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By Root 1129 0

Twice a month, Sheppard did a twenty-four-hour rotation with a seven-to-seven shift. The weekends tended to be busy, a euphemism for bad, particularly now that spring was in full force, early June now, more boaters out on the lake, more accidents, mostly boys doing stupid things. They’d lost a sixteen-year-old last month who’d slipped off the back of an outboard. Unaware of this, his older brother gunned the motor and shredded his hands, arms, and right leg, severing six fingers as well as the superior mesenteric and internal iliac arteries, the blade dicing the cephalic and basilic veins. He’d lost nearly nine pints of blood by the time they got him on the table; and standing over this mess, the boy’s skin milk white from shock, Sheppard froze. The right side looked like it had been mauled by a mythical creature, the blooming gashes revealing veins, tendons, and muscles so grossly mashed that he concluded both limbs would have to be amputated in order to give the kid any chance of survival. But he died within minutes. Afterward, his brother’s face was contorted with calamity and his parents agape, absorbing the news with something near awe, their grief so palpable and strong and localized, their arms over each other in a scrum of protection and anguish, it was like the force field between opposing magnets, thin and utterly impenetrable. And it was with such sudden accidents, when death didn’t just appear out of nowhere so much as erupt, that Sheppard allowed himself to give thanks for his own safety, for a life free of suffering. For his own brilliant luck.

This night, however, had been so very quiet that Sheppard actually longed for disaster. He was bored. He did rounds he easily could have left to the nurses. He took a detour by pathology, walked as inconspicuously as he could past the door, and through the frosted glass he made out Susan’s gray form—like an outline shaded with the flat side of a pencil—just inside the room. He could hear her heels striking the floor, and when they turned toward the door, he hurried off down the hall, went back to his office, and took a nap.

Later, close to five, a man in his midthirties was brought in by the police. He was well dressed, wearing a suit. But he was also disheveled: shirt untucked, tie loose, coat wrinkled, pants muddy at the cuffs, the shoes splattered and flecked with grass. There was a day’s worth of stubble on his face and his eyes were glassy, the rims red, but Sheppard smelled no alcohol. “We found him walking down Lake Road,” the cop said. “He can’t speak coherently.” When Sheppard asked the man his name, he looked up, baffled, as if he’d heard only a distant echo. “Put it in there,” he said. “Please.” He held up both palms, then coughed violently, hunching over. A gob of green sputum hit the floor between his feet. Sheppard had the nurse bring him a container and scooped it up with a tongue depressor, then laid the patient on the bed. Happily, the man closed his eyes. Sheppard listened to his lungs, which sounded like a water whistle. The spleen was enlarged, the abdomen hot. When Sheppard touched it, the man winced alert. “How many times do I have to say it?” he said, looking around as if he’d just landed on Mars. His blood pressure was low and falling. Sheppard thought for a moment, then ordered IV fluids and drew blood, a procedure the patient regarded bemusedly before dozing off again.

“Have Miss Hayes do a CBC, please, and a urinalysis,” he told the nurse. “Tell her to bring me the results as soon as she gets them.” Then he went to speak with the police. The man had no wallet, no ID at all, though he was wearing a wedding band. Neither of the officers recognized him.

“Is he on drugs?” one said.

“I don’t think so,” Sheppard said.

“Is he sick?”

“Very.”

Sheppard returned to the room and waited with the patient, whose blood pressure continued to fall. He checked his watch; it had been almost twenty minutes. When Susan entered, he managed to remain calm.

“Is this him?” she said.

“Yes.”

She looked at the patient for a second, then handed Sheppard her chart.