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“You’re nearly there,” he snapped then he left me alone in the kitchen to go up the stairs to my mother’s room.
Forlornly I followed him to the foyer. By the foot of the staircase I watched him climb but couldn’t go with him. The exhaustion I was feeling wouldn’t allow it. Then I sat down heavily on the bottom step and rested my head against the wood railing at my side and held onto one of the spindles as if my life depended on it.
When he came downstairs Doctor Winkle told me that she was resting comfortably for now. He warned me that she would only get worse. One day soon I would have to tell my sisters that our mother was dying if they hadn’t figured it out for themselves because soon Yancy would need a nurse’s care full time. She would need heavier drugs to make it through the pain and I couldn’t administer those drugs. Soon, I would have to rely on them for help. Soon, I wouldn’t have to be the brave one all by myself because Jack Dawson had his head buried in the dirt behind the house. He was in denial about his wife dying.
Chapter Nineteen
Two nights later Yancy woke in the night in excruciating pain. We heard her screams throughout the house. She was calling my dad’s name over and over in a mournful cry of agony that woke me from a deep sleep with a jolt. In my knit nightgown I ran down the flight of stairs to the second floor down the hallway to her room as fast as I could, considering my belly was large and cumbersome making me awkward. The girls were coming down the stairs right behind me.
“Be careful Mom,” Keegan told me concerned that I would fall on the stairs.
“I am,” I snapped then felt guilty for making my daughter feel bad. “I’m sorry Keegan.”
“I understand Mom.”
Yancy was inconsolable. Giving her pain medication this soon was out of the question not that the pills I had would have relieved the pain my mother was experiencing. Jack was rubbing my mother’s cheek trying to console her. I asked Keegan who stood frozen watching her grandmother writhe in pain to call 911.
“Now Keegan,” I shouted.
She didn’t move.
“I’ll do it Aunt Gabby,” Wynne said uncertainly backing out of the room unable to take her eyes away from my mother.
The ambulance arrived fifteen minutes later. Local volunteers outfitted the emergency and fire units who served Hell. They were bleary eyed from being woken at two in the morning. I knew two of the men from high school. They were a year ahead of me in school. They had played football when my sister was a cheerleader. I didn’t remember their last names but their first names were Ben and Tony.
“Gab, there’s not much we can do besides transport her to the hospital where they can start a morphine drip,” Ben told me.
“Then let’s go.”
They put her on the gurney while Keegan and Wynne grabbed a sweatshirt for me to keep me from going back up stairs.
“Thanks girls,” I said when they handed it to me with my fuzzy, green, house slippers. I threw the Michigan State sweatshirt on over my nightgown. The girls, Keegan finally in motion, slipped on her flip flops with her Sponge bob pajamas and Wynnie in Hello Kitty and Pop in green plaid flannel bottoms and tee shirt. God, what a sight we were.
Yancy was screaming at the men to let Jack and me both be with her when I arrived outside. I was heading towards my car when they finally relented helping me up into the back of the emergency vehicle. The girls climbed into the seat up front with the driver who was Tony. This wasn’t standard procedure for the emergency personnel but knowing the patient and her daughter allowed for some special treatment under the circumstances.
Riding in the back of the vehicle was rocky. Yancy cried out with every bump in the road while clinging to my hand and my father’s hand. I whispered words of comfort to her that I wasn’t sure she was hearing. She was delirious with the pain. I caressed her face and rubbed her hand but nothing helped. How much longer could she go on like this?
Doctor Winkle arrived at the hospital before we did. Wynne had the presence of mind to call him following her call to 911. Thank you God for the thirteen year old. The oncologist was her doctor of record but knowing Yancy as long as he had Doctor Winkle would be in the room with them while they examined her. I was grateful to see his familiar face.
The girls and I sat down in the hallway in chairs while we waited for word on Yancy. Pop was in the room with her. We were a crazy looking bunch with me in my pink knit nightgown, sweatshirt and fuzzy slippers and the girls wearing their pajamas. Keegan walked down the hall alone to call Kerry for me. Wynne looked at me with concern.
“I’m fine,” I replied to my niece’s questioning stare.
She smiled. She had Yancy’s smile, which brought tears to my eyes.
“Did you call your mother?” I asked huskily trying not to cry.
“Yes,” she replied softly hanging onto my hand with her smaller one. Caressing my palm with her thumb, comforting the adult when I should have comforted her.
I glanced down at our linked fingers. She had small, dainty hands like Gemma and Grandma Rosa but she was tall like her mother and Yancy.
“Thank you,” I told her giving
her hand a squeeze. What would I have done without her?
Kerry would be on a flight home today Keegan told me when she returned. An hour later we were waiting for word of Yancy from Doctor Winkle when my sisters arrived together. Wynne ran to her mother and hugged her tight. She had been so grown up throughout the ordeal but now she was a child who needed her mother’s comfort.
“I wouldn’t have been able to get here without her,” I told Micki who smiled at me over her daughter’s head.
