He follows the two of them back to their storage unit, keeping as much distance as he can while maintaining a sightline. He has a sense, though, that even if the woman were to see him, she’d look right through him — as though he and this woman inhabited different planes, touching precariously at a single point. If we’d had a child when we first tried, Robert thinks, he might be this age. That could easily be his face. In the storage unit, the door still rolled up to let in the air, the woman takes off the boy’s cap and, crouching down, rubs at his cheeks and nose with a wet-nap. With the cap gone, Robert can see, even from this distance, two horns, or boney protrusions, one above each eye. Robert is filled with sympathy. There is so much suffering in the world, he thinks. Why are we made like this, that we can only feel someone else’s suffering when we can imagine it to be our own? I will become a benefactor, Robert thinks. I will raise up this people from their suffering.
The woman lights a kerosene stove and uses it to heat the contents of two cans of food, which she then spoons onto a pair of plates. The boy eats ravenously. His mother smiles at him and pushes the food around with her fork. When the boy is finished, she passes her mostly-untouched plate to him. Robert settles down against the side of a storage unit and spreads his sport coat over his legs, a makeshift blanket. He watches the woman wipe off the plates with wet-naps. He watches her spread blankets over the boy and kiss his head.
~ ~ ~
Outside the gates of the self-storage facility, the men in riot gear wait. A signal will come, and they will descend.
~ ~ ~
Robert dreams that he is in a desert, walking for miles, directionless. Each of the grains of sand in his dream is a tiny person. Thousands of tiny people shriek out in terror whenever he takes a step. He feels an overwhelming sense of pity, but tells himself that he’s in the desert, and in the desert one must worry first of all about one’s own survival. At night it’s possible to freeze to death in the desert, he tells himself. I have to keep walking.
~ ~ ~
Then everything is light and noise, and Robert is awake, his heart beating wildly, the dream, even the fact of having been asleep, forgotten. Floodlights surround the periphery of the storage complex. Orange doors pulled up, fought with, thrown open, guinea-piggers stumbling, running, masses of people being pushed forward by other masses, pressing into masses pressing the opposite direction, guinea-piggers falling and being trampled under the feet of other guinea-piggers. And from all sides, increasingly pushing their way in, men in black suits and riot gear, batons held at six and nine, shouting in a single voice MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE, two-handed thrusting the batons forward in unison with each MOVE. The woman who looks remarkably like Viola is screaming out that she has lost her son, and in the next moment Robert has lost track of her in the mob. The feel of so many foreign bodies pressed against his, the stink of it — Robert wants to yell out that he is not part of this, he is something different than this mass, but there is an elbow against his throat, there is a hand on his face, fingers reaching for something to grip find their way into his mouth, into his nose, he presses his eyes shut in fear of having them mindlessly gouged out. It is impossible to say how many people he is in the middle of, it could be a hundred or a thousand, the world seems filled with them and Robert’s options, suddenly, limited to the terrified mind of this press of bodies.
Now the men in riot gear have broken ranks and are falling upon them. When Robert chances to look he can see the great arcs of baton above the heads of the mob. Somehow even above the screams Robert can make out the dry crack of wood against a skull. They are being funneled in a certain direction — those who do not move correctly, or who get too close to the outside of the mass, are beaten, and thus the men in riot gear are training this new, corporate body, that they, with their helmets and floodlights, have called into being. Where to? Robert tries to push himself up on the shoulders of the bodies that press against him, and, just before being forced back down by other bodies likewise trying to push their way up, he catches sight of bodies being shoved into black, windowless vans. Going back is impossible; pushing to the side only presses Robert closer to the swinging batons; the mouths of the vans seem inevitable, and Robert can feel himself along with so many others pushing toward what he cannot avoid.
~ ~ ~
Men in orderly uniforms unload Robert and his fellow captives from the back of the van and lead them to a long hallway filled with other bodies sitting in folding chairs. Robert and the others are told to take chairs and wait. From time to time men in orderly uniforms come to lead one of the bodies to the doorway at the end of the hall.
~ ~ ~
Robert is taken by several orderlies to see a doctor, for processing. There are forms for Robert to fill out. “This is an observation period,” the doctor says. “You should understand that we have a legal right to detain you for a seventy-two hour observation period, to see if you represent a threat to yourself or others.” He sits on one side of a shabby desk, in a shabby office. He looks tired. Robert is one in a long line of bodies that the doctor is processing today. The doctor shuffles through some papers. Robert occupies a chair on the other side of the desk. To Robert’s left and his right stand large men in orderly uniforms.
There’s clearly some misunderstanding, Robert thinks. I have a JD, for Godssake. I am wearing a suit. But Robert’s white shirt is dirty, torn in places. He’s missing his suit jacket. He has been sweating, and pressed against other sweating bodies. “Why do I need to sign the forms if you already have the right to detain me?” Robert says, trying to grasp at whatever he can.
The doctor sighs and looks up at the ceiling. The orderly to Robert’s left holds Robert’s left arm behind his back and twists it, firmly but without undue violence, until it feels as though it might wrench free from its socket. Robert screams. The orderly to Robert’s right hands him a pen.
“Here,” the doctor says, indicating the appropriate line on the form. “Thank you. Here, as well, please,” the doctor says. “Initial here.”
“This isn’t legally binding,” Robert says. “I was under duress.”
The doctor flips through his forms until he comes to one that affirms the patient has signed all forms free of duress, and the orderly twists Robert’s arm behind his back until he signs it.
~ ~ ~
Robert calls Viola, from the depths of the hospital psych ward. “Viola,” he says to her voice mail, “Viola, pick up. For God’s sake please pick up. I’m at a hospital. I’m not hurt. They’ve taken us here. I was… there were all of these people, who participate in drug testing for money, and the police — or somebody — descended upon them. Upon us. They might have been working for Obadiah Birch. There is a man, he’s trying to organize the guinea-piggers… and there’s rumors of someone else, a man in fake fur and black goggles… but that doesn’t make sense. This sounds crazy. Of course this sounds crazy. There is no way, right now, for me not to sound crazy. Is that why you’re not picking up? Is that why you haven’t called back? But you haven’t even listened to this yet, of course. How could you? I just… I really would like to hear your voice right now. They, they have all of the people from the guinea-pig camp here, they picked us all up and are holding us for a ‘three-day observation period’… except that, I’ve just learned, they found out about my insurance, that my insurance will cover a longer stay, they say that I need someone who can accept ‘responsibility on my behalf’ to come sign, to get me out. This is all illegal, of course, it’s completely illegal. I’ve told them its illegal. They’ve told me… something about an obsession with the legality of things. Monomania. They can make anything fit. They’ve got a certain form, and they can make anything fit into it. Oh, God, I want to hear your voice right now. Please pick up. I don’t… I don’t know what number to tell you to call, if you get this message. There’s a number on the phone, here, but it’s been blacked out, and they’ve taken my cell phone from me. Someone else has taken my cell phone from me. Not the doctors. These kids, at the guinea-pig camp, a group of kids. Of course you’re not going to pick up. None of this makes any sense. Why would you pick up? You haven’t even listened to this yet… ”