Clandestine Occupations (Spectacular Fiction) by Diana Block

Author:Diana Block
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: PM Press
Published: 2015-08-28T04:00:00+00:00

CAMOUFLAGE—

MAGGIE

2007

IF HE HADN’T STUMBLED CARELESSLY AGAINST ME AS I WAS RUSHING TO CROSS THE street, I might never have noticed him. I was late for my shift on the Ortho ward and already irritated that Gordon had been too busy skateboarding to let me know he wouldn’t be home after school. So when I felt the man’s body weight slump onto mine, I almost shoved him rudely away before I saw his dayglo-orange uniform and the chains shackling his feet. If I had pushed him, he would have crumbled downward, helpless, on the pavement below.

Sorry, Miss. Clay here seems to have lost his balance. The man in the crisply ironed olive green uniform and buffed black shoes was tugging on Clay in a clumsy, misplaced effort to get him upright on his feet. Clay was staggering, trying to stabilize himself, but I could tell immediately from his labored breathing and the sweat rolling down the dark wrinkles of his face that the stumble was caused by more than his chains.

I think he needs to sit down, not stand up, I said and began to help Clay settle himself on the curb of the sidewalk. When the guard seemed to hesitate about following the instructions of a small, non-uniformed woman regarding his prisoner, I added in my most commanding voice, I’m a nurse, and flashed my ID badge at him. This man may be having a heart attack. We need to call the ER across the street to come get him.

That seemed to shake Mr. Olive Green up a little. I wasn’t sure about the heart attack, but I imagined that this burly guard wouldn’t want to explain a death on his watch.

Okay, I guess. He has an appointment with some other department. He fumbled for a paper in his pocket. Maybe my partner has the paper. He went to get some food at the cafeteria, which is why I’m here by myself. We usually escort the inmates in teams, you know. He was explaining this to me as if I were the supervisor he might have to justify things to back at the jail.

Neurology. Clay’s breathing had calmed down enough for him to talk. His voice was gravelly but surprisingly deliberate. I have an appointment with the neurology specialist because I’ve been having trouble with my balance lately.

Abruptly, I realized that I hadn’t talked directly to the man himself before he spoke. He was an orange-suited inmate and I had chosen to communicate with the commander in olive green instead. I appreciated that Clay wanted to take authority over his own condition.

Thank you. Can you tell me what has been happening lately?

I didn’t want to do an intake interview. But, now that I had heard his voice, I needed to know what he had to say. Despite his distress, Clay quickly described his history of severe headaches, visual impairment, nausea, and increasingly frequent falls that had been ignored for more than two years. He left the accusation of malpractice unstated. I was drawing my own conclusions when the ER team arrived.

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