Laughter is the best medicine.
Keir let her go. “Just know there will be a reconciliation at the end of the day,” he told her.
Okay, maybe some of Keir’s humour was ingrained into his personality. He couldn’t help himself but get in one last dig and let her know she was going to have to make it up to him if he had to behave himself. She rolled her eyes and turned around. Keir wouldn’t be beaten at a game of words today.
There’s always tomorrow.
“What’s your mom’s name?” Kade asked as she walked through the door he was holding open.
“She prefers Maddy, but it’s Madeline Sinclair,” Tess said.
Answering the simple question helped ground her. She was feeling worked up and anxious, playing with the guys not as much of a distraction as she hoped. Now that she was standing in front of the double doors to the ward, the memory of the bell ringing and the butterflies that had been in her stomach that afternoon came rushing back.
It was good she had Kade with her again, a solid presence to fall back on or to pull her out of danger. She could do this.
They were all buzzed into the ward after Tess explained that she brought two guests with her as well. There was a limit of three visitors per patient at one time, which she hadn’t known. Thankfully, the whole gang wasn’t with her.
“Hi, Tess,” Ruby said, waiting for them at the nursing desk. “Hi, Kade. Hi, Keir.”
Everyone greeted her back. Ruby must know Kade and Keir from their friendship with War because Keir didn’t attend counselling here that Tess knew. It made Tess curious to find out how long the guys had been friends.
“Are you all here to meet with Maddy today, or are the boys going to stay here and keep me company?” Ruby asked.
“We’re going in together. Keir was kind enough to give me a ride today, and they both asked to meet my mom. After last night, I think it's safe to say we were all a bit worried,” Tess said.
Kade and Keir nodded their agreement. Tess left her hands up on the nursing desk after she signed the visitors’ log for all of them. Kade put one of his own, bigger hands on top of hers, giving it a squeeze. She had been nervously tapping her fingers. They all tended to give each other those little touches, a kind of physical check in. Tess liked it. She spread her fingers so Kade’s fingers could fall between hers and interlaced them.
“Maddy slept through the night according to the nurse that took over for me,” Ruby said. “I talked over what happened with Doc Mike today, and he agrees it was probably an adjustment to the increased antipsychotics we gave her for the second, short catatonic episode. Maddy was a bit drowsy the rest of today, but she didn't nap and she ate all her meals with a good appetite. She knows you're coming and she's waiting for you at the same spot as last time in the games and entertainment room.”
Normally, Tess would thank Ruby and go find her mother but she had just finished admitting to herself that she needed help. When Tess was younger, her father dealt with the doctors and nurses and Tess was in the sidelines, useless as her father turned out to be at getting things done. In fact, her dad had made things more difficult and used the system to his advantage to get what he wanted from her mother.
This time there was only Tess to advocate for her mother to get help and she could do that best by asking the right questions.
“My mom was never really prone to catatonic episodes before. Mainly, mom had episodes of mania, or sometimes, she would have severe depressive episodes where she didn't really want to talk to anybody, but she wasn't frozen from them and completely unresponsive. She just talked slower and moved slower. Do you think that there is something else that happened that led to this catatonic episode, a kind of progression of her illness? Or could something else have triggered this?” Tess asked.
“Those are all good questions,” Ruby said. “You probably stayed up most of last night thinking about this,” Ruby ruefully added.
“It’s my mom,” Tess explained.
Ruby nodded, leaning forward on the desk so she could talk quietly with them. No other family members or patients were around and the other nurses were busy doing charting. “Doc Mike wanted to talk to you but he comes to work at 6am and his shift was well over. He left about twenty minutes ago. I figured you would want to talk to him, however, so I asked and he told me to call him on his cell phone. How about you go talk to your mom first for a few minutes to settle yourself that she’s doing okay, and that will give Doc Mike enough time to get home. When you’re ready, come back here and I'll set you up in a private spot to have a talk with Doc Mike over the phone.”
“That's a good idea. Thanks for arranging everything,” Tess said.
“I didn't do anything. Just my job, of course, but for a lovely patient like your mother and a responsible young lady like yourself, I want to do whatever I can to help the two of you so your mom can go back home. All I did was tell Doc Mike what happened last night and how worried you were. He's a very nice doctor and quite understanding of what it is like for families in these kinds of situations.”
Although Dr. Michaels did sound like a wonderful doctor, Tess had met with enough of them over the years to know that most of them were busy and overworked and didn’t always think about the families that weren't right in front of them like the patients were. No, it was nurses like Ruby that took the time to get to know the families and intervened between the doctors and the patients, or asked the doctor to take a moment and update the family.
“Okay, I still really want to tell you how thankful I am. Last night, I wouldn't have been able to sleep a wink at all, except I knew that you were here to take care of my mother,” Tess said. “Really, thanks.”
Ruby smiled encouragingly at her. It was so full of warmth and now that Tess had met War, his mother’s kind smile reminded her of her son’s genuine smile. He had gotten it from her, no doubt about it. “Go see your mom and come back. I'm sure Maddy will be pleased to meet such handsome young men that are with you today,” Ruby said.
Surprisingly, Kade and Keir looked like they were blushing. It couldn’t have been the first time that Ruby had praised them up. Tess remembered Ruby saying nice things about Kade the first time Tess had met him at the hospital. It was clear that Ruby thought well of her son's friends, good enough that she had even recommended Tess become friends with them.
“Come on, let's go say hi,” Tess said, tugging her hand from underneath Kade’s and then turning around. She held a hand out to each of the twins so they could both hold on.
It might have seemed a bit childish to hold hands, but what she was doing right now was actually one of the bravest things she'd ever attempted. This wasn't just about introducing a boy to her mother. Tess was opening up about her mother’s stigmatized illness, and it was so much more than the blues or a little social anxiety. Hearing about bipolar disorder was nothing compared to seeing her mother when the mood swings had her in their grip.
It was the difference between being told a friend had cancer and holding her hand while she tried on a new wig in the store because chemotherapy had stolen her hair. This was real and it was scary. If Kade and War weren’t so obviously familiar with mental health, Tess probably wouldn’t have risked introducing any of the guys to her mother like she was with the twins today.
She never trusted anyone and here she was letting boys she had only met so recently see the secret she protected from everyone else to keep her family from suffering unfair judgement.
The guys must have picked up on her tension somehow. Who was she kidding? She was squeezing their hands like lifelines and so when Keir spoke up, she half expected the other shoe to drop.
Mad Maddy. Madness. Mommy dearest.
“Tess?” Keir repeated.
“Uh, yeah,” Tess said, forcing herself to concentrate on what Keir was saying instead of her own racing thoughts.
“I want you to know how much this means to us,” Keir said as they neared the end of the hallway.
She paused outsid
e the doorway to the games room. Her mother must be waiting in the corner again, so she couldn’t see them yet. “Aren’t you guys doing me a favour?” she said, not quite sure where Keir was going with this. “You know my mom’s ill right now but you’re not afraid-”
“Afraid?” Kade interrupted. “We miss our mother every day, Tess. She wasn’t perfect, had her own... demons,” Kade said. It was a whisper.
Demons. Yeah, that was a good way to describe it. Hurtful thoughts were like demons that tormented her own mother’s mind. They understood a bit then, knew a little of how difficult it was to let them meet her mother when she was so vulnerable.
“Oh,” Tess breathed out, so much emotion that she didn’t have the words to express it. She kept her tight hold on both of the twins’ hands and tugged them in to meet her mother.
Mad. Maddy. Mom. Someone with demons that wasn’t so alone or different anymore.
“Tessa?” said a tiny, high-pitched voice.
With a sense of dread, Tess turned to face the corner of the room where she had sat with her mother on Sunday. Maddy was dressed in hospital pants and a top gown, properly fastened and looking like any other patient, except for the two pigtails on the sides of her head.
Why hadn’t Ruby warned her?
“Mom,” Tess said, acknowledging her and pulling the twins with her as she moved towards her mother. “I’ve brought some of my new friends to meet you. Is that okay?”
“Tessa?” her mother said, gaze sharpening and tone flattening closer to her normal voice.
“Yes, I’m here,” Tess said.
She halted in front of her mom, then dropped the guys’ hands to sit down on the floor. The guys quickly followed, keeping their poses casual.
Her mother looked on either side of her at the guys and seemed a bit nervous, hand going up to her hair, playing with it in a fidgeting tic. Her mother’s hand froze for a moment as she felt one of her pigtails, almost as if she had forgotten that she had been wearing them. She even looked a bit chagrined.
“Kade. Keir. This is my mother, Maddy. She probably would like a bit of space right now, so let's all scoot back a smidge,” Tess said.
They did so immediately. “Didn’t mean to crowd you, Ms. Sinclair,” Kade said. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you since Tess mentioned that she was here to see you on Sunday. I attend some counselling sessions here with Doc Mike.”
Her mother looked over to him and smiled. “What day is it?” her mother asked. “Sunday, that was how many days ago?”
Tess was actually relieved her mother thought to ask, was interested in the date. It was normal to lose track of time, especially with all the heavy, sedating medications, but when her mother was ill she didn’t even care about what day it was or the time anyway.
“It’s Tuesday, and Sunday was two days ago. I’m Keir, and obviously, Kade is my twin. I’ve known Tessa for two days and Kade was lucky enough to meet her at the hospital here on Sunday as he mentioned.”
Her mother swung her gaze over to Keir. “You’re friends with my daughter?”
Tess felt her heart skip a couple of beats. Her mother had dropped the ‘little girl’ persona and was acknowledging Tess as her daughter. It was a pretty rapid progression from Sunday. Perhaps putting her mother into a situation like this hadn’t been a bad idea. It established their roles, let social niceties help guide her mother’s mind back to the present and out of the delusional beliefs she was using to hide from reality.
It was one step closer to finding out what was so hurtful, what demon had made her mother retreat into the catatonic state Ruby had described.
Slowly though; Tess couldn’t push too fast.
“I’m tutoring them at the high school. They’re both smart but it’s a way for us all to study together,” Tess admitted.
“We’re friends,” Kade said, not letting her explanation slide. “Although your daughter does seem to be ahead of me in chemistry.”
“She’s helping me get the top mark in physics,” Keir said.
Poor Bastion.
“Mom, are you okay with the guys staying while we talk or do you want them to wait somewhere else?” Tess asked.
Her mother looked at both guys, slower and longer this time, then back to Tess. “You have never brought a boy home to meet me,” her mother said.
It was true. Partly, that was because Tess didn’t date when she was younger, or at least, nobody serious enough to bring home. Nobody that she could ever risk meeting her parents, not when her father was a criminal and her mother’s moods changed with the wind’s direction.
She had been embarrassed. Now, that made Tess feel ashamed.
“These guys are special,” Tess said. “I had to wait until I had a guy special enough to meet you, and now, I have two—well, actually, four guys, but only two of them could be here today.”
“Three visitors per patient,” her mother intoned.
Ah, rules were something her mother would recite sometimes, just like sayings. It must be driving her mad not to have her newspaper and her books to pull her daily wisdom from and write on the fridge whiteboard. It was a habit as much as her morning runs or how Tess like to have a coffee as soon as she got up on a school day.
“My brother and I were always rather good at creative ways to do math. I’m sure we could find a way to get the nurses to let our other two friends in with us next time so we can all talk with you together,” Keir said. “Maybe we could have coffee together?”
Fat chance. They kept the coffee under lock, like the drug of choice it was in this place. A lot of people with mental health diagnoses had a caffeine addiction that made Tess’s coffee habit seem like a mild preference. It was a privilege. “How about tea,” Tess said. “And I don’t want to get Ruby in trouble if they think we’re sneaking in and breaking the rules only because War is her son.”
“Who’s War?” her mother asked.
“Warrick,” Tess replied. “He’s a very nice boy. His mother works here and I’m friends with him, too. He’s another of the guys I’m tutoring.”
“Working?” her mother said. “You should be focusing on your studies.”
“I am in school, mom. These guys go to the same school as me. Students tutor each other.”
“Warrick and Bastion will come to meet you next time,” Kade said.
That seemed to satisfy her mother. Tess decided it was time to broach the subject that was on her mind. At least see how her mother responded.
“Mom, I was actually hoping to go back to your room and look over the notes that you made for me about the answers to those questions I left for you. The bills to pay and where you keep stuff I’ll need around the house,” Tess said, trying to keep the examples mundane.
She couldn’t ask her mom flat out, ‘does Daniel’s bar have anything to do with why you went off the deep end or those scratches on your back?’
Tess knew better than to push too fast, but she also couldn’t drag her feet much longer to ask her mom what she really wanted to know after last night. She wanted to see that piece of paper for herself and exactly what had been written down, even though Ruby had read it out to her and she did trust War’s mom. Ruby still might have missed something that only Tess could see. The significance of some things was understood because a lifetime of knowing someone opened your eyes to how they saw the world, what mattered and how the past coloured everything thereafter.
Like the handcuffs on that patient Tess had fussed about on Sunday. Her mother would have felt frozen with fear just to hear those cuffs jangle or see them snapped onto the patient’s wrists. That wasn’t a normal reaction but if one knew that Tess’s dad was once a police officer, then the response from her mother started to make more sense.
Tess was still hoping there was some hidden clue, something that would tell her what had happened to harm her mother so she could stop it in time from happening again.
“Okay,” her mother said. That has been easy. Tess was actually kind of surprised b
ut she didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth.
“I’m going to go to the front and talk to the nurse for a few moments. She said that the doctor was going to talk to me about your medications because there have been some troubles with them being too strong and making you sleepy. If you go back to your room I’ll be there within 15 minutes and we can go over the notes. The guys will stay with me.”
Her mother nodded, giving the guys a bit of an uneasy look, again. Well, her mother had just met them. Even though they seem to get along with her okay and put her at ease, with her mother feeling sick, she wouldn’t want to be alone with them because they still were strangers.
“Do you want us to walk you to your room?” asked Keir.
“Actually, young man, I would appreciate the escort,” her mother said.
Tess arched an eyebrow in surprise.
Maybe the twins had made a better impression than she had realized if her mother was comfortable enough to accept an escort. She was glad that Keir had thought to offer it.
“Ok, let’s go together,” Tess said.
They all got up, Kade helping up her mom and Keir offering her mom an arm to take for the escort. Tess made sure to grab her mother’s book off the floor and bring it with her to the room.
Her mother offered both of the boys a seat at the window and took one of her own on the bed. Tess remained standing, not really ready to leave and wanting more to rush into reading the notes that her mother had written, which she could see sitting on the bedside desk. Her mother’s chicken scratch was unmistakable. It was always a point of irony that her mother was so neat and organized, maintaining a planner even though she didn’t use it for anything other than appointments and stuff that was already memorized in her head, yet she wrote in an almost unreadable fashion. The chicken scratch was more in keeping with a disorganized person, but hey, even doctors had messy writing so her mother couldn’t be judged fairly by her scrawl.
Impetuous (Victory Lap Book 1) Page 24