Page 65 of The Care of Broken Things
“When?” Nathaniel’s voice was so sharp it cut right through his babbling.
“Just now. At dinner. He got quiet and then I noticed. He started to sweat. And then he sent me away.”
“What did he eat? What had the gluten in it?”
For the first time he considered the matter of food. To be glutened Eli had to have eaten something with gluten in it. But what had he eaten? The food was supposed to be gluten-free. It was his father’s food. Norm would never serve Eli anything else, which meant—
“It’s my fault.” The sick truth had the barrier in his mind crashing down once more. “He only eats food with labels, but it was my food. the food I brought in. It was supposed to be safe, and he trusted me and I—”
He couldn’t continue. The ball of horror was lodged in his throat, choking him. He had poisoned Eli. He alone had done it. No wonder he’d been sent away. And now Eli was—
“Enough!” Nathaniel’s voice forced him out of his own head. “That doesn’t matter right now. Where is he?”
“With Rat.” It was Nathaniel’s sharpness that had the words tumbling from his mouth. “And Leslie, I think. He didn’t let me come.”
Nathaniel swore, soft but vicious. “He pulls the same shit with me, but at least outside we have access to Dex. How much did he eat? Do you know?”
“I don’t know what had the gluten in it, but he finished most of his plate.” He was going through the dinner in his mind, but he couldn’t make sense of it. The only thing he could think of was the brownie, but Eli hadn’t eaten that.
“Let’s hope it’s only cross-contamination. Then he might escape with just a rough night, but if it’s more than just a trace, this is going to be bad.”
He clung to the phone like one would to a talisman, but there was nothing Nathaniel could do from the outside, and they both knew it. “He told me to say he wouldn’t be able to see you Saturday.”
Nathaniel swore again, and now there was a note of hysteria in the man’s voice. Maybe more than just a note. Hearing it stirred Samuel’s panic so badly that before he knew it, he’d choked out a sob.
“None of that!” Nathaniel snapped—though not in anger. He was too scared for anger. “If you fall apart, I will. It’s this stupid panic disorder. Fucking contagious—shit. He’ll need hydration. When he’s badly glutened he won’t be able to keep anything down, not even water. So you need to get him IV fluids. Do you hear me, Samuel? Go to medical and tell them. It’s in his file. Make them look at his file. It’s all in there.”
“What if they don’t listen?”
“They will. I’ll call the warden, and I’ll call an ambulance if I have to. Now take a breath before you pass out.”
He tried to do as he was told. It was true that he felt dizzy, and the floor was doing weird things again. “Medical,” he said. “IV fluids.”
“Right. Exactly. But Samuel—”
He strained his ears to listen, but Nathaniel only sighed. For a few tense moments there was only the sound of his rushing blood. “It’s going to be bad, and it’s not going to feel like it ends, but it does. It’s happened twice since I met him. Once was a cross-contamination. Once was a real glutening. After that I told myself I’d never let it happen again. I’m sorry, Samuel. I wish I was there. I need to be there.”
He wanted to reach through the phone. He needed Nathaniel to be there too. Badly needed it. But there was no point in dwelling on what he needed. Eli was hurting. “Fluids,” he repeated again. “Medical.”
There was the sound of a cut off breath, and then his final directions. “Go.”
Chapter Fifteen
The Tattered Ring
It took too long to get them to listen, even longer for them to open Eli’s file and get someone with half a brain to read it, but even that was just the start. Samuel knew what he was in for before he ever set foot in medical, but some part of him had been hoping that, just this once, for Eli’s sake, that things would go smoothly.
“I can’t give him any kind of treatment without examining him,” the nurse finally snapped. He was a reed-thin man with old acne scars and a very long nose. (The doctor, a cold Slavic woman with very thick eyebrows, didn’t spend many hours in the prison, and even when she was there, it was almost impossible to get an appointment with her.)
He opened his mouth to repeat, yet again, that Eli was busy vomiting up his insides and in no fit shape to be booking an appointment, but Bee made that redundant as he stepped forward, took hold of the nurse’s arm, and bodily propelled him through the door. With Bee setting the pace, they were soon by the bathroom near the dorm. There was already a crowd. Jabbers and Leslie were on guard duty, but the rest were rubberneckers. Bee cut easily through them and dragged the nurse inside without stopping for a consult. Samuel wanted only to follow but forced himself to remain where he was.
The bathroom was large, but the lack of doors meant he could still hear sounds of retching from within. It was the kindof thing Eli had expressly meant for him not to hear, but he refused to put any more distance between them. If the man wanted to punish him for it later, so be it.
“How is he?” he demanded of Leslie, but the man shook his head.
“Doesn’t sound good, does it? I can’t imagine there’s anything left to bring up, but he keeps going.”
“Rat’s still in there,” Jabbers added. “Though your doctor’s already yelled at him to get out.”
