Page 122 of Love Overdose: St. Louis

“What about the sleeping?”

“Continue watching him. If he vomits or becomes difficult to wake, go straight to the ER.”

She was becoming a recording at this point. I took Malik home feeling slightly better but still concerned. The results didn’t match his mood, but then again, I could’ve been overexaggerating. He ate soup for dinner and kept it down. When I asked whether he wanted to watch Spider-Man, he lifted his hand. I turned on the movie and sat beside him, watching his movements. His head rested against the chair, and his eyes stayed on the screen, and I told myself everything would be alright.

The appointment had gone well; his responses were slower because he was tired. I watched him closely because that’s what mothers did.

That night, I slept in his room.

Tuesday began with vomiting. The sound pulled me awake shortly after five. Malik coughed from the bed beside me. By the time I reached him, vomit covered the front of his pajamas and the towel beneath his head.

I turned him onto his side and cleared his mouth.

“I’ve got you.”

His eyes opened but didn’t settle on me.

“Malik.”

I cleaned his face and called his name again. He blinked slowly. The look in his eyes emptied my lungs. I had seen it before, years earlier, before his last emergency scan. His gaze had floated past me as though he were somewhere far away. I touched his cheek.

“Look at Mama.”

His eyes moved toward my voice, then drifted away. I didn’t wait for another symptom. I changed his shirt, secured him in his wheelchair, and grabbed the medical binder and emergency bag. The Spider-Man figure laid near his pillow. I tucked it beneath the strap across his lap.

The cold morning air struck my face when I opened the front door. I was in a rush while trying to be careful. The van's accessible ramp lowered too slowly, and I stood tapping my foot, jaw locked. Every mechanical sound scraped against my nerves while I guided Malik inside and locked his chair into place. His eyes had closed again before I finished.

“Stay awake for me.”

His eyelids lifted, then fell. I drove to the hospital with one hand tight around the steering wheel and the other reaching back whenever I stopped at a light. The sky remained dark. Christmas lights still glowed along the houses we passed, red and white bulbs shining over empty yards. Elijah had been busy at the hospital, but I had barely noticed because my attention had been on Malik.

At the emergency entrance, I pulled into the unloading lane and lowered the ramp. A security guard saw me struggling with the bag and came outside with an orderly.

“My son has hydrocephalus,” I said. “He has a VP shunt. He’s vomiting and difficult to wake.”

They moved immediately. The orderly released Malik’s chair from the floor locks and rushed him through the automatic doors while I followed. At the desk, the triage nurse asked his name and date of birth.

“Malik Mellows. He’s ten.”

“When did the vomiting start?”

“This morning, but he’s been different for four days. Sleeping more. Eating less. Slower responses.”

“Any fever?”

“No.”

“Recent illness or injury?”

“No.”

“Last shunt revision?”

I gave her the date and pulled the records from his binder.

“He has cerebral palsy, and he’s nonverbal, but he understands more than he can show you. His responses are usually much stronger than this.”

The nurse attached a pulse oximeter to his finger.