My hand tightened on the phone. “I’ll be right there.”
I tapped Auggie’s number, and she answered on the third ring. I could tell she was out of breath. “I was just changing from my barn clothes; we’ll meet you there.” She spilled out the words. Evidently her father had called her as well — perhaps hoping to have her soften the blow if she was with me.
I arrived at the emergency room and found Walter sitting in a corner, his legs crossed at the knee, his hand patting his thigh. It was a nervous gesture. “How is she?” I asked as soon as I was close enough for him to hear me.
“Worth, sit down and catch your breath. She’s having a scan right now. They haven’t told me anything and kicked me out when the attendant came to get her.”
“What happened?”
His face pulled in on itself, and it took a few moments for him to answer. “I heard a thud when she was in the shower this morning and when I got in there, she was lying on the shower floor, passed out. I called the ambulance and dressed her as well as I could before they got there. She never woke up. Just went limp.”
“How long ago was this?”
Walter looked at his watch and looked upward, calculating. “About a half hour ago, I’d say. She did come to in the ambulance, but she just looked at me. I don’t think she recognizes me, Worth. There was no smile, no reaction of any kind.” His voice was heavy with sadness.
My heart beat hard inside my chest, so hard I could hear it in my ears. Mother was the last of my side of the family. I’d lost my brother, or at least the man I’d been raised to believe was my brother when he died in a car accident at sixteen. My father had taken his own life just after Auggie and I were married. In a screwed up turn of events, the man who proved to be my biological brother died at Ford’s hand. Filled with vengeance for having been switched at birth, he kidnapped Ford, and the boy had defended himself. At least that’s what I kept telling myself.
I stood up, patted Walter on the hand and went off to see if I could find a doctor or someone who knew more. While I didn’t have privileges here, the medical community was relatively intimate and moved from hospital to hospital routinely.
They were just bringing Mother back from imaging when I caught up to her gurney. I smiled and patted her hand, but she showed no sign of recognition. I was staggered. How could I lose her all in the space of a few minutes?
Auggie showed up in the corridor. “The kids are with Dad,” she told me and looked for me to give her good news. All I could do was shake my head.
“She didn’t acknowledge me,” I said, still unable to believe the dead eyes that had peered out of her living face.
“Maybe she was groggy,” Auggie prevaricated for me, hoping to sidestep the obvious.
I looked into Auggie’s eyes and shook my head. “It’s not good,” I said and took her hand as we went into Mother’s room. “Go get Walter and the kids.”
We stood in a semi-circle around the foot of Mother’s bed, each of us crying and touching her leg or arm. Her eyes were closed, and she looked peaceful. We spoke quietly to her, each offering a story or funny memory.
It was while we all stood around her that she inhaled one last time. We all waited. Waited. Waited for her chest to move, the small hiss of air to escape her nose. It didn’t. Before our eyes, the mother I adored slipped away.
Walter looked as though he could no longer stand and I sent Marga to get a wheelchair for him. He was a proud man, however, and shook his head, rejecting the aid.
“Take them home,” I whispered to Auggie, and she nodded and gave Mother one last look before she shepherded them out of the room.
I sat on the side of Mother’s bed for some time, holding her hand as it lost heat and stiffened. I’d never been a religious man but found it impossible to believe that the vibrant, loving woman I’d known all my life had simply disappeared into the ether. Her soul had to be present, somewhere, some place.
They brought me papers to sign and even though rightfully Walter should have been doing it, I was also a next of kin and took the responsibility on myself. Her wishes were to be cremated, and this would be the last time I would see her loving face. I bent and kissed Mother’s cheek, and for a moment, imagined that her mouth curved upward in a faint smile. It was only muscles contracting, but it was comforting to think otherwise.
I said my goodbyes and left. It was time to go about the business of grieving. Margaret LaViere Langford had passed into her next existence.
***
We held a service outdoors, in a park where Mother had adopted a garden to tend each summer. We were surrounded by her beauteous legacy, as well as our memories of her. The twins were brave, but tears ran down their cheeks. There were hundreds of additional flowers and plants from friends and neighbors she’d had over the years; both from her side and from Walter’s. Mark made it his business to go through and gather all the cards and then we sent the flowers on to Sunset Village, the retirement home Auggie had adopted and converted into a haven for retirees. I wondered momentarily whether they realized their bounty was a result of someone’s death, but perhaps they no longer feared the end as I still did.
Walter stood up well through it all. Auggie was by his side the entire time. The daughter had become the parent as we are all eventually prompted to do. He stayed with us at our house until Auggie and the twins had a chance to go through Walter and Mother’s house, packing up her clothes and personal effects, putting them into storage. No one was ready to throw anything away just yet. There would always be time for that.
Nearly a week after Mother’s death, the family stayed at the dinner table after dessert had been cleared away. We had a stack of thank you cards to send and thought it would be better if we split up the job so no one person would be overwhelmed. There were almost three hundred cards. Mother had been well-loved in the community. Walter was little help. His hand shook too much to write legibly, and his heart simply wasn’t in it. The rest of us finished our stacks and then decided to move out to the porch to look at the stars. Mark held me back by the arm as I went to leave the room. Puzzled, I saw an urgency on his face and stood still until the others cleared the room.
Mark closed the door to the dining room and held out a card. Puzzled, I took it and read, Goodbye, you will be missed. ~Hawk Sansabri
Confused, I looked at Mark to explain why he’d kept this card out of the stack. “I don’t understand, son. Who is it? One of Mother’s friends?”
“It’s him,” Mark whispered. “The man who’s been watching us. I saw his name on the mailbox.”