I have no idea what to do next.
The lights in the procedural room are dazzling. There is a metal table in the center of the room, and a couple of lab techs circulating, adjusting equipment, moving things out of the way. Thomas Fineman and a few other men—the men from the hall—have been moved into an adjacent room; it, too, is enclosed in glass, and although chairs have been set up for them, they are all standing. I wonder what Fineman is thinking. I think, briefly, of Julian’s mother. I wonder where she is.
I don’t see Julian anywhere.
A flash of light. I think explosion—I think run—and everything in me knots up, tight and panicked, until I notice that in one corner is a man with a camera and a media badge clipped to his tie. He is taking pictures of the setup, and the glare of the flash bounces off all the polished metal surfaces, zigzagging up the walls.
Of course. I should have known that the media would be invited to take pictures. They must record it, and broadcast it, in order for it to have any meaning.
The hatred surges, and with it, a cresting, swelling wave of fury. All of them can burn.
There is motion from the corner, from the part of the room concealed underneath the deck. I see Thomas Fineman and the other men swivel in that direction. Behind the glass, Thomas wipes his forehead with a handkerchief, the first sign of discomfort he has shown. The cameraman swivels too: flash, flash. Two moments of blinding white light.
Then Julian enters the room. He is flanked by two regulators, although he is walking on his own, without prompting. They are tailed by a man wearing the high white collar of a priest; he holds a gold-bound copy of The Book of Shhh in front of his chest, like a talisman to protect him from everything dirty and terrible in the world.
The hatred is a cord, tightening around my throat.
Julian’s hands have been handcuffed in front of him, and he is wearing a dark blue blazer and neatly pressed jeans. I wonder if that was his choice, or whether they made him dress up for his own execution. He is facing away from me and I will him, silently, to turn around, to look up. I need him to know that I’m here. I need him to know he’s not alone. I reach my hand out unthinkingly, grope along the glass. I want to smash it to pieces, to jump down and swoop Julian away. But it would never work. I could not get more than a few feet, and then it would be a double execution.
Maybe it no longer matters. I have nothing left, nothing to return to.
The regulators have stopped at the table. There is a swelling of conversation—I hear Julian say, “I’d rather not lie down.” His voice is muffled and indistinct—from the glass, from the height—but the sound of it makes me want to scream. Now my whole body is a heartbeat, a throbbing urge to do something. But I’m frozen, heavy as stone.
One of the regulators steps forward and unchains Julian’s hands. Julian pivots so I can see his face. He circles his wrists, forward and back, wincing a bit. Almost immediately, the regulator clips his right wrist to one of the legs of the metal table, pushing down on Julian’s shoulder so he is forced to sit. He has not once looked at his father.
In the corner of the room, the doctor is washing his hands in a large sink. The water drumming against the metal is overloud. It is too quiet. Surely executions can’t happen here, like this, in the bright and the silence. The doctor dries his hands, works his fingers into a pair of latex surgical gloves.
The priest steps forward and begins to read. His voice is a low drone, a monotone, muffled through the glass.
“And so Isaac grew and was the pride of his aged father, and for a time a perfect reflection of Abraham’s will…”
He is reading from the Book of Abraham. Of course. In it, God commands Abraham to kill his only son, Isaac, after Isaac becomes sick with the deliria. And so he does. He takes his son to a mountain and plunges a knife straight through his chest. I wonder whether Mr. Fineman requested that this passage be read. Obedience to God, to safety, to the natural order: That is what the Book of Abraham teaches us.
“But when Abraham saw that Isaac had become unclean, he asked in his heart for guidance…”
I am swallowing back Julian’s name. Look at me.
The doctor and two lab techs step forward. The doctor has a syringe. He is testing it, flicking its barrel with a finger, as a lab tech rolls Julian’s shirt to his elbow.
Just then there is a disturbance from below. It ripples through the room at once. Julian looks up sharply; the doctor steps away from him and replaces the syringe on the metal tray one of the lab techs carries. Thomas Fineman leans over, frowning, and whispers something to a bodyguard, as another lab tech bursts into the room. I can’t make out what she’s saying—I can tell it’s a she, even though she’s wearing a paper mask and a bulky, too-big lab coat, because of the braid swinging down her back—but she is gesturing agitatedly.