Taken in My Sleep by My Stepfather David and His Friends novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Ellis Takes a Pulse

Ellis sat across from me at breakfast with a pad of paper and a pen, and asked how I'd slept.

"Badly," I said.

"How many hours?"

"Two. Maybe three."

"Did you dream?"

"Are you my doctor?"

"I'm the only one here with a license." He wrote something down. "You took a pill Tuesday night. Zolpidem, ten milligrams. When did you start taking it?"

"After my mother."

"That's fourteen months."

"I know how long it's been."

His voice stayed level. "Do you take it every night?"

"No. Three, four times a week."

"And at the rehearsal dinner you took one on top of two glasses of champagne."

"Three," I said.

He looked at me over his glasses.

"Three," I said again. "Clarence's mother kept filling it."

He wrote that down too.

Then, still looking at the page, he reached across the table, turned my wrist over, and laid two fingers on the inside of it.

I let him do it for a moment.

"Ellis."

"Mm?"

"You touched me."

He looked down at his own hand.

"Occupational," he said.

"That's your whole defense?"

"It's a strong defense. I'm rarely challenged."

"Bernard already broke the rule this morning." I pulled my wrist away. "I'm keeping score, and so far the firemen are winning."

"The doctors are always second." He took his glasses off. "Your pulse is eighty-eight."

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