Eastern Standard Tribe | Page 9

antiinflammatories and painkillers. He tottered the two steps to the
chair at her bedside and shook her hand again.
"Don't take this the wrong way, but you look like hell," he said.
She smiled. Her jaw made an audible pop. "Get a picture, will you? It'll be good in
court."
He chuckled.
"No, seriously. Get a picture."
So he took out his comm and snapped a couple pix, including one with nightvision filters
on to compensate for the dimmed recovery room lighting. "You're a cool customer, you
know that?" he said, as he tucked his camera away.
"Not so cool. This is all a coping strategy. I'm pretty shook up, you want to know the
truth. I could have died."
"What were you doing on the street at three AM anyway?"
"I was upset, so I took a walk, thought I'd get something to eat or a beer or something."
"You haven't been here long, huh?"
She laughed, and it turned into a groan. "What the hell is wrong with the English, anyway?
The sun sets and the city rolls up its streets. It's not like they've got this great tradition of
staying home and surfing cable or anything."
"They're all snug in their beds, farting away their lentil roasts."

"That's it! You can't get a steak here to save your life. Mad cows, all of 'em. If I see one
more gray soy sausage, I'm going to kill the waitress and eat *her*."
"You just need to get hooked up," he said. "Once we're out of here, I'll take you out for a
genuine blood pudding, roast beef and oily chips. I know a place."
"I'm drooling. Can I borrow your phone again? Uh, I think you're going to have to dial
for me."
"That's OK. Give me the number."
She did, and he cradled his comm to her head. He was close enough to her that he could
hear the tinny, distinctive ringing of a namerican circuit at the other end. He heard her
shallow breathing, heard her jaw creak. He smelled her shampoo, a free-polymer new-car
smell, smelled a hint of her sweat. A cord stood out on her neck, merging in an elegant
vee with her collarbone, an arrow pointing at the swell of her breast under her paper
gown.
"Toby, it's Linda."
A munchkin voice chittered down the line.
"Shut up, OK. Shut up. Shut. I'm in the hospital." More chipmunk. "Got hit by a car. I'll
be OK. No. Shut up. I'll be fine. I'll send you the FAQs. I just wanted to say. . ." She
heaved a sigh, closed her eyes. "You know what I wanted to say. Sorry, all right? Sorry it
came to this. You'll be OK. I'll be OK. I just didn't want to leave you hanging." She
sounded groggy, but there was a sob there, too. "I can't talk long. I'm on a shitload of
dope. Yes, it's good dope. I'll call you later. I don't know when I'm coming back, but we'll
sort it out there, all right? OK. Shut up. OK. You too."
She looked up at Art. "My boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend. Not sure who's leaving who at this
point. Thanks." She closed her eyes. Her eyelids were mauve, a tracery of pink veins. She
snored softly.
Art set an alarm that would wake him up in time to meet his lawyer, folded up his comm
and crawled back into bed. His circadians swelled and crashed against the sides of his
skull, and before he knew it, he was out.
6.
Hospitals operate around the clock, but they still have their own circadians. The noontime
staff were still overworked and harried but chipper and efficient, too, without the
raccoon-eyed jitters of the night before. Art and Linda were efficiently fed, watered and
evacuated, then left to their own devices, blinking in the weak English sunlight that
streamed through the windows.
"The lawyers've worked it out, I think," Art said.

"Good. Good news." She was dopamine-heavy, her words lizard-slow. Art figured her
temper was drugged senseless, and it gave him the courage to ask her the question that'd
been on his mind since they'd met.
"Can I ask you something? It may be offensive."
"G'head. I may be offended."
"Do you do. . .this. . .a lot? I mean, the insurance thing?"
She snorted, then moaned. "It's the Los Angeles Lottery, dude. I haven't done it before,
but I was starting to feel a little left out, to tell the truth."
"I thought screenplays were the LA Lotto."
"Naw. A good lotto is one you can win."
She favored him with half a smile and he saw that she had a lopsided, left-hand dimple.
"You're from LA, then?"
"Got it in one. Orange County. I'm a third-generation failed actor. Grandpa