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I can’t hear Jackie, but Dan says, “Right,” then adds, “two cracked ribs.”
He says they’re taking her into surgery to repair the hip in the next half hour, and where to go once we arrive. I relay this to Marty and Mylo after Dan hangs up, and silence fills the car for the next hour.
I expect to cry, but the tears don’t come. There are so many unknowns that I don’t feel sad, just terrified of what’s coming. Will she make it through surgery? Or will she succumb to her injuries before she even wakes up?
Marty doesn’t say it, but I wonder if he’s thinking about the baby gate right now. He suggested we install one to prevent this very thing from happening, and I urged him not to because it wasn’t worth upsetting her.
There’s gonna come a day when we’ll have to put her safety above her happiness.
That day came too late, and it’s all my fault.
Mom’s still in surgery when we arrive at Concord Hospital, and it’s just Jackie waiting there for us. “Where’s Dan?” I ask.
“He went to Mom’s house to clean up.”
“Clean up?”
Her eyes fill with tears. “The blood, Sammy.” She ducks her head into my chest as sobs overtake her. “So much blood.”
I look at Marty, silently pleading for help. He gently extracts Jackie from my front and pulls her in for a hug. She goes willingly, and I look for the nearest nurse or doctor. Then, one of the last faces I ever wanted to see again is the first one that comes into view. “Beth,” I mutter, wondering what I did in a past life to deserve such rotten luck, “you’re a nurse?”
She nods as she fiddles with a chart in her hands. “Sure am. Front-line pandemic hero.” She looks me up and down. “You still taking your little pictures?”
I haven’t seen her since the reunion. What a terrible night that was. She and Vanessa confronted each other in the bathroom, and Beth made sure to make a heartless comment about my mom’s disease before she left. The night ended with the death of her boyfriend, Trevor, the man who raped both me and Vanessa.
I can’t speak for Vanessa, but I wake up every day feeling grateful Trevor no longer roams this Earth, and any grief Beth still feels, well, she’s an asshole, so I’m not concerned about her feelings.
Although, I might have to be nice to her if… “You’re not my mom’s nurse, are you?”
Please say no. Please say no.
“No, I’m working the neonatal unit today.”
Phew, thank you, Jesus.Though I feel bad for those babies. Their little bodies working so hard to survive, and they’re greeted with the angular sneer of this bitch? That’s a rough start.
“What’s going on with your mom?” she asks. I can tell she’s not genuinely interested by the slight smirk she’s failing to hide. She wants gossip, and even more, she wants to see me crack.
Not going to happen.
“Why am I even talking to you?” I ask, shoving past her toward the doctor coming down the hall. My mom is in a fucking coma. I can’t waste my time on Beth of all people.
I tell him why I’m here, and who I’m here for.
“She’s probably still in surgery,” he assures me. “That’s typically a three-hour procedure. Wait here. Take a seat. Get comfortable. I’ll make sure your mother’s surgeon updates you as soon as possible.”
The four of us, Jackie, Marty, me, and Mylo, settle into a quiet corner of the waiting room. Jackie cries as Marty comforts her, then they trade off as Marty starts to cry. I can’t sit still, so I step away from the group and pace up and down the long, brightly lit hallway as my head pounds from an excess of booze and lack of water.
I should be exhausted right now, given how little sleep I’ve had this week, but the adrenaline from the news of Mom’s fall continues pumping through my blood, making it impossible for me to sit and wait.
Mylo paces with me, staying quiet and remaining by my side, and as thankful as I am for his presence, it feels like hovering, and I can’t handle that right now. When I stop walking, he does too, and we lean heavily against the wall, side by side.
“I wish there was something I could do,” he says, looking down at the floor.
“Yeah, me too,” I reply, not knowing what else to say, and I don’t exactly feel compelled to fill the silence. Silence means there’s no news, and no news means that Mom is okay. Because if she weren’t, they’d come out and tell us. There would be words laced with sorrow followed by the loud, undignified sobs of me and my siblings. Yes, silence is where hope lives.
Mylo clearly doesn’t feel the same because he keeps trying to offer me words of comfort that feel hollow, not because he doesn’t mean them, I’m certain that he does, but until I know Mom is going to survive this, telling me that “everything will be okay” seems pointless. He doesn’t know that everything will be okay, and I don’t need him to feed me empty promises.
“Look at it this way,” he begins, and my teeth grind at how little I want to engage, “if your mother dies in surgery, you will not have to witness her suffering.”
