The floods came and we were not ready. Miles from the ocean, flanked by mountainous sentinels, we never thought to build an ark.

The skies darkened and the deluge commenced. Rapturous winds splintered ancient oaks and rent open the heavens. Barbarous gusts cleaved power lines, fractured telephone poles, brought a power grid to its knees. The lights went out in the west. Feeble candlelights flickered to life as the rivers swelled. …

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I leaned over the bed’s railing, straining to hear the morphine-slurred words spilling out of his chapped lips. “Make them stop laughing,” he said, referring to the cohort of young nurses giggling around the code cart in the hallway. “I’m in here suffering, in pain, and I shouldn’t have to hear laughter. Tell them to stop. Tell their boss. It’s so unprofessional.” After spitting out the last spiteful words of …

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