by Garrett Socol

Its stark floor of prison-gray concrete coupled with the dozens of anxious people, some sobbing and shaking, some standing like statues, suggested a bleak railroad car headed to Dachau. Instead, Rachel Zeiger found herself leaning against a rockhard wall in the waiting area of a cramped emergency room. Two of the four fluorescent lights on the ceiling were out, and a third occasionally flickered, creating a ghostly, wan purgatory.

Every minute or two brought the startling sound of an electrical door opening with a whoosh and shutting with a thud, allowing frantic paramedics to push their gurneys inside. Each time Rachel heard the boom, she shuddered, as if she'd been shocked with a bolt of electricity. Or shot in the back of the head. A low mechanical groan coming from the other side of the wall reminded her of the muffled rumble of a train's exhaust. She smoothed her long auburn hair, flat and lifeless after a frantic day at the office, while wondering how many people in the waiting areas of emergency rooms became patients before they went home.

The heat was oppressive; something had gone wrong with the air-conditioning system. Rachel appeared ashen as she unfastened the top two buttons of her pale pink blouse. She daydreamed about ice water and popsicles when she wasn't worrying about the elderly man sitting five feet away, wondering if he would collapse from heat exhaustion. The electrical door exploded open, and a pair of paramedics rushed a bleeding young black man past the triage desk without stopping to deliver the requisite medical insurance information. Just then, a Nordic-looking nurse in a crisp white uniform approached the area. "Who is with Patrick?" she called out in a rich, creamy voice.

"I am," Rachel said, rushing over.

"Hello," the nurse gravely said. "Would you come with me, please?"

Rachel didn't have to be told; she could read the message in the woman's sympathetic expression. But she followed her anyway, with leaden legs, as her fingers touched the small silver Jewish star hanging around her neck.     

The insulated, refrigerated room with its brown carpeting and cushy chairs had a decidedly church-like feel, complete with large stained-glass window. "Why is the temperature in this room minus twenty degrees?" Rachel asked the second she stepped in.

"The air-conditioning is on the fritz," the nurse explained. "But it's being dealt with."   

"So this is where you tell people their friends and relatives are dead?" Rachel asked in a simple manner, trying to exude the calm of someone who could handle anything.

Before the nurse had a chance to respond, a strapping blond doctor entered the room swiftly and purposefully, like a Gestapo officer. "I'm Dr. Straub."

"Hello," Rachel said.

"Are you a relative?" the doctor asked.

"I'm Patrick's fiancée."   

Dr. Straub spoke in a genuinely rueful tone. "We did everything possible," he said. "I'm very sorry." He shot a glance to the nurse, as if to let her know this was the moment: Would the fiancée freak out? Will she start to scream and wail? Will we need to call security? But Rachel remained calm. "Your fiancée didn't die from drowning," the doctor added.   

"Of course he did," Rachel said. "I found him in the pool."

"Death was caused by an overdose of barbiturates. He must've fallen into the water after ingesting them."   

Rachel gazed at the warm, intensely handsome physician with disbelief. "Overdose," she whispered, the word reverberating in her head. "Overdose," she whispered again, as if putting small pieces of a puzzle together. She thought Patrick had been doing well. She thought he'd been managing and coping and looking forward to an exciting future. She wasn't sure if she felt more anger toward Patrick for taking pills or toward herself for not noticing the signs.

The possibility of passing out grew with each second, but Rachel struggled to hang on, telling herself there were important things that needed her attention. She was always the one people turned to in a crisis. She was the leader, the courageous one to spearhead the effort and secure safe haven for the refugees, to smuggle food in from the outside so that children wouldn't starve. Despite the crushing weight of the current situation, her jumbled, overloaded mind leapt from one thought to another. "Do you happen to have a sweater?" she asked the nurse.

"No, I don't."

"It does feel like below freezing in here," the doctor said.

"You could hang meat in this room," Rachel mumbled. "I have to call Patrick's parents."

"Yes, you can call everyone you need to call," the nurse said.

"There aren't too many," Rachel said, drifting into a fugue state. "Most of them were taken to the camps."

"Camps?" Dr. Straub asked, perplexed.      

"Patrick said he'd rather die than go to the camps."

The doctor shared a quick, concerned glance with the nurse. "You've suffered a profound trauma. Sometimes it helps to attend a grief counseling session," the nurse suggested. "I'd be happy to arrange one for you."

"Grief counseling," Rachel repeated, dazed.

"Yes. It can help a great deal."

"I know about grief," Rachel stated, as she heard the hollow shriek of a steam engine whistle. "We're here," she said, peering at the blurry face of the doctor. "Last stop, right?" The locomotive had arrived at the railroad station, and Rachel would do everything in her power to transfer to another train.

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