Page 12 of Mongrels United
She lowered the pad in her hand, let it hang by her side. “Hours, we think. But we’ve never seen this condition before, so we can only guess.”
Hours.
She’d offered to take him to see his father, then, and Nash had nodded, the disorientation starting to hit him.
He followed her down the age-stained passage. The tiles on the floor had once been green, but too many footsteps had worn them down to white in the middle, while the edges were a faded pastel. Swathes of color emitters had died, making the walls patchy with basic silver, between clinical white.
The room he stepped into had a number of beds in it, all of them with thin mattresses and worn covers. None of them were articulated medical smart beds. They were all empty, but one.
The clinician moved over to the occupied bed and shook the shoulder of the shrunken figure beneath the covers. She bent over and said something, but Nash heard nothing. There was a privacy cone around the bed.
He knew when he had stepped into the cone, because he heard Nason’s rattling breath, and the tick of the medical sentry taking vitals. It was parked next to the head of the bed, and like everything in this hospice, it was an old, worn model. But it was still working, still reporting Nason’s current status to the medical officer who would be watching the readouts in their office.
Perhaps it was the duty of this clinician to watch the bio feeds, as well, and Nash was keeping her from that.
Nason hunched, under the covers. “What?” he said querulously, his voice strained.
“Your son is here,” the clinician repeated. “I’ll help you roll over.”
“I can do that myself.” The flat tone was an echo of the man Nash knew, that no one else suspected existed. Nason hated looking weak.
The clinician stood back, while the stick figure in the bed turned painfully from his side, onto his back. He grunted with the effort, while Nash watched, appalled by how much Nason had wasted away since the last time they’d seen each other.
Finally, the man was on his back. He reached for the bed controls, but that was too much for him.
The clinician silently raised the top end of the bed, so Nason was sitting up.
Nason considered Nash with bleary eyes. “Took your time getting here.”
The clinician’s eyes widened. She looked from Nason to Nash. “I’ll be in my office,” she murmured, stepped out of the cone and moved to the door.
“I came as soon as I heard,” Nash replied, fighting to keep his tone even. Then, because it was suddenly there, making his chest ache and his gut to roil, he added harshly, “What were you thinking, to let it go on so long without getting help? Did youwantto die?”
His father didn’t flinch. “None of it was anyone’s business but mine.”
“Thisstupidprivacy thing of yours! It’s killing you.”
“In about eight hours, they tell me,” his father said, his tone calm.
Nash let out a gusty breath. “That’s more than they would tell me.”
“You charming them with your wise-ass manner, then?” Nason smiled, showing yellow teeth. One of them was missing. “Like father, like son.”
I’m nothing like you!Nash wanted to yell the protest into his father’s face, make him take it back. No one but his father would have heard it.
But he said nothing. Instead, he swallowed the intense anger that had welled up, and pushed it back deeper into his gut. He’d pay for that, later, but for now, he wouldn’t let himself fall back into the same pattern of shouting that branded all their conversations. The man was dying. The event deserved something other than screaming fury.
He looked around. One of the beds had an upright pipe-and-board chair next to it. Nash retrieved it and put it next to Nason’s bed and settled in it.
“What’s this? You’re staying?” His father’s voice was strained, but also filled with disdain and mockery.
Nash crossed his arms. “Maybe I want to watch it happen. Make sure you’re really gone.”
“That’s more like it.” Nason relaxed. “For a moment, I thought you actually gave a damn. Shoulda known better. You don’t care about anyone but yourself.”
“And my money, don’t forget,” Nash ground out.
“For all the good it did you.”
