Read Online Red Girl Rat Boy by Cynthia Flood - Free Book Online Page B

basket’s contents down the chute.
    Â 
    Lorraine, doing time all day
    Transfer was today embodied by Lily’s second cousin Felipe, a.k.a. Hot Wheels.
    Soon after he’d started at the care home, Big Man’s picker-upper tripped him. The Boss Lady ordered X-rays, a union rep sympathized. Felipe was fine, but corridor 17 made him nervous. To be done with it, he came early. No breakfast didn’t matter to Lorraine, yet his arrival typified time served in care: rush rush, or so slow that rage beckoned.
    Once, Lorraine’s transfusions came months apart. She’d spent her days in the garden (the fountain, the fountain!) or the library, and enjoyed meals at a lively table where everyone had their marbles. Now fortnightly she was shunted through a tunnel to the hospital, to be topped up with blood. The process granted little vigour. She felt, afterwards—not better, though, with her body chemistry so out of whack, naming sensations was hard.
    The gurney moved.
    Do names matter? If only I could read my file.
    After g ood morning to Mr. Chang, Felipe hung a left, then paused to flirt at the nurses’ station.
    Shelves just inside its open door held the residents’ blue files, thick as encyclopedias, the spines hand-lettered. Lorraine’s fingers yearned as she saw her own name, Sally’s, Annabel’s.
    The Wanderer drew up alongside. She touched Lorraine’s hand, goggled urgently at her, the folders, her.
    â€œI can’t reach.”
    Clack clack of stilettos. Hot Wheels jumped.
    The Boss Lady fingered a blue folder. “Con-fi-den-tial,” softly. “Au-thor-ized rea-ders on-ly. Big words? Close that door! ”
    The nurse whimpered, the gurney shot forward.
    Down down went Felipe and Lorraine.
    Through.
    Up up.
    For hours she lay alone, watching one red plastic pouch and another shrink from fat to flaccid. Her bedsores hurt. Unless her roommates kept today’s menus, June would be incomplete. And—her cellphone forgotten by her bed. Why care? I don’t answer. But if I wanted. . . I told everyone, Don’t call, don’t come.
    Also forgotten, her picture book of water gardens.
    Going dotty? Shall I unpick hems like Teevee-gal, eat threads?
    Enough.
    Lily. What to do?
    Soon after Lorraine came to 17-A, she’d learned how a former roommate, suffering from a migraine, asked for a cold cloth on her forehead. Wrapped in the chilly white was a turd.
    â€œLily just said, Not me .” Sally snorted. “The Boss Lady didn’t do a fucking thing.”
    â€œKetchup packets,” Annabel giggled. “We squished them anywhere Lily’d touch. Handles, trays. Switches. Messy!”
    Now the aide put tissues and eye drops out of reach, opened the window when asked not to. “Fresh air, you smelly in here!” Laughing, she “forgot” to close the door when bathing Sally, who cried in shame. Meticulously the Laundry Lady filed 17-A’s garments, yet Lily claimed favourites were MIA. Hampered by mobility aids and failing sight, the women must wait to retrieve crumpled dresses from the closet floor till Melia Josie Roberto Angelique came on shift.
    Without the aides, we’d die even sooner.
    The second blood-bag and time and energy drained away. At last gentle Melia came, who knew Lily’s little Alicia back home.
    As the gurney passed the Boss Lady’s office, Lorraine glimpsed the woman head-in-hands at her desk.
    Next, a gossip at the nurses’ station. Oh, how long? In any bed, I’d die happy.
    Finally, Van Buren’s and McCoy’s directives. Get a subpoena. Get a grand jury. Get on it, gentlemen, get going.
    Delivered into 17-A, Lorraine saw that her cellphone was gone.

    friday evening: planning
    KD in foil-lidded Styrofoam. Yucky coleslaw, and Sally ate all three servings. Canned mandarins. Lorraine gave hers to Annabel, chocolate milk to Sally.
    Later, while a languid nurse allegedly searched for the phone