Death Benefit

28.

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER NEW YORK CITY MARCH 24, 2011, 5:05 A.M.

Although it was only a little after five in the morning, Pia finally quit trying to go back to sleep and got out of bed. The previous night she’d returned to her dorm room from the security office exhausted mentally and physically. Before she and George went to their respective rooms, he gave her the turkey sandwich that he’d saved. It was flattened to a degree but still recognizably a sandwich. Once back in her room, she’d eaten a corner of it, then threw the rest in the trash and went to bed, hoping to get some rest. She’d not slept well, but at least she couldn’t remember her dreams.

Pia showered quickly and dressed. She understood how essential it was to her future that Rothman pull through. Despite the hour, she knew she had to go over to the hospital to check and make sure he was okay. Her hope was that the new antibiotic had worked wonders and was controlling his infection. In that case, she further hoped that his delirium had cleared up and she could have a word with him. She wanted to ask him if he had any idea what had happened in the biosafety lab the previous morning.

Emerging from the dorm onto Haven Avenue, Pia felt conspicuously lonely. It was morning although not yet light. She felt like the only person in the world as she made her way over to the hospital. Once inside, it was different as the hospital never slept. Quickly she made her way up to the infectious disease wing.

When she got to the ward she was perplexed. She felt she must have gotten turned around because the room she thought was Rothman’s was being disinfected in preparation for its next inhabitant. But no, this was his room. So Rothman had been moved, perhaps because he was showing signs of improvement following the new course of treatment. Pia didn’t allow herself to think that anything else could be the case. She checked Yamamoto’s room. His room was also being cleaned. He’d been moved as well.

Pia turned around and went back to the nurses’ station to find out where Dr. Rothman and Dr. Yamamoto had been sent. The station was humming, even at that time of the morning, in preparation for the shift change at seven.

“Excuse me,” Pia said to one of the night nurses standing at the counter filling out one of the millions of forms they were required to do. “I’m looking for Dr. Rothman and Dr. Yamamoto.” Suddenly Pia felt nauseous and an overwhelming sense of panic rose within her. They weren’t moved because they got better.

“Please, tell me where they are,” Pia pleaded, hoping against hope.

“And who are you? Are you related to Dr. Rothman?”

“I’m Dr. Rothman’s medical student. Please, where is he?”

The nurse took Pia by the arm and walked her away from the busy nurses’ station into the waiting room, which was empty at that hour. She didn’t turn the light on and the two women stood in the semidarkness. Pia was worried her legs were going to give out and she would collapse on the floor like a rag doll.

“Listen, we only just told the families,” the nurse said. “I’m sorry, they both passed. Dr. Rothman first, then Dr. Yamamoto about an hour ago.”

“What do you mean they ‘passed’?” Pia asked, but intellectually she knew what the nurse meant. But just maybe . . .

“They died, sweetheart, I’m sorry. Dr. Rothman died being prepped for surgery. That’s all I know. That’s all I can tell you. Look, I have to go.” The nurse put her hand on Pia’s arm and left the room.

Pia went down on her haunches, her mouth open in a silent scream. She clasped her arms around her knees and pulled herself tight into a ball, as if she were trying to hide somewhere within her own body. Pia felt like she’d been punched in the gut. She was disoriented and angry-angry at the hospital, angry at the world, angry at Rothman himself. If she was going to judge a man by his actions, what had he done? She’d been abandoned. Betrayed. Pia stumbled out of the room and off the ward, descended in the elevator, walked outside in a daze. The sky was now light in the east, but the sun had yet to make it up over the horizon.