Free The Covenant by Jeff Crook

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    I pointed at the video camera hanging from the ceiling above the exit. “What’s with all the security? Keeping people out, or keeping them in?”
    Her lips tugged themselves a wrinkle closer to her half-closed eyes and she asked, “Are you a member of the family?”
    â€œI’m here at their request.” They hadn’t called ahead because they didn’t want to give the staff time to clean their daughter up. They wanted pictures of the pool of piss under her bed. They wanted the jury to see the suppurating bedsores.
    â€œYou’ll have to leave your camera at the front desk,” the nurse said.
    â€œI can’t do that.”
    â€œWe’ll take very good care of it.”
    â€œI’m sure you will, but I’m here to photograph the patient.”
    â€œFor what purpose?”
    â€œGlamour magazine.”
    She laughed softly, like a woman hiding a coat hanger behind her back. “I need to know what kind of pictures you will be taking.”
    â€œThat’s not really any of your business, is it?”
    â€œI’m afraid it is.”
    â€œAre you going to let me see her?”
    â€œI’ll have to call the family and obtain permission.”
    â€œYou do that.”
    I sat in the corner beside a potted schefflera that had dropped most of its leaves. While I waited, a family of three and a couple of doctor-looking men in white coats were buzzed in without being questioned. I stepped outside and spotted a security video camera above the door. They had seen me coming from the parking lot and were ready for me. Next time, I’d make sure to hide my camera in a backpack instead of wearing it around my neck.
    I gave her about five minutes to call the family; then I hit the buzzer. When no one answered, I leaned on it until they did. Nurse Ratched came through the door like a horse out of a gate. “Please stop that!”
    â€œWhat did the family say?”
    â€œI’m afraid I was unable to reach them. I left a message. If you’d like to wait…”
    I handed her the letter Preston had given me.
    â€œWhat’s this?”
    â€œA demand, giving me permission to enter the facility and photograph the patient.”
    â€œOur lawyer will have to look at this.”
    â€œFine.”
    â€œI’m afraid he’s not here.”
    â€œOf course he isn’t.”
    â€œYou can wait here while I call him.”
    â€œI’ll do that.”
    I pretended to sit, but as soon as she opened the door I bolted in behind her.
    Their lawyers had trained her well, because she didn’t lay a hand on me as I slipped by her. “Ma’am! You can’t come in here,” she said as she waved to a couple of big orderlies standing at the end of the hall, probably the guys they called in to wrestle with the paraplegics when they wouldn’t take their pills. “You have to wait in the waiting area.”
    â€œThanks. I’ll find the patient while you call your lawyer.”
    The nurse ran off to fetch somebody important enough to ignore my letter. The orderlies started down the hall like a couple of bulls that had just spotted a Spaniard with a red neckerchief. I picked a hall at random, then cut through a laundry closet to try to lose them. The place was miles and miles of identical halls, identically carpeted and wallpapered. Apparently they let the more harmless inmates wander unsupervised, because I passed a couple of barely animate corpses gaping at the ten-dollar landscape paintings hanging between every cell.
    I didn’t know where to look. All the doors had numbers instead of names, and I was moving pretty fast to keep ahead of the orderlies. In the next hall, I met a finely dressed old woman sitting bolt upright in one of the hall chairs. With her pearls and her white gloves and her little black hat, she looked like she was ready to head out for a night on the town, about sixty years ago. She stopped me as