Sleep Tight

PINNACLE BOOKS

Kensington Publishing Corp.

All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

Table of Contents

The author would like to thank
Gus and Jennifer Alagna, David and Joyce Boyd,
Jen and House Domonkos, all good pals,
the amazing faculty, students, and staff at
the Fiction Department at CCC,
Gary Goldstein, ’cause this book wouldn’t exist
without him, the wisdom and guidance of Doug Grad,
the man, the myth, the legend, “Hell” Owen LaMay,
Mom and Dad,
Karrie and John O’Donnell,
Lou and Sandra Phillips—always and forever,
Mary Reid, my guide to the south side,
Jon and Laura Wojtalik, for the babysitting and sanity,
Arlene Wojtalik, the best mother-in-law in the whole world,
and the best five-string banjo player in his height, weight,
and age group,
the one and only Mort Castle.

Phase 1.
No new influenza virus subtypes have been detected in humans. An influenza virus subtype that has caused human infection may be present in animals. If present in animals, the risk of human infection or disease is considered to be low.

 

Phase 2.
No new influenza virus subtypes have been detected in humans. However, a circulating animal influenza virus subtype poses a substantial risk of human disease.

 

Phase 3.
Human infection(s) with a new subtype but no human-to-human spread or at most rare instances of spread to a close contact.

 

Phase 4.
Small cluster(s) with limited human-to-human transmission but spread is highly localized, suggesting that the virus is not well adapted to humans.

 

Phase 5.
Larger cluster(s) but human-to-human spread is still localized, suggesting that the virus is becoming increasingly better adapted to humans but may not yet be fully transmissible (substantial pandemic risk).

 

Phase 6.
Pandemic phase: increased and sustained transmission in the general population.

 

The change in cabin pressure squeezed Viktor’s skull mercilessly, yanking him out of a dreamless void and thrusting him into cold, hard reality as his international flight out of the Koltsovo Airport in Yekaterinburg descended into Chicago. He blinked; the rows of seats ahead of him floated, drifting from side to side in his blurred vision. His heart raced. Saliva filled his mouth and his stomach threatened to erupt. He didn’t think he had eaten anything since a rushed breakfast before the flight.

If that was true, he hadn’t eaten in over eighteen hours. Had he been asleep the entire flight?

Not sleep
, his body insisted.
Something worse.

Viktor swallowed. Carefully. Something was very, very wrong. Under everything, even beneath the shakily controlled panic, there was something else.

He
itched.

The sensation was insidious. Awful. Excruciating. He froze. He couldn’t put his finger on where he could scratch. It seemed to appear all over and nowhere at once, as if the horrible sensation slithered throughout his body with the speed of thought, stretching out its jagged fingernails to caress just under the skin of his armpit, his face, the center of his back, his scrotum. He reached a trembling hand out and took hold of his water bottle.

The thought of the tepid liquid triggered an eruption of nausea and he let go.

Across the aisle, a middle-aged man in a rumpled suit tucked a paper cross into a Bible and gathered his belongings. Viktor slowly turned to the right. It felt like the bones at the base of his skull were grinding glass between them as he moved his head. The seat next to him was empty, and in the seat nearest the window, an older woman studied her crash-landing instructions, working hard to avoid his stare.

The captain’s voice clicked over the whispered hum of air rushing past the fuselage. He spoke for a while in a southern Russian accent. After the announcement, one of the flight attendants translated his announcement into German and then still another gave her best shot at an English version. “This is Captain speaking. Continuation of final approach is fast approaching. If everyone please can sit still, putting seating belt on, remaining calm, we will be landing in Chicago in few short minutes. Home of Cubs footballs and Blackhawk hockey. Ha. Ha. Ha. Also Al Capone.”

Viktor unbuckled his seat belt. Struggled to his feet. He hoped he could make it to the bathroom before one of the flight attendants tried to stop him. He wasn’t sure what would happen then.

Sweat collected under the illicit cargo hidden carefully along both sides of his chest and stomach. Acutely aware of these small lumps, he knew he had to look truly awful as he found his feet and stood, hitting his head on the overhead bin.

The nice leather jacket, the new jeans, the crisp white shirt were all supposed to convey that he was the lazy son of someone rich. But the new clothes couldn’t hide how he felt. He was tall and underfed, and he lurched up the aisle like a scarecrow running from a storm. Passengers flinched when they saw him.

Viktor made it inside the restroom before any of the flight attendants said anything. He sagged inside the plastic door, trying to slow his breathing. He turned on the light above the mirror and saw that he was much worse than he had feared.

His eyes were red and began to weep in the light. His skin had gotten frighteningly pale. It didn’t make sense. His heart raced; his face should be red from all the blood surging through his body. He fumbled with the buttons to his crisp white shirt, and lifted the heavy T-shirt underneath.

The cargo was still there. Still quiet. Still unmoving.

 

 

“Don’t worry. They won’t get loose. No. It’s the squeaks that will get you caught,” Roman had said in his native language. Roman was a man full of nervous laughter and nicotine.

When Viktor stepped into the back room of the vet office outside of Yekaterinburg, he found the tiny cages, each no bigger than a toaster, on the operating table in a neat line. His passport, student visa, two credit cards, a driver’s license, and just over three hundred dollars in U.S. currency had been stacked in the opposite corner. Down there, some of the metal surface was still smeared with congealed blood.

Roman held up a wisp of a vest, made from flesh-colored nylon pantyhose. He laughed. “I know, I know. It looks like something a prostitute would wear.”

Viktor stripped to his underwear and stepped into it. He slid the straps into place, stretching the nylon from underneath his crotch, knotted it together at the hips, and ran it up the sides of his stomach and chest until it ended in a loop around each shoulder. Roman tied these across his shoulders.

“Trust me, they all wear these. I know a man who carried twenty-four lizards and snakes into Los Angeles not four years ago.”

Viktor held up his arms and turned in a slow circle.

Roman said, “These animals? They will have it easier than you, my friend. Nineteen hours without a cigarette! Put on your pants. Walk around. We have . . .” He checked his watch. “Forty-three minutes.”

“Until the flight?” Viktor asked, confused, trying not to let any panic show.

“No. Until we leave this office.” Timing was everything. A difference of an hour in the international flight time could mean life or death for the cargo.

 

 

Viktor went to splash water on his face in the cramped airplane bathroom, but the sound of the trickling water wormed into his head and he suddenly spewed bile onto the mirror. His legs buckled and he dropped to his knees, dry-heaving into the metal sink. He hoped the gagging sounds couldn’t be heard outside of the bathroom. Reaching up, he managed to pull one of the paper towels out of the dispenser and laid it on the damp bottom of the sink. Using that, he wiped some of the sweat off his face.

It made no sense. Why was he so sick?

One of the pouches along his left side twitched and squirmed. Another, on the right side, started to move. And yet another.

They were waking up.

 

 

He clearly remembered the rest of the preparation in the veterinarian hospital, watching closely as the vet placed a syringe on top of each cage. Each syringe held such little medicine they looked almost empty. The man waited patiently, until Roman, checking his watch, gave him a nod. The vet put a heavy leather glove on his left hand and opened the first cage.

He gave an injection every five minutes. Then they would squeeze each animal into yet another nylon pantyhose, twisting the material to trap it. The ends were then tied to straps in the vest. In the end, Viktor carried six on each side, each lump no bigger than a computer mouse.

“Good! Good! You look good!” Roman said, once Viktor had put his shirt back on. “Turn around. Good!” Viktor walked around the tiny operating room, experimentally swinging his arms.

“Try not to sweat,” Roman offered.

The vet remained still the entire time, until he spotted movement. It was a tiny bug, venturing out of the sixth cage. The thing was no bigger than the head of the eagle on the old American coins they had given Viktor. The vet squashed it with his thumb and flicked it away.

Viktor could remember the ride to the airport, the perfunctory bribe in customs, a quick toast of ice-cold vodka in the airport bar, then the long walk to the plane. He found his seat, flirted unenthusiastically with one of the ugly attendants, and tried not to think about landing in Chicago.

After that, absolutely nothing.

 

 

A sharp rap at the door. “Sir! Sir! We are landing very soon. You must take your seat.”

Viktor tried to respond; his voice came out garbled as if his tongue had forgotten how to create words. It must have worked for a moment because the knocking stopped.

He stared at himself in the mirror again.
Just land, get through customs, and then outside, where a van is waiting.
He sucked in a deep breath and blew it out through his nose.

Everything was going to be fine.

A thin trickle of blood slid out of his left nostril.

Viktor swore and wiped it away. More blood collected on his upper lip. He realized he could use this to his advantage and wound toilet paper around his fist, then pressed it to his nose. He was now just a passenger with a bloody nose because of the dry air in the cabin. That was all.

Something tickled his stomach.

At first, he thought it was just that maddening phantom itch. But this felt different. Something was moving across his skin. He pulled his shirt up, and there, crawling along the sparse black hairs around his belly button, was a tiny bug. Without hesitation, he pinched it between his thumb and forefinger and felt an insignificant, unsatisfying crunch. Examining his fingertips, he found a faint smear of blood.

The attendant knocked on the door again. Louder this time. “Sir! I insist, sir!”

Viktor wiped the remains of the bug on his new jeans, jammed the blood soaked tissue back to his nose, and opened the door. He glared at the attendant over the tissue. The phantom itch crawled across his scalp.

 

 

When the plane finally landed, Viktor was afraid he couldn’t stand. He waited in his seat until nearly all the passengers had disembarked, effectively trapping the older woman next to him. She didn’t make a move to get up, gripping her purse in two tight fists, staring unwaveringly at the perky young starlet skipping through warm surf on the cover of the in-flight magazine stuffed in the pouch on the back of the seat in front.

Viktor didn’t care. He wedged his hands under his thighs, anything to hide the shaking. He couldn’t stop licking his lips. The vibrations in his head threatened to spin out of control and he fought against the seizures that echoed throughout his body. The shaking built. His feet thrummed against his carry-on bag. Drool spilled from quivering lips. A distant burst of his heartbeat.

Abruptly, everything slowed down.

He stopped shaking. Wiped his mouth. The sounds of muttered conversations as the passengers filed past and pulled bags out of the overhead compartments seemed to be coming from underwater.

Viktor took a deep breath. Sweet relief flooded through his body, leaving him dazed and warm. His eyelids slowly slid shut. His breathing slowed.

Now the woman next to him really didn’t know what to do. She thought he was asleep. The last of the passengers filed out. She hit the button for one of the attendants. Down at the front of the plane, the group looked back at her. When they saw Viktor, the attendant who had kicked him out of the lavatory started up the aisle, shaking her head.

She stopped a few seats away. “Sir. Please, sir. You are to leave now.”

Viktor didn’t move. Neither did the woman next to him.

“Sir. Sir.” A little louder.

The attendant looked back at her group and shrugged.

Viktor gasped and jolted awake. The woman next to him flinched and let out a hushed yip.

The pain was back with a vengeance, drilling into the nerve cells in his stomach and behind his eyes, sparking agony as it burrowed deeper. He scrambled to his feet, spun, and almost fell back into the seat.

He licked his lips and grabbed his bag as tremors shook his limbs. Despite the loss of control, he still managed to hang on to the handle in one hand and pull himself along with the other. The attendants backed away as he staggered down the aisle.

Someone at the far end of the tunnel spoke into a phone. Viktor didn’t like that.

When he got within four feet, he bared his teeth and growled at the flight attendant on the phone.

She flinched and dropped it.

He leaned away and stumbled up the ramp, out into the bright lights of customs, and took three hitching breaths. A bewildering labyrinth of lines that looked like they had been laid out by a couple of drunk government employees waited impatiently, all strung together with fake velvet ropes. Thirty or so passengers stood in line, sneaking glances back at him.

Their eyes crawled across his skin.

One of the pouches squirmed against his left hip and just like that, that furtive
itch
scrabbled across his back and Viktor couldn’t take it anymore. He finally simply surrendered and let the shrieking in his head blot out everything else.