by Heidi Willis
"Mrs. Babcock, you need to come with me."
"Is Ashley all right?"
"She's fine now. She had a bit of an episode, though, and I think she'd like to see you."
"What kind of an episode?" I'm shoveling the pamphlets into a canvas bag without bothering to fold or stack them.
"She's fine now," she repeats, and I feel the hairs on my neck grow hot.
"What's wrong with her?" I say this slightly too loudly and several people near us turn. Others pointedly don't, bless them. I imagine most in this room have said these words in the last three days.
"Her blood sugar dropped inexplicably. I'll explain as we walk."
I follow her to the elevator bank and then up a floor before she says anything else.
In the room Travis is already beside Ashley, helping her into a chair as two orderlies strip the linens off the bed.
"What the Sam Hill is going on?" I stare at Travis as though this is his fault.
"I just came up to see if she was awake," he says, his face white as rice. "She was shaking all over and sweating like a hog in heat, mumbling all kinds of stuff that made no sense."
"Often when a patient becomes hypoglycemic they are unable to talk, or are confused."
"She told me the orange juice was making too much noise."
"It made sense at the time," Ashley finally speaks, a meek whisper.
"How can that make sense?" I say.
Betsy shrugs and moves the tray away from the bed as the orderlies put new sheets on. "When the brain doesn't have enough glucose it does funny things. It makes it hard to communicate. Sometimes a patient can't speak at all, and sometimes it comes out all gobbledy-gook. The nerves are misfiring, and the brain wants to just shut down."
"Why did they change the sheets? Did she pee in bed?"
"Mom!"
"No, Mrs. Babcock. The hypoglycemia caused Ashley to break out in a sweat. We just thought she'd be more comfortable in drier sheets."
"When did this all happen?" I glare at Travis.
"Just now. I just now came up and saw her. I rang the bell and a doctor came and tested her and gave her a shot, and then Betsy went to get you."
"I thought shots brought her sugar down."
"This is a glucagon shot," Betsy says. "It gets sugar into her system fast."
"I thought we've spent the last 24 hours trying to get it down."
"Apparently we did that. A little too well."
"Shouldn't you be able to control that?"
"You'd think, wouldn't you?" Betsy doesn't even react to my anger. She laughs it off as though this is some kind of joke.
"Yes, actually, I would."
"Look, honey. This is what you are going to be dealing with the rest of her life. There's no magic solution here. No magic calculation. And until we know how she reacts to the insulin, we can only keep adjusting. Every diabetic is different. With some, one unit of insulin will drop them 200 points. With some, it only drops them 15. She dropped real fast. She must have a good sensitivity to it, but not everyone does, and we just can't know that until we try it out. It's the nature of the beast. If it were all predictable, it wouldn't be much fun, would it?"
I feel like kicking her in her patootie as she leaves the room. When I turn back to Travis, Ashley is leaning against him in the chair, already asleep on his shoulder. He picks her up, heaving a little even though she is so tiny, and lays her back in bed. I cover her with the blankets and use a towel to dry the drops of perspiration off her forehead.
"Can you believe the nerve of that nurse?" I ask. Travis don't answer and I look over at him. "Travis?"
"I thought she was dying." He sinks into the chair next to the bed and puts his head in his hands, the same way I'd been doing just a few minutes before. I wonder if it came naturally to us, or if one of us picked it up from the other. "I came in and she was shaking all over, like she had a fever of a hundred and eight, and she was talking, but it didn't make no sense, and it seemed like it was hard to talk at all. She talked real slow, and her words slurred together, and she looked at me like she was begging me to understand. And she was sweating all over and shaking, and I didn't know what to do."
"Well," I say. "It seems like you did the right thing. She's okay now, right?"
"Lord Almighty, is this what every day is going to be like?" He looks up at me. "I can't do this every day, Babs. How are we supposed to go home and live normal lives? How can we put her to bed every night knowing this could happen any minute? How in the name of all that's holy are we going to send her off to school by herself for eight hours a day?"
Since I saw Ashley go down on the driveway--it seems like days ago--I've been on the verge of a nervous breakdown. I've been holding back waiting for the right time to go psycho. But now Travis is freaking out, and if I've learned anything in marriage it's that only one of us can have a meltdown at once.
"God will give you strength." We both turn towards the door, and Pastor Joel, the preacher at First Baptist, is standing in the doorframe. "God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble."
"Yeah?" says Travis. "I didn't see him here giving Ashley her glucagon shot a few minutes ago. Where was he then?"
And Pastor Joel and I stare, adequately shut up, as Travis storms past us and down the long hallway of the hospital.
~~~~
Chapter Eight
Pastor Joel motions me to go after him, so I do, though I'm madder than a hornet at him. I catch up at the elevators, where he's pushing the down button so hard and fast I think he's going to break it.
"Stop it, Travis," I say, yanking his hand away like I might've if it was Logan doing that and he was three. "You want to explain why you went off like that?" What I'm thinking is how it's usually me thrashing out at God like that. It's Travis's job to hold it together in the God department and hearing him yell like that is like the floor dropping out from under me.
"No." He pushed the button again, just to show me he could.
"What is going on with you?" I say, which is a poor way of saying I need him to be strong. I know it's a poor way 'cause he don't even look at me. The elevator doors open and Gloria, Brenda and Janise step out. Travis storms past them, but I'm too taken back by all the sudden appearances. I hesitate just long enough for the doors to close.
Janise leans over and hugs me--one of those long, I'm-so-sorry-for-you hugs. She's the one person in the world that would really mean it when she said, "If I could take your place, I would."
She hands me a bag of cinnamon rolls. "I knew you'd probably be stuck with hospital food, so I brought you breakfast." The smell, which would normally make me drool, leaves my stomach a little sick. In Texas, food is the cure for everything. Everything except this.
"Thanks."
"Is Travis all right?"
"I don't know." I'm still staring at the elevator doors, wondering what's just happened. I shake it off. "Sure, he's fine. It's been a rough morning."
"With Ash?"
"All of it. Being here, not really understanding what's going on. It happened so fast."
I lead them back to the room where Pastor Joel is sitting in the chair that Travis already claimed as his territory. Ashley is still asleep and Pastor Joel has his Bible out and is reading to himself. I share the rolls with him, and we all talk as if Ashley ain't lying right next to us. Gloria has brought plans for the Memorial Day church barbeque, and they discuss that for a few minutes. I listen, but not really. The Ricardos can rent a party-size grill for the burgers and chicken, and the deaconate will man it. We need at least four families to bring coolers to store the ice and cokes. Gloria is making her famous lemonade, and we need to find one or two other women to make sweet tea. The church will provide the meat--Brenda is calling the order in to the market, and someone on the deaconate will pick it up on Friday. Families A-M will bring side dishes, and N-Z will bring deserts. I half-heartedly suggest switching that around, because frankly who enjoys making potato salad all the time more than
brownies, but Brenda waves me off and insists it works better when there is consistency. She's a Williamson.
She drones on some more. I'd like to tune out completely. I'd like to not be here. I'd like them to not be here, talking like nothing is changed, like life's going on. To be talking about picnics sitting next to my daughter who might as well be in a coma at this moment is surreal. That's one of those SAT words. It's a good one.
Brenda moves on to the Pro-Life rally that's happening here in Austin next week, and which our church is participating in. A million folks descending on the capital steps to make sure people know it ain't okay to kill babies, or something like that. This has never been my thing. I'm just not that much of an activist, although Travis is pretty vocal, especially for a man. His mama was a single mom and almost aborted him. I think that hits a little close to home for him.
Ashley gets really into it, too. The youth group is pretty active that way, and so she's been planning on walking in it for the last two months. Now, of course, I'm not sure if I'll let her.
Brenda's yapping on and on about things that don't matter at all: details about the busses, and how many kids are going, and what kind of poster board will stand up to the marching, and how hot it's supposed to be. I realize she's talking and talking 'cause she don't know what else to say to me. She's here to help, but there's nothing to do to help. Nothing even Travis and me can do. Some of us ain't that good at just being there for one another. Brenda's one of those folks. Baking and cleaning and making phone calls, sure. But not so much of the just being there.
She's going over the agenda for the day and asks if she can put me down as a chaperone for the youth group bus, if'n we're out of the hospital by then and all. I guess she figures she's got me cornered 'cause who's going to say no to life when their daughter's hanging by a thread. I don't want to admit to her that I've never been comfortable with the way the church is involved in political issues. Seems to me a church should be about God and not so much the government. But it always seemed important to Ashley, so I say yes. I don't add the "if we're out of here" part.
Now she fishes around in her trashy gold bag and pulls out a stack of fundraising flyers and a box of envelopes and hands them to me.
"You've got lots of time here, I figured this would be the perfect job for you. You can stuff the envelopes and put the labels on them while you're sitting here all day. Ashley can even help if she's feeling better." She smiles sweetly, the kind of smile the wolf in grandma's clothes smiled right before he gobbled up Red Riding Hood.
She's talking about where to get the banner printed that the kids will carry in the march downtown when I see Ashley's eyes flutter open. I get up from this tiresome group and sit on the bed beside her.
"Hi, Ash. It's me. How're you feeling?"
The women get quiet for the first time, and suddenly, Pastor Joel senses Ashley's awkwardness and herds the small group out into the hall.
"Why are they all here?"
"Because they care about you."
"I think they're afraid you might not show up for church this week and ruin our family's perfect attendance."
"I'd say that's a certainty."
"What time is it?"
I look at the clock behind her bed. "Ten. You fell asleep after the shot."
"I was so tired. I woke up all sweaty and jittery, and I couldn't keep from shaking all over."
"I know. The nurse said you had a sugar low."
"I felt like all I wanted to do was sleep, but I was shaking so much I couldn't. She gave me a shot." She rubbed her arm. "It really hurt. Are all my shots going to hurt like that?"
She still has the IV in, and the insulin is dripping straight into her arms. She's supposed to get it out later today, and we'll start the shots for every meal. We're both scared. "I hope not, baby."
"I have to pee."
I help her out of bed. She's still shaky in the knees, so I let her lean on me. She drags the IV behind her and shuts me out when she can lean on the sink, instead. I do motherly things, like fluffing her pillows and opening the blinds and pouring the now-lukewarm water from the pitcher on the table into the flowers. When she comes out she waves me off and makes a bold but slow stride towards the bed.
"You want to play a game? Pastor Joel brought a few board games, in case you're bored. Get it? Board games for the bored."
"Ha ha!" She grins, though, so I pull the tray table over as she raises the back of the bed so she's sitting upright. Her eyes are more alert and her face looks newly scrubbed, and I think how hard this must be for her at this age to not be taking care of her looks. We've only recently allowed rouge, and the teensiest bit of mascara and lip-gloss, but she already fits into them like a glove.
I rub my hands together fiendishly, the way I do every time we play a board game, and cackle like a witch. "Okay my pretty, what is your poison today?"
"Apparently it's food." She says this with a broad smile, as though finally she has found the perfect comeback at the perfect time, but it wipes the grin straight off me.
"Don't say that, Ash."
"Why? Gosh, Mom, do I have to feel terminal all the time? If I can't joke about it, I'm going to have a really depressing life."
Because it's true, I think.
She gives me a goofy face, mouth twisted and eyebrows arched, her tongue lolling out.
I force a smile. "Okay, then, Miss Cheerful. What'll it be?"
She looks through the games and picks Monopoly, which promises a good, long diversion. She is the banker, because I can't do math in my head fast enough, and I line the properties up by rainbow color order rather than board order along the foot of the bed.
She picks the shoe. She always picks the shoe. I sort through the rest, less certain. I hate the water so the ship is out. I'm allergic to dogs, and horses scare the bejeebers out of me. The use of the thimble is beyond me. I choose the hat. I put it on my head the way I did when Ashley was young. It still makes her laugh. I'd give all the monopoly money in the world, and all the change in my own account, to hear that every day.
She charges around the board buying up every property she lands on until she's near broke. I only buy the bigger payoffs. She never lands on them, but I'm forking over two's and five's like nobody's business.
About six turns around the board Logan sticks his head in the door. He looks unhappy, which ain't unusual, and nods down the hall. "The church people want to know if everything's all right." This is code for they want to know what's going on. Ashley scrunches her face because she knows the code, too.
"Don't tell them all of it, Mom."
"All of what?"
"You know, the personal stuff." Suddenly she's the self-conscious twelve year-old.
"I'll only tell them about the throwing up and the dragging the IV to the bathroom with your gown flying open in the back. How's that sound?"
She sticks out her tongue at me, and it means something faraway different than when Logan does it.
"Can you do the go round for me," I ask him, nodding at the game.
He shrugs but, God love him, he don't roll his eyes. I kiss Ashley's head, and Logan takes my place in the chair, sizing up the board and his loot with an expressionless face.
In the hall down by the nursing station the ladies are sitting in the waiting room. I can't tell if they're praying or gossiping. Probably a little of both. I don't see Pastor Joel.
Brenda seizes on me. "Is everything all right?"
I stare because I can't believe the words coming out her mouth.
"No, Brenda, they're not all right." Janise steps in and puts her arm around me, more to keep me from lunging than to comfort me. I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't know why these women bug the heck out of me so much.
"We know this is really hard. What can we do to help?"
Suddenly, I'm tired of all this. I am tired of fighting these women who have driven all this way to be with me. I am tired of trying to make a wall between us when I've been on the other side
so often. I look at their faces, and even though I want to see the false sympathy, there ain't nothing there but love. I feel ashamed.
"The doctor gave me lots of information I don't quite get. Maybe you could help me sort it out."
They all immediately jump on that, anxious to do something other than bring gifts we can't eat and plan church socials. I say I need to get all the pamphlets back in the room, and I tell them to meet me at the cafeteria.
When I get back to Ashley's room, I stop short at the door.
Logan's sitting on the bed with Ashley, and they're laughing so hard I see tears in Ashley's eyes. She's bunched up like she's got the stomach pains, and Logan throws out one-liners that make her gasp for breath.
I'm all at once standing at the doorway of Logan's bedroom when they were just young'uns, buried in the dark of night in Logan's bunk beds. Despite me painting a whole room of pink butterflies for Ashley, she still sneaked in every night to sleep with Logan. As I'd head to bed, I'd hear them giggling in the black, trading jokes that revolved around body sounds and stuffing the blankets in their mouths to keep me from hearing. Of course I heard, and I'd stomp in and demand Ashley go back to her room and the laughter to stop, because school was coming early in the morning. She'd slink past me, but in the morning I'd find her back in his room, curled up in the bottom bunk.
One night she stopped going in, and I wished I'd never sent her back.
I haven't seen them pass a word between them for barely a year other than to grumble at each other over the dinner table. I want to be happy they've found each other again. Mostly I'm jealous.
I back out of the room without a sound and return to the nurse's desk where I say I've lost some of the pamphlets Dr. Benton gave me. She flips through a file cabinet and produces another stack like magic.