Brooke slid her hip against the lower part of the chair’s right armrest and tried to get comfortable. Her sleep had become nothing more than a series of interrupted dozes, each loaded with its own dream sequence where none of this had ever happened. Each of the dreams took her to places like Lakeside Metropark, where Alex and his full head of bright-red hair swung daringly on the swings, or to Church Road, where a healthy and vibrant Alex—a boy with a spark—threw rocks at invisible monsters. Other times the dreams would allow her to watch as Alex played with Charlie behind the church or irritated everyone by accidentally resetting the TV remote control in the basement. Regardless, the dreams were nothing more than teases, disappointingly dashed when she woke up to reality.
Invisible monster? she thought, lifting her head and glancing at Alex over the bed’s side rail. Keep fighting it, buddy.
She lowered her head again and peeked back at Pastor Jim as he flipped through the tiny Bible. He put it back in his pocket, stood up, and lowered his head while stretching his arm out over the end of the bed toward Alex. He began to say the Lord’s Prayer, and the tranquility of his voice made Brooke sleepier.
Her eyes fell closed again. She was back at the Metropark and could see a flock of geese flying over her head. They now seemed dark and were practically flying in slow motion.
“Hallowed be thy name . . .”
The lake was like black glass. It was perfectly still except for the reflections of the three geese as they headed toward Canada. Three? There were just twenty or thirty of them. And where did Carla go? Wasn’t Carla just there?
She kept walking, and Pastor Jim kept praying. She could hear his voice like a narrator in a movie.
“Thy kingdom come . . .”
She continued to walk down the shore. The sand felt like cool flour between her toes, and the only thing she could hear were the sounds of her own breath and heart. She looked up the bank and then up the hill to where Charlie had just picked Alex up out of the leaf pile. They weren’t there. There were no leaves, no more swing sets, no more playground. It was all gone.
“Thy will be done . . .”
She could hear something. It was coming from above her. It was faint, and it had a pulse. Little flashes of light behind the solid gray sky beckoned her. She looked farther down the shoreline. Someone was standing there, waiting for her. It was a man.
She walked toward him. With each step the pulse grew stronger. Its buzz became louder and more pronounced. It was an old man—a very old man with a beard and shiny white hair. He was holding something.
She kept walking, and the buzz got louder with each step she took. But she kept going, knowing that whatever the old man was holding, she wanted it. It was the reason she was there. It was why they were there.
She was no more than twenty feet from the old man when she stopped. Something about him looked familiar. She felt comfortable, as if she knew him, as if she’d always known him. She knew he wanted to show her something.
He turned his head toward the sky and pointed with his left hand. That light in the sky grew brighter and flashed in perfect unison with each pulse of the vibrating noise, the noise that now came in hollow booms, outwardly warning her of something. She closed her eyes and covered her ears. The noise was unbearable.
And then it stopped.
She opened her eyes, and the old man was smiling at her. Yes, it was a familiar smile—a smile that told her everything was all right. It told her that everything was going to be okay.
The old man lifted his arms straight out in front of him. In his hands was the doll. The doll from the lake.
It was brand-new.
Both of its eyes were glassy and bright, and its thick red hair shined. The man held it out a little farther, offering it to her, and Brooke stepped forward.
The buzzing sound was back and grew louder and louder . . .
Brooke’s head slid off the armrest, and she sprang up in her chair. Kaitlyn was hitting a switch that killed an alarm at the other side of the bed. The nurse then removed something that was attached to Alex’s finger and thumbed at another button on a machine next to Alex’s IV bag. Kaitlyn immediately wrapped a Velcro cuff around Alex’s small arm and began to take his blood pressure manually.
“What’s wrong?” Brooke asked, gripping the sides of the seat and questioning herself as to whether this was real or yet another bizarre dream.
“Alexander was sleeping, and that alarm went off,” Pastor Jim said, looking stricken. He was on his feet.
Diane appeared from behind the curtain and gestured to Brooke. “Brooke, I need you back here for a minute.”
“What’s wrong?” Brooke said. “Why are you doing that, Kaitlyn?”
“Diane, call the code,” Kaitlyn said sternly, beginning chest compressions on Alex.
“What’s happening?” Brooke asked again, her mouth dry. She tried to move closer to Alex before being held back by Pastor Jim. “Why are you doing that? Is he breathing?”
Macey and two other people rushed into the room and took their places beside the bed.
“I’ll take the lead,” the tallest one said.
Brooke cringed. The lead of what?
“Brooke, Pastor, please come with me,” Diane beckoned again.
“No!” Brooke said. “Tell me what happened!”
“Brooke, you gotta let us do our job,” Kaitlyn said.
Pastor Jim grabbed Brooke and pulled her out of the room as the code team continued working on Alex.
And as the door finally closed, the last thing Brooke saw was the expression on Macey’s face.
It wasn’t good.
FORTY-SIX
Just under an hour had passed before they could hear the monotone hum of muffled voices behind the door.
Ian stopped pacing.
Brooke lifted her head off Carla’s shoulder.
Pastor Jim opened his eyes and stood up, away from the wall where he’d been leaning.
When the latch finally clicked open, they watched as the youngest of the nurses pushed the door all the way open and then held it against the wall. Diane was next, slowly backing out and pulling at the foot of a gurney while the tall one at the far end stared straight ahead and pushed forward.
“Alex,” Brooke said, rising. Ian stood next to her as the team wheeled him by. He’d been stripped of his Spider-Man pajama top and was flat on his back, with his arms motionless at his sides. Two other members from the code team flanked the gurney, one of them managing a pair of IVs, and the other holding and squeezing one of those breathing bags Brooke had seen on television over Alex’s face.
Macey was right behind them and waved to Ian and Brooke. “You two only. C’mon.”
“We’ll be in the waiting room,” Carla called as Brooke hurried to catch up with Ian, who was already right behind Macey.
“Where are you taking him?” Ian asked.
“We’re going up to the ICU,” Macey said, her voice now that of someone on a mission. They paused at the thick, gray doors that led out of the BMT unit and waited for them to open.
Brooke turned around and looked at Pastor Jim.
No doubts, Pastor Jim?
He nodded as if he could hear her, and Brooke turned and followed Alex and the team out.
They stopped in front of an elevator marked AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. Brooke stared at it, anxious to look at anything but Alex, looking like he was still battling for his life as the nurse squeezed, and squeezed, and squeezed the bag . . .
Macey took Brooke by the arm and then grabbed Ian’s, leading them into the elevator first, and over to the corner, out of the way. “When we get up there, you guys are going to have to wait a little longer until they get him situated. I’ll come right out and sit with you in the waiting room to go over all that’s happened.”
The tall nurse pressed 4 on the first row of numbers, and the doors closed. The elevator was uncomfortably quiet, with the exception of the puffing sound that came from the bag over Alex’s face. Broo
ke’s boat of confidence was taking in water, and she could tell by the way Ian was looking at the gurney that his was too.
She forced herself to glance down at the side of Alex’s face, which had been practically consumed by the mask. His small jawline was more pronounced than ever, and she reached her hand out, because his little eyelids looked so pink and were—
“Please don’t touch him, Miss Thomas,” the tall nurse said, causing Brooke to pull her hand back as if she had grazed the side of a hot stove. The nurse gave her an apologetic smile. “It’s good for him to hear you, though.” She gestured forward. “Please say something to him.”
Brooke swallowed hard. “Alex, baby, I’m here,” she said. “So’s your dad.” She felt like she was talking to a picture of Alex. What was before her wasn’t her son, not her vibrant, bouncy boy . . .
Ian brushed away a tear like he hoped no one saw it. “Hey, partner. You gotta get better so we can go shop for that bike you want.”
The elevator door opened, and they swung a right and made it past a nurses’ station that Brooke guessed was three times bigger than the one down on the third floor, with nurses who disappeared behind banks of computers. The code team led them to another corridor, obviously knowing exactly what room they were headed to.
Macey slowed down and then pointed to a crowded waiting room. “Please wait in there. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Brooke watched the gurney make its way down the hall. Ian was already sitting in the waiting room and had his head tilted back with his hands over his eyes. She went in and sat next to him, and he glanced over at her.
“You okay?” he asked.
“It’s almost like this isn’t really happening,” she said, absorbing the tension reserved specifically for ICU waiting rooms. It was as if the twenty to thirty people in there simultaneously realized that their priorities had always been out of order. “How about you?”
“It’s like the worst nightmare I’ve ever had. It won’t end, and it keeps getting worse.”
“He’s going to get better,” Brooke said, trying to stop hyperventilating. “He has to.”
“He will,” Ian said. But Brooke thought he sounded only half sure.
Macey entered the room and pulled up a folding chair to sit in front of them. “Only a few more minutes until you can see him, you guys.”
“What happened, Macey?” Brooke asked.
She licked her lips and then looked them both in the eye. “Alex quit breathing.”
A shiver ran down Brooke’s back. He quit breathing? As in, never to begin breathing again?
“Is he going to be all right?” Ian asked, his voice faint.
“We’re doing everything we can,” Macey said. “Now we just have to wait.”
Brooke felt light-headed. The words sounded powerless. Doing everything we can. As in, there’s nothing else we can do. It’s up to somebody else. Somebody else.
A nurse showed up at the waiting room door. She pointed at Brooke and Ian, and Macey nodded back.
“Ah, here’s Alex’s new nurse,” Macey said. “The intensive care unit has its own nurses, and she’s one of our best.”
“Hello,” the nurse said, holding out her hand. “I’m Talia.” Her Indian-brown hair was pulled off her forehead and wrapped neatly into a shoulder-length ponytail. The resilient look in her dark brown eyes and the firmness in her handshake let Brooke know that it was all about business on this floor and that Talia had the confidence it took to be up here.
Which was fine with Brooke.
“Listen, Mom and Dad,” the nurse said. She lowered her voice so only the three of them could hear her. “Before we go back, I want you to prepare yourselves, okay?”
“For what?” Ian asked.
“First of all, Alex is unconscious, and he’s on a ventilator, so you’re going to see a tube in his mouth. Beyond that, there are a few different machines that help us monitor him, so you’re going to see wires running in all different directions. It can be tough seeing your son this way. Don’t let it alarm you, and try to keep in mind that all of these things are necessary, all right?”
Brooke looked at Ian and then at Talia. “Okay.”
“Do we know when he will wake up?” Ian asked, nervously glancing at Brooke as he waited for the answer.
He doesn’t know, Brooke thought, a shred of panic sliding down her throat. Ian really doesn’t know whether or not Alex will be okay.
“We don’t know that,” the nurse said. “But I will be here with you all night.” She smiled confidently.
“Why don’t we head back?” Macey said.
Talia led them down the hallway, and Brooke tried to figure out exactly what it was about open hospital room doors that made her want to look in them. They were like eye magnets, and when she did look, it almost always seemed like someone was looking right back at her.
They went through another set of thick double doors beneath a sign that read CORRIDOR C, signaling to Brooke that Alex was once again in some type of isolation. The nurse took them into another room, where they all put on their masks, gloves, and surgical caps, confirming Brooke’s suspicion. They walked down to yet another room that had the block letters CUBE with the number 9 attached to the door. The nurse opened that door, and they all went in.
There was a bathroom to their immediate left, followed by eight to ten feet of solid beige wall, and then a thin white curtain— not unlike the room he had just left. Talia pulled the curtain back, and they saw Alex lying there.
Ian gasped.
“Oh, buddy,” Brooke whispered as thousands of tiny pinpoints danced nervously across the lining of her stomach.
The back portion of the bed had been slightly elevated, giving the impression that Alex was sitting up. His head was perfectly still and cocked back at what looked like an uncomfortable angle. Just looking at the tube that his mouth was taped around made Brooke want to gag. Alex’s thin, bare chest was crisscrossed with more tape, which held down countless wires that tailed off toward machines to his left. His right arm was tucked under the sheet, and his left arm was draped off to his side. His little legs stuck out at forty-five-degree angles from under the blanket as tiny drops of urine skittered slowly through a catheter into a drainage bag on the side of the bed.
Despite Talia’s words of warning, it was still too much.
Ian stepped in front of Brooke, blocking her view. He slowly turned around and looked at her. She recognized the hollow helplessness in his eyes. You are helpless, she thought. And so am I.
“Come on,” Macey said softly, inviting them to sit down.
“There are chairs over there,” Talia said, pointing toward the side of the bed.
“Talia, I’m going to stay here with them for a bit,” Macey said.
“Okay,” Talia said. “I’ll be back shortly.”
Brooke firmly gripped the armrests and looked at the white piece of tape stretched across the top of Alex’s tiny right hand. My buddy’s little hand. Brooke wondered how many times she’d gone into the basement with a wet paper towel and found Alex sleeping. It was that same little hand she’d lifted and wiped clean of Cheetos, popcorn butter, melted chocolate, or anything else he’d eaten while watching TV. It was the same little hand he held up to her last summer as Charlie carried him, running across the front yard toward the house, the swell of a bee sting forming a tiny red mound between his two little knuckles. He’d howled at her, tears racing down his face, wanting her to please fix it, to please make it all better, to please make the stinging stop . . .
How many other times had she bandaged and soothed that little hand?
Now she couldn’t help. There was nothing she could do.
Brooke looked back to Alex’s small face and knew that he was somewhere in there, quietly crying for her to come, wanting her to somehow help him—to make him better. To please make it all go away.
The sickening feeling of helplessness throbbed between her chest and stomach. She closed her eyes and thought o
f the look Pastor Jim had just given her downstairs. And then she remembered his words.
It’s what he wanted her to do.
It’s all she could do.
Only believe.
FORTY-SEVEN
The Lindys and Carla reluctantly went home when it was apparent that nothing immediate was going to happen, but they’d been sitting at the house for nearly six hours, staring at a plate of untouched cookies and drinking Jim’s especially strong coffee, as if they’d set up their own waiting room. Intermittently, they prayed. They were hoping for something that even resembled favorable news in the periodic updates they were getting from both Ian and Brooke.
So far, good things were not coming to those who waited.
“What did she say?” Jim asked, tilting forward on the La-Z-Boy when Shirley came back from answering the phone.
Shirley sat on the couch, and Carla joined her. As Jim awaited Shirley’s answer, he could sense a tiny bubble of hope that fluttered invisibly around the room, bouncing back and forth between his unwavering faith that Alex would be made well and Carla’s increasing conviction that things were getting progressively worse.
“The same thing,” Shirley said. “She said the same thing that she told you an hour ago.”
“Alex still hasn’t woken up?”
“He hasn’t moved an inch on that bed.”
“Did the new nurse say anything? What are the doctors saying?”
“Macey just left,” Shirley said, removing her glasses and gently rubbing her eyes. “She’s been there this whole time and will be back up there around five thirty in the morning.”
“What time is it?”
Shirley looked at her watch. “It’s 11:50 p.m.”
“And Macey just left?”
“Yes.”
“God love her,” Jim said, his eyebrows rising in admiration. He stood and started toward the front window. “How did Brooke sound?”
“She sounds exhausted,” Shirley said. “And I’m sure Ian is too.”
Jim stood at the window. In the reflection he could see Shirley and Carla and Charlie behind him, all staring at him, waiting for him to say the right words. He looked out the window and down the snowy driveway into the darkness that led out to Church Road. There was another face—another expression—that came to his mind. It was Brooke’s. He could still see the glance she gave him as they took Alex away to the intensive care unit. He knew that Brooke had always trusted what he told her—and more importantly, he knew she trusted in God. Still, that look she had given him let him know that she wanted just one more nod of reassurance. And he’d given it to her. Because Alex is going to be okay.