Tales of the City 08 - Mary Ann in Autumn

emergency room had been far less concerned with the surface knife wound on her back than with the gruesome stew of rotting flesh on her left leg. The knife attack had actually been something of a blessing, in fact, since it brought immediate medical attention. Without it, they said, she’d already be dead.
    Shawna strode into the ward, her eyes fixed straight ahead so as not to invade the tenuous privacy of the other patients. The salmon-and-green curtains on Leia’s cubicle were closed, so Shawna paused and read the sign that identified the occupant:
    LEMKE, Leia
    The last name was news to Shawna, since Leia had been too fucked up and frightened to reveal anything on the night of her admission to the hospital.
    Shawna cleared her throat. “Leia?”
    A growl from behind the curtain.
    “It’s Shawna. May I visit?”
    Another growl, apparently signifying yes.
    Shawna pulled open the curtain and closed it behind her. Leia was sitting up in bed with an IV line sprouting grotesquely from a hole beneath her collarbone. As a nurse had explained on Shawna’s previous visit, there was no other spot on the patient’s over-perforated body that could accept the antibiotic. A tented sheet over Leia’s legs spared visitors—and presumably the patient herself—the sight of a body eating itself alive.
    Shawna pulled up a chair. “They’re treating you okay?”
    Leia grunted. “Methadone sucks.”
    That may be, thought Shawna, but you’re not screaming anymore. You’re not clawing at your skin. You seem almost human now.
    “You cut your hair,” Leia remarked. “It looks better.”
    Shawna was touched by the observation, coming as it had from someone who’d long ago abandoned control over her own appearance. “I wanted something simpler,” she said, reflexively touching the tips of her new pixie cut. She had banished the Bettie Page look an hour earlier; she knew for sure now that it didn’t suit this new chapter in her life.
    “Why are you doing this?” asked Leia.
    “Doing what?”
    “This. Hangin’ out with me.”
    Shawna tried to answer truthfully. “I don’t know exactly.”
    “You with an agency or something? Rehab?”
    “No. Nothing like that. I just saw you under the freeway and … I really enjoyed what little I saw of you, so … I decided to come looking for you.”
    “ Lookin’ for me? You came there on purpose?”
    Shawna nodded. “You think I normally go strolling down Cocksuck Alley at that time of night?”
    A quick flash of ruined teeth as Leia laughed.
    “Give me a little credit, lady.”
    Leia regarded her soberly for a moment. “They wanna cut off my leg.”
    Shawna nodded. “I know.”
    “I can’t do that.”
    “I hear you. I’d feel that way too.”
    “Well … tell ’em I won’t, then.”
    “No, Leia. I can’t.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because … the infection will spread if they don’t amputate.”
    “Fuck it, then.”
    “It’ll kill you. It is killing you. You can start to get better once the leg is gone. That’s what these antibiotics are for … to get you stronger before they … do it.”
    “Please don’t … please.” Leia was sobbing now.
    Shawna took her hand. “Would you like me to stay?”
    “Stay?”
    “Yeah. Be with you when you go in, and be there when you wake up.”
    “FUCK THAT SHIT. THEY’RE NOT CUTTIN’ OFF MY LEG.”
    “Okay,” Shawna replied feebly. “Whatever.”
    “Get the fuck out of here, you pesky cunt. Who the fuck do you think you are?”
    Shawna backed toward the door, then fled without another word.
    S HE CALLED O TTO AS SHE left the hospital. Hearing the alarm in her voice, he offered to meet her for lunch at the Café Gratitude on Harrison Street. Otto was no more a vegan than she was, but the restaurant was an easy walk from the hospital, and they both liked the cheery neo-Aquarian vibe of the place. On previous visits, she had cut them slack about the pretentious-sounding menu items, but she was in no mood for that today.
    “I’ll have the large café salad,” she told the pony-tailed girl server.
    “You mean ‘I Am Fulfilled’?”
    “Okay.”
    “You want that, then?”
    “Yeah. Are you gonna make me say it?”
    The server gave her a curdled smile and turned to Otto. “How about you?”
    “ ‘I Am Elated,’ please.”
    “Would you like that with sour cream?”
    “Yeah. ‘I Am Elated’ with sour cream.”
    “Excellent.”
    “And for dessert we’ll both have ‘I Am Awakening.’ ”
    Seeing that