6:30AM. The ringing phone startles us out of sleep. The nurse tells us Mom’s breathing pattern has changed. We are at the hospital by 7. She gasps like a fish out of water, every few seconds, pulling in the air as if it is a great strain. There are times when several seconds go by before the next breath. We stand over her and just watch her trying to breathe. “It could still be a while,” the nurse explains, “but you said to let you know when things had changed.” We decide to go to breakfast at Perkins North, and the three of us sit, poking at our eggs, trying to decide what to do. Peggy goes to her pedicure at 9; my manicure’s at 10. We’re doing it in honor of Mom, who even now, lying gasping in the hospital, has always had immaculately manicured toes. Ironically we run into each other at KMart Northside in between appointments, and hug each other quickly.
I get back to the hospital at 11:30, and Peggy, Dad and I talk quietly in the family room. I see a recipe for coconut shrimp in one of the magazines, but funnily Peggy has already clipped it to try later. Mom loved coconut shrimp. We used to get it in Florida at Tommy Bahamas on South 5th. But this recipe’s healthy. It won’t kill you. We go back into the room. Dad stands at the foot of the bed, and rubs Mom’s feet. He’s whispering something, but I can’t hear what he’s saying. He bends over, sniffs, and goes outside. I am on Mom’s left, Peggy is on her right. We are both stroking her cheeks, and whispering love things. I tell her how strong and beautiful her body is, doing such a good job of taking care of her, doing such a good job, and now it can be done. I tell her it’s all right, I tell her I’ll be all right. I tell her everybody and everything will be all right. She can go get a good rest now. She’s had a long, good life, and now she’s really going to kick some butt on her next adventure. I tell her I love her so much.
Her eyes are halfway open, and have lost their function, so they roll back and forth. This scares me, so I look away. Mom is now mostly just a body, and is not the Mom I remember. It’s okay, but it still scares me to see her body this way. But I stay. Even though I have to go to the bathroom. The time in between Mom’s breaths are getting longer, and each time we wait to see if the next breath will come. “I think it’s close,” Peggy whispers. I don’t think so. I don’t want it to be close. I don’t want it to be .... EVER. Mom softly gasps, then is gone.
I see a bright green vine curling out of the top of her head, growing out through the wall of the hospital room. There is one single red bloom on the top of it. I watch it until it is gone. I remember doctors calling the time of death from watching “Scrubs” so I look at the clock and see the time: 12:40. I hear my cell phone in the hallway ringing. Dad is standing in the doorway. Dad leaves to go tell the nurses. I think I should leave, but I can’t. Mom’s body is still warm, and that seems wrong somehow to leave her alone. Her cells are still alive. The nurses tell me to take my time. I pull up a chair and start patting her hand. My tears make a solid wet on the front of my body. I pat her arm, up and down, and whisper over and over, “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy.”
Later I will help the nurses clean her body before they take it to the funeral home, but for now I tell them to please speak in whispers. I don’t want to disturb Mom. As I walk out of the room, I collapse in front of the nurse’s station, and just crouch, holding my knees, crying softly, rocking, until I feel Trudy the nurse’s arms around me. She just holds me while I cry. When I am finished, I stand up, thank her, and walk back into the room to clean my mother’s body. Soon enough the phone calls will begin, and life will become lifelike again. For now, it is something else. Maybe even now, one year later, I don’t know what it was back then, at 12:40PM, but it was something else. Something stretched out and large and pulsating and crisp with sharp edges and loud noises. Something very real that you enter into without knowing who you will be when you walk through to the other side. You just know you’ll never be the same again.