Chapter 3

Hairy

“Eep?” I said. I glanced around, “If I didn’t know better ... I’d say this is a morgue” I looked closer ... Hey ... my eyes are better. “That diploma.” I pointed at the framed parchment over the desk, “Does it say ... Forensic Medicine? Never mind.” I swung my legs over the side of the very cold wheeled stainless tray. I shuffled the black bag off my legs and over my feet. I jumped off ... kinda unsteady ... but stayed up. I stumbled over to the desk. I read it out loud. “American College of Forensic Medicine Examiners Institute. Herein make it known that Joshua Bartos MD has successfully completed the requirements for classification as a Forensic Consultant (Morgue). Buncha signatures of people I never heard of and an official seal.” I turned to the two guys, “The morgue? Really? No joke? I’m dead?” I pinched myself. “I don’t feel dead.” I suddenly realized that I said all that in a mix of Sioux and English ... I had spent nearly fifty years as a Sioux and my English was pretty damn rusty.

To the untrained ear ... Sioux sounds like gravel in a tin can ... so did my English.

But ... just about then ... my bowels ... still convinced I was dead ... completed the job they had started in Emergency ... EEW!

The body attempts to protect itself from outside defilement after death by evacuating the contents of the bowels and stomach. This act must be instinctive because vertebrates, invertebrates, fowl and fin all do it. The smell is supposed to drive defilers away.

The pair of hospital staff moved across the room ... and it’s a pretty big room.

“Well ... shit!” I said. “I don’t suppose you have a shower?”

The morgue tech said, “Sorta. Strip outta that gown and we’ll spray you down.”

The transporter said, “Not me.” He reassembled his green gurney and footed it out the door. Going out doesn’t need a buzzer. The gurney he left in the hall.

Meanwhile, the tech was assembling his shower head hose.

“Grab the sheet and take off that gown. They go in the bag marked BURN. I’ll spray ... you turn.”

SHRIEK!

“Fuck, buddy. That’s cold!”

“Funny ... you’re the first one to complain.” He laughed, “Keep turning. The balls are hardest to get clean.”

That was when I found out Vladimir and Estragon were right ... there is a final ejaculation.

Turns out ... the hospital refrigerates the water in the morgue to bring the body temp down fast ... and I can attest to that!

Now I’m in the morgue nude, soaking wet and chattering. While attendant is docking the dead teen girl in the cooler ... in an open closet ... I noticed sets of burgundy scrubs ... they weren’t the thin scrubs ... these things were heavy weight ... I suppose it’s because of the cold conditions in the morgue.

Heat promotes bacterial growth and some of the bodies are infestations of infectious diseases. Killer bacteria...

I snatched up a pair of the wine colored scrubs and a hospital face mask and slipped out the door.

Hmm? Right or left?

Left I could see freight scales and right felt like wrong. At a saunter I headed in the direction of the scales. Sure enough ... daylight. I was through the rear parking lot and heading into the woods and nobody noticed ... I hope.

“Honest, Doctor Bartos. He was right here.”

The coroner snorted. He’d been out of the building ... off the property ... about ten miles away in a fancy downtown restaurant when he got the call about the new fatality.

The body could wait. It wasn’t going anywhere. Bartos traditionally took three martini lunches.

Today he was in the company of a pretty professional. They were in “negotiations” over time. Agreement had just been reached when his cell vibrated in his pants.

He let it go to voicemail. He paid for lunch, helped her on with her wrap and escorted her out to his M3. His apartment was out of town in the opposite direction of his home ... and his wife ... and daughters. So ... it was after five before he arrived at the hospital.

Like the Eagles, I was already gone.