‘Tis Charity
to Show
Chapter V
Part 5
Rand woke up
on the hallway floor in a crushing fugue state. Her head was so heavy on her neck it wobbled, and the
tightness around her eyes and temples pierced through her like shards of flint
rock twisting through her membranes.
She
struggled mightily, pushing herself up from her stomach with weak arms until
she landed heavily on her bottom, straddling her elbows on her knees while her
head hung between them. Rand was
surprised by how winded, how out of breath she was, how spent. Funny, because the air wasn’t thin at
all, she thought.
After giving herself a few minutes she
raised her head and looked around.
The hallway was dead, stone quiet, and the amber hue of dawn seeped its
way through the area, glazing the atmosphere in it’s floating, glittering
clarity.
Rand was
embarrassed, having woken up in the middle of the floor like a complete
fool. The others were probably in
bed, like normal people; except there wasn’t much normal that’s been happening
on this mission. It was obvious
that she never left the hallway, so she wasn’t about to ask herself how she
ended up here. What got to her was
that she couldn’t becoming sleepy, much less becoming so sleepy that she was
unable to make it back to her room.
Ironically, she had left her room because she was unable to sleep in the
first place.
Rand came to
the conclusion right then that she didn’t fall asleep.
Something
else must have happened. But what?
“Hey,
something ‘s missing,” Rand thought and looked around the hallway from where
she sat.
“Where the
hell is Riley?”
He was not
in his former spot, up ahead in the hallway, like before, mangled under the
frightful gaze of Mr. Spock. Where
do he go?
Rand was
feeling a little stronger now, so she hoisted herself up with great care onto
her feet and slowly stood up.
“There. That wasn’t so bed, was it, Janice?”
she thought.
She turned around and walked the length of
the obstacle course, from the hallway to the dining room, knowing that’s where
she’d most likely find Riley.
And find him
she did, wedged between a love couch and a small shelf, asleep on his side,
wrapped in her pink and lilac yoga mat.
Rand’s mouth
went agape and her eyes widened.
Then, after thinking about it, she laughed to herself. She didn’t even want to begin to wonder
when and how the opportunity presented itself for him to get her mat back. Later for that one!
Rand heard some stirrings behind her,
like soft shuffles of people turning over in their sleep, so she turned towards
the kitchen, where she’d left Scotty and Dr. Begay, and headed there, finding
the two men sprawled on the floor by the white counter, covered with the
spilled contents of individually wrapped snack foods from the upturned crates
they were fishing through earlier.
“I don’t understand
this! I don’t get any of this
shit,” she fretted to herself.
Rand
suddenly had the instinctive thought of checking on the others—the others being
Spock and Nurse Rose, to see if they were all right. She walked down the corridor to Nurse Rose’s room and opened
the door. Sure enough, Rose was
there, in bed, her eyes closed, looking like she was asleep, though Rand wasn’t
sure whether it was sleep or something else that hit the crewmembers.
The soft
amber dawn bathed Rose’s quarters, as her blinds were up and tucked away from
the window to give one an unobstructed view of the early morning stillness of
the desert landscape. Rose’s face
was softened by the light, Rand noted to herself. She looked peaceful, almost angelic.
“Yup,” Rand
thought. “A portable little lamp attached to her neck would do wonders for
her.”
She chuckled
at her admitted cattiness and left it at that.
Then, Rand
noticed something that made her head jerk back. Was she seeing what she thought she was seeing?
In the far corner
of Rose’s quarters were containers—canvas sacks, knapsacks, specimen boxes and
tool kits, filled to brimming, with pre-packaged snack foods!
So, that’s
where they all went!
Jesus.
It was then
that she recalled telling Scotty and Begay about her instincts on Nurse Rose
possibly stealing the snacks.
Dead on,
Janice O Girl!
She walked
over to the corner where the boxes were and looked inside to access the damage,
to see just how much food Ms. Bottomless Pit ate. She was pleasantly surprised and absolutely relieved to see
that there was still more than enough snack food to last this mission, and
still enough food for the whole damn landing party.
Rand cut a
glance at Rose, sprawled in the covers of her bed, and snorted in disgust. “Rose’s appetite wasn’t even a hearty
one, it was grotesque and pitiful,” she thought.
Rand took
both a knapsack and a canvas bag full of food and slung them over her
shoulders, careful not to let any of the contents spill over. Then, she walked out of Rose’s quarters
and headed back to the kitchen, where she dropped the heavy bags onto the
counter.
She had to
make three more trips to Rose’s room in order to retrieve every snack food
bundle taken, before she was able to put them all back in the cabinets behind
the serving window.
“Uuuhhh…”
Rand heard
the groan right outside the serving window. After closing the last of the cabinets she left the pantry
and returned to the counter out front, where she saw Dr. Begay wobbling on his
hands and knees, while Scotty lied next to him moving his head from side to
side groggily, his eyes open but droopy.
“Hey, are you
guys all right?” she asked.
She came to
Begay’s assistance, holding him by his shoulders and guiding him to sit on his
buttocks.
“Easy now,
don’t push it. I was just here
myself, so I know what you’re experiencing.”
Begay
breathed quite heavily once he was sitting up, as if the simple act of doing so
had spent him greatly.
“Jesus
Christ. Did I fall asleep on the
kitchen floor? I can’t even
remember being sleepy.”
He placed
both hands on his head and grimaced, like he was in pain.
“Head feel
like a sack of pebbles?”
“God, yeah!”
“Yep, just
like me earlier. You’ll just have
to wait for it to pass.”
“Wonderful,”
Begay deadpanned.
Rand
chuckled and patted Begay’s shoulder reassuringly.
“I’m going
to go and check on Scotty,” she said.
“Wuh-wuh-wuh-wherres
th-th-thu bloody f-f-fuh-fooood?!”
Scotty was
standing by the counter, frantically searching for the boxes of food that he and
Begay were searching through earlier. Rand couldn’t believe that this was the
same man who was lying on the floor barely conscious just a few minutes
ago.
Exactly when
did he get up?!
“Scotty, you
can calm down. All the food’s back
in the cabinets, and I mean all of it.
All of it was retrieved, all found.”
Scotty
looked at Rand, his eyes wide, before he dodged to the pantry without saying
anything else. Rand could hear the
doors to the cabinets open, the shuffling of boxes, and the rustling of cellophane
being rummaged through.
“B-b-b-bluh-bluh-bloodyyy
h-h-helll! Y-y-yuh-yuhr r-r-r-…”
“Where did
you find the food, Janice?”
Rand turned
to Begay and gave him a self-satisfied smirk.
“Take a wild
guess,” she said.
Dr. Begay
shook his head, drawing his lips in a frown.
“Hyacinth’s
room.”
Begay jerked
his head back and gave Rand an incredulous look.
“Why the
hell was she hoarding food in her room like that?”
Rand
sighed. She was sure as shit not
going to run around that tree again!
“What the
hell is that? Is someone moving
furniture around?” asked Begay.
Rand groaned
inconsolably. God, not again. Rand pushed herself off from the floor
and went into the dining area, where she saw a newly charged up Riley
methodically rebuilding his obstacle course, holding his palms up in front of
his face like a filmmaker looking for that perfect shot.
“Riley!”
He ignored
her as he engrosses himself in his dubious work.
Then…
“Give me
back my goddamn food, you stuttering ass!”
Rand would
recognize Rose’s voice anywhere, but the high-pitched screeching coming from
her was alarming. Rand left Riley
to his own shaky devices and ran back into the kitchen area, where she
witnessed Begay wedged between Scotty and Rose. There was an open crate of snack food spilling onto the
floor right by their feet.
“What’s
going on now?!” yelled Rand.
She wanted
to pull her own hair out, this was getting to be too damn much. All this insanity!
“It’s my
fuckin’ food!!” bellowed Rose.
Rand took
Rose by her collar and yanked her away from both Begay and Scotty.
“It’s your
food, my ass! What the hell were
you doing hoarding the snack foods in your room anyway, for fuck’s sake?!”
Rand had
just about had it with this woman.
With everyone. Even Dr.
Begay, with his earlier irritatingly blank-faced cluelessness.
“It’s my
food! MY FOOOOOOOOD!”
Rose yelled
in Rand’s face, the spittle spraying against her nose, lips and chin, the stale
order of almond, cheese and gut acid assaulting her nostrils.
“Hold it
together, Janice,” she thought.
“Restrain yourself from wrapping your hands around this buzzard’s fat
neck!”
“Listen,”
Rand said in a steady voice. “You
don’t want to go toe to toe with me, ok?
So I suggest you don’t cast your reeking breath in my face again. Ever.”
“Janice! What are you doing?! Let go of her collar!”
Dr. Begay
reached out and angrily pulled Rand’s fingers off of Rose’s collar. There was something about the gesture,
his hand tearing at hers, that felt like an intrusion, even a personal slight.
“Calm down,
Matthias! You act like I was gonna
take a hurl at her!”
“Well, it
sure looked that way!”
“Maybe you
need to look a little more carefully before you go around accusing people,
Doctor!”
Who the hell
did he think he was?! The back of
her neck grew hot. Rand suddenly
had thought of hurting this man, really hurting him. Maybe even eviscerating him.
Like that
kid back in that mining colony he used to be stationed at, she thought with
grim glee.
“Look, I know
what I saw!”
“And what
exactly what is it that you saw?!”
Just then,
Scotty ran away from Begay and headed towards the crate of food that was on the
floor, gathering its fallen contents and placing them back in the container.
“No, my
food! MY food!” yelled Rose.
She made as
if she was heading for Scotty, but then stopped suddenly, covering her mouth
with both hands while her face contorted and turned ruddy, and her body jerked
and heaved like a small, helpless animal struggling against the blades of a meat grinder, her eyes popping wildly.
Rand, Begay,
and Scotty were frozen where they were, watching Rose gag and then vomit up the
sour, curdling, yellowish paste of partially digested snack food right there in
the middle of the kitchen floor.
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