In the Time of Kings (9 page)

Her voice is as faint as a memory. “Someday you’ll understand, Ross.”

The white sheets crinkle as I lean against the edge of the hospital bed, trying to get closer so I can hear her better. “Understand what?”

“Him.”

She’s full of painkillers. It’s just the drugs talking.

She winces, grasping my hand with amazing strength, as if to anchor herself in the here and now. I turn to call a nurse, but she grips my hand harder still. “Maybe someday you’ll even ... forgive him.”

Not a chance in hell.

The pillow seems to swallow her head as she tips her chin up to gaze at the plain white ceiling. “We all have a past. Some people just can’t let go of it.”

I say nothing, but she goes on.

“Ross ... there’s something you should know. Your father had plans. He wanted to go to college, make something of himself. But then, well, I told him I was pregnant with you and he gave that all up to take care of us.”

So he had to go to work instead of school. Big deal. And that’s my fault how, exactly? I can’t tell her I’ll forgive him. How can I? I’ll never feel anything but anger from him. Anger delivered without cause or reason. I’m just a kid, barely sixteen. What have I ever done to deserve the harsh words, the quick criticisms? What has my mom done, for that matter? She’s as kind a soul as anyone on the planet. She’s the only family I have. My grandparents all passed away long ago. There’s one uncle in Florida, my mom’s brother who is a globe-trekking nature photographer, but there’s never been more than the occasional postcard from him and even those have tapered off over the years. I’ll get through this. I’ll survive. But forgive? Not in a million years.

She reaches for a piece of paper on her bedside table. I hand it to her, but she pushes it back at me.

“Those are your ancestors,” she says. “I thought you might want to know about them some day.”

I unfold the paper. Towards the bottom, I recognize my grandfather and grandmother’s names, my mom’s parents, but there are many other lines branching upward and long ago dates underneath them. My father’s side of the family tree only goes back four generations. I fold it back up and put it in my pocket.

The machines beside the bed hum, the red numbers on the displays fluctuating at random intervals. I pat her forearm lightly. It’s all I can do. She’s too frail to hug.

Tears choke my throat. I’ve held them off for so long, trying to be brave, to believe she’ll kick cancer’s ass, but I’m finally coming to the same terrifying realization that she has. She’s going to leave me. Go off to a better place. “Mom, I —”

Shoes squeak in the corridor. A growly voice rumbles from the doorway. “Time for you to go home, boy. Let your mother rest. Nothing you can do for her.”

I want to tell him what an insensitive bastard he is, but I can’t, not in front of her. Leaning in close, I whisper to her, “I love you, Mom. More than anything. I always will.”

HERE & NOW

Berwick, Scotland — 2013

D
r. Nehru’s words dart around my head like fluttering moths.

“It took a few tests to determine the precise cause of her condition, but we did an MRI and we’re now certain it’s a case of Cerebral Venous Thrombosis, or CVT. Basically, that means she —”

“She has a blood clot in her brain,” I say.

I have been directed to take a seat in a quiet hallway. Judging by the machinery visible through one open doorway, this wing is where they keep the more serious cases.

“Yes.” The doctor slides her glasses to the tip of her nose and peers over them at me. There’s something consoling in her look and I gather there are more details to come — not necessarily good ones. “Unfortunately, the occlusion, meaning the —”

“Blockage.” I have a PhD in Biology, for Pete’s sake. I’m not going to let her go on talking to me like a fifth grader from backwoods Appalachia.

“Yes, the occlusion is in her sinuses. It has created some complications, primarily vasogenic edema. We’re trying to get it under control, but there’s already some intracranial pressure.”

It’s like someone has kicked me in the gut with a steel-toed boot. Claire’s brain is swelling. I thunk the back of my head against the wall. How could I have left her alone this morning? I should have taken her to a doctor right away. Maybe they would have caught this sooner, prevented the worst?

Drawing a clipboard from underneath her arm, Dr. Nehru clicks her pen and scribbles a few words at the top of the paper. “Can you tell me what symptoms she’s had recently, even as much as a week or two before this? Anything at all.”

“She woke up this morning with a killer headache, but she has those sometimes.”

“Any difficulties with motor control or vision problems?”

“No.”

“Did she seem light-sensitive?”

“Yeah, I guess so.” I don’t mention the shot of Glenfiddich.

“Nausea?”

I nod. “She threw up a couple times. Said she felt better after that and just wanted to sleep.”

“This was all this morning, correct? Anything prior to that?”

I think hard. “A slight earache a few days ago.”

“Ah, that helps.” She writes furiously, flips the page over and writes some more. “Sometimes the initial symptoms are very vague.”

“So ... is this like a stroke, then?”

“You could call it that, but stroke is a very broad term.”

“But how? How does a woman who’s not even thirty have a stroke?”

“They can stem from a variety of causes: infection, medication, genetic disorders. It’s not uncommon for women in her condition, but it is quite rare in the first trimester.”

Trimester?

Tucking my head down, I clamp both hands over my stomach.

Dr. Nehru must sense my shock, because she stops writing. “I’m sorry. You didn’t know?”

Three months ago, Claire had quit taking the pill and switched to other contraceptives. We were both in agreement that we wanted to start a family sooner, rather than later. Too many couples in their thirties, even forties, that we’d known were trying for their first and had a difficult time conceiving. Claire had said she’d wanted to have kids while she was still young, so she could keep up with them and later enjoy her grandkids before she had to resort to a walker. It made sense to me, although I did enjoy the thought of having her to myself for a year or so before we had to trade feeding duties for a colicky infant.

“No, I didn’t. Actually, I don’t think she knew.” Or had she? She’d been unusually quiet on the way back from the Orkneys. No, she wouldn’t have had the one shot of Glenfiddich if she’d even suspected she was pregnant. Claire isn’t reckless that way.

I hear the click of a pen again and feel Dr. Nehru’s reassuring hand on my shoulder.

“Mr. Sinclair,” she begins, “I know this complicates her situation, but we’re going to give her the best care possible. First and foremost, we have to find a way to relieve the pressure on her brain.”

“Is the baby at risk?”

She withdraws her hand. “The fetus is six weeks, at most. It’s at a very delicate stage. If the pregnancy was further along and the baby was in distress of any kind, we could do a C-section, but obviously it’s far too early for that. Right now, we need to make sure your wife has every chance of survival.”

The words ricochet around in my head like a steel ball in a pinball machine.
Chance of survival
...

“You mean ... she could die?” From a headache. A headache brought on by a tiny blockage in a blood vessel. Just like that.

“Survival in these cases runs about 90%, so chances are good she’ll pull through. However, the more time that passes, the lower those chances are. Every day matters.”

I nod to let her know I understand. I can far from accept what’s happening, though. Only last night we had laughed till the early hours of the morning with the locals at The Finch and the Frog in Aberbeg. On the walk home, we’d talked of our trip, how wonderful it had been, and then of our future plans: the vegetable garden, Claire buying out the dental practice, me getting tenure, whether to repaint the kitchen cabinets and gut the 1950’s bathrooms or save our money for a new house.

Our perfectly laid out future is dissolving like a sand castle being washed away by the tide.

Laying the clipboard on the floor, the doctor sits next to me.

“We’ll have to administer medication to reduce the edema and minimize the possibility of brain damage. If that’s not effective, then we may have to perform surgery. Of course, that increases the risk to the fetus, so we’ll try to avoid it at all costs. I’ll keep you informed at every step. Meanwhile, are there relatives you’d like to call? I know you’re a long way from home, but if she has family, they might want to be here with her.”

Her implication hits me brutally hard. Suddenly, all those things like tenure and decrepit old cabinets don’t matter. All I want is to know that Claire’s going to be okay — and hopefully our baby.

“Her mom had surgery recently. I don’t think her parents can travel yet. But I’ll call her brother.” Lacing my fingers together, I exhale the breath I’ve been holding for what seems like minutes. “Can I see her first?”

She rises and gives me her hand. “Of course you can. Come with me.”

––––––––

S
erene. That’s the best way to describe her. Snow White in her hundred years sleep. Her head rests on a pillow of crisp white linen. A sheet and a thin blanket are tucked tight around her, swaddling her like an infant. Both arms lie atop the blanket, the tubes and wires attached to her snaking back toward their respective devices.

I kiss her cheek. It’s surprisingly warm. Then again, what had I expected? She’s still very much alive. Just not awake. Not completely here.

The rustle of Dr. Nehru’s scrubs whisper from the doorway where she lingers. She rattles off a few more facts about Claire’s condition and her prognosis. I may have nodded, mumbled okay — I honestly don’t remember. All I can think of is how much I miss Claire’s mischievous eyes, the way she crinkles her nose when joking, the bubbly excitement in her voice over the smallest of things, like when her favorite song comes on the radio and she’ll start singing at the top of her lungs. She’s a terrible singer, but I’d give anything to hear her off-key warbling at this moment. Anything.

For almost an hour I sit beside her in a stupor, sure I’ll awaken from this nightmare at any moment to find myself back in bed at Dermot’s, my arm wrapped around my sleeping wife. I stroke her bangs from her forehead, touch my fingertips to her lips, then at last curl my hand around hers, waiting for her to squeeze back, to let me know she’s still with me.

Finally, I tug my phone from my front pocket, thumb through the contacts, find her brother Parker and hit ‘Send’.

“Parker? It’s me, Ross.”

“Ross! How the hell are you? Lucky you. You caught me before bed. It was a looong day in court, but we nailed the greedy suckers. They’re going to lose
everything
.” He laughs, taking delight in someone else’s downfall. “Bet you two are having the time of your lives. Hey, put Claire on the phone, will you?”

“I can’t. I ... You ...” My mind goes momentarily blank. The hope that this is only a bad dream vanishes with the reality of having to say her condition aloud.

“Ross, what is it? Is something wrong with Claire?” His voice abruptly turns from cheerful to accusatory. Four years older than Claire, Parker had always been protective of her. We get along well enough, but I’ve always gotten the vibe from him that I’m not quite good enough for his little sister.

My eyes wander to the medical paraphernalia surrounding Claire: the monitors, the IV drip, the hospital bed with its chrome railing, the long rectangular box on the wall behind her bed that emits a blue fluorescent glow at all hours.

This is real. It
is
happening. I have to deal with it. And I can’t do it alone.

“Parker, you need to get on the next flight here.”

HERE & NOW

Berwick, Scotland — 2013

D
ays float by in a cottony haze. My thoughts churn as slowly as if I’ve just awoken from an anesthetic cloud. I’ve never felt as completely drained of energy and will and feeling as I do now.

Every night I sit in the chair tucked in a corner of the hospital room, watching Claire’s chest expand and fall, expand and fall, the muted TV flickering on the wall above me. I haven’t slept more than two hours straight since they admitted her. I’d even forgotten to eat most days, only pushing food in my mouth and swallowing tasteless bites when Parker insisted. It’s my job to watch over her. But with every day that passes without improvement in Claire’s condition, my hope dies a little more.

The door handle clicks and I startle awake. Parker strides in, somber but fresh-faced. He’d arrived less than twelve hours after I phoned him. The guy may be a snob, but he’s a good brother to Claire. We’ve taken to exchanging shifts, but I seldom leave the hospital, afraid of being too far away if she wakes up. I want to be the first one she sees when she opens her eyes, so she’ll know I love her too much to leave her.

“Hey,” Parker says, coming toward me. He tugs on the cord of the blinds and sunlight invades. “You look like something the cat vomited up.”

“And a bonny frickin’ morning to you, too.” I yank the blanket over my face and slouch further down in my chair. By now, I have a permanent kink in my back and neck from sleeping in weird positions. By contrast, Parker has moved quarters from my bed at Dermot’s B&B to a posher hotel just a few blocks away, where he makes sure he gets his eight hours of sleep every night.

The problem with being here all the time is that I startle at every little sound, thinking the doctor is coming in with breaking news or that Claire is stirring. But neither ever happens. Claire never opens her eyes. The doctors never have anything new to say. Maybe if I follow his lead, get some real rest, I won’t be such a wreck. As it is, I can’t even think straight. I inch the blanket lower, letting the light in slowly until my eyes adjust.

Parker cuffs me on the shoulder so hard my chair tips. “Ross, you look like hell. Really. Do yourself a favor. Go back to your own room. Take a shower, get some sleep, sit down to a real meal, and then go for a refreshing walk. I’ll call you if anything happens, okay?”