Heft - By Liz Moore Page 0,54

Moscot says she had made a noise and that she has opened and closed her eyes. But please know, Kel, he says, that this doesn’t necessarily mean she’s recovering. It could mean she’s entering a permanent vegetative state.

On top of this: her organs, many of them, are failing her.

The outlook is still not good, says the doctor.

I say nothing.

But there’s still a chance, the doctor says. A little chance of anything.

He says, Do you want to come see her again?

And I say I do, I will.

During practice I miss a phone call from an unavailable number. Again. Again the caller does not leave a message.

At five I drive to the hospital and when I walk into her room she looks better than she did last night. She looks asleep and alive. She looks cleaner than she has in years. Somebody has washed her. And she moves a couple of times on her own and it seems so natural that I get kind of hopeful. I tell myself not to but I do. She looks peaceful.

On the way back to Trevor’s I go into our house just to get some of my things and it feels like a ghost house. I run from it fast as I can.

Tonight, as I am waiting for sleep to come, I try to imagine my mother asleep as well, resting and happy. Then the next second I imagine her having terrible nightmares from which she cannot wake up.

• • •

Wednesday is the worst day so far. At school, in computer class, I Google lupus. It is a mistake. Believe it or not I have never done this before, which is something I’m now ashamed of. And as it turns out I’ve been a bad son, because the things I hated her for were not her fault. Not entirely.

I’m sorry for leaving her all alone every day. I should have found her friends. I should have come home after school. What did she do all day? What did she do in the house all day?

My mother. There were times when I loved her so thoroughly. I can remember things about her. The smell of her skin, the humanness of her skin, the secret that only babies know about their mothers. The smell of it especially in summer. The mother smell. Beneath everything else I could smell it on her still when I found her in her bed.

Trevor’s house is so beautiful and so full of delicate things that I have to stop myself from breaking them one by one every night before bed. The antiques and the clocks and the little statues. The little paintings on the wall. The wallpaper itself is asking for ripping. The sheets for tearing. The vases full of enormous flowers for spilling.

I have gotten used to my very white bed. It’s high off the ground and it feels like there are pillows underneath me when I sleep. My mother would love it and it would be good for her back and her joints. I would like to buy her a bed like this someday. Trevor’s family maid Maxine makes it up for me while I am at school. I have a feeling she washes the sheets every day. Every day. I did not realize she would do this. That Trevor is used to this frightens me and makes me doubt him as a friend. Before school, I have started making my bed up very carefully the way she makes it up. With the comforter turned down one-third of its length. With the pillows plumped and organized in rows of blue and white and purple.

I have not spoken to Lindsay Harper since Monday. I don’t know if I can go to her house after Thanksgiving dinner. I’m having dinner with the Cohens. How will I leave.

I don’t know what to say to her. I’m sure she has heard something because Trevor has a humongous mouth and has probably told everyone what happened. She’s probably heard. She called me once and did not leave a message. In history class today I did not meet her eye and at the end of it I left without stopping.

Recently a thousand questions have occurred to me that I would like to ask my mother. What were you like when you married Dad? Did you laugh more? Did you drink less? Did he think you were pretty? Did he treat you well at first?

I used to have this fantasy. I used to dream about going back in