Not that he hadn’t dealt with his share of corpses, first along the border north of Hong Kong, in the New Territories, and then, more significantly, at the Well. But that was different; everything was different at the Well.

* * *

Whitman stirred, opening his eyes. He reached for her glass, took a sip of her whiskey, relinquishing his hold. It wasn’t half bad; in fact, he thought with time he could grow to like it almost as much as she did. He glanced at his watch. How had twenty minutes flown by so fast? When he thought about the Well, it seemed to him that he stepped outside of time. An hour could easily go by without him noticing.

He rose and padded down the hall, stood in front of the bathroom door. He listened, thought he heard something, but couldn’t be certain. He was about to rap on the door with his knuckles, then hesitated. “Charlie,” he called instead.

No reply, not even the sound of a body moving about.

“Charlie, come on out of there.” He leaned his forehead against the door. “Charlie, don’t do this. Don’t hide away. Don’t—”

Without either warning or sound, the door opened inward, putting him momentarily off balance in every way possible. She had been crying, and was crying still, silent tears rolling down her cheeks.

“Charlie, for the love of—”

“Why?” she cried. “Why did you do that to me?”

He was appalled; he’d never seen her like this, emotionally naked and vulnerable. He felt the pieces of his broken heart start to stir. “I didn’t mean—”

“Of course you meant it, Whit! You mean everything you do!”

Then she slapped him hard across the face. He took a step toward her, and she fell against him.

5

Squeak, squeal, slap-slap. A female patient calling pitifully for an enema, followed by sniggers erupting from the nurses’ station. Slap-slap, squeal, squeak.

How in the world anyone slept in a hospital was anyone’s guess, Flix Orteño thought as he lay flat on his back, listening to the workings of the floor. They were somehow magnified at night, when the acrid odor of disinfectant could not quite hold down the faintly nauseous-sweet stench of sickness. The sounds caromed around in his brain like pinballs, seeming, at length, surreal. He was on the verge of shouting out for a pair of earplugs, but could not bear the thought of the nurses laughing at him as well.

He stared up at the ceiling so fixedly that a certain crack began to metamorphose into a spider. He was about to close his eyes when he became aware of someone standing in the doorway. He turned his head, but the figure was in shadow, the hall light falling on its back.

“Hello, Felix.”

A male voice, one on the far edge of Orteño’s recognition.

The man came into the room as silently as he had appeared in Flix’s doorway. Orteño strained his ears but could no longer hear any sound emanating from the nurses’ station; they all seemed to be elsewhere.