his arm. His body was covered in a hundred cuts from the explosion of glass. His eyes were closed. He had a huge tube sticking out of his mouth, connected to a jungle of monitors. Machines were breathing for him. Eating for him. Monitoring everything from his heart to his brain. Christopher’s mother saw an ICU nurse enter numbers into Christopher’s chart, stopping only once to scratch her shoulder.
“What’s wrong with him?” Christopher’s mother asked.
The nurse turned to her. Startled. Christopher’s mother instantly flagged the look on the nurse’s face. There was a moment of the nurse wondering who this woman was. Once she realized it was the mother, she plastered on a poker face and spoke like she was in church.
“Let me get the doctor, ma’am.”
The nurse quickly left. Christopher’s mother moved to the bed. When she took Christopher’s hand, it felt like touching a hot stove. She moved her hand to his forehead. She figured he must have a fever of 106 degrees. She looked at the monitors and found his temperature buried in all of the numbers and lights.
According to the monitor, he was 98.6.
Christopher’s mother grabbed a cup of ice chips from his bedside table. She shook the ice out on her hands and gently put them on his forehead. The ice melted rapidly, as if it had been left on hot asphalt. His skin turned the ice to water and quickly to vapor. She grabbed more ice and packed it under his armpits, neck, and chest.
“Mrs. Reese,” the voice said.
Christopher’s mother turned to find the doctor in the doorway. His face was covered by a surgical mask.
“Doctor, you have to wake him up!” she said.
“Mrs. Reese, please have a seat.”
“No!” she said. “He needs to wake up! You have to wake him up now!”
The doctor took down his surgical mask. His poker face was not as good as the nurse’s. Whatever the news was, it was not good.
“Mrs. Reese, I’m sorry, but we’ve already tried everything. I’m afraid nothing has worked. We can’t revive your son.”
“Why not?” she asked, panicked.
“Christopher is brain-dead, Mrs. Reese.”
The words landed on her chest, taking away her breath for a moment. Then, she snapped back to anger.
“The hell he is! We need to revive him! WE HAVE TO DO IT NOW!”
“Mrs. Reese, you don’t understand—”
“No, you don’t understand! Somebody has my son!”
The doctor gave a quick glance to the orderlies in the hallway. They entered the room quietly.
“Somebody has your son? What do you mean, Mrs. Reese?” the doctor asked calmly.
She was about to talk about the hissing lady wanting her boy to sleep. And his imaginary friend, the nice man, who was disguised as a white plastic bag. Then she noticed that the doctor was obsessively scratching his ear. His face was sweaty with fever. She could feel the orderlies standing behind her. Security would come next.
You will sound like a crazy person, Kate.
She thought it again to make sure it was her voice and not the false one.
You will sound like a crazy person.
It was her. And she was right. She looked at the faces in the room. She had seen her husband get this reaction before. That strange mixture of calm and tense. That watch-spring ready to pounce if the patient is deemed unstable or dangerous. They were all scratching their skin, as if this were an opium den. Doctor. Nurse. Orderlies. Security. All waiting for her to give them an excuse to pounce.
She realized that Christopher was back in the hospital. Unconscious. Right where the hissing lady wanted him. And if the hissing lady was powerful enough to arrange that, then she could easily manipulate a doctor into locking up a grieving mother for a psychiatric “evaluation.”
“Who has your son, Mrs. Reese?” the doctor repeated.
“No one. I’m sorry. I just…I’m just…” She feigned speechless grieving.
The room instantly relaxed as if some invisible sergeant said “At ease.”
“We understand, Mrs. Reese,” the doctor said gently. “I know how difficult this is. Please, take all the time you need. Then, we can discuss next steps.”
Christopher’s mother knew what he meant by “next steps.” He meant a grief counselor, a lawyer, a piece of paper, a pen, and a funeral. Once she signed Kate Reese on the dotted line, Dr. Feel Bad would pull the plug on every machine keeping her son alive. Never believing her that Christopher was not brain-dead. Never believing that her son was simply lost. Right where the hissing lady wanted him.