Page 75 of That Birthday in Barbados
My hand is on the buzzer when I hear my name and turn to find my mother walking toward me with tears streaming down her face. Mycomposure melts, and I let myself be folded into her arms, each of us holding onto the other as if we’ve been dropped in the middle of the ocean and must not let go if we are to survive.
Finally, she leans back and pushes a strand of tear-soaked hair from my face. “How is she?” I ask, the words barely audible under my fear of hearing the answer.
My mom shakes her head, glancing down and then meeting my gaze with tear-drenched eyes. “Not good. She’s so lucky they found her.”
“Who? Who found her?”
“There was a fire alarm in her building. The firefighters were going door to door to find the problem. If they hadn’t gone in to check her apartment, no one would have found her in time.”
A sob rises out of me at the image of Nicole dying alone. I think of the last time I saw her, a weekend a few months ago when I went to South Carolina to visit my parents. She’d been so happy to have me there, and even though she’d questioned me about the divide she sensed between Nicole and me, we had mostly avoided the subject and done the things Mom liked to do when I was home, visit aunts and uncles, go to the library on Saturday morning where she enlisted my help picking out a few novels to read. Go to church on Sunday morning and have as many relatives as possible over for lunch afterwards.
She had looked so happy that weekend and always young for her age. But this weight that has been dropped on her, Nicole’s attempt to take her own life, has aged my mother overnight. I feel instant grief, fear stabbing me at the thought of losing her as well as Nicole.
“Oh, mom. She’ll be okay. She has to be.”
My voice breaks, and I press my face to her shoulder the way I used to do as a little girl, and I dreaded telling her something I had done wrong. As if she feels the awful burden weighing on me, she pulls back and says, “What is it, Cat? I know something happened between you and Nicole, but neither of you has been willing to tell me. Do you think I haven’t sensedthe divide between you two?”
Reluctant as I am to meet her knowing gaze, I pull back, meet my mother’s eyes. “I don’t want to tell you now, Mom. I promise I will, but it doesn’t feel right now. All that matters is that Nicole gets through this.”
Mom wants to know the truth, but she nods once, and says, “Go in and see her. We can only visit one at a time. I’ll wait out here. Just go through the doors, and the nurse at the desk will take you to her.”
Here, I falter. The thought of seeing Nicole alone fills my feet with concrete, and I can’t bring myself to move.
“Go on, honey. She needs to know you’re here.”
Tears fill my eyes, and I want to sob out the truth. That it is my inability to forgive my sister that is the reason she is here.
*
THE NURSE IS a woman in her fiftieswho has clearly seen more sadness than any human should have to process. I see this in her eyes as she puts a hand on my shoulder and directs me down a short hallway to the bed where my sister lies, still as death.
“She’s in a coma, as you know,” she says, her voice soft and sympathetic.
“Can she hear us?” I ask.
“Many people think the answer to that is yes.”
“What do you think?” I look at her, wanting to see her answer as well as hear it.
“I’ve had patients tell me they did have awareness when they were unconscious. And I have to say, there were some memories voiced to me that I knew to be accurate.”
I don’t know whether to feel comforted by this or alarmed by the thought that Nicole might be aware of where she is and what has happened to her.
“I try to tell family,” the nurse says, empathy underlining her words, “that the important thing is to just be present. Let them know you’re here. Sit with her. The doctors are limiting her visits to fifteen minutes. I’ll be back, okay?”
I nod, trying to thank her, but I can’t make any words come out. She walks away, heading back down the hallway to the front desk.
It is only when I am alone that I let myself fully look at my sister. I cannot stop the sob that rises up out of me. I sit, collapse, onto the chair next to the bed. Her skin is so paleit is as if all the blood has been drained from her body. Her arms lie to her sides, her palms flat against the mattress. The tube inserted in her mouth is hooked to a machine that helps her breathe. The sound it makes is a softwhoosh-risp, over and over again, that reminds me with each intake that it is the machine keeping her alive.
I sit, staring at her. Not a single word comes to me. The only thing that comes to my mind isWhy? Why have you done this to yourself? Why did you betray me?
They are not questions I can ask. I reach for her hand, lace her cold fingers through mine. There is something in the connection between us, her skin against mine, that melts the awful rock of anger in my heart. I drop my head and begin to cry. I hold her hand as tight as I dare, and finally, the words come. “Nicole. Come back. Please. Don’t go like this. I need you. We’ll find a way back. Don’t. Go. You’re my sister. I forgive you.”
Chapter Forty-one
‘When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.’
‘Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,’ he asked, ‘or bit by bit?’
