Corvus could walk to the cafeteria now, with the help of a walker. He was an old man, shuffling his steps, forcing himself to lift his legs to get the strength back.
They had moved his room so he could no longer see the woods in the back to a different section, a section where patients were more mobile and maybe a little crazy. One was Gringo, a thief, stealing anything that wasn’t nailed down, and the nurses would go into his room every week and clean it out, filling up their lost and found or trying to find what belonged to who. Most of the patients suffered from dementia anyway and didn’t remember sometimes who they were or who anyone was.
Corvus, in a strange way, liked Gringo. He would go into his room also and paw through the things Gringo had. Gringo would show him things, ask him if he wanted to barter for them. What he wanted with someone else’s picture of a granddaughter was beyond him, but Gringo was crazy like that.
Corvus had gotten to the main lobby, his face bathed in sweat, and he flopped down into the nearest chair.
“I see you’re working hard,” said a voice, and Corvus turned his head around to see the doctor from the hospital. He still wore his ID tag from there. Erik Benjamin, MD.
“Say, can we talk?”
Corvus motioned to the couch. Erik glanced around, shrugged, and sat down. Corvus finally regained his breath enough to talk to him. “What about?”
“I want to ask you something. About what you saw in your NDE.”
“I told you. An owl.”
“You know what an owl means?”
“Death,” said Corvus. He’d looked it up.
“Yes.” He leaned forward. “You’re a death-bringer.”
Corvus stared at him. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Next to your room, at the hospital, people died. Here, I noticed, next to your room, people die. But the guy who was in your room, he’s alive. Not thriving, but alive.”
“What’re you trying to say? I’m some kinda killer? I suck the life out of people or some shit?”
“Well, yes.”
Corvus struggled to get up. “The fuck!”
“Hear me out.”
“Hear you out? Fuck you, man.” He tried to pull himself out of the chair, but missed and fell. Erik rushed over to him, picked him up as if he was nothing–
He felt it. He felt a surge of energy coming from Erik to him, like liquid energy flowing from him to his legs; and he thought, he honestly thought, that he could stand on his own and walk across the floor without the aid of the walker. It was pain and pleasure and flowing all at once, and he gripped the side of the walker to keep himself upright.
Erik let him go. He felt tingles down his legs. “Are you okay?” Erik asked.
“What – what did you do?”
“What you can do,” Erik said quietly. “I helped your fate.”
“How do you know what my fate is?”
“Because you’re still here.”
Corvus pulled away from him. “This is fucking crazy, like a Stephen King novel.”
“Oh, I think he has done something like that.”
Corvus started walking, and he realized that it was easier.
Another code, another death two doors down. Gringo, the scavenger, found his way inside the next day and started swiping things. Corvus had just seen Mabel yesterday, wheeled into the cafeteria, seeing them feed her soup in between her gasping for air. She had a heart attack, which was not surprising.
Corvus didn’t want to go anymore to the cafeteria during dinner, but he had to because since he was ambulatory, he could go anywhere he liked. He ended up going to the café, and tried to sit alone, but others sat with him in the crowded room.
These people didn’t die. So he tried an experiment. He sat with one man, a man who was robust and healthy, who had most of his faculties and was there only because he was terminally ill. He held lots of conversations with Timmy. “I don’t want you to die,” Corvus said to him once, with full conviction and meaning. Timmy just laughed. “I have a cancerous tumor in my brain. It’s a matter of time, kiddo.”
Corvus was improving daily, and Timmy was not getting sicker. Others, however, the sicker ones, the ones Corvus had said either to himself or others that they seemed to be hanging on by the slimmest of threads, those went faster. Some went into the hospital and died soon after, some stayed.
The rehab place was put under investigation. During the time the investigators were in, Timmy had come back from a doctor, rushed over to Corvus and took him in a bear hug. “The tumor’s gone. I can go home!”
Eventually he found out that he couldn’t go home because his family had sold his house, and he had no money left because the nursing home took it. But the nursing home was going to kick him out because they didn’t find a reason for him to be there. Finally a sour bitch of a daughter came and picked him up, and Corvus never saw Timmy again.
At that time, Corvus was getting around with just a cane. He had been in rehab for close to a year now, and wanted to get the hell out. He started looking in the classifieds, trying to find a job. Gringo had by now slipped all the way over to thieving point blank, taking things out of people’s hands, and he was sent to the mental hospital.
At his year anniversary, he set aside the cane and tried to get around. He did it slowly, but he did it. That’s when he said he wanted to be out of there in a month.
Erik came back at his call. Corvus didn’t know who else to call. “I need to get out of here,” he said, guiding Erik to his room so they could talk privately. Gus was passed out as he usually was. Erik’s nose wrinkled at the smell of liquor and he glanced at Gus. Corvus only nodded. “I let the guy have his peace,” he said.
“So you want to get out of here.”
“I need a place to stay. And a job.”
Erik frowned, thinking. “I can get you both on one condition.”
“Let me guess.”
Erik crosses his arms, daring him.
“You’re gonna tell me all about this death bullshit.”
“It’s not death, it’s hastening fate.” Erik looked around and sat on the bed. He pulled out a deck of cards with words on them. “Pick one.”
“Cards?”
“Trust me.”
He took one, and looked at it. “Blurred vision,” he said. He turned it over, and on the back were different diseases that this could be reflective of. “Head trauma,” he chuckled.
“Blurred vision is what you have. You have the power, but you don’t have the ability yet.” Erik nodded. “Yes, I’ll teach you all about this death bullshit.”
“You gonna lecture me?”
“Sometimes.”
“Can I leave whenever I want?”
“Sure.”
“Then sign me out in two weeks.”
“Better. I can sign you out today.”
Corvus’ heart leapt. “I need to say ‘bye to people.”
“Two weeks then.”
And then, Corvus was free. Sort of.