Nine Days
By Loretta Morris
I knew from the moment I opened my eyes that something inside of me had shifted while I slept, and I was no longer on steady ground. Like a robot, I got ready to face the day. The ninth day.
I gripped the steering wheel too tightly and sat up too straight as I concentrated, concentrated on keeping the car within the lines. I rolled through the stop signs, I barreled through stale yellows.
An ambulance, in no particular hurry, arrived just as I pulled in. No one was ever in a hurry here. A never-ending lazy cycle of ambulance in, hearse out, ambulance in, hearse out.
My own churning mind, however, railed against the slow motion and serenity of the place. My head, my stomach, my limbs all screamed and twitched in response to the hushed voices, piped-in harp music, and sherbet-colored walls. Yes, something inside me was giving way.
All the doors to the patients’ rooms were closed. Someone had passed, as they say here. Anyone who had been waiting for nine days knew the routine. Someone dies, close the doors. I swallowed hard. Maybe this was it. Maybe day nine was the unlucky day for my dad. Or lucky day, depending how you looked at it.
Alive. He was still alive. Still.
And then we sat, my brothers, sister and I. We’d been sitting for eight days here, and ten days before in the hospital, and three days before that in his apartment. The first one of us to arrive got the good chair. It was my sister. It was usually my sister because she rarely left his side.
Way back on day one, we brought his own clothes for him to wear, and framed photographs of the family for the bedside table. On day one we thought he might enjoy those things, not realizing they were more for our comfort than his. The clothes remained folded in a drawer, the photographs were constantly in the way. On day one we were told he probably wouldn’t make it to day three.
There had been no real responses from him since day two…or was it day three? Just a slight movement of his head, or maybe the raising of an eyebrow. No speaking, or fighting, or anything. The fighting had stopped. Medication had taken care of that, thank God. I thought the bruises on his wrists that were left by the hospital restraints would fade, but as the days went on they just got darker and darker. A constant reminder of his struggle, although I didn’t know if it was his struggle to live or his struggle to die. It seemed to me that he was not winning either one of those battles, even though we all knew how this would end.
On day five all the grandchildren who could handle it came. They couldn’t all handle it, and that was ok with me. On day five I could handle it for them. On day five I was The Rock and I could handle it.
Days six and seven were the strangest. Emotionless. At times I forgot why I was there, it had become so routine. He lay there, I sat there. He lay there, I watched television. He lay there, I talked on the phone. We had conversations across him, like he wasn’t even there, and ate our fast food in the room, right in front of him.
Day eight was endless. Shallow breathing. No urine. Weak vital signs. Cold toes. Staring, staring, staring, and then a blink. The doctor, who came only once a day, said the end was near, very near. Probably less than a few hours. I readied myself for the inevitable, but it didn’t happen on day eight. Through it all, though, on day eight I was still The Rock.
But day nine, day nine was different. When I entered the room my sister was in the good chair, camped out with her breakfast and coffee, magazines and laptop, all ready for another long day of sitting. I said good morning to my dad, and kissed him on the top of his head. I’d never done that before coming to this place. Never kissed him on the head. Like he was a little boy or something. It didn’t bother me until today, but today was day nine. Everything bothered me on day nine.
I could see all of his ribs today. They started showing on day four, but on day nine I could see them all. Two, four, six, eight….all of them. The nurse was busy arranging his gown to cover them, a blue gown to match his eyes because she thought he might like that. Funny, I’m sure she was right. How did she know?
The doctor returned on day nine, reporting that dad’s vital signs had improved overnight. Improved. Improved? How could that be? No food, no water, no medications except those for pain, since day one. HOW COULD THAT BE? HOW? How? how….
And then I was done.
Done keeping my shit together for myself and others. Done holding back the tears. Done with this goddamn place, and the tip-toeing nurses and the smiling social worker in his ridiculous sweater vest. Done with the one good chair and the stupid music and the pamphlets with their platitudes and the hugs from complete strangers who claimed they knew what I was going through. Done being The Rock. Done.
I escaped to my car and managed to drive to a parking lot one block away, and cried and cried until I was exhausted. And when there were no tears left and I was able to drive again I filled the rest of my day with my favorite things: a giant cupcake, coffee with girlfriends, window shopping at an antique store, soaking up the sun, Words With Friends. And just breathing. Clearing my head and trying to get strong again. Phone turned off, knowing I was doing the right thing, no guilt.
Then, much later, after pulling a mountain of weeds in my terribly neglected garden, something told me it was time to turn my phone on. It was time to clean up and go back.
This time, I sang along with the radio. This time, I didn’t roll through stop signs or barrel through stale yellows. Like Popeye after his spinach, I was strong again.
My cell rang. It was my brother asking me to come back quickly. “I know,” I answered calmly, “I’m just two minutes away.”
And then finally, on day nine, the patients’ doors were closed.
Ambulance in, hearse out.