City Out of Time. William Robison III
hoping to become a doctor, someday.”
“Good for you, son… How about tomorrow night?”
Lanz thought it over and nodded. They shook hands and then Lanz saluted again.
“Colonel, it has been my pleasure. See you tomorrow night.”
Colonel Buck handed Lanz the flag and then turned quickly on his heels and limped away. Lanz had never thought to ask him about the cane, but something told Lanz that the question would not have been answered anyway.
Lanz climbed into his car, placed the flag on the seat next to him, and then headed off to work.
He was late to work and all the parking spots were taken in the parking structure. Lanz ended up finding street parking about three blocks away and had to walk through the blistering heat to the employee entrance of Desert Springs Hospital. After showing his ID, he was finally admitted through the security checkpoint and headed immediately to his locker.
As Lanz sat down on the bench in front of his locker and yanked one of his dress shoes off, he noted the yellow sticky note that had been placed on the locker handle. Mr. Fredrickson wanted to speak with him immediately. The note had been written two days before.
Lanz crumpled the note in his hand at the same moment that Jorge entered the locker room wearing an ice pack over his eye and a blood stain down the front of his hospital gown.
“What the hell happened to you?”
“Drunk guy head butted me when I was trying to find his vein.”
“Great…” Lanz empathized.
“It gets better… for you anyway,” Jorge smiled devilishly. “He left you a mess in the emergency room bathroom.”
“Son of a…” Lanz let the sentiment float away.
“Oh, and the boss is looking for you.”
“Could this day be any more screwed up?”
“It’s early,” Jorge said as he headed into the shower.
The drunk guy had tried to make it to the toilet but had failed, and a river of effluence now covered most of the bathroom floor and parts of the walls. It looked like someone had dropped a water balloon full of brown paint on to the floor. Lanz’s head drooped from the incredible crappiness of the job, then went to the janitor’s closet and removed a mop, bucket, gloves, facemask, and several gallons of bleach and disinfectant.
The job took him until lunchtime – a meal that he didn’t think he could face at just that moment. As he sprayed the bathroom down with an aerosol for the fifth time, Lanz really wondered if this was the career for him. He turned around and rolled the mop bucket and all of his equipment out of the bathroom.
“Well, it’s about time,” said a thirty-something yuppie who was standing in the hall with a self-important look on his face. “Geez, how long does it take to clean a bathroom? My maid can do it in ten minutes. What were you doing in there?”
Lanz ignored the schmuck and started to roll the mop bucket towards the janitor’s closet.
“What? Are you deaf?” asked the yuppie. “You think you can keep me waiting two hours and then just walk out of there like nothing happened?”
“Sir…” Lanz bit off his reply, and then added, “The bathroom is now opened.”
“Idiot,” said the yuppie.
Lanz waited until he was well out of sight and then flipped him the bird. But as he turned around, he saw his supervisor, Carl Buddig, standing right there – having clearly seen what Lanz had just done.
“Is that how you treat our customers, Franco?”
Lanz stifled another career ending reply and muttered, “No, sir. It just… slipped.”
“You’ve been slipping a lot lately,” Carl Buddig noted. “Did you give some Mexican woman your business card?”
“Mrs. Concepcion?”
“She came here with her son – torn medial blah blah blah… She said that you told her that we’d take care of her… no charge?”
“What?” Lanz asked. “That’s not what I said.”
“But you did give her your card?”
“Yes, sir. I was trying to reassure her. Her son plays for the Hospital soccer team. He was injured while playing and I told her to bring her son here.”
“Did you know that she has no insurance?”
Lanz had to think it through. No. She had never mentioned it one way or another.
“The topic didn’t come up,” Lanz stated.
“Damn it, Franco! You know we’re required by law to take care of indigents that come to our door. I believe you just spent two hours cleaning up after one. But under no circumstances should we ever recommend one to come to our hospital! We’re not a charity!”
“I didn’t know they were unable to pay. If it’ll make any difference…”
Lanz reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened the Velcro hinge with a loud zipping noise and then removed a Visa card that he’d just qualified for only the month before. He held out the card to his supervisor.
“Look… put the charges on my card. I’ll pay it off myself… eventually.”
Carl looked at the card and at Lanz, but before he could take the card or answer, Lanz heard someone clear his throat. Lanz turned and saw Mr. Fredrickson standing in the hallway.
“A word, Mr. Franco.”
It wasn’t a request. Lanz put the card back in his wallet and handed his supervisor the mop handle, then turned and followed Mr. Fredrickson into his office.
As soon as the door shut behind them, Mr. Fredrickson directed Lanz into one of two chairs in front of his desk and then, instead of going behind the desk, or taking the other chair, Mr. Fredrickson remained standing, leaning slightly against his sturdy wooden desk.
“You’ve had quite a week, Mr. Franco,” Mr. Fredrickson noted. “We were very sorry to hear about your loss. I hope the time off you had was adequate to bury your brother?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good… good… now, Lanz… it seems that I’ve been hearing your name quite a bit lately. There was some incident with a homeless family earlier this week?”
“They’re hardly homeless, sir,” Lanz replied. “And I believe it was just a misunderstanding. Vincent, their son, was hurt while playing for the youth soccer team that the hospital sponsors. He was badly hurt, so I sent them here to get the best care.”
“And what did their insurance forms ask you to do if the boy was injured?”
“Sir?”
“When the parents sign the waivers to play soccer, they submit proof of insurance. Usually the proof includes some directions for what to do in case of an emergency.”
“I don’t think we asked for proof of insurance.”
“I see,” said Mr. Fredrickson. “Do you have any idea how big of a bill they racked up while they were here?”
“No, sir. But as I was telling, Mr. Buddig…”
“It was quite substantial.”
“You can charge my credit card,” Lanz noted.
Mr. Fredrickson sighed and he seemed weary.
“It’s against our policy to have our employees pay for other people’s hospital bills, Mr. Franco,” Mr. Fredrickson said. “And the fact that you would even suggest such a thing tells me that you may not be cut out for