Now, Devesh rounded the corner, and she smiled. He looked boyish in his green scrubs, a kid clad in his pajamas and father’s dress shoes. He hugged her to him and introduced her to the nurses.

“Is that man here?” she whispered to him. “The burn patient?”

“Yes, do you want to see him?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let’s not then.”

The stories in the paper had talked about the man’s heroism, how he had emigrated from Cuba to make a better life for his children, how he had been assisting immigrants for the last thirty years. Now there was a fund to help him get back to the devoted family man and citizen he was.

“No,” she said. “I want to.”

“Morbid curiosity?” he asked.

Josie shrugged. But it was more than that. Here was a man who was willing to sacrifice himself for someone else’s baby, a child he didn’t even know.

“All right; we’ll have to get you some scrubs,” Devesh said.

He took her to a closet-sized room behind the nurse’s station where she draped herself in a large blue gown and hairnet. She felt like she was playing dress up and she giggled and turned to him for inspection.

He laughed softly. “Charming.”

Through this room was a bigger room, and she followed him closely. Large machines on wheels cluttered the space, and she had to push one to the side to stick near to him. On the walls were hundreds of pictures of family and friends collaged around homemade cards and a deflated Mylar balloon. Along the wide window hung a computer-printed banner that read “Te Amamos.” A crayoned parrot on a square of pink construction paper squawked “Abuelo! Abuelo!”

And then there was the bed, the body tucked neatly in up to the chin. The only thing visible was the face and head, a stretched mass of polished red—the skin wet and furrowed and angry. The eyes were large and glassy, forced open like a doll’s; and from beneath the covers, one hand peeked out, bandaged in a large gauzy mitt.

Josie stared. She felt the room slowly roll and she grabbed a chair beside her and shook her head violently. It was horrible, the worst thing she’d ever seen.

“He’s sedated so he doesn’t feel the pain,” Devesh said. “And a ventilator is breathing for him.”

“I can’t touch him,” she said.

It was a statement but Devesh answered. “No.”

There was a long pause, and then Devesh spoke. “They brought his grandson in this morning,” he said. “His eighty-year-old mother comes every day. And there’s a blind cousin that comes with his wife,” he continued. “The cousin doesn’t speak any English, but he had someone write a thank-you letter to all the doctors.”

“Okay,” she said.