The Faculty Club Part 17

I rang the bell, and an unfamiliar girl answered the door.

"Can I help you?" she said. She looked like an engineering student, short ponytail, no smile. She had a book on bridges under her arm.

"I'm looking for Sarah," I said. Suddenly it felt crazy to be here. My palms were clammy. My shirt was wet under my arms.

"She's still at the hospital," the girl said.

"She's working?"

"No." The girl looked at me, puzzled. "She's in the hospital."

"What? What happened?"

The girl c.o.c.ked her head.

"I haven't seen you before."

"I'm a friend of Sarah's."

She looked at me suspiciously.

"What did you say your name was?"

"Never mind. I'll just see her there."

I started backing away.

"Hey!" she called, but I was already down the steps. I half-ran to Student Health. The hospital entrance was around the side.

It was late, and the floor was deserted. I saw two nurses at the end of the hall, watching TV in the waiting area.

No one was manning the nurses' station. I stole a look down the hall, then went behind the counter to the row of charts on the back wall. I found Casey, S. There was a tab marked Admission History. I went to the first page and tried to decipher the handwriting and the abbreviations.

The opening line made the world lurch and reel under me: Pt is a 26 yo WF c- no significant PMH who presented to the ER tonight s/p acetaminophen OD c/w suicide attempt.

I felt my heart drop. I checked the date on the note: four days ago. I had no idea what s/p or c/w meant, but I got the picture.

My skin was cold and my heart was pounding in my head.

Room 203, the chart said.

I looked at the door. I didn't want to move. But I had this sick feeling that my only way out of this hospital was through room 203. What was my alternative? To just take off, the way you might drop a vase in a store and walk out past the clerks, leaving them to find the pile of gla.s.s on the floor? It was tempting.

I knocked, touched my forehead against the cool door, and listened until a weak, sleepy voice said, "Come in."

She was on her back, a stack of pillows under her head. A yellow mirrored balloon hung halfway to the ceiling behind her. It said get well soon. There was a plastic water pitcher and two empty cups of ice cream on her bed tray. She looked pale.

When our eyes met, it took her a second to recognize me.

"Sarah, I am so sorry," I managed.

"Get out," she said, her voice scratchy and soft.

"I'm sorry."

"GET OUT." Louder this time--it would have been a scream if her throat had been working at full strength, but as she was, it came out like a hoa.r.s.e moan, and she winced as she said it. I found the door and fumbled my way out, willing myself toward the exit, head down. I left, stealing one last look at the nurses watching I Love Lucy down the hall.

Chance was already in the library, with a baseball cap pulled over his messy curls.

"What's with you?" he said. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

"Two in one day." I brushed past him. "Let's do this."

"Geez, what got into you?"

Rage is what got into me--something about Sarah, the hospital, the V&D. I was filling with a hot, venomous anger; it had started in my toes on the way over here, and my eyes were about to go under.

"These are not good people. They make people do bad things. Someone should do something."

"So now this is public service?" Chance asked, smiling. "It's not about revenge anymore?"

I was starting to hate this guy.

"Why are you so interested in them?" I snapped. "Going for a Pulitzer?"

"This is a university. It's supposed to be open. I don't like the idea that there are places on campus I can't go."

"Are you kidding me? This whole place is one big club. You think anyone can just walk on campus and start taking cla.s.ses?"

"So?"

"So you don't hate clubs. You hate clubs you can't get into."

"Are you calling me a hypocrite?"

"Are you calling me a hypocrite?"

I had a sudden vision of Miles clapping his hands: You guys are gonna love each other!

I took a deep breath.

"Forget it," I said. "It's just . . . I just saw something that rattled me."

"I think you'll find," Chance said, "the more you do this, the more that will happen. Shall we?"

I laughed, a little embarra.s.sed at my outburst.

"Why not? Like I said, someone's gotta do something."

"That's what we humans do best," Chance said, grinning. "Something."

I pulled the Shepard's index, a large dusty tome, from the shelf. We found Creighton v. Worley. We pulled the volume and scanned down to the list of citing cases.

They were identical to the ones on the Internet.

But in the margin, someone had added a few more.

My heart started pounding. I saw Chance's face light up.

"I totally underestimated you," he said.

I read the first case out loud.

"Michaelson v. Mitch.e.l.l."

"Holy s.h.i.t," Chance said.

"What?"

It was exciting, but I didn't feel like we knew anything helpful yet.

Chance said, "Those are buildings on campus."

I stared at him.

"They are?"

"Michaelson. The Michaelson Chemistry Labs. Mitch.e.l.l. One of the freshman dorms."

"Where?"

"We need a map," Chance said. He was buzzing now. I saw a glimpse of the old reporter, the one who must have existed seven years and a thousand joints ago.

We grabbed a campus map from the information booth and marked the buildings: Creighton, Worley, Michaelson, Mitch.e.l.l.

Four dots.

"Check the rest," he said.

I recognized some of the names. Chance recognized all but one. Each pointed to a building on campus. My heart was racing. We charted nine points on the map.

Chance took the pencil and drew a line connecting them. It started in one part of campus and snaked lazily--but purposefully--toward another.

My fingers were starting to tingle.

But it was incomplete.

We stared at the last case.

"Zimmer Kettle Corp. v. Industrial Steel, Inc. Hmm . . ." Chance tapped a pencil on his forehead. "Kettle is Kettle Hall. That's easy. But Industrial Steel . . ."

He shook his head.

He tapped the pencil relentlessly. It was starting to drive me crazy. I was about to s.n.a.t.c.h it away when a smile spread across his face.

Then, with the flourish of an artist drawing the final stroke of his masterpiece, Chance put one last dot on the map and circled it.

"Industrial Steel," he said, shaking his head with admiration.

I looked at his dot. It fell right on our path, completing it. It landed smack in the middle of a rectangular building.

"That's a dorm, right?"

"Indeed. Embry House."

"I don't get it."

"Of course not. Only someone who really knew this campus would. That's why they saved it for last. That dot," he said, pointing to his final mark, "sits, give or take, on a famous room in Embry. The only room on campus, in fact, to allow ten people to live in one s.p.a.ce. Party central. The waiting list is out the door. But it always seems to go to legacies. And not just any legacies--like tenth generation, 'my ancestors were on the Mayflower' legacies. You have to hold your liquor to live in that room." Chance gave me a proud look. "That's why they call it the Steel Man."

He beamed, either at his own cleverness or the V&D's.

"You think the V and D meets in a dorm room?" I asked sarcastically.

Chance shook his head, unfazed.

"No," he said, smiling at me. "I think they meet below it."

19.

Chance and I made a pact. First, tell no one. Second, meet tomorrow night, under cover of darkness, to see where our trail might lead.

The thrill of discovery got me home and into bed, and then reality broke through. I tried to press away thoughts of hospital rooms and half-limp balloons. But her face kept coming back to me. Her strained, scratchy voice: GET OUT.

I had terrible dreams. I saw a room filled with a thousand baby angels, plump and dreamy, the kind Raphael imagined. They had slow, doll-like movements. There were shafts of light from tall windows. The angels were eating. Their chubby little hands brought spoons up and down, up and down to their mouths. When I entered, all thousand of them looked up at once and started screaming.

I woke the next morning, sweating, raw. I felt alone and lost, sick in my stomach. I reached for the phone in the darkness and dialed.

"Twice in one week? What is this, Christmas?"

"Hey Dad. Is Mom there?"