'I can do anything.'
'I'm gathering that. But how?'
'I'd tell you, but then-'
'Yeah, I know, you'd have to kill me.' She looked embarrassed to have said that with his having just lost his fiancee. 'I'm sorry,' she whispered.
'My fault,' he said. 'I started it.'
She lightly tugged at the bandage, making his eyes water. 'Bear with me,' she said, squirting more liquid.
'That stuff supposed to make it easier?'
'We tell ourselves that,' she said. 'Fortunately, you had a good surgeon. Oh, yeah, it was me. I cut enough hair that all we're dealing with is scalp and wound and stitches. Imagine if there was hair too.'
'I don't want to think about it.'
'Think about something else and I'll hurry.'
'You can't just yank it?'
'Not with stitches. Those have to come out the right way. If I pull one out with the bandage, you're on the ceiling. Now try to get your mind on something else.'
'Like what?'
She stopped and put her wrists on her hips, careful to keep her gloved hands from touching anything. 'David, I hardly know you. How would I know what you have to think about?'
He shrugged.
'Think about freedom,' she said. 'About being away from here forever.'
'You call that freedom? It's just another form of prison.'
'I've been wondering about that,' she said. 'It has to be less tension, don't you think?'
'Different kind, I guess. Ow!'
'Sorry. Be brave. Tell me more.'
'Well, we won't have to worry about who's watching and listening and whether my secure E-mail and phone connections have been compromised. We won't have to worry that we've already been found out and they're just letting us hang ourselves and expose others before they arrest us.'
'That's what I was thinking,' she said.
'But we'll never be free again. We'll be fugitives.'
'So you've already ash-canned my idea.'
'No, why? I assigned it to Mac and Abdullah.'
'Because if it works, no one's even looking for us. We get new IDs, change our looks, and start over.'
'But without the loyalty mark.'
She hesitated. 'Well, yes, there is that. Hold on. There we go.' She held before his eyes the long bandage in a pair of surgical scissors. Besides disinfectant, it showed his blood and the imprint of his wound, two staples, and several stitches.
'Can I ask you something?' he said. 'Totally off the subject.'
'You mean may I?'
'Ah, one of those. Showing off your education.'
'Sorry. Incurable.'
'I guess we'll need a grammar cop at the safe house, in case Tsion and Buck are out. Anyway, why do you people think we want to see that stuff? The yucky bandage, I mean.'
'Yucky?' She morphed into baby talk. 'Does he hate to see that yucky stuff?'
'Doctors and nurses are forever doing what you just did. Just remove it and toss it. You think I need to see it or I won't pay?'
She shrugged.
'You all must just love this stuff,' he said. 'That's all I can figure. By the way, you never said anything about staples.'
'You just answered your own question.'
'I'm lost.'
'I showed you so you know what's next. The stitches are separate, so they come out individually. It's not one of those deals where I cut or untie and then the whole thing just sort of tickles as it comes looping out. It won't hurt, but there are several. And there are two staples that have to stay in till the stitches are out, just in case, to hold everything together. When the stitches are gone, I'll know whether the scar can contain that big brain of yours. Then I have to get under each of those two staples, one at a time, with a wire cutter.'
'You're joking.'
'No, sir. I cut through the staple-'
'Ouch.'
'Not if you don't flinch.'
'You're the one who'd better not flinch.'
'I'm good. I promise. Then I grip each remaining end, that would be two for each staple, and slowly curl it out.'
'That's got to hurt.'
She hesitated.
'I needed a real fast 'Not at all' right there.'
'I admit you'll feel it more than the stitches. It's a bigger invasion, thus a busier evacuation.'
'A busier evacuation? You could be in management.'
'What should I say? The big, yucky staple displaced more tissue than the itty-bitty stitchies. If any of the scar tissue adhered to the metal, you may feel it give way.'
'I don't like the sound of 'give way.' '
'What a wuss! It won't even bleed. And if I feel it's too early and it would cause trauma, we'll put it off.'
'Not unless it would kill me. I mean it, Hannah. I want to be done with this.'
'You don't want any reason to have to come back and talk to me.'
'It's not that.'
'No,' she said dismissively, obviously feigning insult. 'I can take it. I don't know any other believers with reasons to come around, but that's all right. Just leave me here to suffer alone.'
'Get on with it.'
'Shut up and I will. Now think about something else.'
'Can you talk while you work?'
'Oh, sure. I told you I was good.'
'Then tell me your story while you do this.'
'Story's longer than the procedure, David.'
'Then take your time.'
'Now there! That was a sweet thing to say.'
THIRTEEN
Hannah Palemoon's story actually took David's mind off what she was doing. And she did take her time, pausing between each stitch. She teased him by showing him the first, but his look stopped her.
She had been raised on a Cherokee reservation in what was now known as the United North American States. 'You wouldn't believe the misconceptions about Native Americans,' she said.
'Never been to the States, even when it was just the United States of America. But I read about it. They called you Indians because of Columbus's mistake.'
'Exactly. He thinks he's in the West Indies, so we must be Indians. Now it's Indian this, Indian that. Indian tribes. Cowboys and Indians. Indian nation. Indian reservation. The Indian problem. American Indians-that was my favorite. And of course, anyone who hadn't visited the reservation assumed we lived in tepees.'
