Forecast by Janette Turner Hospital Page B

now if we hadn’t grabbed you.’
    â€˜I don’t believe you.’
    The words come out more or less clearly, and Paul is startled. He rakes his fingers through his hair and butts his forehead against the wall of the room, over and over, though gently. ‘Nelson, I don’t even know if you’re sane.’ He slaps his own forehead with the flat of his palm. ‘And I’m trying to keep you on? What’s wrong with me?’
    Nelson is asking himself the same question. What is wrong with Paul?
    â€˜You’d had way too much champagne,’ Paul says. ‘That’s for sure. And God alone knows what else you were on. I tried to get that info from your medical records but your doctor says that’s privileged garbage, blah blah blah . Very convenient.’ Paul rattles Nelson’s bed rails in irritation. ‘You should have told us you were getting other offers.’
    Nelson frowns, trying to remember. He raises his eyebrows, a question.
    â€˜Oh please,’ Paul says. ‘I wasn’t born yesterday.’ He fans through envelopes on the table beside Nelson’s bed. ‘You want me to open these for you?’
    Nelson shakes his head, no.
    Paul thumps the end of the mattress with a fist but makes an effort. ‘The pathetic truth is, even if you’re a nutcase, which you are, we still want to keep you, you’re that good. We’re holding open your slot on the Nerd Squad. It’s there whenever you want it, whenever you’re well enough, whenever they let you go.’
    Nelson reaches for the notepad beside his bed. Thank you , he writes.
    â€˜You had any other visitors, by the way?’
    Yes , Nelson writes.
    â€˜Shit! Don’t tell me Wholesome …?’
    Nelson nods.
    â€˜Motherfuckers! You know they’re sharks, don’t you? You do know that, right? You know they are the most fucking hypocritical hustlers in the entire—’
    Nelson writes: They said I could work from home.
    Paul kicks the stand that holds the IV drip, and a long coil of tubing breaks away from Nelson’s wrist and writhes in the air. ‘Even thinking of settling for a client, jeez, Nelson … Where’s your loyalty?’
    Â 
    All day long, Nelson reads emails, hundreds of emails, from customers who buy the products of Wholesome Food & Beverage Company Ltd. He answers these emails diplomatically and courteously, within the strict guidelines prescribed.
    Â 
    I am so grossed out, a woman named Jill Willoughby from Macon, Georgia, writes. I bought a vacuum-pack of one dozen of your chocolate cupcakes for my little girl’s birthday party, and one of the girls found a fingernail in her cake! Believe me, if you’d seen the way those children shrieked and gagged, you’d understand what sort of bad publicity your disgracefully defective product is generating. I’m willing to bet that not one of those girls will ever again, for the rest of her life, take a single bite from a cupcake that is not home-made.
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    Dear Ms Willoughby, Nelson types in his email response. On behalf of Wholesome Food and Beverage, I want to thank you for your valuable communication. You can scarcely imagine how grateful we are that this appalling lapse in our vigilant hygiene standards has been brought to our attention.
    It is owing to the sense of civic responsibility of customers like you that we are able to crack down on these rare lapses in our rigorous monitoring system.
    We hope you will accept our gift of five-dozen vacuum-packed cupcakes as recompense for your inconvenience. We are also sending balloons and sparklers for your birthday girl.
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    Nelson keeps on his desktop a folder of replies that he’d love to send, is often tempted to send, that he sometimes actually types into the response space while letting his cursor hover above ‘reply’. Then his eye falls on the UPS box of his folded party clothing and he clicks