“You give niggas a damn degree, they ass get all siddity. Using them ten-cent words to say you gonna die.”
And like that, she’s back. The real Sara. The one that doctor will never see.
“She seems to really like you so why you gotta be like that? You understand what she said. Why you care what words she uses?”
“Shit, my time is short. Don’t use five minutes to tell me what you can in one.”
Sara’s mouth puckers and she draws the thin bedsheet closer to her chest. “Women like that think they got something ’cause they wear a white coat and got a title. Just wasn’t place for that nonsense when I was younger. No place for dreams. I coulda done that. I was smart. Momma always told me I was smart.”
Dr. Savoie wasn’t that much younger than Sara. She probably went through a lot to have a white coat with her name on it. Saying this wouldn’t make a difference. Truth plain in front of her face rarely does. That’s why she had liquor I suppose. Easier to deal with your life at the bottom of a glass full of whiskey.
“Mmm-hmm, bet you’re gonna say your daddy said the same thing. Poor smart, sweet, innocent Sara.”
“Shut the hell up! You don’t know what you talking ’bout!” Sara’s body tightens, she grimaces and hits a small plastic button attached to the twisted artery of tubes and her body relaxes. Whatever liquid concoction she released takes hold quick. She tries to yell, but she’s whispering. In her head, Sara’s probably calling me all kinds of names like when I was a kid, but she mutters, “Don’t talk about...him...no right.” Her eyes glaze quickly and close. Her breathing is uneven and she whimpers like some wounded animal. And I’m at peace. Not because it’s quiet and she isn’t grumbling whatever cruel nonsense comes out her mouth.
I might be happy. Maybe not so much happy as I need Sara dying to mean something more to me. I’m scared it won’t. That’d make me even less human than I already feel. Who doesn’t feel something when their momma dies?
Me and Sara are tethered by time and hate, by blood and broken promises and dreams, and even more fractured beliefs of who’s guilty for what’s happened between us. Without Sara, who do I blame for...being me? Are children supposed to forgive their parents for the horrible things they’ve done? Alice begged me to see Sara, to listen to her story, find some understanding for why she is the way she is. Alice wanted me to do this for the sake of our family, for “our little girl Ruby,” she said. And I never listened, because my anger was righteous. It still is.
But what if I’d have forgiven Sara earlier? Would I have been different? I don’t know what a better man is supposed to look like. But maybe I wouldn’t feel like I’m almost underwater without my wife, so lost when I look at our kid who has that same look in her eyes for me, the same one I have for Sara. And I know that girl can do something about it. And the hate Ruby has for me is the same flavor I have for Sara. Salty with a little bit of smoke.
I have no answer to who Sara is to me and why she is the way she is, why I am the way I am, because whatever haunts her, haunts me. What I should do with her. There’s no action for this situation that seems whole enough to provide relief for the inside of me, the parts constantly churning and moving.
The nurses’ station is perched just outside of Sara’s door. Some of them type. Some of them are on the phone. Dr. Savoie calls my name right before I make my escape. “Mr. King, can I steal a few more minutes?” She shrugs on a long black wool coat. The muted clack of her feet ringing in my ears. I do my best to muster any semblance of sadness or sense of loss or anything a son about to lose his mother would feel. Something other than relief.
“Mr. King... I again want to...”
“What’s up, Doc?” I chuckle. “I’m sorry, I just...”
“It’s fine. I’ve heard it all.” An easy smile graces her face. Like the kind Alice had when we first met. The one I hadn’t seen in years until I witnessed it a final time in her open casket.
“Mr. King, your mom needs you. She’s a fighter—”
“That she is, Doc.”
Her eyes go wide for a brief moment as she continues, “I know she puts up a tough front, but Sara’s scared. Having someone there for her, to hold her hand can make these next days easier, for both of you. Maybe easier isn’t the best word, but I...well I hope to see you more.”
“Sara doesn’t need anybody.” I can’t snatch back those words after they escape my mouth. “What I mean to say is she’s tough and she deals with things the way she deals with them, and sometimes it’s alone. That’s her way. It’s best to leave her be.”
Her mouth opens to respond, but she thinks better of it and squeezes my shoulder.
“I appreciate your help and you being so nice to her,” I say.
She smiles that smile again. “Well, you know your mom, but we all need someone. Connection is a human thing. We all recognize that especially if there’s something...propelling us to an inevitable conclusion.”
Sara is right. Dr. Savoie uses too many words.
“What I mean to say, Mr. King, is to visit her if and when you can as much as you can handle. I’m sure your mom will appreciate it and, in the end, so will you.”
She glides to the bank of elevators beyond the clustered desks and computer screens, past the glossy pictures of doctors pretending to care for patients with rosy cheeks and hope in their eyes. I start to follow when I hear my name again. A nurse with flat dark eyes and golden skin motions me to the desk.
“Mr. King, we still need the rest of your mother’s insurance information.”
“I’m not sure what it is. I don’t really handle that.”
Alice begged me to visit Sara before all this. In that cramped, dirty apartment, where my childhood was broken off into my blood on the floor, and the men in her room and the light in the refrigerator with no food.
“Well, do you know who does, because we have to contact them in order to maintain care and we can’t do that without—”
“Money. Yeah, I get it. What’s the balance?”
“I don’t have the current information, sir. Accounts Receivable would deal with that.”
“Give me an estimate,” I say, my voice starting to rise.
The nurse’s tiny nose goes slightly in the air and she closes her eyes though I can see the slight roll of them under her lids. “Sir, as I said, I don’t have the current information. So anything I say...”
“Goddamn it! Just tell me what the hell I need to know!”
The rest of the nurses’ eyes cut in our direction, a pack of wolves ready to protect their own.