“As I’ll ever be,” Marion says. Her voice sounds hollow. She is on speakerphone.

“Dread Pirate Marion,” Rose says, “prepare to board.” Back straight, chin up. Eyes alert, she holds the clipboard in the crook of her arm and walks with what she hopes is casual purpose to the sliding glass doors of the MCU. She steps on the sensor mat and they slide open. Once inside, she lets them close, then tries the keycard on the black plastic reader. No luck. She drops it behind a potted ficus tree and walks into the foyer.

To her left is the dogleg of a hall, windowless, if she remembers correctly. A sign she hadn’t noticed on her last trip reads SECURE COMMUNITY. Beneath it an arrow points in the direction of the lockdown ward.

To the right is a reception desk. A woman sits behind it playing solitaire on the computer. She glances up. Before Rose has the opportunity to use the lie she’s rehearsed, the receptionist registers the scrubs and turns back to her game.

Heartened by this success, Rose loses no time ducking into the blind L-shaped hall. “I’m in,” she says. “The keycard is a dud.”

“Lose the purse,” Marion says. “I’m blind.”

“Right, right.” Rose was so preoccupied with getting in, she’s all but forgotten why she is doing it. She takes the tissue box out of the bag. She turns it until she can see the hole. “Hi,” she says.

“Don’t dick around,” Marion growls. It isn’t fair that Marion is having fits of nerves. She isn’t within a thousand miles of the action. Rose should be the one allowed vapors. She puts the clipboard back in the purse. “Bless the ficus-tree epidemic,” she says as she hides the beachy tote behind another potted tree gracing the bend in the hallway. “I’m putting—”

“I see it,” Marion says.

“Okay. Good. I’m going to wait—”

“We’ve been over all this. Stop talking.”

A shudder, like a horse ridding its coat of flies, runs over Rose. Placing her feet hip distance apart, she laces her fingers loosely in front of her abdomen. The box with the camera she anchors securely between her thumbs. Concentrating on her breath, she waits. Her monkey mind scampers madly up and down the hall, in and out of the lockdown unit, even out onto the greenway, snatching at fragments of memory, bits of speculation, images of capture, speeches of conquest.

Each time, she catches it gently and brings it back, only to have another monkey caper out and begin reinventing her wardrobe, predicting her future. The attempt at calm abiding is about as fun as a barrel full of monkeys would be in actuality, showing their fangs and slinging excrement.

Breathing, Rose perseveres.