Gorge, a novel in progress by Michael Gullo (2026)
“Can you believe there’s people already at City Hall?”
“What time is it?”
“I don’t have my phone.”
“Me neither.”
“I never thought I’d see the day again when a seventeen-year-old American girl – woman – would leave her phone behind.”
“It’s cooked, bruh.”
“Still. He’s not the only one of us lacked the imagination to predict that one.”
“Is it in this screen somewhere?”
“Don’t reach up front, Kyle.”
“I’m not sure there’s a real division here.”
“Oh, there’s a division.”
“It’s 1:03 if that’s right.”
“This rain is so weird. One minute it’s raining boat oars and the next it’s sunny like nothing ever happened.”
“That crowd looks like it could use a little more rain.”
“What’s with all the backpacks?”
“Do I smell smoke?”
“This is a microphone used wrong, Maddie.”
“I mean, they’re just standing around.”
“Look closer. They have both garbage cans burning like hobos.”
“Hobos, yes, but not behaving badly.”
“Do you see any officials out there, Maddie? There’s no city officials giving a speech or offering information. Those people are on those steps burning city property, and when they don’t get what they want, what will they do next?”
“You can’t predict that, Bruh. And right now, they’re not doing anything wrong.”
“Kyle’s partly right, Maddie.”
“Slow down.”
“No way. I’m outa here.”
“They’re in McDonough monument too.”
“How’d they get in?”
“Who knows. Turn left.”
“I’m turning left, Kyle. I live here too, you know.”
“I’m sorry. I just…”
“You just need to calm down.”
“I’m trapped back here like a tumbrel.”
“What’s a tumbrel?”
“That’s it. I’m Mel Brooks trapped in his own tumbrel rolling through the city of Paris on my way to the guillotine.”
“Easy does it, Unc.”
“You don’t even know who Mel Brooks is, do you?”
“He’s the old timer, History of the World movie guy. That was wack.”
“Appropriate.”
“Settle down, Piss Boy.”
“Run this red light, Shawna.”
“No.”
“You’ve been sitting at endless redlights all day. Aren’t you sick of it?”
“Fine. I literally just ran the red light in front of the motor vehicle driver license testing office. That’s wack.”
“There’s a couple cars, finally.”
“Teslas.”
“HA! Who’d have guessed.”
“I would have. I predicted it.”
“Of course you did.”
“Unc. You gotta settle down.”
“Gimme the dub, kid. You young’ns, it’s your fault. If you would just buy the vehicles we built for you, America would be at twenty-five percent uptake like every other advanced country on the planet.”
“That’s a little high, unc.”
“Can we go back to bruh? And it’s not high. Europe is over thirty percent. Great Britain is more than fifty, and Norway is like in the high nineties.”
“That’s sus.”
“It’s not. I need my phone back!”
“Did he just whine?”
“He did.”
“It’s your own fault. You made new cars so expensive that we can’t afford anything but the best beaters.”
“She has a point. We have run prices up. These kids are even more screwed than we were.”
“It took two of you, both PhDs to buy a house in Podunk New York.”
“Is Studio 136 actually open?”
“I mean, it looks like.”
“So’s Opulence. They’re not going into the Armageddon with a ratchet coif.”
“We don’t say ratchet anymore, Kyle.”
“Three more blocks. Three more blocks. Three more blocks.”
“Don’t kid yourself. It’s a lifetime sentence.”
“There’s a gas car.”
“Those two look like they broke out of Dannemora.”
“That’s the crew that picked up our patio set.”
“I’d have got the guns out too.”
“Why did your hand just move to… Are you packin’, Shawna?”
“Hush, Maddie.”
“Shawna?”
“Mind your business, you two.”
“Shawna.”
“Can you believe that accident is still up there?”
“You’re changing the subject.”
“Actually, I’m right on subject. If those cars are still here all this time later and phones don’t work, and credit cards don’t work, and cash is king, and I have the whole court in my purse, I’m bringing the Queen’s guard along with me.”
“Shawna.”
“Run this light too, Badass.”
“No, Shawna. Do not run redlights with a gun in the car.”
“Don’t be such a square.”
“I’m no square. I’m from Indiana. We Constitutional carry up there. But this is New York, and you do not carry a concealed weapon in New York.”
“Kyle. I’m not confirming that I have a gun in my purse on my left side where I would never keep my purse ordinarily, and as long as you don’t know, you don’t have to worry about it.”
“Shawna.”
“Pull up under – What’s that in the ambulance bay?”
“What’s Incident Command mean?”
“Is something wrong?”
“No, Maddie. I’m sure it’s…”
“Stop the car. Stop. Stop the car.”
“Maddie, come back here.”
“You gotta work on your command voice.”
“I just wanted her to let me out.”
“You’re such a… Hang on.”
“I can’t get out the driver’s side, Shawna.”
“You see me getting out, don’t you? I’m coming around.”
“Come on, let me out.”
“Easy.”
“Shawna, open the door.”
“It’s open. Get out. Sheesh, it’s pretty tight back there, isn’t it?”
“I know what you were thinking. I do. Give her a command seat. Build her confidence. I…”
“Where are you going?”
“I’m sitting in front, Shawna.”
“We’re not just dumping her here. Get that food.”
“What about my panini?”
“Get out of the car, Kyle. You’re a child.”
“What’s with all the ambulances?”
“First clue. It’s a hospital.”
“Okay, but that one is Chazy, and that one’s Beekmantown. Cadyville. There’s Altona. It’s like a used ambulance car lot.”
“Something’s going on here. What’s with all the police tape?”
“Shawna! --- Thank you so much for bringing Maddie!”
“Oh, hi Rebecca. You look fantastic!”
“I haven’t blown my hair out in four days.”
“You look like you run the place, though.”
“Nobody runs an emergency room, but I keep pretty notes on the whiteboard.”
“What’s with the police tape and all the trailers?”
“Our semi-annual response drills were scheduled for this week, and we pre-staged a lot of it last week.”
“So, not?”
“No – not an incident, unless that’s what you call the thirteen cranky EMT crews and their pissy supervisors.”
“I mean, it is an actual emergency, though, right?”
“It seems like it, but we haven’t seen anything serious yet. Did you see WPTZ news this morning?”
“We did.”
“We expect quite a bit from that gathering.”
“I mean. We didn’t see any cops down there or anything.”
“They’re down there. We’ve been listening to the radio chatter. I love that coat!”
“Oh, thank you. We got it last summer in Montreal.”
“I mean, I love Canada Goose as much as the next guy, but that’s refreshing.”
“Kate Spade.”
“Love it --- Kyle. You do know it’s thirty-five degrees out here, right?”
“He’s worse than a child.”
“At least clip some mittens to his sleeve.”
“Good luck. He’d lick them off.”
“Insert sexist comment here.”
“You’re the one must be freezing. Where’d Maddie run off to?”
“Come on in just for a minute. Tell her seeya later.”
“We bought you some lunch.”
“I haven’t eaten all day. Come in, please. I painted my office.”
“Serious? There’s a FEMA control stationed out here, and you want to show me paint – spill.”
“Walk and talk. This smock ain’t cutting it.”
“What’s with the Incident Command? Maddie almost had a heart attack.”
“The drills. It couldn’t happen at a better time. We have the Push Pack, the Mobile Pharmacy, and the wholesale truck backed up to the loading dock too.”
“What’s a push pack?”
“That’s the awesome part. We only request the push pack for the spring drill, and the state sets that as the stock rotation date at the same time. We get all the near-expiration supplies, and they update their emergency trailer – it’s like a free mass supply week.”
“So not really FEMA?”
“No. The government supplies these to the state once a year for the drills, and the state sets up regions and has one for each region.”
“Everybody wins.”
“Mobile pharmacy’s the same. This is the best weekend of the year for the regional resource center hospital.”
“It’s so warm in here.”
“It just seems that way. We keep it at sixty-seven.”
“It’s so calm.”
“Smoke and mirrors. We have twenty-seven rooms in this ER, and twenty-one of them are occupied.”
“Where is everyone?”
“All four PA’s are on duty, and two nurses didn’t show – plus it’s the day after a holiday, so we have a slightly higher patient census. There’s…”
-He’s here early. Heads up, everyone. Bring out the lectern.-
“What’s that?”
“That’s the scanner.”
“But?”
“So, when that guy got on the news and called for a rally at City Hall, they made a plan. The fact is he’s probably reaching less viewers out on the front steps than he’d reach on television, so they’re going to encourage him.”
“How do you know all this?”
“We have the radio, but the department sent us a runner, and they clued us in.”
“So, they’re going to arrest him when he gets there?”
“No. When he left the station, he took a mobile van, and they don’t know how that works, so they’re going to encourage him just in case the damn thing is live. They think it gets recorded and then uploaded, but there’s nobody to ask.”
-He has a cameraman.-
“He mentioned a friend on the air.”
“We heard that.”
-Go with the lectern.-
“Is that the station on the TV?”
-He’s accepting the invite. All hold.-
“The plan is to lure him inside and reason with him. Get him to put out a calming message.”
“Are they going to arrest him?”
“Probably not. They’ll probably join him. The Mayor’s MIA, so it’s just the Incident Commander and the duty lieutenant down there with a handful of officers that reported for duty. They couldn’t even staff a Trooper here at the hospital.”
“Mom, we need the cabinet key.”
“Babe. I can break a few rules, but I need two medical professionals at least to hand out the Pyxis key.”
“That’s stupid.”
“I know. You keep these guys company, and I’ll go check in.”
“Seriously?”
“Oh, I know, but drug rules are rules, Dr. Maddie.”
“Fine, Chief. Let me know if you need a consult.”
“Speed dial.”
“Maddie. Are you working here, now?”
“I mean, sort of. They couldn’t get along without me.”
“What’s that called, like a candy striper, or something like that?”
“Unc, you’re way old. Junior Volunteers. I wouldn’t be caught dead in striped red.”
“I’m so jealous. When I was seventeen, I worked at the Cracker Barrel.”
“Oh, that’s hideous. Denny’s wears all black at least. I could handle that.”
-Plain-clothes, we’re coming out.-
“Here goes.”
“Here goes what?”
“The police are at City Hall, and they’re with Eric from the news. They have a plan to…”
“Is this it?”
“Mom, are you codgers going to tell me what’s going on, or do I just guess?”
“That reporter was invited into City Hall when he got there, and they gave him a talking to – apparently a fast one. And what’s supposed to happen is he gets on message and keeps everyone calm. Otherwise, we could have a very busy night in here.”
“Like, a protest, or whatever?”
“I think it’s more of an explanation.”
“What’s the plan, Riddler?”
“Just watch – the shot’s back up.”
“That’s not a shot. It’s a camera moving all over the place.”
“Wait for it.”
“Oh, I see. It’s the stairs.”
“Looks like.”
“Turn it up.”
“It’s up. He’s just not…”
“Okay, okay. Ohh, that don’t look good.”
“It’s just the smoke from the burn barrels.”
-Good afternoon. I’m Eric Barns reporting live from Plattsburgh City Hall. Behind me are, Chief of Plattsburgh Police Department Rene Thibideau, State Police Troop B-Incident Command Captain, Bart Duquette, Executive Director, Mountain Lakes Regional EMS Council Irene Lavalley and President and CEO of CVPH Medical Center, Dr. Honorio Dispo. We’re here today to provide what limited information is available to the authorities and to help our community band together in this emergency.-
“That TV is crooked.”
“Mr. Trombley! You have to go back to your room. That leg is fractured, and I haven’t even set it yet.”
“Good drugs though.”
“We have the decon trailer, the CHEMPACK and a dozen extra ambulances. All of that and five criticals I can’t ship out.”
“Has it been busy?”
“We expected super quiet with the holiday, more translation emergencies than anything else. That’s why we schedule the drills for the days after holidays.”