Keep You (33 page)

             
Wooden signs indicated that staff should continue around the side of the building, patient drop-offs and ambulances should proceed to the portico, and visitors could park in a small, shaded lot to the right. The pavement was littered with bird droppings and when Jo climbed out of her Mustang, she could hear the cardinals and finches twittering above her.

             
She stared up at the building for a long moment, leaning against her car, well aware that there was no way to undo this visit. She felt oily, like she was betraying Tam somehow. But she gathered the flowers she’d brought and started up the sidewalk. Betrayal or not, it was important to her that he know she couldn’t be scared off.

             
The interior of what had once been a narrow, choppy house had been retrofitted. Double red front doors were wide enough for a gurney or wheelchair, the foyer had been opened up into a small sitting room, a pamphlet stand on a side table offering information about the services offered. Some of the original finishings had been preserved: the hardwood floors, the crown moldings and footboards, the window transoms. But there was no mistaking this for a medical facility. The aromatic cocktail of disinfectant and disease was pungent, and the soft music floating from hidden speakers couldn’t make it any less clinical.

             
What had once been a parlor or sitting room was now an office, the staff inside shielded behind a counter and sliding Plexiglas window. The woman sitting on the other side of it was heavyset and stern-looking, her hair military short, a frown stamped across her face as she studied her computer screen. Her eyes flicked disinterestedly to Jo when she propped her elbows on the counter. “Help you?”

             
Charming
. “I’m here to visit someone, but I’m not on any kind of list of approved visitors or anything.” She chewed at her lip, knowing how pathetic she sounded.

             
The receptionist gave her a withering look. “Name of patient?”

             
“Melinda Wales.”

             
Her fingers flew over the keyboard. “Your name?”

             
“Joanna Walker. Like I said, I know I’m not - ”

             
“Any relation to Elizabeth Walker?”

             
Jo blinked. “That’s my mom.”

             
“You got any way to verify that?”

             
“Um…”

             
“Wait over there,” she said with a sigh like her world was full of idiots and maybe she should just accept it already. “I’ll have one of the nurses walk you back.”

             
Thankfully, the nurse was nothing like the reception staff. Maria Sylva was a short, plump Latina who somehow carried herself like a ballet dancer. She swayed as she walked, humming with energy, talking animatedly with her hands as she stepped onto an elevator at the back of the “house” and waved for Jo to join her.

             
“Your mother’s such a nice lady,” she said as she pressed the button for two and the doors slid shut in front of them. “She stops by after work sometimes. But” - her little brown eyes were twinkling beneath a dark fringe of bangs - “never when Tameron’s here. Bless him, the boy is so proud, I don’t think he’d want your
madre
seeing him here.”

             
Not when he’s vulnerable
, Jo thought, swallowing hard. “He probably wouldn’t want me here either.”

             
Maria gave her a sideways glance as the elevator dinged to a halt and the doors whispered open. “Wanting is not needing. He takes on too much by himself and I keep telling him he needs to do something for himself now and then.”

             
Jo nodded and followed her out into a sterile white hall that been dressed with mediocre impressionist art and a grapevine wallpaper border. Her mind was doing somersaults as it tried to catch up to the idea that here was someone who, in this aspect of his life, knew Tam better than she did. It was jarring. As long as she’d known him, as much as she loved him, and here was a mother she’d never known was sick and a nurse telling her what Tam needed. She felt like a stranger, walking down a make-believe hall in someone else’s dream sequence.             

             
“Here we go,” Maria said as they reached a door hung with charts and clipboards, a laminated calendar on the wall beside it. A chicken-wire reinforced window allowed the nurse a peek into the room, then she nodded and pressed the handle, sweeping the door open and rustling air that reeked of medicine and illness. “
Hola
, Melinda,” she called in a sing-song voice. “I brought you a visitor.”

             
Which Jo knew was her cue to enter. One last cold shiver of trepidation tickled down her spine, but then she took a deep breath, stole herself against whatever she was about to see, and stepped in.

             
It was a small room, the headboard of the bed set up against the left hand wall. A series of plastic cabinets, a sink and a biohazard disposal box – standard issue in any hospital exam room- ran along the front wall. A dressing table, a bundle of brittle, dead roses on top of it, and several plastic chairs had been crammed in as well. Vertical blinds over the window were cracked open and clapped together as the AC pushed them around. A painting of sailboats in a harbor was hung above the bed. A TV was mounted up in the corner.

             
Jo looked at everything, took in every gray fleck of the floor tiles and every clinging strand of spider web on the outside of the window, and then she looked at Melinda. The bed was elevated, the pillows stacked high, and it looked like that was the only thing that had her upright. She had no meat, no muscle or fat; she was yellowed, papery skin stretched so tight over bones it looked like she might tear. She was so translucent, Jo swore the white sheen along the high ridges of her cheekbones was the actual bone showing through. Her fleshless body was swallowed by a sweater and robe, her blankets piled high, her shape not even visible beneath them. One sleeve was pushed up and IV tubes snaked down across the covers from her elbow, attaching her to an assortment of fluid bags strung up on a pole beside the bed. Skeletal, blue-veined hands clenched and relaxed on the blanket in what seemed to be a reflexive move. Her head was swathed in a violet and indigo striped scarf to cover her baldness. A wheezing, rattling sound was sweeping through the room and Jo realized that was the sound of Melinda breathing. Or trying to. No eyebrows, her face lined and puckered…she didn’t even look human.

             
In what seemed to be a Herculean effort, Melinda lifted her chin, struggling against the oxygen tubes in her nostrils, and picked her eyes up to meet Jo’s.

             
It was the eyes that did it. Those blue, blue, fathoms-deep eyes that had been smiling at Jo for so many years. Melinda had given them to her son. And suddenly Jo could see what she’d been before her body had been ravaged by disease. Like a forensic pathologist using bone structure to construct a lost face, Jo’s eyes filled in the sunken cheeks and smoothed her skin, added layers of youth and flesh, long dark lashes and a luscious mane of almost-black hair, glossy-sleek beneath the lights. And then Melinda was not a corpse in a bed. She was Tam’s mother, and Jo felt the backs of her eyes start to burn.

             
Maria bustled around the bed, checked the flashing light board of monitors, nodded to herself, and started back for the door. “I’ll be back in a bit to check on you, Melinda.”

             
The door shut with a soft click and then they were alone. Jo was terrified.

             
She took a hesitant step forward, palms clammy on the ceramic bud vase she’d carried in. Not knowing how much room there would be for flowers, she’d brought three white roses, and suddenly wished she’d brought two dozen. “Hi, Mrs. Wales,” she began, taking another tentative step. Melinda’s breath wheezed in and out of her. “I’m Jo. Joanna Walker. I, um,” another step, “I know you and I have never met, but I’m Beth’s daughter. Tam and I are - ”

             
“Joey.” Her voice was such a soft little scraping sound that Jo held her breath, not sure she’d heard correctly. Melinda lifted a shaking, claw-like hand and coughed into it, her lungs making wet, smacking sounds. “Joey,” she said again, when she could, her voice stronger. Her lips twisted and Jo realized she was smiling. “That’s what he…calls you. You’re…Tam’s Joey. He…talks about you…all the…time.” The smile widened. “He was right…about how…pretty you are.”

             
“Oh my God,” Jo whispered. Her chest was suddenly so tight it was difficult to breathe.

             
“I always…wanted him to…bring you…to see me.” A cough racked through her and threatened to shatter her. “Worried,” she wheezed. “He’s so worried, though…all the time. My poor…sweet boy.”

             
Trepidation abandoning her, Jo pulled one of the plastic chairs away from the wall and towed it over to the bed, sitting right at Melinda’s elbow so she wouldn’t have to strain to be heard. “I…” God, what did she even say? “I’m so glad I’m getting to meet you finally.”

             
“He didn’t tell you…did he?”

             
“No. No, I’m sorry, he didn’t.”

             
It looked like rolling her head on the pillow might take the last of her waning strength. Her blue, Tam-eyes blinked slowly. “Shame. Such a…shame. We would…have…got on…well.”

             
“I’m sure we would,” Jo said, and had no idea if it was true, but was struck with a heavy sadness because she would never know. She would never sit snapping green beans into a bowl at a dinner table with Tam’s vivacious mother, the two of them gossiping about him, Tam rolling his eyes and feigning embarrassment. How many times had she allowed herself those curiosities? Those secret, terribly domestic fantasies. They were an impossibility now.

             
“Your mother,” Melinda breathed, “so…kind. So good…to my Tameron. All of you…your family.” Tears filled her eyes, but didn’t fall. “I wanted a chance…so glad I get to…say thank you…in person.”

             
The stinging in her own eyes was becoming unbearable. “It was never an effort, ma’am. We all love Tam. He’s always been family.”

             
“So glad,” Melinda repeated. “He needs a real…family. He…could never…forgive his…father. And I just wish he…could be happy.”

             
Jo couldn’t respond, her throat tightening.

             
“He should…have children. He should…” her glistening eyes locked on Jo’s and there was no mistaking, terminal weakness or no, that the words were spoken directly to her, a specific message, and not an abstract want. “Get married. Such a…sweet boy. He can’t…love his father. And I’m…” she coughed. “He should be happy.”

             
Jo nodded.

             
“You have…my ruby?”

             
Jo was going to need to lie down if the shockwaves kept coming. “He said it was a family heirloom.”

             
Melinda sighed and it was an oddly happy sound. Her flat chest became concave. Her eyelids fluttered and her smile stretched, pulling at her shrunken face. “Somewhere safe…he said. We had to keep it somewhere safe. It’s been…in my family for a hundred years…passed down to…the daughters.” Another coughing fit gripped her and Jo reached, hand shaking, not sure what she should even do. Melinda’s fingers caught at hers – they felt like a bundle of twigs – but they held strong, and Jo covered them with her other hand, resting them on top of the blankets. “It’s yours,” Melinda wheezed. “The ruby…it was for…Tam’s…wife…”

             
Jo’s chest and throat and eyes ached. She squeezed Melinda’s fingers as she coughed. “Maybe you should rest a bit,” she suggested gently. “Don’t tire yourself.”

             
“Oh, I…” Her hands went limp. Her birdcage chest worked. “Yes. Rest. I need a rest.” Then her eyes widened, liquid and far away. “You won’t…leave, will you?”

             
“No,” Jo said automatically. “I’ll sit right here.”

             
“Good…good.” Her breathing was more shallow and soft than that of a newborn. “The ruby.” Her voice was just a whisper. “Is yours. Please…”

             
“I’ll take good care of it,” Jo promised. She spoke in a hushed voice, like she was afraid being too loud might crumble the woman to dust.

             
“Tameron.” Melinda’s head rustled on the pillow. Her face was pale as death, but her eyes shone. “Take care of him. Do you love him?”

             
“So much.”

             
Her eyelids flagged, relief smoothing some of the harshness of her gaunt features. “Take care…of him.” Her breath hitched, then evened, the rhythm as soft as a pulsing ceiling fan, and she was asleep.

             
Jo cradled the brittle hand between both of hers. The pulse that thumped against her fingertips was just a ghostly murmur. Her eyes moved across the bed to the small, rolling metal nightstand where a lamp and a single framed photo stood. Even from a distance, she could tell the child on the swing set was Tam, just a little boy, the sun painting white shadows on his dark, glossy head. In the picture, Melinda was maybe thirty, blue-eyed and laughing and gorgeous, her skin porcelain, cheeks touched with pink, her hair a lustrous black tangle caught up in the wind. She was wearing a cheap blue t-shirt and acid wash jeans, Keds. Tam had a big hole in the knee of his jeans and his sneakers were grubby. But they were smiling. Jo wondered who had taken the picture, if maybe Hank Wales had loved his family just a little bit before alcohol had wrecked him and turned him into a monster who would do willing harm to either of the two people in the photo.