her eyes searching for the reason. That’s when she saw it. Christopher’s temperature. It had been 98.6 every time she looked at it. Except now.
102 degrees
She sat up in her chair. She felt Christopher’s hand. It was hot as a skillet.
“I’ll get you out of there. I promise you. But you have to fight for me. Fight!” she said.
103 degrees
Thanks to WebMD and the panic of early motherhood, Kate Reese knew that any temperature above 104 degrees was dangerous. At 107, the brain begins to cook.
beEp. beEp. beEp. beEp.
104 degrees
The door opened. The doctor and nurse moved quickly into the room.
“Mrs. Reese, we need you to leave. Now.”
“No,” she said. “I can help.”
“Security!” the doctor yelled out.
The guards ran into the room so quickly, Christopher’s mother thought they must have been standing outside, waiting for this moment. Ambrose put a steady hand on her shoulder.
“That won’t be necessary, Doctor,” Ambrose said. “We were just leaving.”
“The hell we were!” Christopher’s mother shouted.
Ambrose squeezed her shoulder and whispered in her ear.
“You can’t help him in a straitjacket.”
Christopher’s mother looked at the security guards. Two big guys with even bigger bellies. They were both obsessively scratching their faces, sweaty with flu. One held pepper spray. The other a nightstick.
“Doctor asked you to leave…” the bigger one said, swallowing the word “bitch” and pushing its replacement through the bile in his throat. “…ma’am.”
Everything in her wanted to fight them, but she knew they would just lock her up.
Just give us a reason…bitch ma’am.
“Of course,” she said as pleasantly as she could fake. “I’m sorry.”
Then, she calmly left the room with Ambrose in his wheelchair, giving one last glance to the life-support machine as it ticked up.
105 degrees
beEp. beEp. beEp. beEp. beEp.
106
Chapter 84
When night fell, something changed. There were no words, but everyone felt it. The temperature dropped. The wind quietly picked up and left a little whisper on the backs of a thousand necks.
it’s tiMe
“It’s time, Eddie. Listen to Grandma.” Special Ed sat in his bedroom with his father’s gun in his hand. He looked outside at the tree in his backyard. One branch sagging like a smile gone sick. Load the gun, Eddie. It’s time to go to the woods, Eddie. To Grandmother’s house we go, Eddie. Special Ed loaded the gun. Each bullet slid into the chamber with a click sick click. Special Ed threw it in his backpack along with the rest of the supplies Grandma told him to pack. He zipped up his coat and opened the window. He jumped out of his window and grabbed the grinning branch, which lowered him safely to the ground like a snake. Go into the woods, Eddie. Brady is going to try to take the tree house, Eddie. Don’t let them take the tree house, Eddie. Brady. Eddie.
“Listen to Grandma.”
it’s tiMe
“Did you hear me, Brady? It’s time. Listen to Grandma,” Mrs. Keizer said.
Brady Collins tried to help his grandma stand up, but her arthritic joints clicked, and she fell back into her hospital bed.
“Brady, I’m too old to walk to the woods, but you remember what Grandma told you to do, right?”
“Yes, Grandma,” he said.
Brady walked to the closet. He put on his scarf and winter jacket. He grabbed his backpack that he had filled with supplies when he waited for the ambulance to bring his mother to the hospital. He found his father’s hunting knife and a handgun that he collected from World War II. Brady zipped up the pack and walked back to the bed.
“I hope you find your maiden name, Grandma.”
“I will if we win the war.”
Brady Collins nodded, kissed his grandmother’s whiskery cheek, and left. The hospital was so crowded that no one paid any attention to the eight-year-old boy with the backpack. Brady easily slipped out of the hospital and started the long walk to the Mission Street Woods. He wanted to say goodbye to his father, but his dad was at his mother’s bedside in the ICU. Brady hoped that when his mother woke up, she would forget Kathy Keizer. She deserved that. After all, she sacrificed herself to distract Brady’s father from tearing down the woods by midnight. Brady thought it a shame that nothing else had worked. But now it’s time, Brady. Jenny. Brady.
it’s tiMe
“Jenny?” the voice whispered. “It’s time, Jenny.”
The voice sounded like her mother. Soft and sweet. Warm as a blanket. Jenny Hertzog reached under her pillow and pulled out the knife. She looked at the reflection of her eyes in the metal