Chapter Twenty
Norah cried during the entire drive back to camp, letting out big, ugly sobs until she thought she might throw up.
In fact, she welcomed her tears, as if she wanted to expel all the misery from her body.
It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair. Norah didn’t know what to do. What if she was killing Jamie?
Chase would be upset when she learned Norah had decided to tell John, especially since Chase had wanted to from the beginning.
But Norah didn’t know what else to do. She needed some guidance, a third party, someone with experience and wisdom to assure her everything would be okay.
A big part of Norah expected Chase to run if things got worse.
But it really didn’t matter what Norah did at this point.
Chase would leave when things got hard, just like she always did.
It was only a little after eleven a.m. when Norah returned.
Chase had called her twice and sent her three text messages, asking where she’d disappeared to that morning.
Norah had ignored all of them. She found John at the Situation Room table, drinking coffee and flipping through pages in a notebook.
“Good morning,” he said.
“What are you looking at?”
“Case numbers came out today. They’re down another 5%. And I got word earlier from the FDA that they plan to send us the first batch of vaccines by the end of the month.”
Norah sat across from him, her face no doubt failing to reflect the enthusiasm John’s did.
“What’s weighing on you, kid?” John asked. “That should be good news.”
“It is. It’s great news.”
“So?”
Norah felt her heart jump, and she wasn’t sure how to get the words out.
“John we…I did something bad.” Tears flooded her eyes and tumbled out onto the table at a rate far faster than Norah could contain. She dabbed frantically at them, trying to pull herself together, but they just kept coming.
“Let’s go to my office.”
Norah nodded and followed John to his tent, where she sat on the floor, her knees pulled to her chest, the tears now an all-out rainstorm.
“What happened?”
“I found out about a clinical trial. One that hasn’t gotten very far with the FDA but looked really promising. But then I thought maybe I could save Jamie so…”
She was bawling now, like she’d been when she was in the jeep by herself, her voice completely failing her. Through the bleary cloud of tears, she could make out John’s face. He looked furious.
“Are you trying to tell me you gave Jamie a medication not authorized by the FDA? One that could be incredibly dangerous, even deadly?”
“I’m sorry,” Norah choked out. “We just wanted to help her.”
“We? Was Chase involved in this too?”
Norah hadn’t meant to include Chase. She ultimately had a feeling that no matter how mad he was, John wouldn’t turn them in. But she didn’t want to risk taking Chase down with her if he did.
“No. No. This was all me. It’s all my fault.” She realized she sounded like a ten-year-old throwing a tantrum while suffering the consequences of her own actions. But it still felt good to tell John, like confessing to her own father.
John was quiet for so long Norah wondered if he was pondering who he would call first—Briggs? No, better go all the way up the ladder to the director of the CDC. Or how about the attorney general? Straight to jail. Do not pass Go.
But the hard lines on his face softened, and he reached out and pulled Norah into his barrel chest.
The crying started again.
“Shhh…it’s okay,” he whispered, stroking her hair. “It’s okay.”
It wasn’t unlike Norah to just disappear these days, but it still frustrated Chase.
Especially after the night they’d had together.
Norah was so clearly still keeping a wall up between them, and although Chase understood, it pissed her off nonetheless.
Norah hadn’t answered any of her calls or texts that morning, and Chase had no idea where she’d sneaked off to before the sun was up.
It wasn’t that she wanted to keep tabs on Norah.
But she did worry about her. She worried about her trying to do everything herself.
“Hey.” Norah’s eyes were puffy and rimmed red, and she was carrying two hot cups of coffee as she walked over to Chase in the mess tent.
“Well, good morning.” Chase smiled at her playfully. She knew Norah was upset, and riding her for disappearing wouldn’t help her.
“I’m sorry I went MIA this morning. I had to do something.”
Chase knew instantly what that “something” was. “It’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”
Norah sat down across from her at the large folding table and slid the paper cup to her.
“Consolation coffee?”
“I’ll take what I can get.” Chase offered her one of her famous winks, and Norah smiled, her eyes brightening just a bit.
“I went back to the hospital.”
“I figured as much.”
“Are you mad?” The way Norah’s face twisted with pain broke Chase’s heart.
“Mad? Of course not. I wish you’d told me so I knew you were safe. But I’m not angry.”
Norah took Chase’s hand in hers. She didn’t look around to see who might be watching. She just kept her eyes fixed on Chase.
“You might be after I tell you this.”
“What is it?” Chase couldn’t think of anything Norah could do that would make her as angry as Norah was worried she would be.
“John knows.”
Norah’s face contorted further, and she slammed her eyes shut, almost like she was expecting to be hit. No. She wasn’t expecting that. She was expecting Chase to abandon her again.
But all Chase cared about was Norah—protecting her, comforting her.
Loving her. Let her tell John they’d done this together.
Chase wasn’t even mad she’d decided to do it on her own after Chase had already suggested it.
Whatever her reasons were, Chase knew they were valid.
She trusted Norah. She only wished Norah could trust her not to run.
“You told him.” Chase kept her voice steady and soft.
“I’m sorry. I had to.”
“Nor, it’s okay. We’re in this together. I support whatever you want to do. I hope you can see that eventually.”
Norah squeezed Chase’s hand hard, the look in her eyes changing quickly from sadness and worry to gratitude.
“You aren’t mad?”
“Stop asking me that,” Chase said. “No. Not at all.”
“Well, you’ll be happy to know that he’s not going to turn us in. He’s pretty furious at us. And he definitely doesn’t agree with what we did. But he says he’s too close to retirement to ‘rock the boat.’ And besides, he understands why we went rogue.”
Chase laughed quietly. “I kind of figured he’d say something like that.”
A crowd had gathered by the sloppy-joe station, cheering and playfully shoving the guy in the center. Stevens was back. He’d made a nearly full recovery. Chase’s heart warmed at the sight of him, but then she immediately thought about Jamie again.
“How is she?” Chase asked.
Norah’s expression dropped, and she shook her head. “Not good.”
“What’s that mean?”
“She’s maxed out on the vent, and sats are still barely above 92%. I don’t think she’s going to make it, Chase.”
Norah’s eyes welled, and Chase could see they must have been swollen and pink from crying like that for most of the day. She hated to see Norah cry.
“We need to give it more time, okay? It’s only been a day.”
“She should be better by now.”
“You know there’s no way to predict that outcome. We just need to give it more time.”
Norah glanced back at the crowd, satisfied no one was paying any attention to her or her tears, but she still shut them off in an almost robotic fashion.
“You’re right. We just need to give it more time.”
Two more days passed without word about Jamie.
Norah wasn’t sure how to take that news, but she tried to hang on to “no news is good news.” They occupied their time with data sheets and vaccine rollouts and, of course, any and all updates they could find on Birtimamab.
Another case study had come out from St. Louis that week.
A thirty-two-year-old marathon runner was treated with Birtimamab after being on life support for eighteen days.
Four days after receiving the treatment she was extubated and talking.
It was that hope Norah kept close as the hours ticked by.
They spent every night in Norah’s bed, crammed together on the small cot, holding each other and whispering about that same hope.
Chase would talk about taking Norah to the zoo to see the capybaras when they got home.
She would weave fairytales about wine-tasting in the North Georgia mountains and tell Norah how she couldn’t wait to cook her famous ribeye and red potatoes and show her the view of the city from Chase’s living-room window.
Norah didn’t argue with her. She didn’t tell her these things were beyond impractical.
She didn’t tell her that once they left Louisiana, they would have to go back to the way things were.
Norah knew Chase knew that fact deep down.
Besides, the fantasy was as nice for Norah to live in as it was for Chase.
The morning of the second day, Norah felt an undeniable pull to go back and see Jamie again. She didn’t intend to keep her plan from Chase this time.
“Do you mind if I go with you?”
“I want you to,” Norah said, slipping on her boots and lacing them tight. She didn’t fight Chase when she got into the driver’s seat this time, thinking if it was anything like her last visit, she’d be crying all the way home.
In spite of the cheery conversation and the soft melody of the radio, Norah was sick to her stomach.
Something was telling her Jamie wasn’t going to make it.
Call it intuition, or call it purely clinical knowledge about the very dire prognosis of someone in Jamie’s condition, but Norah couldn’t shake the dark cloud that hung over her.
There was no change in Jamie’s status when they arrived.
The ventilator was still maxed out. She was still entirely unresponsive, despite the fact her team had lightened her sedation earlier in the day.
And her blood pressure had trended down enough that she was getting medication through her IV to normalize it—a sign that often signaled the beginning of the end.
Norah could see on Chase’s face that she was thinking the same thing. It wasn’t just Norah being scared, or pessimistic. Things were really as bad as she thought they were.
Something about leaving Jamie that day felt like good-bye.