DISCLAIMER: Not mine. No money made. Maca, Esther and (to my great disappointment also Cruz), along with the entirety of Hospital Central, belong to Telecino. All I own is my brain and a very vivid imagination. I only lay claim to the journey I'm sending the characters on.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: After taking refuge in the Hospital Central fandom almost a year ago, I am delighted to see the growing interest for Maca and Esther in the international community, where Ralst's call for submissions finally convinced me to post this story here as well. It is originally being written in single chapters on the Spanish Maca y Esther board at miarroba (Ralst has kindly added the link to the HC link section, and if any of you speaks Spanish, I'd advise you to run and don't walk over there and take a look at the fan fic section) and is as of yet unfinished.
TIMEFRAME: uh… let's call it al Alternative AU, which is like an Über, but not quite. The Spanish folks on miarroba write nearly exclusively in this form.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
Prologue
The hot earth trembled under my feet
as if lions were treading past to the water hole
and my breath was light-footed
like the gazelles on the horizon
when you first walked by.
The grass pressed itself closer to the plane,
feeling the upcoming storm
just like my soul trembled, thirsty and afraid to drown
like the heat-cracked soil under the rain
when you first came close.
The drums in the evening sounded loud,
like the beat of your heart;
in your eyes, you carried all the fires of a long night
and the first song of the morning bird
when you first looked at me.
And the earth moved.
('Arrival', Songs of Kandolo)
PARTE UNE
1
The sounds of the night filtered into the room through the window that was sealed only with a piece of gauze, a feeble attempt at keeping the wilderness outside. Inside, the room was sparsely decorated. On a roughhewn table, the polished wood of a small hyena statuette glinted in the low light. A few pictures were pinned to the walls, memories of a home far away. Against the far wall, covered by a mosquito net, stood a small bed in which two figures lay side by side, one of them staring through the window opening out into the night. Actually, she thought, the window was nothing but a square of deeper black against the surrounding darkness of the walls. The heat and the humid air of the night easily poured into the room, along with the wild smells of the grass and the faint tang of the smoke from the watch fire that Malik kept stoked all night, in case a leopard or lion wandered to close to the camp in search of prey in the dark.
Before she had come here, she hadn't known how dark nights could be outside the cities. Dark, and full of strange sounds. Tonight, there was hardly a breeze and the soft cries of the night birds carried up from the foot of the hill, where the forest began.
The figure next to her moved, edging a little closer, and then a hand trailed up her chest with unmistakable intent.
"Not now," she warded off the amorous assault. "We'll stroke out in this heat." She stroked her fingers across a soft cheek as if to apologize for her refusal. "Besides, if the transporter gets here tomorrow, it'll be a long day."
"Which day isn't long out here?" Her companion asked, once more trailing teasing fingers up her chest.
"Begoña…" She pushed the questing hand away with a chuckle. "Do you want to explain the reasons to Vilches if I pass out in consultation tomorrow?"
"No," Begoña admitted. The boss of their little clinic let a lot of things pass, but slack at work was not one of them. And angering him was not a wise thing to do with the temper he was having these days, now that there was nobody around to keep him in check anymore. "I wonder if the transport even made it out of Mbuji-Mayi yet," she pondered, changing the topic. "This is the third day we're waiting, Maca."
"The last time the radio worked, it said the fights let up, so unless there's new rainfalls, they should be on their way," Maca reasoned. "Hopefully they make it tomorrow. We need the supplies."
"And Cruz's replacement should get here," Begoña reminded her.
"And coffee," Maca added hopefully.
Begoña snorted, punching her lightly in the shoulder. "You're impossible."
Maca didn't reply, but for her, this was one of the biggest letdowns out here. There were mornings where she could have killed for a proper café con leche. Of course, such small amenities hadn't been what she was thinking about when she signed up for this post in a mixture of defiance and despair – defiance against her family, who refused to accept her choices, both professionally and personally, and despair over a disastrous break-up that had left her heart in a thousand pieces.
'Médecins Sans Frontières' had sounded heroic and romantic back then, almost a year ago, but in the end, it was mostly hard work under dire conditions, in between the heat and the chaos, but then again, at times, it was of an insane beauty that drove even the most stoic of them to their knees.
A rustling outside drew her gaze to the window again. In the first months, the sounds had woken her up every night, having her gaze nervously toward the window every time, half expecting a pair of glinting eyes to bear down on her. Now, the nighttime sounds were normal to her, lulling her to sleep when she lay awake in those last precious moments between thought and dream where she was at peace alone with herself, knowing that another day had passed trying to make a difference.
Tonight her last thought was about the transport. She really hoped it would finally arrive the next day.
2
She looked back with a final wave at the village where they had spent the night, noting how the brown loam huts already seemed to disappear into the surrounding landscape, the last two kids who had excitedly waved her goodbye becoming small dots on the horizon. Turning to look out the front window of the transporter, she took in the wide planes of the Kasaï-Oriental province ahead of them, feeling incredibly small in comparison to the vastness in front of her.
"Look, there!" Her driver and companion pointed to their right, and only after a few moments, she could make out a group of gazelles crossing the plain and she was fascinated by their seemingly weightless jumps.
So this would be her life now, she thought, the nervousness she had felt ever since they had left Mbuji-Mayi the day before increasing by the minute.
As if reading her thoughts, the driver turned to look at her again. "You'll be fine," he reassured her and for a moment, out of sheer reflex, she wanted to tell him to watch the road and not keep looking at her, but this wasn't Madrid. There was no traffic in sight for miles, and the path they were following could hardly be called a road.
Instead, she cast him a grateful smile. "Thanks, Mbele."
He answered with a broad smile of his own, his teeth shining in contrast to his dark skin. That was another thing she would have to get used to: being one of very few white people. In the village where they had stopped overnight because Mbele didn't think it was safe to drive on through the night, people had stared at her – and not just the children, everyone. She had asked Mbele whether she had perhaps unknowingly done something offensive, but he had only laughed and told her that foreigners, especially white ones, rarely passed through there.
She thought that he was probably used to having to calm down the new medical staff he brought out to the station. When he had picked her up at the headquarters in Mbuji-Mayi, he had introduced himself as the girl Friday of the clinic and indeed he seemed to do everything from cooking to maintenance. And, of course, the driving.
She wondered whether it would have been different if she had stuck to her original plan and gone to South America. That had been her plan when she signed up, but then they urgently needed someone in the Congo. She had protested that she didn't really know a thing about Africa, much less spoke French, but the board she had interviewed with had told her that as long as she could tell a malaria from a meningitis and knew how to give a shot, the team in Kasaï-Oriental would be more than happy to have her. It was a Spanish team at least, which was what made her agree in the end. She had briefly met the woman whom she was replacing, Cruz, a doctor from the Central. The day afterwards, she had signed the papers and now, a scant few weeks and the necessary shots later, here she was.
The old transporter shook as they drove through another chuckhole and she wondered again what had made her think that this was a good idea in the first place.
Of course, there had been the idealistic belief that she could do some good in a place less privileged. Her contract with the private clinic on the outskirts of Madrid had run out and instead of prolonging it immediately, she had asked for a six-month sabbatical so that she could work for a while in a place where she felt truly needed.
Of course Miguel had been anything but enthusiastic about her plans, claiming that he needed her as well, and more than a bunch of strangers who wouldn't care whether they got treated by her or some other doctor. But she had stood firm, seeing this as her last chance to really take a break from everything and do something completely different. She and Miguel had talked about getting married and having kids, and if she wanted to do an adventurous project like this, it had to be now, before they eventually founded a family.
Still, Miguel had taken it worse than her mother, where she had expected things to be the other way around. Sure, Encarna had had a conniption, claiming that her only daughter was trying to kill her with fear, but once she had explained why she wanted to do it, that it was about giving something back to others, her mother had been proud. Still just as afraid for her, but also very proud.
They drove on for hours without talking much, Mbele only now and then pointing out an animal to her. She was fully occupied with taking in her surroundings, the sun that stood so oddly high in the sky, the bright, burnt colors and the way the landscape slowly changed, luscious green to their right indicating that there had to be a river, while on their left, soft rolling hills with rocks and low shrub became more and more. Two times, they passed by small accumulations of huts, so few that she didn't really think she could call them villages, and Mbele told her that they were deserted anyway, most likely abandoned in the ongoing skirmishes around the Southeastern borders.
Another small bunch of huts, with a bigger, oddly shaped structure to the side came in to view, nestled against one of the hills to their left. It was surrounded by a low wall of rocks and looked just as poor and abandoned, if not for the line of white laundry that could easily be seen even from the distance. The laundry hardly moved in the thick, warm, air.
She was surprised when they drove closer and finally stopped in front of the low wall.
"Esther?" She turned to face Mbele who nodded at her in encouragement. "We're here."
3
"Thanks," Esther replied automatically, gazing incredulously at the huts and houses in front of her.
This was supposed to be her home for the next six months?
For a moment, she wanted to ask Mbele to turn the car on the spot and take her back to Mbuji-Mayi, or better yet, all the way Kinshasa, to the airport, so that she could take the next connection back to Madrid.
But she hadn't made it this far to give up now, and with a deep breath, she opened the car door, the hot air slamming against her like a wall as she stood on unsteady legs. She was sure to have bruises on her thighs in the morning from the bumpy ride through all the chuckholes. But looking around, she guessed that those bruises were probably going to be the least of her problems.
A throng of curious people immediately swarmed around her and the transporter, staring at her and talking in a language – or perhaps it was several, she couldn't tell – that she didn't understand. She saw patients and what had to be family of some of them, waiting for relatives to get treated or be released from the clinic. From what it looked like, the row of huts to her right seemed to be the 'hospital rooms', with a more modern looking structure in the middle that had to be the actual clinic. On her left, from another adventurously 'modern' looking house, she saw two people hurrying over, one of them wearing a white coat.
Casting another look at the melee around her, Esther suddenly realized that there was a figure leaning against a hut in the background, a tall, white woman who stood out because she was the only one not moving, apart from the occasional lift of her wrist since she was smoking a cigarette. She wore olive utility pants and a black t-shirt, the arms of which she had rolled up, making her look more like a guerilla than a medic. Esther supposed that since she was white, the woman had to be a medic. Cruz hadn't mentioned any Spanish military personnel, and with the way the woman had her hair in a loose ponytail, she didn't look like military at all. She took another draft of her cigarette, looking at Esther and the transporter, but she didn't walk over, remaining leaned against the loam wall behind her.
Mbele turned to Esther at that moment with her luggage, and when she set it down and curiously looked once more over at the hut, she only saw the empty wall. The strange woman had disappeared.
"Esther García?" A voice next to her called out.
4
She turned to find a very tall, broad-shouldered man with dark hair looking down at her with a friendly smile. "Welcome to the jungle. I'm Pablo, one of the medics, and this…" He pointed at the petite woman in the white coat next to him who had short, curly hair and sparkling dark eyes. "…this is Maria."
Esther had to raise on tiptoes when she kissed Pablo's cheeks in welcome, feeling her own skin already sweaty against his. It was incredible how hot it was out here. To greet Maria, she actually had to lean down a little, the woman was a good head shorter than she was herself.
"Let's get you settled in, and then Vilches wants to see you right away." Pablo leaned down to pick up her bags, and she could see a large scar running along his upper arm when his t-shirt sleeve rode up with the movement. Next to it, he had a tattoo of an elephant in a tribal looking design. Esther thought that he had to have gotten it here, and for a moment, she wondered with what she would go home in six months. She didn't know if Miguel or her mother would be more shocked if she came home with an elephant tattooed onto her arm. Pablo nodded at the throng of people still surrounding the car. "Maria will supervise the unloading of the transport."
Esther took in the scene skeptically: the petite Maria facing the excitedly shattering crowd, but then Esther almost dropped her bagpack when Maria yelled something in a foreign language with lots of snarring sounds and she watched in amazement how immediately, the crowd parted and moved to the sides to make room for Maria, taking her orders to unload the transporter.
"Okay… the tent over there is the cafeteria…" Pablo pointed at a dusty white tent, the open front flaps allowing a view onto a simple row of tables and benches. "The washrooms are back there…" Esther saw a few small wooden sheds at a bit of a distance, with strings drawn between their roofs. On these strings, there were shower curtains tied to the sides and on a set of wooden bars that led form one roof to the other, there was a line of dented old buckets.
"Our showers," Pablo explained, having seen Esther's puzzled look. "Don't worry, once you get used to them, they're actually pretty good." He walked on, not noticing how Esther paled next to him. "Back there is the well… the most valuable thing we have, probably. We never had a shortage, but we're still trying to save water where we can."
Finally, they walked into the medics' quarters on the left end of the 'village' as Esther had decided to dub it. It was nothing but a hallway with rough wooden doors leading into small rooms left and right. The light was low in here, the only source of it a small, square window opening at the other end of the corridor. It was considerably cooler in here than outside, and Esther heaved a sigh of relief.
Pablo stopped in front of a door to the right. "Your quarters."
After seeing the adventurous shower construction, Esther had expected worse. The room was small and clean, two window openings taped with gauze letting in the daylight. There was a bed, a chair and a table, and a long bench of sorts.
"We try not to place anything on the floor," Pablo explained, gesturing at the bench. "The ants and the snakes, you know…" He shook his head at Esther's worried expression. "We never had any real problems with it in here, but we try to be careful anyway." He gestured at her surroundings. "Well, I better let you get settled in. When you're done, just check in with Vilches – across the courtyard, the big office in the middle. You can't miss it."
Left alone, Esther sat down in the bed for a moment, nervously looking at the clean loam floor to see if there were any ants or bugs. Or, God forbid, snakes.
She blinked back a few tears, feeling incredibly lost, but then she squared her shoulders. "Well, you wanted to do this, so you better get started," she told herself, getting up to organize her bags on the bench. A few items, she took out and placed on the table, the last of them a picture of Miguel that she put in the middle.
She ran her fingers along the frame, and had to blink back another tear at seeing how he smiled back at her from the photo. It was hard to imagine that she shouldn't see that smile for real for a whole six months.
5
The office was indeed easy to find, even though it was empty when Esther entered. On a large desk was an array of medical equipment and a fan that was plugged into a generator, but the generator wasn't working. In the middle of the desk sat a small wooden statuette of a gazelle.
Steps behind her made Esther turn around and she found herself face to face with a man in a white doctor's gown with rolled up sleeves. He had his graying hair cropped close to his skull, underlining the angles and lines of his face. "Esther García?" he asked. When she nodded, he held out his hand. "Vilches. Good to have you here."
If Esther had expected a welcome speech on his part, she was mistaken. Vilches didn't seem to be a man to sugarcoat things. "Heal anything that comes your way as good as you can, except for terrorists and guerillas," he outlined her tasks. "Ignore the losses, since there will be plenty, stay away from uncooked food and keep your mosquito net without holes."
Esther nodded, dumbfounded by his attitude. He certainly hadn't been sent to the Congo for his bedside manners. She wondered how he had ended up with a woman like Cruz, who was so cordial and sociable, or at least that had been Esther's impression during their brief meeting. She remembered the carefully sealed bag she had brought, Cruz had given it to her, asking that she deliver it personally, but even this gift didn't elicit more than a brief smile from him when she handed it to him.
"Maria will give you the tour," he stated, nodding at the door as a sign that they were done here. "I need to get back to the next twenty patients." As if called, Maria appeared in the door of the office.
"Did I do anything wrong?" Esther asked uncertainly, looking after Vilches who briskly walked away toward the clinic habitations, the small package still clutched under his arm.
Maria smiled dismissively. "Don't worry, he's always like that – even more so since his wife left. The one who was here before you, Cruz."
"I met her briefly in Madrid," Esther said as the two of them started their walk around the clinic complex. "She talked about your work here in a way that made me sign the papers on the spot."
"You saw her? How is she doing?" Form Maria's tone, it was obvious that she cared about Cruz.
"Fine, she is doing fine," Esther replied. Out here, people probably cared more about each other than normal colleagues. When she had asked for her sabbatical at the private clinic, nobody had even asked where she was going, or why. "She looked great. Of course she misses all of you, and the work. She sent things for you – coffee… and chocolate…"
"That's Cruz," Maria stated with a fond smile. "She's what, fourth month now?"
"She was at thirteen weeks when I saw her," Esther remembered. "It's understandable that she didn't want to stay here under the circumstances."
"Oh, Cruz wanted to stay," Maria contradicted. "She and Vilches fought tooth and nail over it, but in the end they agreed that it would be safer for her and the baby if she went back home early."
"That certainly explains his mood," Esther muttered. Having a pregnant wife a continent away, without a chance to talk to her and see how she was doing, had to be hard. She thought of Miguel as Maria explained the work and the layout of the clinic to her. Right away this evening, she would sit down and write him the first letter.
Passing an 'office' in front of which a line of people sat waiting, Esther looked twice when she saw a white woman with blonde curls in between all the dark-skinned people, walking around and presumably taking first diagnostics.
The blonde accepted a small package from someone in the line and Maria, seeing Esther's curious look, set to explain. "Sometimes, people bring food as a payment, or they help out around the clinic for a bit. We don't charge them for treatment, of course. They hardly have anything to give away, but a bit of extra food is always a good thing." Maria nodded towards the blonde. "That is Begoña, by the way. She's one of the nurses, like Pablo, although out here, it doesn't really make a difference if you have a doctor's degree or not. You just do what you can wherever you're needed."
Esther saw Begoña again later when they had almost finished their tour. She stood behind the row of clinic huts in the shade, talking to the woman Esther had seen upon her arrival, the one with the utility pants and the small black t-shirt. Right then she was lighting a cigarette for Begoña.
"And that would be Maca," Maria said gesturing at the brunette with the ponytail. "Dr. Wilson, officially."
Esther looked at the doctor, taking a chance to survey her unseen when suddenly, much to her surprise, Begoña leaned in to kiss said Dr. Wilson soundly on the lips.
6
"Jungle Fever," Maria commented upon seeing the flabbergasted expression on Esther's face.
Esther had to tear her eyes away from the sight of Dr. Wilson kissing the blonde nurse back. "Excuse me, what did you say?"
"Jungle Fever." Maria shrugged as they walked on. "It happens a lot. People go crazy out here on their own. They try to cling to something, and then they end up involved with each other, just to have something other than this." She gestured in a way that encompassed the clinic, their work, the heat and the entire province of Kasaï-Oriental.
"I have my boyfriend back home," Esther stated with a smile.
"Really?" Maria seemed surprised to hear that. "That's rare. Most of us come who come down here don't have anyone waiting at home. It's easier that way." At seeing Esther's uncertain look, she hastened to tack on, "If you have a two-year-contract, I mean. For six months, you'll be fine!" Still, her encouraging smile wasn't all that convincing.
"So you don't have anyone to go home to…?" Esther asked hesitantly.
"Me? Good Lord, no!" Maria laughed. "I couldn't have left if I had someone I really loved back home."
Esther didn't know what to reply to that, so she didn't say anything. Maria finished their tour by introducing her to the local staff. Other than Mbele, there were two more men, Karim and Malik, both locals from abandoned villages, who only spoke little and broken Spanish.
The last ones Esther met were indeed Begoña and Maca who were working shift at the clinic. When Maria and Esther entered, they were trying to treat a boy of perhaps five or six who had a badly infected rash on his leg, but the kid seemed to be afraid to sit down on the medical cot with its metallic legs.
Maria interrupted the scene, giving the boy a chance to retreat to the corner of the room, staring at the four white women with suspicion. "Girls, I know you're busy as hell," Maria said by way of greeting. "I just wanted you to meet our new staff member, Esther. – Esther, these are Begoña and Maca."
"Nice to meet you," Begoña said, leaning in to kiss her cheeks and Esther thought that it was odd how they all clung to these customs, even out here in the middle of nowhere among a culture so different from their own.
Maca just looked her up and down. "You're here for Cruz?"
"Yes, I'm the replacement," Esther said, startled by the somewhat gruff tone.
"Hm." Maca nodded, holding up her gloved hands with a nod to indicate that she couldn't shake hands right now. "Welcome, then – I'm Maca." With that, the topic seemed to be done for her because she bent back down over her tablet of medical instruments.
Esther thought it was rude, but since she was the new girl, she didn't think she should start with confronting people on their attitudes. At least not on her first day. Dr. Wilson was probably just stressed out because the waiting line outside was so long.
"Just let me change into some scrubs, and I can give you a hand," Esther offered instead, trying to be friendly. "You seem to be a little crowded."
Maca looked up from her instruments again. "It's like this every day," she said coolly. "But if you want to help, come in and give me a hand – gloves are in that box on the table, and whatever you're wearing right now is probably cleaner than anything we have here anyway."
Begoña smiled. "Thanks Esther, I'll take a small break then. – If there's anything you aren't sure about, just call for me, okay?" She disappeared from sight with Maria in tow, leaving Esther alone with the abrasive Dr. Wilson.
"What a great start," Esther muttered under her breath, reaching for a pair of gloves.
Maca turned towards the little boy who was still pressed against the back wall of the office, staring at her with wide eyes. Slowly, she crouched down and held a gloved hand out to the him, saying a few words in a foreign language that Esther didn't understand, but that seemed to sit in the back of one's throat, low and guttural.
"They're Luba," Maca said at Esther's perplexed look, motioning at the boy and toward the entrance, encompassing the waiting line outside. "You better pick up some words along the way, it makes the work a lot easier."
Esther thought dourly that Maca could just as well have translated the phrase for her. She could have picked up her first words of Luba that way, instead of Dr. Wilson just being all arrogant about knowing the native dialect. Esther took a slow, deep breath. Between Vilches and Maca, this was going to be a long six months.
She couldn't blame the little boy. In his place, she'd have been afraid of this doctor, too.
To her surprise, however, the boy took a step away from the wall, limping toward Maca. And to her even greater surprise, the doctor lifted him up from the ground in her arms, not caring that his skin touched hers above the safe barrier of the gloves while she softly spoke to him in Spanish. "Come on, sweetie, I won't hurt you… I'm only trying to take a look at your leg… Would you let me do that?"
When she gently sat him down on the cot, Maca had to lean forward and the pendant of a necklace slid out from underneath her t-shirt.
From what Esther could tell, it was a small representation of an animal's head, carved from ebony. A tiger perhaps, or a leopard, with large, sharply cut eyes. The canines were glinting in the light, they had to be made from some kind of embedded gemstone or jewel.
The boy leaned back, his expression trusting now as Maca carefully probed around the infected wound. Esther automatically reached for swabs and pincers, holding them out to Maca who took them without looking up, leaving Esther wondering how this Dr. Wilson could be so abrasive in her attitude, and yet so incredibly gentle with the child.
7
In the evening, Esther was convinced that she had never been so exhausted in her entire life. She followed her new colleagues to the 'cafeteria' and ate her dinner without even asking what it was she was eating.
The others were talking excitedly over the goodies Cruz had sent, and everyone congratulated Vilches since Cruz had enclosed the first ultrasound picture of their baby in the package Esther had delivered. If she hadn't been so tired, Esther would have found it cute how the gruff medic from earlier was grinning from ear to ear now, proudly showing around the grizzly black-and-white image again and again.
Esther felt kind of left out. These people had lived and worked closely together for a year already – she heard that only Begoña and Karim had arrived later – and it showed. They were a bit like a huge family, a family that she didn't belong to, at least not yet.
In the end, she excused herself early, falling into bed without even writing that letter to Miguel. She was simply too tired, and sound asleep in mere minutes.
Over in the food tent, the evening went on.
"So what do you think of the new girl?" Begoña asked. "She wasn't even here for an hour and already picked up work!"
"She seems very idealistic," Maria said pensively. "And she has her boyfriend at home and all. I don't know if she'll make it long."
"We'll know soon enough," Maca stated with stoic calm. "She did good work today, though," she added after a moment, remembering how Esther had jumped in immediately, seeing what was needed without Maca even having to say anything. Of course, her attitude was gratingly serene, but Maca supposed that a few weeks in the jungle would take care of that. Then, this Esther might well turn out to be a good addition to the team, if she didn't run home to her boyfriend first.
"And she brought us news from Cruz!" Maria saluted. "And coffee!"
"And hairspray," Pablo added, having seen the item on Esther's desk earlier. "Well, she still has a coiffure."
"Not for long," Maca commented dryly, and everyone laughed. Most of them had arrived with more or less fashionable haircuts and had over time succumbed to the laws of practicality – keeping their hair either short enough not to be a bother at all, or long enough to tie it back, without any shaggy extravagances.
"Hairspray, great!" Vilches chimed in. "That way we can burn out a few more of the termite holes that are a little close to the kitchen tent for my liking."
"Oh, and she brought more chocolate, and coffee," Mbele pointed out. Other than Karim and Malik, who preferred the open fire outside, he tended to sit with the Spanish team in the evenings.
"I thought Cruz did that?" Maca asked, pausing in reaching for one of the chocolate bars on the table. It was a veritable feast tonight. They had stacked the supplies into the medical fridge so tightly that there even had been some room left for the chocolate so that it was now perfectly chilled and delicious.
"Well, Cruz told Esther we like it, so Esther brought some on her own," Mbele said, gesturing at the candy on the table.
Maca hesitated in taking another piece, wondering why Esther was trying so hard to ingratiate herself with her colleagues. It had to be that, because nobody could be that genuinely kind. Even for the last of their patients tonight, she had still had a friendly smile, never once losing her calm.
She shrugged uncomfortably. In contrast to Esther's attitude, she was suddenly forced to recognize how jaded she herself had become, hardened by the things she had experienced down here and by the hastened flight from Spain, away from her family and from Azucena.
"You'd be the perfect candidate for the Foreign legion," Cruz had told her one morning in the showers. "If you weren't a woman, that is, and if you weren't a hundred years late."
Maca had turned to look at her in puzzlement, with half-shampooed hair and a very perplexed expression.
"Well, with all that righteous romantic anger you keep harboring…nothing to lose but a broken heart full of despair…" Cruz had mocked her in good humor, but then she had narrowed her eyes. "Macarena Wilson, you did not just check me out!"
"I did not!" Maca had protested. "I was glowering at you for making fun of me!"
"Good. Because you ogle me, and you'll be lacking a pair of eyes," Cruz had stated in feigned threat.
"If I'm blind, I'll need to use my hands," Maca had informed her with a grin, but she had steadfastly kept her eyes on Cruz's face. Better safe than sorry.
"…and you'd be lacking a pair of hands, as well" Cruz had serenely added. "Now pass me the shampoo and behave."
Maca had to grin all over again at the memory. God, she missed the way Cruz had kept her with her feet soundly planted on the ground, taking her down a notch every time she could. Of course, she'd never have admitted it to Cruz, but underneath their mutual mockery, they had formed a solid friendship over the past year, and Maca missed the talks with her more than anything. Before Cruz went away, she hadn't realized that she and Begoña hardly talked.
Looking over at where the nurse sat sharing a bar of chocolate with Maria, Maca remembered another of her conversations with Cruz. They had been sitting on the low wall around the village, looking out over the vast plain in the evening.
"So, you and Begoña," Cruz had said, her tone somewhat reserved.
It hadn't even been two days since she had first slept with the new nurse, but Maca realized that denying it would be futile. In a place this small, you couldn't sneeze without someone else knowing immediately. "I thought you'd be happy for me," she had said instead, put off by Cruz's critical tone. "After all, you were the one telling me that I should allow myself to feel again."
"Maca, you don't like her because she makes you feel something," Cruz had said in her trademark dry tone. "You like her because she doesn't."
Maca had protested, of course. Now, however, she wasn't so sure whether Cruz had perhaps been right.
8
Esther looked up from her breakfast – a porridge of sorts and, thank God, coffee – when a shadow fell across the table. She looked up to find Maca looking down at her, putting a small bottle of pills in front of her.
"Your stomach will need a few days to get used to the food," Maca said by way of explanation.
"And good morning to you, too," Esther replied dryly. "I hate taking pills that could be unnecessary, I never do." She pointed at her porridge with her spoon. "And the food is fine so far."
Maca shrugged. "Suit yourself." She turned on her heel and walked out of the tent, leaving Esther staring after her once more. Only then she saw that Maca had left the pills behind, but she didn't feel like calling after her, deciding to hand them back to her later.
Two hours later, however, she was infinitely glad about the small bottle in her pocket when she had to jolt out of Vilches' office in the middle of treating a patient and hurried over to the bathroom sheds.
Two small white pills and fifteen minutes later, she felt a lot more human again, even if she was still somewhat pale around the nose. Of course, that was the first thing Maca commented upon when Esther entered her consultation office. She wished Vilches would have asked her to assist him with the operation he was currently doing, instead of asking Begoña, but of course he was right: It was only her second day out here, and Begoña had a lot more experience in operating under these conditions. And that left Esther in the company of the abrasive Dr. Wilson again.
"Take two after each meal," Maca said by way of greeting after taking one good look at Esther.
"I can read," Esther snapped in reply – there had been an instruction printed on the pill bottle. She reached for a pair of gloves.
Abrasive. And arrogant, as well, she corrected her mental image of Maca. It was going to be a long shift. But Encarna hadn't raised her little girl to give up easily, no Sir, so Esther focused on the patients instead, making it her goal to get a smile even out of the most reserved elder and the most frightened kid. If Dr. Wilson thought she could do charming, Esther was going to show her what real charms were.
Before it was even time for lunch, Esther knew the Luba expression for 'heal', 'no fear' and 'your name?', no thanks to Maca Wilson. She had also learned a phrase that had to mean something like 'Have a nice day' even though with the way the patients looked at her, she didn't seem to be getting it quite right yet.
The last patient they let in before lunch break was a young girl with a feverish ear infection and Esther kept her distracted by making a pair of small surgical scissors appear and disappear in front of her eyes until the girl laughed in delight.
"If you want to give a free circus performance, I could wait for five minutes," Maca offered haughtily, pausing in her examination.
That did it. Esther laid down the scissors although she would have loved to ram them into the table instead. Or into Dr. Wilson. "Are you always this arrogant?" she demanded testily, crossing her arms in front of her chest.
"Are you always this obnoxiously nice?" Maca shot back, but it came out a bit lame, subdued by the other woman's unexpected glare.
So this was Esther García losing her patience, Maca thought. She had to admit that it was a sight to behold: Esther with blazing eyes, her lips pursed, her jaw squarely set. Involuntarily, she felt a shudder run down her spine at being the focus of that much passionate anger. Making Esther mad was not a wise thing to do, Maca decided hastily, having to admit that she had underestimated the woman. Esther seemed to be a lot more ballsy than she looked.
Esther took a deep breath, reminding herself that they would be frightening their patient if they kept this up. "My mother taught me to be friendly," she said instead, with as much arrogance as she could muster.
Maca just raised an eyebrow at that. "My mother tried to teach me many things, and yet here I am," she commented lazily.
"Out in the wilderness? Or dating a woman?" Esther asked bluntly. But instead of becoming angry at the admittedly low blow, a slow grin spread over Maca's face and Esther was surprised to see that it made her look a lot younger. Pretty, even.
"A little bit of both," Maca replied, still grinning, impressed with how Esther had cut her off at the knees. And then she grinned a little more, thinking that Cruz would have done exactly the same thing.
Faced with Maca's disarming smile, Esther couldn't really keep up her anger. "Thanks for the pills, by the way," she murmured.
"You're welcome," Maca said, and now she didn't sound arrogant at all. "Cruz gave them to me when we first got here." She smiled again, dropping her tone to a conspiratorial whisper. "I was sick for the entire first three weeks."
"You and Cruz were good friends, weren't you?" Esther asked, the puzzle pieces coming together for her. If Maca missed Cruz, it was not surprising that she didn't really like her replacement.
"I guess so," Maca said with reserve, wondering what she had said or done to make Esther figure this out so quickly.
Between the two of them, they treated the last patient quickly and cleaned up for break. "So…" Maca waited until Esther looked at her. "Can I interest you in some lunch? I know this great little cafeteria very close by…"
Esther was startled, not having expected the playful comment. Actually, she wouldn't have expected Dr. Wilson to say anything playful at all, ever. "You mean the only cafeteria within the next… oh, I don't know… three-hundred square miles?" she replied with a sardonically raised eyebrow. "I'll have a hard time deciding where to go, with all the choices!"
"Just don't forget your dessert," Maca grinned. When Esther blinked at her in confusion, she added, "The pills."
"Thanks for reminding me," Esther muttered a little peeved, following Maca across the courtyard. But despite the joke at her expense, Esther thought Dr. Wilson was a lot more sufferable like this than she had been earlier today. Especially when she grinned.
9
The days passed, and Esther adapted to the daily rhythm and the heat. The long rows of people who were patiently waiting, often sitting on the ground around the village for whole days, became a familiar image and she soon developed an eye for sorting out the most urgent cases – infections, blunt traumas, suspicions of viral contamination. The last ones, she immediately sent to Maria who was the one who had a specialization in virology. Vilches and Maca took care of most of the other cases, although Maca tended to treat more children – Esther knew now that she had her degree in pediatrics – while Vilches did most of the tougher surgical cases that required anesthesia. Esther had begun to help out with those ever since Vilches had found out that she had a background with prepping anesthesia patients.
The work kept her so busy that most nights, she dropped into bed with exhaustion, too tired to think about anything. She had written that letter to Miguel, and a second one, too, and an even longer one to her mother, but it was so hard to put into words what she saw and felt out here. She had begun to take pictures with her small digital camera for them, but since she hadn't any place to download them, she would probably have to mail the memory cards, or wait for a trip to Mbuji-Mayi where they had internet and computers at the headquarters.
She still wasn't quite used to the adventurous showers, she had to admit that, but at least she had been paired up with Maria for that, and not with Maca or Begoña. With Maria, she got along very well, and also with Pablo who had found her sitting on the low wall around the village crying on one of the first evenings. He had tried to help her with the homesickness, talking to her late into the night, and ever since, they had forged a friendship of sorts.
He was the one who had talked her into giving away her hairspray and she had watched in amazement how he and Vilches, who seemed to have far too much fun doing this, had burned out a few termite holes using the spray as a miniature flamethrower.
Apart from moments like these, Vilches was his usual gruff self, and Esther had learned not to ask him about anything before mid-morning if she wanted a civil answer of any kind. She had gotten used to it.
She had also gotten used to the sight of Maca sneaking out of Begoña's room in the mornings, although that seemed to be happening less these days, or perhaps it was simply that Maca snuck back into her own room before daybreak.
The clinic, on the other hand, was looking better than ever, or at least that was what Pablo said. After having spent half an hour looking for replacement swabs one day and then finding boxes in three different places, a very frustrated Esther had sat down in the evening and reorganized the entire storage tent, including the medicine fridge, which was the only item in the entire village that was constantly connected to electricity. With their few generators, they tried to save energy where they could.
Maria and even Vilches had noted with a certain awe how suddenly, everyone was able to find things a lot easier. The only one who hadn't been impressed by Esther's work was Begoña, but Esther thought that was probably because she had originally been assigned that task.
The odd sounds at night were frightening her less and less – the rustling, the wild cries from the jungle on nights when the breeze carried up from the river, and the oddly sad songs Karim sang during night watch sometimes. Esther was even adjusting to the food, hardly needing Maca's magic pills anymore, although she was still wary about some of the things Mbele was serving them during meals. With some of them, it was definitely safer not to ask, or so Maca had told her.
Esther had stopped calling Maca 'Dr. Wilson' in her mind, but even though they formed a good team at work, she didn't quite know what to make of her beyond that. At one moment, the woman could be funny and caring, teasing her about lunch or her way to keep things in order, and in the next moment, she was insufferably arrogant and standoffish again, ordering her around and seeming to rile her up on purpose until Esther exploded.
She didn't understand how Begoña could date that woman. Vilches' snarky attitude, she could tolerate, after all he had to bear the pressure of being the boss around here and he was far away from his pregnant wife. But Maca's attitude? It drove Esther crazy. At work, however, they made a very good team, working in tandem without having to exchange too many words. Between Maca's gentleness when it came to children and Esther's attempt to make small talk with just about everyone of them to make them relax, and to pick up some more Luba along the way, they released a lot of smiling little patients.
One morning, in the middle of treating a young girl with a nasty gash across one eye, Maca and Esther were interrupted by Mbele who hurried towards the office, already calling from afar, "Close it! The boss needs you both. Surgery!"
While Esther tried to put their instruments away as sterilely as possible, Maca was already snapping off her gloves and shouting a few words to the waiting line outside, leaving the girl with the sister who had accompanied her before she rushed off to follow Mbele.
Esther, not quite understanding what was going on, hurried to catch up.
"What is it?" Maca called out to Mbele.
"Amputation," Mbele replied curtly, ushering them along.
"Shit!" Maca cursed. "Arm?"
She looked at Mbele hopefully, but the man shook his head. "Leg."
They were running now, hasting towards the operating theatre which was nothing but another hut, but it had a generator and an operating table at least.
"We don't have the means for that…" Esther turned toward Maca in shock. "Amputate a leg under local anesthesia?"
"Esther… we've already had to amputate legs without any anesthesia," Maca said harshly. "Gloves, quickly, and tie back your hair!"
Esther wanted to reply that she wasn't stupid, but didn't really feel like talking anymore when she saw their patient already stretched out on the table, a man who seemed to have had a run-in with a lion or some other predator, his left leg torn to a bloody pulp, the kneecap visible and awkwardly twisted.
"Fucking landmines," she heard Maca swear and Esther felt sick when she realized that the man wasn't under full anesthesia.
She reacted to Vilches' terse comments like a machine, passing and accepting things, trying to keep the environment as sterile as she could. Even Vilches was sweating more than usual, indicating that this was a tough one, and she could see that Maca was deathly pale under her mask.
Esther was just grateful that she didn't have to touch the bone saw, trying to look the other way, to where Pablo had thrown himself across the patient's chest to keep him immobilized. She told herself to keep going, to help as best as she could, but the high, piercing sound of the saw seemed like the worst thing she had ever heard, ringing in her ears even long after they had shut it off again.
Only at the very end, when they had to burn out the edges of the wound to prevent infection, what had happened caught up to Esther, as if the stench of burnt flesh cut through the haze she had been caught up in for the past hour or two – she had no idea how long this had taken, and now, she rushed outside, not making it farther away than two huts before she threw up violently.
Standing hunched over, she saw the front of her hastily thrown on scrubs covered in blood and grime, and she retched more, her hair falling into her face, but she didn't care, she just wanted the stench of flesh to go away, the stench that seemed to cling to her nostrils.
Then, suddenly, there was a hand holding her hair back, and an arm who rubbed in soothing circles over her back. "Sssh," she heard Maca's voice, as gentle as if she spoke to one of her little patients. "Try not to breathe too deeply. Sssh."
Maca's fingers were cool against her forehead despite the heat, and it felt heavenly. A cool, wet towel was pressed against her neck and Esther took a deep breath in reflex, relaxing too late that this way, she inhaled the same stench all over again. She tried to rip off the scrubs, her movements uncoordinated in their haste. She just wanted the smell to go away.
"Wait…" Maca reached across her shoulders, pulling off the bloodied garment. "Better?"
Esther nodded numbly. "A little." She looked up at Maca apologetically, but found nothing but concern in her eyes. "I'm sorry," she said with embarrassment. She had assisted in so many operations, she didn't understand why she had become sick.
"What should you be sorry for?" Maca shook her head, leading her away to walk a few steps. "For reacting to this? – Don't be. It's human."
"I didn't see you getting sick," Esther mumbled, still embarrassed by her lapse.
Maca actually smiled a little. "You weren't here when I had to do my first amputation. I staggered out of the operating theatre afterwards, and dropped like fly. Fell right on my face, too. I had a shiner for over a week."
Esther shot Maca a grateful look in reply, now seeing that Maca must have dumped her scrubs right after the operation. They had reached the shadowed spot behind the habitation huts and they stopped, leaning against the wall in the shade. From one of the back pockets of her utility pants, Maca pulled a cigarette, lighting it and taking a first, deep draw. She held it out to Esther. "Here."
Esther shook her head. "I don't smoke."
"Neither do I," Maca said over another draw. "But after things like this, it's good for your nerves."
Hesitantly, Esther took the cigarette, trying to remember when she had smoked last. As a teenager, probably. She took a pull, feeling the comfortable numbness of the nicotine against the roof of her mouth. She held the cigarette back out to Maca, and only when Maca reached to take it, she saw that the doctor's hands were shaking, enough to nearly drop the cigarette. Esther reached over in sheer reflex, grasping the shaking hand between her own for a moment in a calming gesture.
"Shit," Maca mumbled, turning her head away and taking another draw with trembling fingers. "I hate these surgeries."
She offered the cigarette back to Esther who took it. They remained standing there in silence, leaning next to each other against the wall and finishing off the cigarette between the two of them.
10
One week later, after dinner, Maca and Esther were cleaning up the instruments from their day shift. The mood was subdued. Late this afternoon, even though he had initially done well after his operation, their amputation patient from the week before had succumbed to an infection and died without any of them being able to do anything about it.
Esther could just as well have cleaned up the office on her own, but she was glad not to be on her own with her thoughts now, and she suspected that Maca didn't want to be alone, either. They didn't talk, just cleaning away instruments in companionable silence, while outside, dusk began to fall over the plain.
A sudden commotion drew their heads up, and before they had a chance to react, there were two shadows in the door, framed by the darkness behind them. One of them was standing, while the other one was half draped across his shoulders.
And there was the metallic glint of the barrel of a semi-automatic rifle, pointing right at them.
"Heal!" The armed guerilla shouted at them while he placed his companion on the medical cot. He looked around the office wildly. "Nobody else!"
Her heart beating in her throat and utterly conscious of Maca's body beside her, Esther fumbled for a Luba expression. "Peace," she tried to say, her tongue feeling like cotton in her mouth, numb with fear. "Peace!"
"Don't try Luba on them," Maca mumbled between her teeth. "Those are Shaba rebels. Bad idea."
The barrel switched back and forth between the two of them, and Esther could see that their attacker was barely more than a kid behind his munition belt and oversized fatigues. He was probably scared to death himself, which, of course, made him all the more dangerous in return.
With the gun pointing at her, Esther cut away the bloodied fatigues that the wounded guerilla was wearing with a pair of surgical scissors. She was leaving jagged edges in the fabric since her hand was so unsteady. The hurt guerilla was just as young as the one with the gun, perhaps even younger, his eyes glazed over, his forehead wet with perspiration.
"Bullet to the shin," Maca ascertained curtly, and Esther could hear the fear behind the gruff tone. "Grazed the bone and stuck." She looked up at Esther across the prone body of the injured boy, and then at the determined youth with the gun, "We'll have to get it out."
Esther nodded. "Fine." In that moment, she heard the click of the safety of the gun being slid off.
"You heal!!!" The boy repeated angrily.
Things seemed to happen in slow motion in that moment as Esther perceived everything around her as if through a kaleidoscope, every impression separated from the next – the nightfall outside. The cold sweat running down her neck. The voices of first night birds out in the planes. The instruments they had been cleaning away, glinting in the light of the oil lamp. The smell of disinfectant. And Maca's frightened eyes on her.
It was probably the most inopportune moment to notice this, but in staring at her like this, Esther couldn't help but notice that Maca had the most amazing eyes, more chestnut than brown, the color a bit as if Maca had witnessed a huge fire as a kid, and as if her eyes still were remembering it, a last hue of fire mirrored in them, warm and intense. And Esther thought that she didn't want either of them to die in here today.
"Esther, get some anesthetics," Maca ordered in a clipped voice.
Esther nodded, slowly walking towards the door and the armed guerilla. The barrel swiveled her way, and Esther couldn't suppress a shudder when she felt the cold metal press against her stomach through the thin layer of her shirt.
"No other!" the guerilla demanded.
"You want your friend to be in that much pain?" Maca asked him harshly, panicking at the sight of the barrel against Esther's skin. "You want him healed, he needs anesthesia!"
Esther winced when the barrel pressed even more tightly against her. The aggressive tone was only riling their attacker up further, and Maca's attitude wasn't helping.
"Pain no matter," the guerilla declared proudly.
Looking down at the distorted, anxious face of his companion, Esther was sure the hurt kid was ready to disagree.
The weapon was trained back on Maca. "You heal," their attacker repeated angrily.
Without thinking about what she was doing, Esther pushed herself between Maca and the weapon. "All right," she said with as much calm as she could muster. "We will heal your friend. But we will need your help." She gestured carefully towards the barrel. "So why don't you put away your weapon?"
"No!" The frightened gaze of the boy flickered between the two of them.
Although Esther couldn't see Maca, she could feel the tension radiating off her in waves behind her. "Look," she addressed their attacker as she pointed at Maca over her shoulder. "She is a very good doctor, and she'll do the best to heal your friend, but the gun makes us nervous." She took a deep breath, trying to keep her voice calm and even. He was a kid, just a frightened kid, she told herself over and over. "I'm sure you understand that – that having a gun pointed at you makes you nervous?" She looked at him steadily, her tone friendly, and she hoped that it didn't show how much her knees were shaking.
After a moment, the guerilla nodded, looking at Esther with wide eyes.
"And to help your friend, we need to be calm. We will need to operate." Esther held out her hands, raising them very slowly. "See how they are shaking? – I can't help your friend like this." He looked at her hands. She didn't even have to fake it, her fingers were trembling all on their own. "So why don't you put that gun down and help us heal your friend?"
The young guerilla searched her face with his eyes, his expression hesitant, scared and exhausted. Esther thought that he couldn't be older than sixteen.
"See? I'm going to get a pair of clean gloves now…" She reached for the box on the office desk, mindful to make all her movements slow and unthreatening. "My name is Esther, by the way." She put a hand against her chest and repeated, "Esther." Then she gestured at him. "And you?"
"Amobi," he replied in reflex and then held even more tightly onto the gun, as if he had said something he shouldn't have. His knuckles were white on the trigger.
"Okay, Amobi." Esther said with authority while she slowly reached for another pair of gloves and held them out to him. "We need your help now."
With one hand, Amobi reached out and took the gloves and even though Esther's instincts screamed at her not to let the barrel out of her sight, she turned her back on the boy and his weapon, instead bending over their patient and adjusting his leg on the cot. She looked up at Maca to find her standing stock-still and staring back at her with something akin to awe, as if Esther was the most amazing thing she had ever seen in her life.
At that moment, she heard the click of the safety being slid on again behind her and she sagged forward a little in relief. When she turned, she saw Amobi leaning the gun against the wall before he stepped closer, awkwardly pulling on the gloves.
"Very good, Amobi," Esther nodded at him. "Now, I need you to hold your friend's leg still… like this…" He imitated her moves, uncertainly looking at her for confirmation. Despite the fright, Esther almost felt sorry for him. "Good." She reached for the tablet of swabs that she and Maca had been packing up only minutes before, although it seemed like hours now.
Slowly, Maca reached for her instruments. "I'm sorry," she said to her patient, although her voice was cool. "This will hurt like hell." She thought he'd probably scream at some point, which would alert the others and then they could overpower their attackers and get out of here. She also, briefly, flirted with the idea of tackling Amobi down, or trying to grab the gun herself, but as desperate as Amobi was, he would probably be quicker. He also clearly knew a lot more about handling that gun, and Maca wasn't about to put Esther at risk.
The bullet had thankfully only grazed the bone and was embedded in the muscle tissue surrounding it. Even though it had to hurt like hell, their patient didn't scream once, although he bit his lips until they bled.
In the end, as soon as Esther had finished taping the last bandage shut, Amobi dragged his companion off the cot, shifting him half across his shoulder again. With the other hand, he reached for his gun, lifting it in a practiced move and motioning with the barrel for Maca and Esther to accompany them outside.
He probably needed them as a living shield to get out of the village, Maca thought, and she slowly moved forward, reflexively reaching for Esther's hand to pull the other woman behind her.
They walked stealthily, in silence, and despite the added weight of his companion, Amobi hardly made a sound in walking. They were almost at the back wall of the village when Pablo caught sight of them. "Heh – what's going on there?" he shouted.
At seeing the tall man rushing towards them, Amobi panicked, and he raised his gun. Esther didn't see the rest of it, hearing shots ring out over her head as she tackled Maca to the ground. Looking up, she saw that Amobi had merely fired a few shots into the air. In the ensuing commotion, he dragged his nearly unconscious friend's body with him over the village wall, disappearing with him into the silky night of the plain.
Esther looked down at Maca buried underneath her, suddenly oddly conscious of that tall body against hers.
"Geez… did you watch too many police shows back in Spain, by chance?" Maca wheezed, but a bit of that trademark grin played around her lips, even though she was still rather pale around the nose.
"Sorry," Esther muttered, hastily standing and offering Maca a hand to pull her up from the ground. They stared at each other for a long moment, pale and on shaky legs, but grinning with relief.
It was Maca who pulled Esther into a hug then and it seemed like the most natural thing in the world to stand there, holding onto each other as tightly as possible, simply reveling in the fact that they were alive and unharmed.
Maca blinked against tears, her face half hidden in Esther's hair. She was feeling oddly at peace like this, her body relaxing into the embrace in instinctive trust. Distractedly, she noted the smell of Esther's hair, and that it smelled good.
The moment seemed oddly removed from time, and around her, beyond the sensation of Esther's warm and solid body against her own, she heard the night birds louder and more clearly than before, and the light that the night cast over their village seemed to have more colors than she had ever noticed.
Then their colleagues were with them, concerned and frightened and asking about what had happened, hands pulling at them and voices surrounding them. Maca had a worried Begoña flinging herself into her arms, and Esther wondered how she was going to write this to Miguel and her mother. She would have to tone it down a little.
"Thank God you're okay!" Vilches pushed his way through the melee and surprised them both by pulling them into a brief hug. Then he shook his head at them. "We'll talk in the morning. – I need to be in a really bad mood for this!"