Hidden Jewel (Landry 4)

She touched the stone of Jean's vault lovingly and smiled. "He heard me. He won't let Pierre leave us. Jean is a good boy, a good boy."

"Come home now, Mommy. Please." I helped her to her feet. She looked at Jean's tomb again, and then the three of us, crippled by our tragedy, hobbled along the pathway past other vaults and other scenes of sadness where the ground was soaked with similar tears.

I gazed back once and shuddered with the horrible vision of a second vault, twin to Jean's.

"Please, God," I murmured, too low for Daddy or Mommy to hear, "please help us."

17

Please Wake Up

.

Despite being exhausted by the time we all

returned home and to bed, I tossed and turned, slipping in and out of nightmares. When I woke, I welcomed the morning sunlight, but I felt as if I had just run a marathon in the middle of the summer. My sheet and blanket were drenched with perspiration, and when I sat up, my legs and my back ached from the twisting and turning I had done in my sleep.

I was the first to rise, wash, and dress. Both Mommy and Daddy looked as if they had been through the same wringer of horrors when they entered the dining room and sat down to breakfast. Mommy had already phoned the hospital and spoken to Pierre's nurse, who told her there was no change.

"At least he's not getting worse," I said, hoping to find a ray of sunshine in all this gloom.

"Yes, but he's not getting better," Mommy replied in a voice that was totally devoid of energy and expression. She ate mechanically, her eyes fixed on nothing. Daddy reached across the table and took her hand. She smiled weakly at him and then turned and chewed and stared. Daddy flashed a sad look at me, and I could tell that he was at his wit's end.

"Jack's coming tomorrow," I announced, deciding that a change of subject might be the best antidote to our depression. Mommy's eyes widened with some interest, and Daddy looked impressed. "Is that all right?"

"He's coming here?" Mommy asked.

"Yes. I invited him to stay."

Mommy looked at Daddy, who shrugged.

"From what I hear, we owe this young man a great deal," Daddy said. "The least we can do is offer him hospitality."

"I don't think I'm up to being a hostess," Mommy said.

"Jack won't expect anything special, Mommy. He's here to be at my side and offer his comfort."

"He sounds like a special young man," Daddy said.

Mommy sighed deeply. I knew there was no room in her heart and mind for anything but sadness right now, but I also knew we had to dwell on hope and find new strength.

While Mommy got ready to return to the hospital, Daddy returned the phone calls of friends and business acquaintances who had been inquiring about Pierre's condition. Afterward we drove to the hospital.

The three of us stood around Pierre's bed gazing down at him in silence. Mommy choked back a sob and sat beside the bed to hold his hand and talk to him softly. She left his bedside only to eat some lunch, and only at Daddy's and my insistence.

There was a great deal of pressure building on Daddy, too. He had business problems and tried to handle them over the telephone, but some things required his presence.

I told him it made no sense for all three of us to hover around Pierre's bed. He finally agreed and had a driver pick him up in a limousine to take him to some business meetings. I sat with Mommy and spoke with Pierre's nurse, Mrs. Lochet, a pleasant woman in her late fifties with short, thick gray hair and light blue eyes. Afterward I met Sophie for coffee in the cafeteria. I told her I had informed the hospital I wouldn't be able to return to work.

"My parents need me at home right now," I explained. She was sad about it, but I assured her we would always be friends.

"Maybe when you become a doctor, I can come work for you," she suggested.

"There's no one I'd rather have at my side while I tend to patients," I told her.

When I went back to Pierre's room, I found that Mommy had fallen asleep in her chair. The nurse and I gazed at each other and stepped outside the room to talk so Mommy could sleep.

"Have you ever seen a patient like Pierre improve?" I asked her.