10
Pam was sitting on the end of the bed in her classic nurse’s uniform when Wayne Johnson woke up.
For a long time, he lay motionless under the comforter, blinking at the ceiling.
Finally, he sat up and looked at her.
He was shirtless, balding.
Forty-two years old.
Never married.
No children.
Wayne had come to Wayward Pines, Idaho, on August 8, 1992, as a traveling encyclopedia salesman. He’d arrived late and knocked on five doors. In the evening, after one sale, he’d checked into the Wayward Pines Hotel and then walked to a family-style restaurant. En route, he was struck by a motorcycle in the crosswalk, a perfect hit and run—enough head trauma to render him unconscious, but not enough to kill or permanently damage his brain.
In light of the death of Peter McCall two nights ago at the fence, the town was primed for the introduction of a new resident.
Wayne Johnson’s skin still looked gray. He was only ten hours post-suspension blood transfusion, but his color would be back by day’s end.
Pam smiled and said, “Hello there.”
He squinted at her, his vision probably still blurred as his system rebooted.
His eyes darted around the room.
They were on the fourth floor of the hospital. The window was cracked and the white linen curtains pushed in and out as the breeze ebbed and flowed, the rhythm as steady as if the room itself was breathing.
Wayne Johnson said, “Where am I?”
“Wayward Pines.”
He pulled the covers up around his neck, but it wasn’t modesty that drove him.
“I’m… freezing.”
“Totally normal. You’ll feel better by the end of the day, I promise.”
“Something happened,” the man said.
“Yes. Something happened. Do you remember what?”
His eyes narrowed.
“Do you know your name?” Pam asked.
Total amnesia, especially during the first forty-eight hours, occurred thirty-nine percent of the time.
“Wayne Johnson.”
“Very good. Do you remember what brought you here?”
“I came to sell encyclopedias?”
“Yes. Good. Did you make any sales?”
“I don’t re… one. I think. Yes. One sale.”
“And then what happened?”
“I was walking to dinner and…” She could see the memory of the trauma wash over him, the fear and the shadow of the fear passing across his face. “Something hit me. I don’t know what. I don’t remember anything after. Is this a hospital?”
“Yes. And this is your town now.”
“My town?”
“That’s right.”
“I don’t live here. I live in Scottsbluff, Nebraska.”
“You did live in Scottsbluff, but now you live here.”
Wayne sat up a little straighter.
This was far and away Pam’s favorite part of integration. Watching a new resident begin to comprehend that their life—or whatever this new existence was—had irrevocably changed. Nothing beat the fêtes, but these moments of quiet, devastating revelation were, at least for her, a close second.
“What does that mean exactly?” Wayne Johnson asked.
“It means that you live here now.”
Sometimes they connected the dots on their own.
Sometimes she had to nudge them over the line.
She waited a minute, watching the wheels turn frantically behind Mr. Johnson’s eyes.
He finally said, “In the accident… was I hurt?”
Pam reached across the bed and patted the lump that was his leg under the blankets.
“I’m afraid you were.”
“Hurt bad?”
She nodded.
“Was I…?”
He looked around the hospital room.
He looked at his hands.
She could feel the question coming.
Willed it to come.
He was tiptoeing right up to the edge of it.
“Was I…?”
Pam thinking, Ask it. Just ask it. The data was conclusive—almost every time a resident arrived at the question on their own and found the courage to give voice to it, their integration progressed without incident. Failing to ask the question was a frighteningly accurate predictor for unbelievers, fighters, runners.
Wayne closed his mouth.
Swallowed the question down like a bitter pill.
Pam didn’t push it. No point in that.
It was still early.
Still plenty of time to make Mr. Johnson think that he was dead.