chapter 2
fiction
HUFFINGTON
09.23.12
A
FAINT
CLICK
OPENS
THE AIR.
“The Perfect Code”
is excerpted from
Granta 120: Medicine.
A disembodied voice calls out: “Adult Code 100, Adult
Code 100, 5 East. Adult Code 100, 5 East.” Or it might be
“Code Blue, Code Blue 3C, Code Blue 3C.” From place to
place the wording varies, but the message is always the
same: somewhere in the hospital, someone is dying. Hearts
stop. Vital signs droop. Whatever the nature of the emergency, the response is the same: from all over the hospital
the code team comes running, and the attempt at resuscitation begins. I’m not sure, still, just what I learned running
to so many codes, but the experience haunts me, long after
the fact. As if somewhere in the tangle of tubes and wires,
knotted sheets, Betadyne and blood, I lost track of something important. Listen.