Brutally short nails of youthfully awkward, slender hands scrabbled over the pitiful attempts of a goatee that itched abominably from those rare occasions when his girlfriend nagged him to “shave that piece of shit off.” He scratched it thoughtfully as he stared out onto the courtyard. The last vestiges of autumn leaves quivered in the branches and drifted onto the patchy lawn, showing patches of muddy yellow grass revealing that the landscape maintenance crew had skimped on their shift again, foregoing turning the sprinklers on at six PM as stipulated in their contract.

Acrid curls of smoke danced up from the glowing red tip of a Marlboro, quickly withering into a homely tube of whitish-gray ash as his companion dragged thirsty gusts into his lungs. He tugged on his earlobe, pocked with empty piercings where he’d removed several silver studs to comply with dress code on the ward. He worried the flesh out of long habit, silently mourning the absence of the trinkets “ all eight, including a wicked ball hoop that cost him a bundle at the tattoo shop “ and twisted the flexible nodule between finger and thumb. His heel bounced up and down on the concrete step as he tunelessly hummed a Prodigy song that wouldn’t leave him alone since his ride to work that afternoon.

Matt jingled the change in his pocket, counting it by touch and contemplating whether he had enough time for a Snickers and a Coke from the vending machine in the break room before resuming his shift. He cursed scratching his chin and that damnably short scrap of hair; now his whole face decided to itch, and he rubbed at it like a dog chasing a flea with its paw, scrubbing his nape and squinting at the shifting glare of the midday sun. Jayse flicked his butt onto the concrete as he yawned and stretched; his scrub top rose above his stomach, exposing a pitifully slender abdomen and sunken navel, also pierced, and skin that hadn’t seen the sun in months.

“Dude…ya better put that thing out. Don’t let Nurse Bitchface catch you flicking a butt out here.”

“I don’t give a shit. Let her catch me,” he yawned, letting his scrub top fall back into rumpled disarray as he leaned back on the heels of his hands.

Matt shrugged; let him get his ass in trouble, if he wanted. He wasn’t his shift mate’s keeper. The only thing that kept them coming out on breaks together was the mutual surrender of being the only two male CNAs on the ward of the Westchester County Rehabilitation and Convalescent Care Home. Jayse was good for a laugh every now and again. His beat-up Pinto had a fender bald all the way down to the primer, with decals of bullet holes on the windows and a bumper sticker that proudly declared “I’m the one who beat up your Honor Roll Student.” He had a band, or so he said, and they commandeered his dad’s two-car garage every weekend. He boasted about gigs at the coffeehouses that never materialized, and Matt had caught him on several occasions in the linen and supply closets, grimacing and arching over an air guitar that only he could hear, letting “riffs” whine out from his lips.

He reached into his pocket for his security badge, looping the lanyard back around his neck, and was just about to press it against the face plate of the door when Jayse’s exclamation of disgusted horror stopped him.

“Holy crap…DUDE! What time did you get in this morning?”

“I didn’t. I’m on the alt shift, ‘bro. S’up?”

“Did you already do shower rotation on wing two?”

“Nah. Lainie took that ward. Even numbers and window beds.” Jayse groaned and leaned his face into his hand, rubbing his eyes so deeply Matt thought they’d roll out of the sockets. His face was flushed when he faced him again, shaking his head.

“You don’t get it. That means we’ve gotta work showers today, man. Men’s bath, odd beds.” To drive the point home, he snapped, “Room seven A, dude!” Comprehension socked him in the gut, and he felt his bowels twist, shaking his head in denial.

“No way. Jay, man, I’ll flip you not to hafta do it this time. Better yet, I’ve give you five bucks, man! ANYTHING!”

“Nuh-uh, bro!”

“C”MON!”

“Fuck that. He’s all yours, bro,” Jay grinned. Matt smothered a litany of curses and slapped the doorframe in defeat, his palm smarting from the impact with the cool metal. Nevertheless, he re-entered the wing and wandered back to the battered time clock, punching his card into the slot with a hollow thunk. Back to the grind.

He shuddered. All that friggin’ hair… Most of it growing out of places he refused to try to describe.

The wing was busy today; Matt reviewed the schedule on the dry-erase wall scribbled with three transports for surgery at the main hospital in Salem. The low impact fitness hour was scheduled for three. The children’s choir from the local elementary school was set for three-thirty. Matt didn’t see any other way around it; Nurse Kinney, the senior RN on the wing, or “Bitchface,” as she was affectionately known, was a stickler for ensuring patients were groomed and fanatically clean at all times. Heads would roll if incoming family and visitors arrived to the stench of urine from an unchanged bed or the residents lying there riddled with bed sores or other ailments that were to be avoided at all costs. It was an ugly job, but someone had to do it, Matt mused. Memories of his own grandparents at a care home not unlike this one spurred him on. His grandmother had developed a habit of regaling his mom with tales of bingo games and showing off her manicure and pinkly permed curls, provided by the beauty school students on-site. He missed his grandparents ever since they passed away; he felt a pang of regret at conversations he’d skirted on those last few visits when all he’d done was watch the painfully limited television selections and scoot out of the way while his mother neatened the dismal room, brightening it with store-bought geraniums from Rite-Aid.

“Don’t touch my BABIES!” BOFF!

“Easy, there, Raven, I wasn’t touching your babies, you just dropped one-“ CLOP!

“I saw you do it! You were going to hurt my babies!” They made a comical sight. Terry was a middle-aged, dishwater blonde wearing a scrub shirt made from calico printed with Snoopy characters and her badge hanging from a beaded lanyard that her daughter made. She was generously built and very tall, seemingly more than a match for the anemically slender, fragile woman.

“She was going to do no such thing, now, Raven. Terry didn’t mean it.” Matt grinned briefly at the newest spectacle. Mrs. Darkholme was a real trip, he marveled. Every day, she babbled on in a tide of varying dialects, moods, and discernible personalities. She was a legend in her own right.

Not every rehab facility in town could boast housing one of the world’s last known mutants, let alone one immersed in the median stages of senile dementia and a slowly progressing lymphoma.

Raven was ambulatory, much to the combined relief and frustration of the staff. She scooted along using her feet to propel herself in her wheelchair, dressed to the nines in a fuschia dressing gown and matching slippers. It had taken Matt about a week to grow accustomed to her appearance, but lately she was the most fun thing about showing up to work.

Her skin was a mottled, faded, yet still distinctive shade of indigo blue. Her hair was surprisingly lush, cropped into a tidy blunt cut, the yellowish-white locks showing streaks of faded auburn. Deep brackets flanked the corners of her mouth, giving her a mulish look.

She roamed the halls at a sedate pace, reserving her most volatile moods for the LVNs when it was time for her medications. Accompanying her on her treks were her “babies,” namely about five stuffed animals, each with distinct names, genders, and life stories that ranged from the mundane to the sublime.

They also made excellent weapons. Terry was getting it by the dozens now, having had the unmitigated gall to restore the smallest of the lot, “Anna,” to her lap after the small, rust-colored bunny with green plastic eyes was knocked to the floor. Raven’s nearly skeletal arm rose up repeatedly, landing over every inch of Terry that she could reach with the stuffed toy, her voice huffy and full of righteous indignance.

“Raven,” Nurse Kinney intoned crisply, “we’ll have no more of that. It’s time to behave, now. Tell your baby you didn’t mean to get angry.”

“I don’t like you,” Raven pouted, snatching back the bunny after Nurse Kinney pried it from her hand. “You’re my enemy! You’re ALL my enemy! No cell can keep me, do you hear me? The Brotherhood will take me from this place!”

“Shit,” Jay muttered under his breath, as he struggled with a dispenser of hand sanitizer at the nurse’s station.

“I didn’t mean it, Anna,” she cooed, simmering down and staring into the well-worn face of the bunny with rheumy amber eyes. She stroked it and hugged it to her chest like a lifeline.

“That’s a girl; Anna knew her mommy still loved her. Raven, are you still my friend?” the nurse beckoned, leveling her voice to the calm one she reserved for her children at home.

“Yes,” she agreed affably, kissing the bunny between it’s ears.

“And is Terry still your friend?” she encouraged.

“Hmmph,” she huffed.

“Not yet?”

“Maybe tomorrow,” Raven decided pertly, throwing Terry a glare calculated to make her blood curdle. It almost worked.

“I’ll take that under advisement, Mrs. Darkholme,” Terry sighed. “Would you like some juice?”

“You may serve me in the sitting room,” she sniffed, scuffling off in the direction of the guest lounge down the hall.

“Yes, your Majesty!” Terry agreed, finally allowing herself a smile. She turned to Nurse Kinney and muttered, “I don’t know how you do it, Laura. I love her to death despite myself, but she just exhausts me!”

“Don’t be partial; the other residents rely on us to spend time on them, too, and not play favorites.”

“She’s so hard to read,” Terry replied, darting off in her silent-soled white sneakers for the juice before Raven could get into any more mischief.

Matt continued to make rounds, checking each bed and emptying urinals, changing sheets, and calling housekeeping to unclog a toilet in room three. He rescued a makeup kit for Mrs. Darkholme that she’d accidentally left on the bed when one of the other CNAs allowed it to be swept into the linen bucket in the main hall. He checked the clock.

It was that time. Matt steeled himself before adjourning to the linen pantry in the hallway, gathering up an armful of clean towels. He grabbed the waiting wheelchair outfitted in waterproof polyurethane and wheeled it painstakingly to seven-A.

The volume was low on the set; Mr. Howlett was one of the only residents in the men’s wing that didn’t crank the sound until Matt’s ears bled, simply because he wasn’t as hard of hearing, nor did he seem to crave constant background noise to stave off loneliness. Most days, he seemed content to keep his own company, preferring to be alone with his thoughts.

The room was spare and sparsely decorated. Among his cherished items was a faded, sun-bleached piece of contruction paper, scrawled with the words “Happy Birthday, Daddy” in blue crayon. Dried white navy beans had been glued on with a heavy hand in the shape of a snowman; there were gaps where some had eventually fallen off. An old-fashioned cigar box rested on the bedside table, right next to a framed photo of a woman that Matt never had a moment to peek at in his myriad, brief visits to Mr. Howlett’s suite.

He remembered that day well, when he was first transported to the facility from Westchester County General. Some impressions lasted with you for life, and Mr. Howlett was the brashest, toughest-talking, ornery old cuss he’d ever had the misfortune to piss off. All he’d done was try to get him to put out his Cuban so he could fit the cannula above his lip.

“Don’t even think about it, bub!” A gleam of life flickered in those dark eyes, his lids thin enough to be almost transparent, sagging beneath the weight of those heavy brows. “Ain’t finished yet. Better be movin’ those fingers if ya wanna keep ‘em.”

“But-“ Matt stood there futilely, gripping the hose of the cannula, peering back at Jay as though he held the answers as to how to administer his oxygen.

“Ya don’t wanna come between a soldier an’ his SMOKES, ya little pissant!” The most ironic part of it all was that Matt easily topped Mr. Howlett in height by at least six inches, but he was scared shitless of the old man.

Some illogical voice kept nagging him that he shouldn’t be. He beat that voice into submission and skirted around that room when he could, entering only to attend to his immediate needs, such as removing old sheets or emptying the trash bins. He filled them quickly with snack cake wrappers, used Skoal Bandits when he couldn’t have his smoke inside quickly enough to suit him, and countless wads of scratch paper scrawled in his own handwriting, such as it was. Matt tried to avoid peering at them when he emptied the bins, but curiosity burned a hole in his gut.

The old man was stubbornly perched upright in bed, impatiently chewing a fresh, unlit cigar, savoring the taste. He was still clad in his flannel pajamas and a graying white tank underneath. He stared at Matt as he wheeled the chair into the suite and put on the parking brake as he pulled it alongside the bed.

Entre-vous, s’il vous plait, monsieur!” he rasped, giving a rusty chuckle at his own joke.

“What?” Matt replied, surprised at what sounded like surprisingly good French for a guy who hadn’t paid much attention to English phrases that didn’t include using “bub” and “fuck off, Chuckles!” every five minutes.

“Never mind. I know the drill. Get that other pencil-necked geek in here ta help ya saddle me up and roll me outta here,” Mr. Howlett barked, waving Matt out of the room. Matt reached for the intercom button and clicked on the light. “Wouldn’t want ya ta strain anything, Junior.”

“I think I can manage-“ Matt held up his gait belt.

“Naw, I don’t think ya can. Ya don’t wanna risk it, and ya definitely don’t wanna drop me on my ass tryin’ ta maneuver me inta that thing yerself, bub.”

“All right,” Matt sighed.

“Bring my shaving kit, too, while yer at it.” He reached up to give his jaw a rough, thorough scratching, making Matt wonder how someone’s skin and stubble could seem to be made from noisy sandpaper.

Matt and Jay were sliding Mr. Howlett carefully into the shower chair minutes later after changing him out of his pajamas into a spare bed gown, and Matt was shocked to discover that Mr. Howlett had been right on the nose about needing more than his own two hands to move him. Despite his thin, crepey skin and spare frame “ there really wasn’t an ounce of fat on him “ he weighed as much as someone twice his size, and he knew he’d be feeling it tomorrow in his shoulders. He heard Jay grunt a low “oomph!” under his breath as they got him settled.

“Let’s get this over with,” Mr. Howlett grimaced. “Gotta get all pretty fer the ladies.” Matt grinned. Jay just took off, his eyes saying “good luck, sucker.” Matt’s shot back a quick “fuck off” at his departing back.

“Hey, kid?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Don’t act like ya lost a coin toss.” Shame and guilt flooded him and sent hot prickles over his cheeks; Matt knew he was blushing.

“I’m not,” he muttered. Then, “Sorry.”

“Yeah, yeah.” They made their way to the shower, and Matt started the shower, wheeling Mr. Howlett carefully into the wide stall. The temperature was moderately warm when he initially set the dial, testing it on his wrist. His charge grunted at him to turn it up a notch or two.

“Feels good when it’s a little hot. Soothes these tired old bones,” he explained.

“Fine.” Matt obliged him, then got down to business. Jayse had kidded him about how hairy Mr. Howlett was, and he wasn’t joking. The guy wasn’t gonna catch a chill; he was practically hirsute, generous, graying layers of hair slicking over his upper back and chest. But what tore at Matt, and would haunt him even after he went to bed that night, were the scars.

Round ones. Narrow ones. Long, jagged ones. Sharply notched scars torn across his torso, spaced in such a way that they looked as though they were made by an animal’s claws, but he mentally slapped himself for thinking it. A wave of pity washed over Matt, and he felt a strange admiration for a man who surely shouldn’t have survived what he had. The human will wasn’t strong enough to live through what he had, let alone to keep struggling, day after day, to wake up every morning to watery applesauce and the daily barrage of needles and disinfectant.

Matt commenced with his ablutions, scrubbing more briskly when Mr. Howlett nagged him to get at a particularly stubborn itch between his shoulder blades. He heard his creaky voice groan in relief as he massaged a generous handful of shampoo into his hair and rubbed away what troubles of his that he could. There was a wealth of unspoken sorrow in the ropey sinew of his body and the slump of the once massive, still broad shoulders.

“Gotta look pretty fer the ladies,” he repeated huskily, picking at his ragged fingernails. Matt made a note to himself to trim them, too, before he started his rounds.

“Gonna chat up Mrs. Darkholme?” he teased. Mr. Howlett looked at him, squinting through the foamy runnels of suds as he rinsed his hair.

“Are ya stupid?” Matt couldn’t suppress a smile.

“What? She’s cute.”

“Broad’s outta her gourd,” Mr. Howlett claimed. “B’lieve me, she ain’t one fer a guy ta mess with. She’ll gut ya where ya stand, just like a black widow or a praying mantis. Gotta be careful o’ them femme fatales, bub. Yer gonna thank me one day fer warnin’ ya now.” He nodded for Matt to turn up the hot water. “Raven an’ I, we go way back.”

“No kidding?”

“I don’t kid about that shit, buddy.” Matt almost choked. “More’n once, back in the day, Raven tried ta take me out.” Matt paused in his attempts to clean behind Mr. Howlett’s ears.

“Take you out…as in-“

“Filleted. Stabbed. Shot. Drop-kicked off a building or two. Poisoned. Garroted with a wire. She ain’t so nice underneath all the tears an’ smiles. She don’t trust nobody, an’ I don’t blame her. She thinks the world’s out ta get her, an’ she ain’t wrong. Just cuz she’s old and mellowed out a little don’t mean that she ain’t the same poisonous viper underneath. She’s lonely, though, God love her.”

“You guys go that far back?”

“Yep. Ya know those babies she’s always cartin’ around, kid?”

“She nearly took Terry’s head off with one of ‘em a little while ago.” Matt’s grin was shameless. Mr. Howlett’s mirrored it, his teeth long and housed in dark, bruised gums. His canines were strikingly sharp-looking, something Matt hadn’t noticed before, but he put that thought aside. The old man’s eyes were bright and full of mischief.

“I woulda paid money ta see that.”

“Yeah.”

“Those really are her babies, ya know.”

“Get outta here.”

“She named ‘em after her own kids. Gray’s short for Graydon. That’s the homely little brown bear that she ripped the ear off of. The blue duckie is Kurt.”

“She was nailing Terry with Anna, the rabbit.”

“Right. That’s her favorite. Always has been. The little orange cat is actually Irene. Ain’t one of her kids. She’s special.”

“Her sister or something?”

“Her girlfriend. Or something,” Logan drawled, patiently letting Matt dry him off, trying not to scrub him too briskly lest he take his skin off. There was a funny weight to his words that gave Matt pause.

“Girlfriend?”

“Yep.”

“Wow.”

“Yep.”

“Wow…” he repeated again weakly.

“Kid…the images yer puttin’ in my head are startin’ ta creep ME out. Minda outta the gutter, awright?”

“…sorry, sir.”

“Gads…anyway, the other one she calls Trevor, the one that looks like a little mouse missing its nose. Weird story behind that one. Kid acted like Raven was his mama, but it was twisted. Everything about that frail’s always been a little twisted…” Mr. Howlett let his voice die off, and sucked his upper lip thoughtfully as Matt helped him into a fresh gown so he could get started on his shave. They approached the sink, and Matt ran warm water into the basin and opened the kit. He took out shaving foam and shook the can, letting a swirling dollop hiss out onto his palm, watching it expand into a bluish puff before kneading it into Mr. Howlett’s jaw.

“I kin handle it from here, kid,” he advised, scraping the remainder from Matt’s hand and finishing the job more than adequately, scrubbing it into the bristles of stubborn growth, making a dead fish face as he tackled his upper lip. “Yep, Raven’s a pistol. Ya don’t want a woman like that, boy.”

“What? Psycho?”

“Don’t be a smart aleck; she ain’t so much a psycho now as she let the butter drip off her noodle.” Matt bit back a laugh with some difficulty; his facial muscles cramped with the effort. “She’s troubled. We were all troubled, back in the day.” He ignored Matt’s reach for the razor and began to shave, briskly whisking off the whiskers.

“Sure you don’t need any help?”

“All I needed was the ride in here, kid.” He resumed his work, plowing clean patches of newly smooth skin from the layer of graying foam, rapping the blade against the sink. “Gotta let ya do yer job so we both don’t get in trouble. Legs don’t do such a great job o’ takin’ me where I need ta go, ya know?”

“Sure.”

“Back ta what I was sayin’…let’s see. Yeah. Yeah, about women like Raven. She ain’t consistent. Ya don’t want a woman who’s always changing her story about where she’s been. Or fer that matter, WHO she’s been.”

“Who she’s been with? Like, sleeping around?”

“Eh. I mean ‘who she’s been.’ That’s her gift.” At his baffled look, Logan shot him a measured scowl in the mirror. “Ya knew she was a mutant, boy. She ain’t baseline.”

“They told us in orientation on the ward-“

“They didn’t tell ya squat. They gave ya the polite version, bub. Raven can change her shape. If she ain’t now, it’s because she ain’t decided who she wants ta be. Either that, or she’s still wearin’ a chip.”

“A what?”

“Chip. Tracer. Just like they tag yer pooch with when ya first get ‘em from the vet.” Matt was immediately struck by two things. One, he really needed to talk to Nurse Kinney about Mrs. Darkholme. Two, Mr. Howlett was either spinning him a tall tale to pass the time, or they fudged a little about their residents during orientation to keep them from running off after the first day.

Thing was…he did such a damned fine job of telling the tale, tallness and all.

“I didn’t mess around much with Raven. She wouldn’t want me ta talk about it, so I won’t go inta detail, kid. She deserves that much. There were days when she wasn’t so bad.” He continued to neaten his lip. “Then there were days when we just about flattened a building trying to take each other out. I like my woman straightforward. Honest. Loyal.” Matt began to grow bored again, sighing behind him. “Of course, being built like a brick house ain’t bad, either.” Matt resumed his grin and slapped Mr. Howlett’s shoulder fondly.

“Now we’re talkin’,” he agreed.

“Whatever woman ya pick, that lights yer fire and stirs up a storm in yer gut whenever ya look her in the eye, she’s gotta have it all, bub. Scratch the surface, and everything on the inside better make ya feel just as good as the shiny gloss. A woman like that makes ya proud ta be a man.”

“I wanna hear about her.”

“Eh?”

“This woman. C’mon, sir, I want to know who measures up to all of that so I know what to look for!” He was coy; Mr. Howlett shrugged, then prodded him to hand him a face cloth. He rubbed his jaw, and Matt could have sworn he saw the threatening shadow of new stubble in his pores.

“If ya promise me one thing,” he grumbled. “Call me Logan. Folks used ta call me that.”

“All right, Mister Howl…Logan. Got it.” He bundled up the kit and snapped it shut, and wheeled them to the exit. The air in the hallway was cool after the steam of the shower suite. “Tell me about her.”

“Once I get into some new duds. Then ya can take me out ta have a smoke.”

“After your meds,” Matt reminded him.

“After my friggin’ meds. Slave driver,” Logan added as an afterthought. Matt grinned. From the opposite end of the wing, Jayse rolled his eyes at him, but Matt gave him a dismissive wave before taking Logan to his armoire.

Ten minutes later, Logan was combed out, spruced up, and smelling like Old Spice retrieved from his last care package he’d received for Christmas. The aroma battled it out with the acrid smoke curling up from his Cuban outside, on the same concrete deck that Matt and Jay had occupied earlier.

“Ororo coulda set tongues a-waggin’ just by walkin’ into the room. She was class. Ain’t never been, and ain’t never gonna be anyone like her. First time I laid eyes on her, my jaw just about hit the floor.”

“She really had you from go, huh?”

“Yep. Not that I let her know that, mind you. I was at a different point in my life.” He puffed contentedly, sucking the sweet poison deeply into his lungs.

“Those things’ll kill you,” Matt chided him. He wasn’t expecting the rib-cracking, rusty guffaws that exploded from his charge, despite his initial look up at him like he’d just farted in church.

“Boy…ain’t much in this world that can kill me.” He wiped his eyes with the cuff of his flannel shirt. “Damn, if only it were that easy. Then I wouldn’t be here. Hoo,” he chuckled. As if to dispute his claim, his lungs chose that moment to rebel, and his compact frame was wracked with wet, ragged coughs that left him gasping for air.

“Easy,” Matt scolded gently, grasping his shoulder in concern.

“I ain’t got much ta live for anymore. I can’t even tell ya what it is that keeps me wakin’ up ta each new day in so many words. I still hear screams at night.” Matt felt a faint chill despite the warmth of the afternoon. “One of these nights, I’ll lay down, an’ I won’t hear those voices screamin’ at me, makin’ me so damned desperate ta wake up. I won’t hafta.” He chewed thoughtfully on his stogie. “I’ll be where I belong.”

Matt felt that guilty pang return, chafing him. It felt too much like conversations his grandmother and mother had, during her more lucid moments. “Where’s that, sir?”

“Home with ‘Ro.”





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