Mark Dunn - American Decameron

“Duh. That’s not why I’m going. And I’m not asking you to go either. It’s somebody else who’s coming with me tonight.”

“Who?”

“I am so not telling you. You’ll go straight to Mom.”

“Why would you say that?”

“I don’t trust your generation anymore. Gran and Winnie’s generation — they’re pretty cool, I think, but I don’t know about you , Uncle Matt.”

“I’m devastated. What team do you think I play for anyway, O-Niece-O-Mine?”

“I soooo need to leave to meet Winnie.”

“Winnie.”

“Well, duh. I have to take the bus, you know, since I do not happen to drive.”

“I’ll drive you. Would that put me on your team?”

“Oh my God, are you serious? Because that’s the reason I called you.”

Part B of the plan seemed, at first glance, to be the trickier part. It was making a personal, deeply heartfelt, pull-out-every-stop-in-the-emotional-manipulation-handbook attempt to get the night nurse supervisor, Ms. Gibson, to break two hard and fast rules of Intensive Care patient access: to allow a patient to see a visitor past seven o’clock, and then to allow in a visitor who by traditional definition isn’t even a member of the patient’s family.

By traditional definition , I’m smiling. I’ve known gay couples who’ve been “married” for more years than most straight couples of my acquaintance. And of course it wasn’t Mom and Winnie’s fault they got a late start. Winnie knew all along who she was. Maybe Mom knew too, but she’d always tamped it down. Coming out as a lesbian in the pre-Gay Rights era, especially coming out after you’ve been “traditionally” married and already raised two kids — that would have to be classified as one of life’s most difficult decisions. But, to her credit, she did it. I once asked Winnie how my mother could possibly have taken such a bold step, knowing the consequences. (Sibyl didn’t speak to Mom for over a year.)

Winnie didn’t bat an eye. “Because she loves me.”

Added to the mix was the fact that Nurse Gibson doesn’t even come on duty until nine o’clock. Roughly calculating the odds in my head, I gave my niece’s scheme about a fifty-to-one chance of success. And that was being optimistic.

We met Winnie at her and my mother’s favorite Chinese restaurant over on Second Place. Winnie was worried. She’s generally a tough old broad, just entering her seventies, sharp as a tack and very much her own woman. Now she seemed emotionally, well, fragile . It had been almost two weeks since she’d seen Hallie. And she was the one who brought Mom to the hospital in the first place, for Chrissakes. By late that same day, Winnie’s access to Mom had been totally cut off. I think this was Sibyl’s way of getting back at Mom and Winnie for all the embarrassment she felt they’d caused her. If so, it was hateful and punitive. I should have confronted her that first day.

But in case I haven’t said it already, I’m a… right .

Winnie poked at her General Tso’s chicken. She didn’t seem to have much of an appetite. “Lindsey, honey.” She closed her eyes. “I admire what you’re trying to do. But what makes you think that the head night nurse is going to put her job on the line just so I can spend a few minutes with your grandmother?”

“Because she’s, like, one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. I talked to her one day at Ward’s.”

I gave my niece a quizzical look. “Based on one brief conversation at the supermarket, you’ve decided that this is the kind of woman who can make miracles happen?”

Lindsey put her chopsticks down. They had been a struggle for her and I had twice suggested that she be an ugly American diner like Winnie and me and resort to the fork. “I think it’s wrong the way my mother has stood in the way of you getting to see Gran.” Lindsey was looking at Winnie. Both had tears welling in their eyes. I felt like a heel because I wasn’t likewise moved. And besides, I wasn’t really involved in this little escapade. I was just Lindsey’s chauffeur for the evening. Although, if it ever got back to Sibyl that not only had Lindsey lied about where she was that night, but that I had tacitly approved of the deception, I’d probably get put on Sis’s shit-list for a couple of years, at least. I’d have to miss all those great Saturday backyard cookouts with Doc bending my ear about infusion pumps, blood pressure cuffs, and peripherally inserted central catheters. On second thought, maybe being on my sister’s bad side wasn’t such a bad place to be.

“Hey, it might take a little convincing,” Lindsey went on, “but I’m totally not giving up. Is it almost nine?”

Winnie glanced at her watch. “No, honey. It’s just a little past eight.”

“Really? That’s all?”

Winnie nodded. We all picked up our forks and tried our best to eat.

In the main lobby of the hospital, Winnie and I sat down on a couch, while Lindsey approached the information desk.

“General visiting hours are nearly over,” we could hear the woman saying to Lindsey. It appeared from all the activity behind the desk that the woman was in the process of closing down her station for the evening.

“I know,” said Lindsey, glancing up at the clock on the wall. The clock read 8:55.

“I was wondering if all the nurses who come in for the next shift, if they, like, use that door there, or is there a back door — a staff door or something they might go through?”

“Are you waiting for one of the nurses?”

Lindsey nodded. “Nurse Gibson. She works in ICU on the fifth floor. Does she come in through this door?”

The woman, who was holding her purse against her stomach and looked ready to go, thought for a moment and said, “I have seen her come in this way.”

“Can we wait for her here — the three of us?” asked Lindsey, indicating Winnie and me with a twitch of the hand.

“If you wish. At some point, though, the security guard will come by and ask you to leave. The emergency room waiting room is the only public space in the building that stays open past nine.”

“Yes, thank you,” said Lindsey. I noticed that nearly all of the Floridian Valspeak had disappeared from Lindsey’s delivery. My niece was determined to succeed in her mission; she’d even created a new persona for herself: the ultra-polite and earnest young woman who would carefully watch every syllable that left her mouth so as not to give offense to those who found the youth of today lexically lazy.

Lindsey sat down between Winnie and me. “She was, like, totally nice.”

“Lindsey, honey,” said Winnie, reaching over and touching Lindsey gently on the arm. “I just want to let you know that regardless of what happens tonight, I very much appreciate what you tried to do for your grandmother and me.”

Lindsey nodded.

“Where did you come from, honey?” Winnie cocked her head. “They don’t make girls like you very often.”

In the midst of all of her worry, Lindsey allowed a glimmer of a smile to peek through. “Twice, Winnie, Gran’s asked for you. Both times was while I was with Mom. One time she just said your name. The next time she said, ‘Where’s Winnie?’ She said it out of the side of her mouth but I, like, understood her perfectly.”

“And how did your mother respond, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“She lied to Gran. Both times. She said that you weren’t able to make it.”

There were angry words that seemed poised upon Winnie’s lips — words that she would not allow herself to say. But I was under no such self-restraint: “Your mother was dead wrong to say that, Lindsey.”

“ Très wrong,” said Lindsey, nodding in sad agreement. Then she said in a half-whisper to herself, “Worst. Mother. Ever.”