Day 2

*Ed. Note: This story was written on March 10, hours before the Sendai earthquake and subsequent tsunami rocked Japan.

Some time back I joined a short fiction writing group here in Portland. The group dissolved after a few months but I loved the method we used to fire our imaginations. Each week we drew a card from a hat on which was written a name, verb and adjective. From those three points of inspiration we could craft any story we liked. Today I’m going to return to that method and, in honor of group founder Rob, take a page from his book and use the first name I find in the spam folder of my email: Julia Ward. A random word generator has filled in the other two blanks with “quake” and “polar.” The story below is a draft, and not one with much direction. I think if I came back to it in a week I might just discover what I wanted it to say. Instead, I set it free into the world…


Julia Ward hated work some days. The ones when her patient load led to patient loathing before the first cup of coffee had even gone cold, untended in the nurse’s station. Ones like today. Maria, the 46-year-old in 342, was the star of today’s mess. Julia had no idea why Maria was still here. Sure, her heart was a mess, but nothing was going to change that fact. There was no procedure to fix this and Maria would just keep showing up back at Sacred Heart every few months until her heart finally simply quit. Normally cases like this just made Julia sad, pushed her to cry a little before bed (she’d never quite gotten the hang of leaving her work behind at the end of the day) and drink a slightly-fuller-than-usual glass of wine with dinner. Not today. Not Maria.

Psychologically speaking, bipolar disorder is a specific mood disorder characterized by dramatic shifts between high energy, manic phases and periods of severe depression. In the hospital it was a label slapped on any patient who met the criteria for “pain in the ass.” 342 was a textbook example of hospital bipolar. When she rejected her lunch tray Julia understood. The food at Sacred Heart was not altogether excellent. By the third time she’d refused her meds, though, Julia was ready to quit going into her room altogether. When Maria then blamed her mood on low blood sugar Julia had to restrain herself from slapping the sweaty, obstinate train wreck right in her mouth. Julia had her limits and this was pressing right up against them. Worst of all, Maria was a frequent flyer; no matter what she’d be back next month, and Julia would once more come on the floor and check the board, hoping to dodge the bipolar bullet in a game of problem patient roulette.

The hours dragged by on three south but eventually the day ended. Maria was even discharged an hour before the end of Julia’s shift, granting her a little peace and some space to begin decompressing even before the bus ride home. Tired and still a bit irritable she tromped up onto the 47 bus and took a seat for the short ride home. She did not have any particular affinity for public transportation but she did appreciate finally taking a seat among people who neither needed nor expected anything from her. A couple days off and no agenda beyond a couple of paperbacks would do her some good.

When the quake hit the entire Seattle-to-Tacoma corridor went into crisis mode. Businesses, at least the non-essential ones, closed their doors. Schools were canceled for the following day and even the latest American Idol incarnation was bumped for live coverage of what turned out to be pretty minimal damage. People hear the word “earthquake” and they immediately envision gaping holes in the earth, cars swallowed up and the entire West Coast sliding away into the cold Pacific. The reality of this earthquake, thanks to good preparation and a little bit of luck, was a bunch of downed power lines and a few roads rendered impassable. A bad rainstorm and a couple blocked sewers caused as much damage, but the label “earthquake, magnitude 6.0” made it national news, at least for a day.

One of the cracked roads, a non-descript four-lane commercial strip, fell right along Julia’s route from cold hospital coffee to chilled pinot gris, and so she sat with the rest of the still-shaking passengers in the stopped bus and pondered what to do next. The driver was on his radio getting directions from someone with a rapidly updating map and an annoyingly dull, emotionless voice. Over the crackling drone, though, she recognized another, higher voice, and was momentarily stunned to turn and see Maria from 342 three rows behind her, slumped in her seat, cell phone pressed to her ear and tears in her eyes.

Julia was confused. She had offered to arrange a ride home for Maria, at the hospital’s expense, but Maria had insisted she had someone coming to get her. Yet here she was, fresh from a hospital bed onto a public bus, tears and profanity spilling out of her at an astonishing rate. Their target, as best Julia could discern, was apparently whoever had either failed to come get her or never offered to in the first place.

The driver’s voice broke over the speaker just inches from where Julia stood in her seat, jolting her from her reverie. She sat back down, unseen, and stared out the window at dark homes in the gloaming. Maria’s voice was silent; in fact, none of the passengers spoke, just waited for their respective stops and watched the passing, largely undisturbed scenery roll by. Maria was still on board when Julia’s turn came. She looked back as she stood, intending to catch Maria’s eye, maybe say something, but the bipolar bane of her existence just a few hours before was staring at something unseen in darkness. Julia paused for the briefest of moments, swung back around and headed home to her wine, (two glasses tonight), and the increasingly pointless quake coverage on the evening news.