Then the vertigo, the sense of tumbling. The kid had spit him out like a watermelon seed, never once slowing the pendulum swings of his mop.

With the others who poked into his room from time to time, he had no success at all, and this failure was a lot more frustrating than being unable to scratch his face when it itched. Brady had taken an inventory of himself, and what he had found was dismaying. His constantly aching head sat on top of a skeletal body. He could move, he wasn’t paralyzed, but his muscles had atrophied and even sliding a leg two or three inches one way or another took a herculean effort. Being inside Nurse MacDonald, on the other hand, had been like riding on a magic carpet.

But he’d only gotten in because MacDonald had some form of epilepsy. Not much, just enough to briefly open a door. Others seemed to have natural defenses. He hadn’t even managed to stay inside the orderly for more than a few seconds, and if that ass-munch had been a dwarf, he would have been named Dopey.

Which made him remember a joke. Stranger in New York City asks a beatnik, “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?” Beatnik replies, “Practice, man, practice.”

That’s what I need to do, Brady thought. Practice and get stronger. Because Kermit William Hodges is out there someplace, and the old Det.-Ret. thinks he won. I can’t allow that. I won’t allow that.

And so on that rain-soaked evening in mid-November of 2011, Brady opened his eyes, said his head hurt, and asked for his mother. There was no scream. It was Sadie MacDonald’s night off, and Norma Wilmer, the nurse on duty, was made of tougher stuff. Nevertheless, she gave a little cry of surprise, and ran to see if Dr. Babineau was still in the doctors’ lounge.

Brady thought, Now the rest of my life begins.

Brady thought, Practice, man, practice.

BLACKISH

1

Although Hodges has officially made Holly a full partner in Finders Keepers, and there’s a spare office (small, but with a street view), she has elected to remain based in the reception area. She’s seated there, peering at the screen of her computer, when Hodges comes in at quarter to eleven. And although she’s quick to sweep something into the wide drawer above the kneehole of her desk, Hodges’s olfactories are still in good working order (unlike some of his malfunctioning equipment further south), and he catches an unmistakable whiff of half-eaten Twinkie.

“What’s the story, Hollyberry?”

“You picked that up from Jerome, and you know I hate it. Call me Hollyberry again and I’ll go see my mother for a week. She keeps asking me to visit.”

As if, Hodges thinks. You can’t stand her, and besides, you’re on the scent, my dear. As hooked as a heroin addict.

“Sorry, sorry.” He looks over her shoulder and sees an article from Bloomberg Business dated April of 2014. The headline reads ZAPPIT ZAPPED. “Yeah, the company screwed the pooch and stepped out the door. Thought I told you that yesterday.”