It went beyond just me, though. It felt like people were more frazzled, more angry, more rumpled. My mind was in a place where I was more able to dwell on the bad.

Natalie had family with her—a few young cousins or siblings, a few people of an age to be aunts and uncles, and a lone parent: a mom who was probably the complete inverse of my mom. Her mom babied her, getting water that she didn’t reach for, fretting, moving aimlessly. The main reason I thought the kids were Natalie’s siblings was that her mom looked very much like a mother of four that hadn’t slept, showered, and had pulled on whatever she’d had at hand. Natalie just seemed to lie back on the hospital bed and let it happen, making regular comments to the cousin or sibling nearest to her in age.

A rain-slick umbrella licked its way along the length of my arm. I pulled my arm away, gripping my wrist to help keep it out of the way, and took a step forward and a step the side. Toward the door, putting myself in line of sight. I rapped my knuckles on the frame.

“Oh, hi Victoria,” Natalie said. To her family, she said, “This is someone I’m working with. You’re up early.”

That got me a dubious look from her mom.

“I was in the area.” Intentionally. “How are you?”

“I’m ready to go home. They kept me overnight after I fainted a second time, and I really shouldn’t have. I’m discharged after lunch.”

“I’m still worried,” her mom fretted.

“I’m just really, really lame.” Natalie’s head lolled back to her pillow as she said it, as if she was exasperated.

“You’re not lame,” I said. “You went above and beyond last night.”

“That night feels like a dream now,” she said. “The pain drugs are contributing to that feeling.”

“I’m sorry we put you in the line of fire,” I said. “That kind of thing with going after people at home—that shouldn’t happen. It’s unprecedented.”

“Don’t say that,” Natalie said, mock-stern. “As the closest thing you have to legal counsel, you saying that is tantamount to admitting culpability. If I wanted to sue you, you’d be digging your own grave with that.”

“Right,” I said.

“This wasn’t what I wanted for you,” her mom cut in. “You would have been safer going into medical school.”