But none of that really matters because my mom is improving.
Slowly. It’s so slow. But she’s moving forward and that’s all that matters. Yeah, I wish the doctors and nurses were more enthusiastic about her progress than I am. I guess they really have to tamp down their feelings. But as long as she’s moving forward, then there’s cause to celebrate.
It started with my mom squeezing my hand when I played her Dire Straits. After that, no matter what I put on, whether it be Shania Twain or Faith Hill (her taste in music is different than mine), she would react a little. Just in her face. She hasn’t opened her eyes yet, but she would frown and her lips would move. I like to think she was trying to sing to the songs.
The nurses finally seemed encouraged by this, so they would start addressing her by name more often, speaking loudly. Eventually she would follow some of their commands. Sometimes she would squeeze their hand too, and when they asked her to open her eye, her eyelid would flutter like she was trying.
She was trying. I could see it. I could feel it.
I have so much hope.
But today the head nurse, the doctor, and the head of neurology are meeting with me to talk about my mom’s results on her most recent scans and I’m so nervous I feel like I’m going to vomit.
I’m sitting in the waiting room, fiddling with the ends of my hair that’s pulled back in a tight, greasy ponytail. I’ve been using copious amounts of dry shampoo but even that’s given up on me. I feel like pins and needles are covering every inch of my body, these tiny little stabs of panic in my gut, my chest, my heart.
No fear, only faith, I tell myself, rocking back and forth like a mad woman, no fear, only faith.
Suddenly the loudspeaker crackles and beeps and I jump in my seat, nearly screaming out loud.
“Code Blue” the person on the loudspeaker says. “ICU. Cold Blue.”
I’ve heard that damn thing go off several times a day and each time before they announce the location, I have this all-encompassing fear that they’re going to say the ICU and it’s going to be my mother. It’s never been the ICU until now.
I get to my feet and go to the door, throwing it open in time to see doctors and nurses running through the halls, bursting through the ICU doors.
“Oh no,” I cry to myself, clutching my chest. “No, no, no. Not my mom.”
I follow the crowd, their hushed murmurs over the loud alert, into the ICU, expecting to see them running to my mother.
But my mother is alone in her bed. Two beds over is where the doctors and nurses have gathered, all of them coming in like a stream. I watch as they perform CPR, one nurse, that I recognize as having looked after my mom a few days ago, is pumping the person’s chest so hard I think she’s breaking his ribs or hurting him. I had no idea CPR was this violent. Television has been lying to me.
“Miss?” a nurse says to me, gesturing for me to go outside. I guess this isn’t a thing I’m supposed to see.
I nod, and somehow tear my eyes away from the scene, away from everyone trying to help, and it gives me comfort somehow, that if this happens to my mom, all these people will keep rushing in trying to save her. I feel so selfish in the moment, sad for the person who is crashing, but so fucking relieved it’s not my mom. I cling onto anything I can.
The nurse taps me to go again so I go through the doors and back into the waiting room, wondering if the meeting will be delayed a little now, when I see Wolf sitting down in the chair.
The sight of him takes my breath away. All the anger I had toward him comes flooding back (you could have prevented this! This is all your fault!) but then I’m just too fucking weak now to hang on to it. I’m so aware of how precious life is that anger seems like something I must immediately let go of.
“Why are you here?” I ask him quietly, leaning against the doorway. “I thought Lenore was coming here for the meeting.”
He swallows hard and gets to his feet and I feel a little dizzy looking at him, my heart turning itself inside out and upside down. He’s so magnetic, so beautiful and strong, that the last five days without him suddenly feel like a century in the desert with no water in sight.
“I know I’m not the person you wanted to see,” he says to me, his voice low and gravely and, fuck, I’ve missed the sound of him. “But I’m the person that’s here.”