Furious, Sasha stormed to the window and looked down at the neighbor’s yard. It seemed as though they had completely ignored their earlier conversation and were allowing their dog to roam around freely once again. Sasha couldn’t believe it.

“Those motherfuckers,” she muttered to herself.

The triage nurse took one look at the woman in white fur held in the arms of a man in oil-stained coveralls and dropped his cinnamon twist to the desk. Another nurse wrapped her chocolate eclair in bakery tissue, shoved it in her pocket, and scrambled for a wheelchair.

Early on, fearing he’d be recognized, he went far from the building to beg for funds to replenish their stocks. He got caught in black rain once during a phage surge. At least the rain wasn’t yellow. He wouldn’t be here now, he’s sure, if it was yellow. That day, before he could make it home, the rain burned holes in his suit and damaged his mask. The shakes from phage exposure set in then.

You may be able to guess that this is from my wartime experience.  She, Pinky, the woman with whom I had sex …  was in some ways just a girl – things were different then and we were all so afraid – and no one, none of us anyway, none of the American soldiers, were allowed to think let alone – let alone anything – we were … we were just there to fight and kill – kill as many living things as possible – plants animals people of all ages and all anything else …

I liked the work; I was good at it. But the company, Cory, getting demoted…I hated this place and the bastards who ran it. But I couldn’t leave. Not with my seven-year-old daughter, Tina, just starting private school. Tina and her mom, Tanya, had me deathly afraid of getting made redundant, for redundancy here meant redundancy there.

It was not uncommon to see complete families piled onto a single motorcycle on the streets of Haiti and not a helmet on anyone. Necessity always trumped safety. Roberson himself had suffered several broken bones and broad patches of road rash when his motorcycle clipped the bumper of a tap-tap taxi several years earlier. Dr. Dean had helped pay for the medical expenses to make sure the bones were set correctly and prevent any long-term disability.

“You know I have cancer,” Dr. Dean said, “but I’m not prepared to die today.”

She glanced at the ornate wall clock Doug picked up from Home Goods. Heather told him it was ugly, yet here it was.  Nothing else they owned in the house matched. The clock’s lacquered finish glinted in the afternoon sun. Lacy and Ryan would get off the bus soon. Heather turned off the laptop and collected her papers. She placed the computer into a kitchen drawer with other paper miscellany. Secure, but not secret.

The shine trade kept her family fed, but Tess wanted more for her children. She was determined to keep Acey and Jessie in school. None of her kids would be joining the gangs of dirty urchins gleaning coal along the railroad tracks or shadowing delivery wagons for fallen scraps.

Lovelace told me I would need to be there for him until the end. As the disease progressed it would become more and more cumbersome, leaving no time for my social life. I could tell he was sizing me up, seeing if I was up to the task, with that smug, judgmental look, thinking he’s superior just because he’s a doctor.

She would invite a few of her friends as well, so I’d meet some more people in town. When I got to her house, it turned out she’d changed her mind. Other people could wait. This was now all about getting to know me.