The Harvest Floor (Chapter Two)

Chapter 2

The fourth floor has no windows.

Marcus learns this on his second day of night shift training. Diane Foster leads him through a security door that requires her thumbprint and a six-digit code. The hallway beyond is white and fluorescent and silent.

“This is where we house donors who’ve gone below threshold,” she says. Her voice echoes. “They’re medically stable, but their cognitive function is too compromised for independent living. We provide care until they recover.”

“How long does recovery take?”

“Varies. Some bounce back in a few weeks. Others…” She shrugs. “We have a partnership with a state facility that handles long-term cases.”

She swipes them through another door. The room beyond is dim and vast, filled with rows of hospital beds. Maybe forty. Maybe fifty. Marcus counts without meaning to. Each bed has a person in it. Some are sleeping. Some stare at the ceiling. One woman rocks back and forth, humming tunelessly.

“This is David Martinez,” Diane says, stopping at a bed near the front. “Remember him? He dropped to 50% last month on your floor.”

Marcus remembers. The thrashing. The blank stare. The three minutes it took him to stand.

Martinez is sitting up in bed, eyes open, hands folded in his lap. He doesn’t look at them.

“David,” Diane says. “Can you tell me your name?”

Martinez’s mouth moves. No sound comes out.

“He’s at 47% now,” Diane says quietly. “We’re hopeful he’ll stabilize.”

She moves down the row. Marcus follows, trying not to look at the faces. Trying not to count.

At the far end of the room, a man sits in a wheelchair facing the wall. His head tilts at an odd angle. His hands open and close rhythmically.

“That’s Robert Chen,” Diane says. “Laura Chen’s brother. He came in at 53% two years ago. Kept donating even after we recommended a break. Now he’s at 41%.”

“Can he—does he understand?”

“Hard to say. He responds to basic commands. Eats when prompted. But there’s not much left.” She checks her tablet. “His sister’s still donating, actually. Three times a week. We tried to tell her it runs in families, that she should consider stopping, but she needs the money.”

Marcus thinks about Pod 23. About Laura Chen crying for six hours straight, bandwidth holding steady at 67%.

“How many people are on this floor?”

“Forty-three currently. We have space for eighty.”

“And they all… they all just stay here?”

“Until they recover or transfer.” Diane turns toward the door. “Below 51%, you can’t function in society. You can’t work, can’t manage finances, can’t make decisions. Someone has to care for them. Might as well be us.”

Marcus starts night shift the following Friday. His first paycheck is $2,230.77 after taxes. He pays child support, pays rent, buys Simone’s cleats and ships them priority mail. He has $340 left over. He puts $200 in savings and takes Simone to dinner at a real restaurant, not fast food, somewhere with tablecloths and a waitress who brings water in actual glasses.

Simone orders steak. Marcus orders chicken. She tells him about soccer practice and school and a boy named Tyler who keeps asking to carry her books. She shows him pictures on her phone—her team posing after a tournament win, her room with new posters, her and her mom at the beach last month.

“You look happy,” Marcus says.

“I am.” Simone cuts her steak precisely, the way her mother taught her. “Are you?”

“Sure.”

“You look tired.”

“New shift. I’m adjusting.”

“Mom says you’re working with people who sell emotions. Like, they take them out of their brains and sell them.”

Marcus sets down his fork. “It’s not quite like that.”

“How is it?”

“We help people who need money. They donate some of their emotional capacity to research and therapy programs. It’s voluntary.”

“What happens if they donate too much?”

“They stop.”

“But what if they don’t?”

Marcus picks up his fork again. “We make sure they stop.”

Simone doesn’t look convinced, but she changes the subject to soccer, and Marcus lets her. When the check comes, it’s $87 with tip. He pays without checking his account balance and tells himself this is why he took the job. This right here. His daughter eating steak and smiling and not worrying about cleats.