Page 52 of The Art of Loving Ellie
“Clark Family?” She inquires, identifying us before we’re allowed to go any further.
When Richard nods his head, she escorts us back to a private room, asking us to take a seat, and my stomach is knotting so painfully that I feel the bitter urge to vomit.
The nurse closes the door with a soft click and turns her sad eyes toward us. “Mr. Clark has gone into cardiac arrest.” She pauses, allowing that information to sink in. “We were able to revive him the first time, but his oxygen levels have plummeted since then, and we had to begin CPR a second time.” Her hazel eyes touch each of ours before she speaks again. “I’m going to go check on him, and I’ll come back with more information as soon as I have it.” After asking a few questions, Aunt Jane finally nods her head and breaks eye contact with her, looking defeated.
It’s been thirty minutes since the nurse we spoke to left the room and minute after excruciating minute, we’ve sat here in silence. I decide here and now that Ihatethis God-forsaken place. I hate the smell, I hate the anxiety, but I mostly hate the uncertainty of what is happening to my dad at this very moment.
A short time later, an older gentleman in a long white lab coat opens the door to our room. He informs us that his name is Doctor Thomas and that he's been the physician involved in my father’s treatment during his stay here.
“I'm so sorry to you all, but Mr. Clark—” He pauses to look at each of us directly and Aunt Jane grabs my hand, digging her nails into my palm. His voice falters a little when he begins to speak again. “The fluid in his chest returned rapidly and he was unable to fight the pneumonia compromising his weakened lungs.” Richard lets out a heavy breath and my aunt turns into his chest sobbing, but I can’t comprehend what he's saying.
“Wait, wait.” I stop him, trying to understand. “What do you mean? Isn’t there another treatment you can give him to help? Maybe he needs to go to surgery to have some fluid removed—”
Dr. Thomas cuts me off as gently as he can. “There are no alternative treatments we can give him because he is… no longer with us.” I see the sadness that begins overwhelming me reflect in his eyes, and briefly, I wonder why anyone would want such a horrible job. Sure, doctors save some lives—but how many lives do they lose in comparison? How many lives have been lost at the end of this man’s fingertips?
Richard is trying to keep Aunt Jane sitting, but she’s fallen to her knees on the ground. He looks to me for assistance, but I don’t know what help I could possibly give him. It’s as if I’m floating through a bad dream, and any moment now, I’m going to wake up.
I move my eyes back to Doctor Thomas and realize that he’s still talking to me. I think he’s telling me that he’s sorry for our loss, but his words sound like a foreign language.
I’m nodding my head at something he just said because I feel like that’s what I’m supposed to do, and he reaches out a hand to squeeze my shoulder. He must understand how detached I’ve become because through blurred tunnel vision, I see his white-clothed figure heading for the door, escaping the tragedy that has overtaken our lives. How nice that he gets to go home to his perfectly put together family, while we attempt to move on with what’s left of ours.
When I turn back to Richard and Aunt Jane, I’m overcome with the sensation that I’m completely deaf except for a loud ringing in my ears. Everything I’m looking at is fuzzy, and I suddenly take on the feeling I had when I was drunk and the room was spinning out of control.
Out of control.That’s exactly what I feel when my mind finally catches up to what the doctor just told us. Smells, sounds, and bright lights rapidly assault my senses one by one until the contact of the tile floor jars my knees. Aunt Jane’s sobs ring against my eardrums as she desperately reaches out for me, dragging my numb form toward her.
My father is dead.
Chapter Seventeen
Somewhere in the time between leaving the hospital, and arriving at Aunt Jane’s, I’ve started hyperventilating. I rush through the front doors and up the stairs to my room where I yank off every inch of clothing on my body in a rush, not bothering to care when I score my arms with scratches in my haste. I need air, I can’t breathe.
I’m stripped down to my bra and panties as tears I don’t feel pool around me on the ground, and I angrily slap them out of my eyes. I hear light footsteps coming from the staircase and I cry harder, hiccupping in between breaths.
“Aunt Jane,” I wail to her as a panic attack threatens to swallow me whole. She rushes to my side on the floor, but next to nothing can calm me down as it’s happening. She loves me through it as my mind blacks out, and all I hear are her soothing shushes, and the touch of her warm hand petting my wild hair.
“You’re gonna be okay, Ellie.Shhh… you’re gonna be okay.” I hold onto her as tight as I can as I fight this monster of mine. Little Ellie peeks out at me in my mind with her widened bright blue eyes. She’s scared, but I try to tell her it's okay; that we are going to make it through this. She takes my hand and leads me back to our safe-haven—the area in my mind where I go to protect myself from the unknown. We hide away there together, and I stroke her hair just as Aunt Jane continues to stroke mine, and Little Ellie tells me this is my fault.
It’s my fault for trusting that I could change. It’s my fault for trying to be someone I’m not capable of being, and she’s right. I wish I never would have trusted Tyler and his advice to open my heart up to my father. This is the price I’ve paid for attempting to find a happiness I never truly deserved.
∞∞∞
I’ve been sitting on the front porch step of my aunt’s home for the few four hours with my knees hugged tightly into my chest. The only clothing I have on is a pair of tights and a thin tank top, and I barely register the feeling of my frozen feet.
“Come on, let’s get inside.” I hear my aunt Jane’s soothing voice, and her warm hand slips underneath my arm, but I don’t feel her touch. It’s midnight and thirty-six degrees out, but I want to stay out here and freeze. I want the frigid night air to find its way into every pore in my bones, and hurt me.
After several attempts, Aunt Jane gives up trying to move me, and I resume my sitting position. My heart aches for the loss of a father that I’ve mistreated for most of my life. A father who desperately wanted to love and protect me, even when he failed.
Staring out into nothingness, I wonder why I’m not crying. I want to curl up into a ball and scream until my throat is raw—but I’m unable to do either of those things.
I hear loud footsteps coming through the door behind me, and before I have time to react, Richard scoops me up into his arms and throws me over his shoulder as if I weigh nothing. For as numb as I have felt since we left the hospital, I am suddenly full of emotion as I wildly kick and slap at him.
“Stop! Stop it, what are you doing!” I yell, pounding into his back with balled up fists, but he won’t let me down.
“I’m not letting you sit out there all night in the cold,” he states sternly, keeping a death grip on my legs.
“I want to be out there, Richard! Let me go, dammit!” He crosses the living area and plops me down in front of the fire they’ve had burning for a few hours now. I whirl around on him, angry and ready for a fight.
“Ellie, we are all upset, and from the bottom of my heart, I’m so sorry—but I won’t allow you to harm yourself. Do you understand?” He’s looking down at me, with the saddest eyes I’ve ever seen, and I feel every bit like a small child being scolded by her father. Except, he isn’t my father—my father is dead. There’s not enough energy inside of my body to argue with him, so I give up, hugging my knees back into my chest, and stare into the fire.
