“Here you go, Mr. Gonzalez.” Vera lifted the hospital-grade pasta off her cart and set it on the swivel table attached to the patient’s bed. She made sure the steamed carrots were closest to him, because he liked those best. Then she peeled off the foil top to the apple juice, knowing his arthritis made it hard for him to pinch.

“Gracias.” The old man nodded, wisps of gray hair dotting his sun-spotted head. He smiled with the glint of a young man. “I used to be a cook, you know. In the army. I peeled potatoes!”

“Hmm.” Vera hummed, already knowing this story.

She headed back to her cart, and a woman wheeled past the open door, Get Well Soon silver balloons trailing behind her.

“My Maria loved my cooking,” Mr. Gonzalez went on. “Especially my croquettes! Chicken, and sometimes a little jalapeño…” He winked.

Vera half listened, her eyes busy avoiding a makeshift altar resting on a small table near the window. Every time she passed it, the hairs rose on her arms. Vera supported religious expression. Of course she did. First Amendment and all that. But she swore the air in the room grew colder the closer she got to it.

Plus, it had grown. Atop a disposable tablecloth now sat fresh lemony carnations in a glass bubble vase. There were black and white candles—not burning, of course—along with a chocolate bar with frayed gold foil, a crumpled dollar bill, a small jar of what Vera hoped was dirt, and a gold-trimmed chalice seemingly filled with water. But it was the object in the center that caused icy fingers to slither down her neck—a twelve-inch statue of an ivory skeleton in a white robe with matching feathery wings. Its bony hands held an ivory torch, a skull carved into the handle, and it was upside down, the flame at its feet extinguished. It was weeping, black streaks marking its face.

“The Angel of Tears,” said Mr. Gonzalez, noticing her gaze.

“Yes, I know.” Vera nodded stiffly.

Just get out of here.

She tossed a polite see-you-later grin his way. Then she paused at the sight of his face. His smile looked off. His lips were turned up, the corners straining toward his ears as they had been earlier, but now his mouth looked too wide and his lips too moist. A sudden smell wafted through the room. Her eyes searched for a bedpan, but it wasn’t human waste. The air was full of rotting sweetness, as if the carnations were dying, only the petals looked fresh. The stench hadn’t been there earlier. She was sure of it.

“El Ángel was there for my Maria,” he said, his voice suddenly scratchy.

Mr. Gonzalez suffered from dementia, had just had hip surgery, and was on a grand cocktail of new medications. Sometimes he thought he was back in high school and Vera was his date to the dance. Other times, he spoke at length about his days in Mexico. And almost every time she saw him, he mentioned his wife.