Kathleen Creighton: The Awakening of Dr. Brown

Tearing his eyes away from her face, finally, he reached for her hand and raised it to his lips, then simply sat and gazed at it. They’d made an effort to clean it up some, he noticed, but grime still lingered around the short, unmanicured nails, making it seem more than ever like the hand of a child-a grubby one, now. Slowly, he raised it again and pressed his lips to the palm. Then he folded it into a fist and enclosed it in both of his. Bowing his head over his clasped hands, he closed his eyes and silently spoke the words he knew he’d never be able to say to her out loud. Please…hold me. Protect me. My heart is here, now…in your hand. I’ve placed it in your keeping.

“Jeez, Doc, am I that bad off?” Raspy as a file, her voice scraped across his raw and tender nerves. Speechless, shot through with adrenaline and shaky as a newly awakened child, he held on to her hand like a burglar caught with the goods. Her smile quirked sideways; her eyes regarded him calmly, shining like broken pieces of sky. “What are you doing, praying? ”

On the last word she erupted into racking coughs. Ethan rose and, relinquishing her hand, picked up a basin from the tray beside her bed. He held it for her until the spasms had subsided, then said calmly, “Not praying-just…thinking.”

“Oh, yeah? What about?” Her sideways glance seemed wary.

He didn’t reply, and after taking sips of water from the straw he held for her, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and lay back on the pillows with an exhausted sigh. A moment later, though, she sat up again, her eyes going wide. “Oh, God-are they all right?” Her voice was a painful croak. “They are, aren’t they? That little boy-”

“Michael’s fine-he’s going home later today.”

“Doveman?” And her face was suddenly still, her eyes stark with fear. She’d already read the truth in his.

“He’s been waiting for you,” Ethan said gently. “I’ll take you to him now.”

The wheelchair made whispering sounds on the smooth hospital floor. To Phoenix the sounds seemed like voices just out of earshot, voices of people she’d loved…and lost.

She felt chilled…stone-cold. And more frightened than she’d ever been in her life.

The chair paused at a doorway. Beyond a half-glass partition she could hear the quiet beeping of monitors, see a nurse moving about with efficient and soundless steps. Of the person who lay on the bed, she could see only one hand, lying stark and black as a gnarled old tree root against the pristine white. When the chair moved forward again she reached out a hand and clutched at the door frame, stopping it.

“I can’t,” she whispered fiercely. “I can’t. ”

Ethan’s hand lay gently on her shoulder; as if she were drowning and he’d thrown her a life preserver, she grabbed at it and held on. “He’s not in any pain,” he said softly.

Pain? But what about me? I feel like my heart’s being torn out through my throat. A sob spiked through her and emerged as a faint, desperate laugh.

After a moment she nodded and the chair began to move, though she still clung like a child to Ethan’s hand.

“But it’s hard, so hard to say goodbye…”

It’s what happens between hello and goodbye that matters, baby-girl…

“Hey, Doveman, how’re y’doin’?” Her voice sounded loud and harsh, like a sputtering chainsaw. She reached for the hand that was lying on the sheets and took it in both of hers. It felt cool and papery…almost weightless.

His eyes opened about halfway and focused on her. “Hey, baby-girl,” he whispered. His lips curved in a smile.

There were fewer tubes than she’d have expected, but the doc had told her what that meant. Doveman was DNR-Do Not Resuscitate. Because he had end-stage lung cancer and wouldn’t have lived much longer anyway, even if the smoke and heat from the fire hadn’t destroyed what was left of his lungs. Doveman was dying, and he hadn’t told her.

She felt herself being buffeted about as if by cruel, freezing winds. She felt herself breaking apart inside, shattering into a million tiny pieces.

It’s okay, baby-girl…ol’ Doveman’s got you under his wings.

She heard herself whimper like a lost child, “Doveman, don’t go…”

“Got to, child. It’s like I told you. It’s time…”

“I won’t let you go!” The child was angry now, railing futilely against that over which she had no control.

His chuckle was a soft whiskery noise, like dry leaves rustling. “These ol’ lungs been shot for years…wouldn’t a’ had much longer anyway. This is a good time to go…now I know you gonna be okay…”

“Okay! How can you say that?” How would she ever be okay again? “What will I do without you?” She was trembling…desolate. Closing her eyes, she held his hand against her cheek and felt it grow wet with her tears. Frail and lost, she whispered, “Who’s going to sing to me when I have my nightmares?”

For a few moments the silence in the room was broken only by the beeping of the monitor, while Doveman’s tired eyes looked past Joanna’s bowed head and straight into Ethan’s. Then, with a tremendous effort he croaked, “Can you sing, boy?”

Ethan, knowing exactly what was being asked of him, didn’t hesitate. With a fierce and protective resolve burgeoning inside him, he nodded. “Yes, sir, I can.”

“There, you see?” Gently withdrawing his hand from Joanna’s, he placed it on her head as if he were bestowing a blessing…then let it slide down to her shoulder, where it covered and briefly squeezed Ethan’s. “You got nothing to worry about…” His eyelids drifted closed.

Joanna gave a little cry and clutched at his hand. Gently, as he might have touched a newborn baby, Ethan stroked her hair. He said, “He’ll sleep now…”

“I’m not leaving him.” Her voice was hard, breaking. She looked up at Ethan with tear-silvered eyes…then took a deep breath and wiped a cheek dry before she quietly added, “I want to stay.”

Ethan nodded, but he couldn’t bring himself to leave her. He stood beside her and gently stroked her hair while she held on to her old piano man’s hand.

It was only later, when the line on the screen had gone flat and the beeper sang its sad one-note farewell, that she finally said it:

“Goodbye…”

Back in her room, Joanna sat staring at the narrow white bed, the head cranked up and the covers rumpled, just as she’d left it. Now it looked to her like the set from a TV hospital show; except for the wheelchair under her and Ethan’s hands on her shoulders, nothing seemed real. The bed was a movie prop, made of cardboard and tissue paper; it would collapse if she tried to sit on it. The window was just a painted rectangle on a cardboard wall.

“Take me home,” she whispered.

Ethan’s hands moved on her shoulders, massaging gently. They slipped alongside her neck, holding her in warmth and safety. The thumbs softly rubbed the edges of her jaws. And she sat rigid while peppery tears stung her nose and eyelids, filled with such sorrow…for him. He didn’t know-how could he?-that every place he touched her, meaning only tenderness and comfort, ached so savagely she could scarcely bear it.

Leaning close to her ear, he said quietly, “There’s a pretty big crowd of reporters out there. Are you sure you feel up to it?”

Desperately, she shook her head. “Tom and Carl could get us around them, couldn’t they?”

He was quiet for a moment. Then… “I imagine they could. You’ll need some clothes. Wait here…”

He left her then, taking with him all that was alive and real in her existence…as if the screen had suddenly gone blank and the sound had been turned off. She sat motionless, unaware of the passing of time, feeling nothing at all except emptiness. Thinking maybe this was what death would feel like…