip tighten. It seemed to him a kind of chill shot through his arm. “About — About your—”

  “Yes.”

  He stopped trying to speak.

  Roger said nothing either.

  Finally, he used his free hand to pull Roger’s hand loose from his own. “All right then,” he said. “I’ll let you sleep now. Karen, I’ll wait for you in the visitors’ lounge. It’s just around the corner there.”

  After he’d gone, Karen asked Roger what had happened to him.

  Roger’s gaze drifted up to the ceiling again. “Remember,” he said.

  “Remember what?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Remember what?”

  “Don’t you remember what happened to you?”

  “Memories. Thoughts.” He spoke slowly, as if he wasn’t sure whether he was using the right words. “There is that, yes.”

  “Just tell me.”

  “There is asking. And answering. Asking causes answering. But. But. But who?”

  “Roger, just talk to me.” She took his face in her hands. “To me.”

  In the gloom of the room, his
small eyes sparkled under her face. “There’s, there’s no, there’s no — ”

  He stopped trying to talk and just looked at her — into her. She hadn’t seen such a look from him in many years. But it wasn’t just intimacy. He saw her. Suddenly she felt fear — or something like fear. She began to cry again, silently, tears spilling from her eyes and falling on him. She saw his eyes soften.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “No need.”

  “I’m not worried, honey,” she whispered. “I just don’t understand. I don’t understand.”

  “Understand.” Vaguely.

  “Please get some sleep now, OK? I’ll be here in the morning. I’ll take you home.”

  He said nothing, his eyes softening more, already going to sleep, as if on command.

  “Roger? Promise me that you won’t try to leave your room tonight.”

  But he was already asleep.

  Karen picked up the sheets and blankets he had knocked on the floor and spread them over him.

  She sat beside him for a long time while he slept.

  She found Marley sitting in the visitors’ lounge near the nurses’ station, reading something on his tablet. She slumped into the seat next to him. Typical hospital furniture — she might slide off it any second.

  Marley looked up.

  “How does he seem?”

  “I’m staying here tonight,” she said. “I don’t trust him not to try and leave.”

  “I’ll stay too.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “He’s different, isn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  She shifted in the chair. Comfort was impossible. “Now go home,” she said.

  “I want to talk to him as soon as possible tomorrow.”

  “What’s the urgency?”

  “The urgency is that it may continue to spread.”

  “Worried about a patient rebellion?”

  “Among other things.”

  “Well, you can go home tonight. Come back tomorrow. Don’t you want to get some sleep?”

  “I can talk my way into the doctors’ lounge.” He nodded toward a pillow and folded blanket stacked on the sofa beside her. “Also I asked the charge nurse to bring you a blanket and pillow. You can stretch out here on the couch.”

  “You’ve really become almost human, doc.”

  “Almost.”

  “What are you doing there?”

  He tapped his tablet. “I’ve been doing some research. The thing is, I’m having trouble labeling the symptoms. When I interviewed the other two patients today, I strongly felt the similarity of their behaviors with what I saw in your husband this morning, yet I can’t quite put my finger on what these behaviors are. Behaviors doesn’t even seem like the right word.”

  “I’ll tell you one thing. I’ve never seen Roger talk so slowly, and, and something else. So indefinitely. He always thought fast and talked fast — and with complete assurance. Even before he got sick. A lot of people, when they first met him, thought he was arrogant, but I liked it. But now he doesn’t seem to know what he wants to say. It’s like talking to a child in some ways. Did you ever have a four-year-old try to tell you something they didn’t have the words for? Lots of false starts, and repetitions, and disjointed syntax.”

  “Right. All three of these patients seem to be at a loss for words. But it isn’t like they don’t understand what happened to them, they just don’t know how to say it. However, I will tell you Roger is less coherent now than he was earlier today. Not surprising, considering what he’s been through.”

  “I wish I’d seen him.”

  “I’d guess you’d have been even more impressed than I was.”

  “So what do you think it is?”

  “I’m not sure yet.”

  “But you have a theory.”

  “Not a theory. But I see certain correspondences.”

  “With what?”

  “Let’s talk more about it later. I’m not sure what I think yet.” He stood up. “I’ll come find you for breakfast.”

  “It’s silly for you to stay over. What about your wife — Ally?”

  “She‘s a big girl.”

  He said it defensively. Karen saw it. There was more to that story.

  Part Two: March

  We become plants, trunks, foliage, roots, bark,

  We are bedded in the ground, we are rocks,

  We are oaks, we grow in the openings side by side,

  We browse, we are two among the wild herds spontaneous as any,

  We are two fishes swimming in the sea together,

  We are what locust blossoms are, we drop scent around lanes mornings and evenings,

  We are also the coarse smut of beasts, vegetables, minerals,

  We are two predatory hawks, we soar above and look down,…

  Chapter 6

  Morning rounds done, Marley had returned to his office on Joplin’s second floor and logged in to the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry to check the feedback on his article, “Case Report: Pseudo-infectious Iatrogenesis of Depersonalization Disorder in Five Schizophrenic Patients.” He had an hour for lunch between morning rounds and his first outpatient appointment. For the past week, since his article had come out, he’d been spending that hour at his desk, reading and responding to feedback. The article was getting some attention. Several prominent physicians had already posted responses, challenging some of his assumptions, calling for more details, grabbing some attention for themselves. And he’d also received two invitations to consult on similar outbreaks at two other primary care facilities. Checking his e-mail now, Marley was pleased to discover an enthusiastically-worded invitation from the chairman of the planning committee for the Annual Convention of Clinical Psychiatry to present a follow-up report at their upcoming meeting in New York. He began composing his acceptance at once:

  “I would be happy — I would be honored — I would be pleased to present—”

  The receptionist beeped in, interrupting his composition. “Dr. Marley?”

  He thumped the answer button on his screen. “Yes? What?”

  “There’s a Colonel Benford asking to see you.”

  “Lunch break.”

  “I know. She says it’s urgent.”

  “Who?”

  “Her name is Colonel Sarah Benford.”

  “What does she want?”

  “She says she’s from the NIH.”

  Pause.

  “She says it’s about IDD.”

  Holy shit. “Send her in.”

  Marley tapped the door open from his screen and stood up.

  A few seconds later, a female Army officer stepped into his office, flanked by two subordinate male officers. She was in olive uniform — slacks, overcoat over one arm, flight cap tucked in her belt. She looked about fifty, slightly greying blond hair pulled back in a tight roll, sharp eyes, fit build. She smiled and crossed to his desk, extending her hand. She moved with a controlled, economical grace and self-assurance.

  “Dr. Marley, pleasure to meet you. I’m Dr. Benford, from the NIH.”

  Marley shook her hand, glancing at the expressionless subordinates who’d closed his office door behind her and taken up positions inside it. When the guards stand inside it’s to keep you from getting out.

  “What can I do for you?” he said.

  “I want to talk to you about depersonalization disorder. Shall we sit down?”

  Marley hadn’t thought to offer her a seat. He wasn’t sure what the protocol was with armed guards in the room.

  Benford sat down in the chair in front of the desk and crossed her legs.

  Marley returned to his chair behind the desk. “You say you’re from the NIH?”

  “Yes,” she said. A slight smile crossed her face and was gone. “I’ve just flown in from Washington.”

  “You came from Washington just to talk to me about depersonalization disorder?”

  “Yes.”

  On his desktop screen, the cursor in his message editor blinked on
the first line of his reply.

  I would be pleased to present |

  He tapped it off.

  “OK. Well, you have my attention now.”

  Again the brief smile appeared on her face and vanished. “Dr. Marley, what I’m about to tell you is classified. I want to make sure you understand that. If we are to continue this conversation, it can only be with the understanding that you may not discuss anything we say here with anyone outside this room. You were a communications officer in the Navy, and you had clearance at that time, so you understand the implications.”

  Was this for real? It was easy to see that she had carefully planned what she was going to say to him and how she was going to say it.

  “So, shall we continue?” she said.

  He nodded. He felt wary. And excited.

  She seemed to relax a bit. But even that looked planned. Now when he agrees to continue, sit back a little. “My boss reports directly to the Secretary of Homeland Security,” she said. “Under the auspices of the NIH, I have been ordered to organize and take charge of a special infectious disease task force. Your brief on an outbreak of infectious depersonalization disorder here at Joplin was forwarded to me by our research staff.”

  “Pseudo-infectious,” he said. “I called it pseudo-infectious depersonalization disorder.”

  “You don’t think five cases in one week counts as a bona fide infectious outbreak?”

  “Not without a plausible vector.”

  “Dr. Marley, the cases of IDD you observed at Joplin last month were not isolated.”

  “I know. I’ve been contacted by doctors at two other hospitals who think they may have the same thing going on.”

  “Dr. Marley, we’ve known about IDD since January. According to the latest estimate by Defense Department doctors, there are now more than three-hundred active cases.”

  That stopped the clock. “Three-hundred?”

  “Yes. More.”

  “I don’t follow. Where are these cases?”