'Hello.' He coughed to clear his throat.

'Tom is that you?' Someone. Sam. 'Tom?'

'Yeah, it's me, Sam.' He cleared his throat. 'What happened to you last—'

'Listen, Tom, they've found him.'

Breathlessness.

'Frankie?'

'They've found him, and he's alive. The EMTs think he's going to be fine.'

'You found Frankie?' Thomas cried, his voice breaking.

'They're taking him to St Luke's-Roosevelt right now.'

'St Luke's?' His mind raced. Why would they take him there? Then he remembered all the hoopla from the university paper. St Luke's had recently completed a world-class neurosurgery center.

No-no-no—

'I'll be right there!'

An audible sigh. 'Listen, Tom… I really think you should wait.'

'Wait? What the fuck do you mean, wait? You said he's fine.'

'Please, Tom. Trust me on this. Give the doctors—'

'You said he was fine!'

'He will be. I swear. He's in no immediate danger. You just—'

'The bastard did something to my baby, didn't he? The fucker hurt him, didn't he?'

'Shhhhh. Please, Tom. It'll be—'

'What the fuck did he do to my baby?'

'No one kno—'

Thomas dropped the phone and flew down the stairs.

The drive seemed little more than a crazed abstraction, after the fact. Lights, lines, and menace.

The city, the snaking labyrinth, obdurate and overshadowing, laughing at yet one more white-knuckled father. The parking garage. The smoky concrete. The stupid, surly nurse, asking him to restrain himself.

'Just tell me fucking where!'

Elevator doors opening like stage curtains.

What was that noise?

Sam down the fluorescent hall, glancing, turning, hastening to prepare, to caution. Gerard glaring at the floor.

'Tom… Tom… Tom…'

Pressing past her, past all the professional faces, the smart shoes, the crisp white coats.

'Tom… He's okay. Okay. H-he—'

That noise…

Through a door, down a windowed hall.

'Tom, please!'

Past pale-faced physicians.

Pulled up short, as though by a leash chained to his heart.

The lights. The bed. The starched sheets and soft cotton blankets. The restraints.

His boy, his eyes as round as a coin trick, his mouth a yawning 'O', his body riven, curling about some unseen fire…

Frankie.

Sam clutching his shoulders. 'He can't stop screaming, Tom. He can't stop screaming.'

That noise.

The weak man wonders why he has been chosen. The strong man knows all along.

Of course there are no words for this knowledge. No books.

I find this convenient.

You cry out when I touch. You gag when I strangle. You try to cover yourself with hands that are too small. It is strange this power I have over you—like a liquid. Your every surface is helpless, even those folds hidden within. And yet I can only pound you into shapes of your making.