Sycamore Row

He assumed he was an officer.
    After dark, he returned to his hotel, called Jake for the update, and went to the bar.

    It was either his fifth or sixth night in this damp, dark room with windows that never opened and somehow blocked out all light during the day. The nurses came and went, sometimes tapping softly on the door as they pushed it open, and other times appearing at his bedside without making a sound to warn him. He had tubes in both arms and monitors above his head. He’d been told he wouldn’t die, but after five or six days and nights with virtually no food but plenty of meds and too many doctors and nurses, he wouldn’t mind a prolonged blackout. His head pounded in pain and his lower back was cramping from the inactivity, and at times he wanted to rip off all the tubes and wires and bolt from the room. A digital clock gave the time as 11:10.
    Could he leave? Was he free to walk out of the hospital? Or were the goons waiting just outside his door to take him away? No one would tell him. He had asked several of the friendlier nurses if someone was waiting, but all responses had been vague. Many things were vague. At times the television screen was clear, and then it would blur. There was a constant ringing in his ears that made him mumble. The doctors denied this. The nurses just gave him another pill. There were shadows at all hours of the night, observers sneaking into his room.Maybe they were students looking at real patients; maybe they were just shadows that did not really exist. They changed his meds frequently to see how he would react. Try this one for the pain. This one for the blurred vision. This one for the shadows. This one is a blood thinner. This is an antibiotic. Dozens and dozens of pills, and at all hours of the day and night.
    He dozed off again, and when he awoke it was 11:17. The room was pitch-black, the only light a red haze cast off from a monitor above his head, one he could not see.
    The door opened silently, but no light entered from the dark hallway. But it wasn’t a nurse. A man, a stranger, walked straight to the side of the bed: gray hair, long hair, a black shirt, an old man he’d never seen before. His eyes were squinted and fierce, and as he leaned down even closer the smell of whiskey almost slapped Lonny in the face.
    He said, “Ancil, what happened to Sylvester Rinds?”
    Lonny’s heart froze as he stared in horror at the stranger, who gently placed a hand on his shoulder. The whiskey smell grew stronger. He repeated, “Ancil, what happened to Sylvester Rinds?”
    Lonny tried to speak but words failed him. He blinked his eyes to refocus, but he was seeing clearly enough. The words were clear too, and the accent was unmistakable. The stranger was from the Deep South.
    “What?” Lonny managed to whisper, almost in a gasp.
    “What happened to Sylvester Rinds?” the stranger repeated, his laser-like eyes glowing down at Lonny.
    There was a button on the bedstead that summoned a nurse. Lonny quickly punched it. The stranger withdrew, became a shadow again, then vanished from the room.
    A nurse eventually arrived. She was one of his least favorites and didn’t like to be bothered. Lonny wanted to talk, to tell her about the stranger, but this gal was not a listener. She asked what he wanted, and he said he couldn’t go to sleep. She promised to check back later, the same promise as always.
    He lay in the dark, frightened. Was he frightened because he’d been called by his real name? Because his past had caught up with him? Or was he frightened because he wasn’t sure he’d actually seen and heard the stranger? Was he finally losing his mind? Was the brain damage becoming permanent?
    He faded away, drifting in and out of blackness, sleeping for only a moment or two before thinking of Sylvester.

37
    Jake walked into the Coffee Shop at five minutes after seven on Saturday morning, and, as usual, the conversation lagged for a few seconds as he found a seat and swapped a few insults. The trial started in two days, and, according to Dell, the early morning chatter was dominated by rumors and endless opinions about the case. The subject was changed the moment Jake walked in each morning, and as soon as he left it was as if someone flipped a switch and Seth’s will was again front and center. Though her customers were all white, they seemed to be divided into several camps. There were strong opinions that a man in his right mind should be able to give away his