Free Captain Quad by Sean Costello Page A

never saw any of them anymore. Even his mother's visits had become sporadic. . . and when she did come in she was usually three sheets to the wind and still babbling about a cure. Sam was the only one who hardly ever missed a day, who made Peter feel as if he were still. . . okay.
    But he was not okay. In the year since the accident he'd been back to the OR eight times. Twice to reset a poorly healed fracture, three times to release the deforming contractures that doglegged his lower limbs, once to remove a chunk of inhaled food from his trachea—that one had almost killed him—and twice to skin-graft the bedsores that had formed on his keester. He got bladder infections at the drop of a hat, gobbled more pills than a busload of blue-rinsers, and regularly upchucked his meals. He had to have someone brush his teeth, trim his nails, and scrub his backside. And when he wasn't shitting his bed, a nurse had to slip on a glove and manually disimpact him.
    Humiliation? He could rewrite the book.
    But somehow, hope never wholly abandoned him. That made him a fool as well as a gimp; he knew that well enough. Still, it was hard to give up. Maybe someday researchers really would come up with a cure—maybe even old Sammy. The kid had made good on all of his promises so far. To give up hope was to court the blackest of depressions, blacker by far than anything Peter had previously thought possible. On the few occasions he'd let his hope slip, he had glimpsed that blackness and judged it to be worse than death.
    There was always hope. No matter how slim.
    His mother stamped into the room then, startling Peter from his grim reflections. She was dressed all in black, with one of those overturned-ashtray hats on her head, the kind with the black lace netting and the long shiny pin. A church hat. Her gait seemed more unsteady than usual, but Peter attributed this to the large, paper-wrapped package she was lugging. He could barely see her eyes over its broadly curved rim.
    As usual, the raw smell of booze preceded her. . . and something else. A green, piney odor that sparked formless, yet distinctly unsettling associations in Peter's mind.
    It was coming from that package. . .
    "Hi, Mom," Peter said, forcing a cheerful tone. "What'd you bring me?"
    Apparently unaware that he had spoken, Leona set her package on the floor below Peter's sight line, then kicked off the doorstop. When the door closed, she thumbed the latch, its soft snick shutting them in with the smell of cheap whiskey. . . and the cloying green reek of that package.
    "Mom?" Peter said, unable to disguise the fear in his voice. "What are you doing?"
    Leona made no reply, only glanced at him—but with such an expression of loss and bereavement that Peter almost cried out.
    Now she was unwrapping that package, her back to him.
    "Mom?" Peter said again, his voice breaking like a frightened child's. "What are you doing? Is Sam okay?" This thought slammed into him like a gun butt. "Is he, Mom? Why don't you answer me?"
    The crinkle of wrapping paper seemed impossibly loud. She tore it free, balled it up, and stuffed it into the wastebasket.
    Then, very deliberately, she swung Peter's call button aside.
    That green smell was very big now, filling the room. . .
    "Mom! Look at me. Look at me."
    And she did. She looked at him. Gray eyes swimming in boozy tears, she regarded her son as she might—
    (an embalmed corpse)
    Leona hoisted the funeral wreath onto Peter's chest, allowing its prickly weight to settle there. Peter had to wrench back his chin to prevent the stiff leaves from scratching his face. The smell of it made his head spin.
    "Get it off me!" he shouted, horror scuttling over his unfeeling body like sewer rats. "Get it off!"
    Unheeding, Leona reached out a mourner's hand and stroked her son's brow. Peter jerked his head aside, but she seemed not to notice. A grimacelike grin quivered on her lips.
    "Why are you doing this?" Peter pleaded.
    While in his brain a battalion of