If You Were Here by Stephanie Taylor & Omar Martinez Morales

Author:Stephanie Taylor & Omar Martinez Morales
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Stephanie Taylor

20

December 22, 2016

Stone

Lisa sat at the side of her son’s hospital bed, completely unaware that Jenny and the grown woman who was Lisa’s own granddaughter had been in that very room just days before. Her eyes were glassy and distant as she sniffed and rubbed at the nostrils of her red nose. Her hand shook.

“Want me to get your dad and bring him in?” Lisa’s cousin Sheryl had driven down from Buffalo to sit with her at Daniel’s bedside, and it had clearly been troubling her that Lisa had no intention of picking her father up from the nursing home where he’d lived for the past decade so he could see his only grandchild. “I’m happy to run over and get him. You know he’d want to see Daniel.”

Lisa shrugged. “That seems like a lot of work.”

Sheryl’s face contorted as she tried to suppress an eyeroll. Lisa had always been the young, pretty, favored child of their family, her blonde hair and childlike attitude inviting everyone to baby her and cater to her desires. It had taken years for Sheryl to stop hating her.

“It wouldn’t be any work for you,” Sheryl said pointedly, “since I offered to do it for you. I just can’t stand to not see your dad here. This is family, and we all need to stick together until Daniel wakes up and we know what’s going to happen next.”

Lisa shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.” She stared at her son, as she’d done for days now, watching for signs of life. As much as his presence had hindered her in life--as many times as she’d secretly wished that she wasn’t a single mother with a quiet homebody of a kid waiting for her to come home with dinner each night--seeing him on the brink of death in this disgustingly clean hospital room made her sick to her stomach with regret. She regretted every time she’d chosen a man over him; every time she’d left a ten dollar bill on the kitchen table and told him to walk to a fast food restaurant; every time she’d taken pills and gone to bed without saying a word to him about school, his life, or his friends.

“You guess it’s fine for me to check your dad out of his home and bring him over here?” Sheryl asked, trying to get verbal confirmation as she stood up and slipped her thick upper arms into her bulky winter coat. “Maybe hearing his grandfather’s voice will do something good for Daniel.” Sheryl flipped her curly hair over the collar of her jacket and buttoned it up to her chin. She tied a thick, knitted scarf around her neck.

Lisa reached for her purse. She’d managed to get her prescription for Xanax refilled on the grounds that seeing her son in a hospital bed was causing her emotional distress. As soon as Sheryl was out the door she’d pop a couple into her mouth and rush into the bathroom of Daniel’s hospital room to put her mouth under the tap and wash them down with water.

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