***
When Jackie got back to her house, the world had turned upside down. That in itself was astounding as it had been upside down for weeks. Does that mean the world is right-side up again? she wondered. No, it was more like the world was a M?bius strip, something she had learned about in math class. “Why did the chicken cross the M?bius strip?” her teacher had asked. “To get to the same side,” he said, answering his own joke. Jackie, along with the rest of the class, groaned, but for some reason, walking into the madness that was her home, it finally seemed funny.
Medical personnel were everywhere. They were drinking coffee in her kitchen, talking on cell phones in her living room, even smoking cigarettes in her backyard. (Seeing doctors smoke made Jackie wonder if maybe it wasn’t so bad for you after all.) And, of course, they were squeezed into the room that used to be her father’s office and was now an extension of the Saint Ignatius Hospital.
As soon as Deirdre learned about Jared’s condition, she left to pick her daughters up from school and bring them home. When Jackie saw her mother in the principal’s office, she knew the news was bad. She thought maybe the network had seen The Real Family Stone of Portland, Oregon, and they were all going to jail. Or maybe her father had died.
Somehow, the coma was worse.
If her father had died, this would be over. His suffering would end, and Jackie’s life could get back to something closer to normal. When her dad first got sick, she was certain that the hole created by his absence would devour her. But if she could survive Ethan Overbee and the American Television Network, she was pretty sure she could survive anything.
No one spoke on the ride home. Megan started to say something, but Jackie shushed her. “Remember, they’re listening here, too.”
All three of them did their best to ignore the strangers and equipment and noise as they walked through the house. Jackie looked up once or twice at the cameras on the ceiling, knowing they were watching her every move. She put them out of her mind, and, trailing behind her mother and sister, made her way to her father’s office.
When they entered the room, everything seemed to stop. The air was heavy with the toil and sweat of the medical workers, television crew, and clergy, and dripping with the feeling of death. Jackie felt like she was trying to swim through some sort of foul-tasting milk shake.
The lead doctor gave Deirdre an update while Jackie and Megan listened. Jared had fallen into a coma, and there was little prospect he would come out of it. They were keeping his lungs breathing and his blood circulating, and they were giving him morphine to keep him comfortable, but they had entered the endgame.
“How much longer?” Deirdre asked without emotion.
The doctor looked at Sister Benedict, who seemed to be watching his every move.
“It’s hard to say, Mrs. Stone. We’re doing all we can to preserve his life for as long as possible.” Again the doctor’s eyes found the Sister, who smiled in response. Jackie fixed her own gaze on Sister Benedict. She imagined using a World of Warcraft spell to immobilize the nun in creeping vines, and a second spell to blow her head clean off her body.
“All right, everyone,” the doctor said, “let’s give the family some space.” One by one everyone left. Even Sister Benedict moved to go, giving a long look over her shoulder at the tattered mess that was the family Stone.
Megan reached for and found her mother’s hand. Deirdre took it, but with no emotion, like she was on autopilot. Jackie saw this and could tell that her mother was distracted. At first, Jackie thought she was grieving for her husband, for the father of her children. But there was something else; Deirdre looked like a prisoner plotting an escape.
Jackie turned her attention to her dad. He looked so small, so breakable. His skin was the color of the Portland sky: gray, hazy, foreboding. His nose, mouth, and chest were covered with tubes and wires. The flight deck of machinery by his bed whirred with an electric hum that made Jackie’s hair stand on end.
“Mom?” Jackie started to ask. But her mother shook her head no, raising her eyes to the ceiling.
“Right,” Jackie answered, understanding right away.
“But what do we do now?” Megan asked. It was basically the same thing on Jackie’s mind.
Deirdre paused a moment before answering. “Girls,” she said, “let’s go out to lunch.”
***