Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
It's just logistics.
The floor drain backed up every Tuesday.
Gav kicked the metal grate. Oily water crept over the edge, smelling of rust and something curdled.
“You gonna just look at it?”
The voice came from the cot. Sal, his partner, was cleaning his fingernails with a Bowie knife. Sal was always cleaning something. His nails. His boots. The gurneys. It was the only clean thing in the room.
“It’s your turn,” Gav said, jamming a bent coat hanger into the drain. It hit something solid that wasn’t pipe.
“My turn was the pickup. Your turn is the cleanup.” Sal flicked something dark from under his nail. “That’s the deal.”
The deal. Gav hated the deal. He cracked his knuckles, one by one, the way he did before every pickup. Then he shoved the wire harder.
Sal started humming. Low, half-conscious. “Head, shoulders, knees and toes... knees and toes...”
“Can you not?”
Sal didn’t stop. Kept cleaning his nails. “...eyes and ears and mouth and nose...”
“Sal.”
Sal blinked, looked up. “What?”
“The singing.”
“Was I?” He shrugged. “Gets stuck.”
Gav turned back to the drain. Jammed the wire deeper. Christ. He pulled hard.
A clump of gray tissue and matted hair came up, snagged around a small gold hoop earring, still pierced through a shred of cartilage.
“Eyes and ears,” Sal said, not looking up.
Gav dropped it back in the drain, kicking the grate into place.
The tablet on the charging station pinged. Both of them looked.
Sal stood, walked over, picked it up. Read. His face didn’t change.
“Problem?” Gav asked.
“Delivery 4721B. Quality rejection.”
“What?”
Sal turned the screen. Red text across the top: GENETIC MISMATCH DETECTED. INCOMPLETE INVENTORY. Below it, a list. Bilateral femurs: check. Tibial plateau: check. Patellae: MISSING.
“We delivered what the hospital sent,” Gav said.
“I know.”
“So it’s their fuckup.”
“Doesn’t matter whose it is.” Sal set the tablet down. “Client wants matched set. We gave them mismatched.”
“Use extras from last week.”
“Can’t. Genetic profile has to match. Hospital logged this one as a full harvest. Clean intake, all systems go. Now the knees are missing and the client’s contract says matched or refund.”
Gav felt his jaw tighten. “So what, we eat the loss?”
“No.” Sal picked up his jacket from the back of the cot. “We go back.”
“Back where?”
“Source facility. St. Catherine’s. They still got the donor on hold pending final processing.”
Gav stared at him. “You’re saying we go back and…”
“Reacquisition,” Sal said. “It’s in the contract. Incomplete delivery, we return for corrective procurement. They’re holding the rest until we clear the discrepancy.”
“The rest.”
“Yeah. The knees. And the toes, apparently. Looks like intake fucked up the limb sectioning.” Sal checked his phone. “We got until 6 AM before they cremate. After that it’s a full loss and corporate docks our metrics.”
Gav looked at the drain. At the grate. At the oily water still pooled around the edge.
“This happen before?” he asked.
Sal zipped his jacket. “Last month. Different hospital. Clerical error on a spinal column. Had to go back, re-harvest T4 through L2.” He picked up the keys to the van. “It’s just logistics, man. Shit happens.”
Gav didn’t move.
“You coming or not?” Sal asked.
“Yeah.” Gav grabbed his own jacket. His hands were shaking. He balled them into fists.
Sal was already halfway to the door, humming again. Quiet. Reflexive.
“...knees and toes, knees and toes...”
He stopped at the threshold, looked back. “You good?”
Gav nodded.
They walked to the van. The tablet pinged again in Sal’s hand. He glanced at it, thumb swiping.
“New pickup scheduled for Thursday,” Sal said. “Northside General. Full harvest, pre-cleared. Should be clean.”
“Should be.”
Sal climbed into the driver’s seat. Gav got in the passenger side. The van smelled like disinfectant and cold storage. Sal started the engine, pulled up the GPS.
St. Catherine’s Hospital. 4.2 miles. Estimated arrival: 11:47 PM.
Gav looked at the tablet screen over Sal’s shoulder. The work order was still open. Delivery 4721B. A name at the top. Renée Voss. Age 29. Organ donor. Bed 1847.
“They know we’re coming?” Gav asked.
“Hospital? Yeah. They logged the hold. Procurement wing stays open 24/7.” Sal pulled out of the lot. “It’s all automatic. We scan in, they scan out, we load and go. Ten minutes, tops.”
The scanner on the dash crackled. Dispatch, calling out other routes. Other vans. Other pickups across the city.
Gav closed his eyes.
Sal hummed.
“Head, shoulders, knees and toes...”
The van turned onto the freeway. St. Catherine’s was lit up in the distance, white and sterile against the black sky.
Gav’s phone buzzed. Text from his ex. Child support due Friday. Don’t be late again.
He put the phone in his pocket.
“...knees and toes,” Sal sang, barely audible over the engine.
“Your kid know what you do?” Gav asked.
“She’s four. She thinks I drive a truck.. You tell yours?”
Gav didn’t answer.
Gav opened his eyes. Watched the hospital get closer.
“You ever think about quitting?” he asked.
Sal glanced at him. “And do what?”
Gav didn’t answer.
Sal turned into the hospital parking lot. The procurement entrance was around back, past the loading docks. A single light above the steel door. A keycard reader glowing green.
Sal killed the engine. Grabbed the tablet. Looked at Gav.
“You ready?”
Gav looked at the door. The light. The reader.
He unbuckled his seatbelt.
“Yeah.”
They got out. Sal swiped his card. The door buzzed, clicked open.
Inside, the hallway was white tile and fluorescent hum. A woman in scrubs stood behind a desk, not looking up from her computer.
“Delivery 4721B,” Sal said. “Reacquisition.”
She nodded, typed something. A printer spat out a label. She handed it to Sal.
“Bay three. Already prepped.”
“Thanks.”
They walked down the hall. Their boots squeaked on the tile. Another door. Another swipe. The cold room.
Bay three was a steel gurney with a blue sheet. A clipboard hung on the hook beside it. Sal checked the tag, cross-referenced the tablet.
“This is it.”
Gav looked at the sheet. Didn’t move.
Sal picked up the procurement kit from the shelf. Unzipped it. Pulled out the bone saw, the collection bags, the labels.
“You wanna do it or should I?”
“I’ll do it,” Gav said.
Sal handed him the saw. Stepped back.
Gav pulled the sheet.
Renée Voss. Age 29. Skin pale. Legs sectioned below the knee, stumps clean and sealed.
The knees were still there. Intact. Unsectioned.
Gav positioned the saw.
His hands weren’t shaking anymore.
Behind him, Sal hummed.
“...knees and toes, knees and toes...”
Gav started the saw.
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It’s part of my short story collection, NO KINGS. Purchase the short story collection here:
It's the normality of what's happening that makes this so unsettling. Great read!