She doesn’t raise her voice. And her screams, her wails, are now a periodic burst of s-s-sobs, her face afflicted with a soundless pain, like when the hurt is lodged in the back of your throat, still chambered in your heart.

I never again want to see someone hurt so badly.

See someone suffer.

This is your face, helpless.

This is hope, smithereened.

This is good things happen to good people, solid as a soap bubble.

There’s no divine hand reaching down to save the person you love.

Today’s all out of miracles.

83

“I can’t fathom how you must feel, Ms. Barrantes.”

The woman in the gray dress sits as if she’s auditioning for Human with Extraordinary Posture, her hands folded, face even. Her only embellishment a silver bracelet that rattled as she shook our hands.

A grief specialist, Dr. Rodriguez called her, as he’d led us through a section of the hospital straight out of a horror flick.

Our only light a rope of low-wattage bulbs in metal cages strung the length of the cinder-block walls. Most of the ceiling missing too, bundles of cables dangling, some hanging low enough we had to move around them, some of them hissing.

We hurried right by the Authorized Personnel Only signs.

“Where are we going, Doctor?” Ms. Barrantes asked.

“They’ll explain better than I can,” he said. Before I could point out that she’d asked where, not whom or what, he added: “Please, hear them out, Simone.”

When we came to the mouth of the final hallway, it was so aggressively dark and quiet, I hesitated, searched Ms. Barrantes’s face for affirmation this was okay, that we were safe—but all I saw was pain.

Without knowing our destination—or what awaited us—our commitment solidified with each step. Somehow, we both knew that no matter what lay on the other end of this dark rainbow, we’d say yes. What was there to lose?

In the conference room, when he’d finally calmed her down enough to hear him, Dr. Rodriguez had said what was at best a rather peculiar thing: “There is tremendous opportunity here, Simone. Don’t let it slip through your fingers.”

I first assumed he wanted her to donate Q’s organs—waited for him to say: this is how Q lives on.

But this isn’t that. This is several galaxies removed.

When the labyrinth ended, we were in front of a single elevator, its door open, a dingy orange light shining from its ceiling. We’re barely inside the car when Dr. Rodriguez’s finger mashes SB. The door closes, and the elevator hiccups as we descend.

“What’s SB?” I asked.

Ms. Barrantes made a face. “Subbasement.”

“What’s in the subbasement?”

“Nothing,” she whispered.

“This is as far as I go,” Dr. Rodriguez said, holding the elevator door. “It’s the third door on your left.”