Holding Out for a Zero

by Wardell, Heather

  I haven’t been close to my parents in twenty years, and nothing changes in the twenty minutes we spend in the grungy police waiting room. I know I should say something, or they should, something reassuring or even something about our mutual surprise when the doctor told us that Gloria has the best private insurance possible since there’s no way she could afford that with her job history. Something, anything, to tie us together as a family. No one speaks, though, and I feel our joint relief when the cop finally calls us in and we’re no longer in a position to have the kind of conversation we don’t know how to have.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Malloy, Valerie, I’m Detective Johnson,” she says, shaking hands with us all. “Can I get you a coffee? And a bagel, perhaps? You probably haven’t had time for breakfast.”

  My parents accept both, but I just shake my head.

  Tipping her head to one side, the cop says to me, “Are you sure? We actually do pretty good coffee here.”

  “Okay,” I say, wanting at least something in my stomach. “Do you have artificial sweetener?”

  Her expression says she doesn’t think much of me for worrying about calories at a time like this, but of course she doesn’t know that I’m worrying about them precisely because it is this time. “No, sorry, we don’t. I can go easy on the sugar or you can take it black?”

  I’ve never been able to tolerate black coffee, but I can’t take in empty calories. Until I make a plan for how I’ll lose the weight, I just won’t take in any calories at all. “Could I get water, maybe?”

  She gives me a single nod and leaves, returning in moments with a tray. Once my parents have their food, the smell of which makes my stomach mutter nasty things at me, and I have my water, she says, “So, first let me tell you I’m so sorry about Gloria. We’re going to do our best to figure out what happened. And to help with that, do any of you know why she was at the Whitehall ferry terminal at three-thirty last night?”

  “Is that where it…”

  Mom can’t finish but the cop knows what she means. “Yes. We’re still investigating whether she’d been on the ferry and was arriving back in Manhattan or was about to take the ferry across to Staten Island. Either way, do you know what she might have been doing?”

  We all shake our heads.

  “When did you last see her?”

  “Easter,” Mom says, her voice shaking, “so a few weeks ago. She met us for dinner. Just Mike and me. Valerie had to work.”

  I hadn’t, actually, but I’d said I did. I hadn’t been able to face the four of us sitting around a table all thinking about the fifth who should have been there and the one who’d killed him. Every Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas since Gloria stopped ignoring us, the same thing, and since I’d have to do it an extra time this year for the anniversary party I’d given myself Easter off.

  “But I was supposed to see her today,” I say, before wondering whether I shouldn’t.

  The detective turns to me. “Where, and at what time?”

  Once she’s recorded the details in her notebook, she says, “And when did you arrange that? And for what reason?”

  “We arranged it yesterday, so we could…” I clear my throat, feeling awkward about saying something I know will upset my parents. “We were going to talk about Mom and Dad’s anniversary. Make party plans.”

  Mom buries her face in her hands and Dad wraps his arm around her shoulder.

  The detective leaves a brief but sympathetic pause then says, “And how did she seem when you arranged the meeting?”

  “Fine. Normal. She said she was having dinner with her friend Leah. She suggested we meet for drinks afterward but I had other commitments.” My throat tightens as I realize that if I had skipped my extra work and met with Gloria she might not have been hurt, but I manage to add, “Maybe Leah knows where she went after dinner.”

  She writes in her notebook, saying as she does, “I’ll check into that. And, Mr. Malloy, are Gloria and Valerie your only children?”

  We all freeze.

  She looks up, clearly surprised.

  Dad clears his throat. “Only living children, yes. Our son Anthony passed away nearly twenty years ago.”

  “I’m sorry,” Johnson murmurs.

  I think for a moment she’s going to ask how he died, but she doesn’t. If it would make a difference I’d tell her, but Anthony can’t have anything to do with Gloria’s…

  Realizing I don’t know how to finish that thought, I say, “What exactly happened to Gloria? Was it a mugging? Or do you think the attack was aimed at her?”

  Mom gives a whimper, and the cop says, “It’s too early to know that for sure, I’m afraid. There have been quite a few muggings in that area lately, but nothing like this. She wasn’t robbed, other than her phone being taken… at least, I’m assuming she had one?”

  We all nod, and she asks for its number. I pull out my own phone and provide it, and she writes it down then goes on. “But the other contents of her purse were scattered across the walkway in front of the ferry station as if someone went through them. Or as if the purse was thrown aside when her attacker fled. We are working on getting the security footage and that should tell us more.”

  So Gloria might just have been in the wrong place at the wrong time. I don’t want that to be the answer. How could a coincidence lead to this? But I also don’t want her to have been involved in something so bad she’d be beaten into a coma for it. None of this makes sense. No answer to why she was there alone so late would be the right one. I could investigate it myself, but I know nothing about how to do that and next to nothing about my sister. So how could I help?

  That awful terror at my uselessness sweeps over me again, and as I fight back my panicked need to run in any direction that’d let me escape all this Mom whispers, “What are we supposed to do now?”

  “Take care of Gloria,” Johnson says, with that sympathetic but distant tone I’ve heard on so many cop shows but never expected to experience in real life. “We’ll take care of the investigation.”

  Dad, who has always been able to eat no matter the situation, takes a tiny bite of his bagel, and my stomach growls but I will it to shut up. It doesn’t matter what it says. I will take care of my sister the only way I know how.

  *****

  “I can’t believe you’re here,” Jaimi says, her brown eyes full of tears. “If my sister were hurt like that, I’d…” She sniffles. “Well, I don’t know what I’d do.”

  “There’s nothing I—”

  I cut myself off, hard. I can’t say I can’t do anything. I’m not eating. That’s what I can do. Admitting out loud that nothing I do will make a difference might somehow make it true, and I can’t allow that. Besides, Gloria did take a turn for the better when I threw out the bagel, so maybe it is working somehow. Stranger things have happened.

  I clear my throat and start again. “I… the doctors are doing everything they can, and the police are investigating too.” The detective gave me, and my parents, her card, and I gave her mine too and told her I’d let her know if I thought of anything useful. “And my parents are staying with her until tonight. Not enough space in her hospital room for all of us to cram in there.”

  “But…” Jaimi takes a step toward me like she wants to hug me, then stops. Good. I don’t want that. I didn’t even want the office to know exactly what happened to Gloria, but it’s all over the news so there’s nothing I can do about that.

  Why do I keep thinking there’s nothing I can do today? I hate it. I won’t allow it to be true.

  “Listen,” I say, looking across the group of my stunned coworkers. “I get what you’re trying to do but honestly the best thing for me is to just keep going. I… I’m doing what I can do, and that’s that. Okay?”

  My cell phone rings, with the ‘here comes the bride’ tone I’d assigned to Mara after the wedding-food tasting at her joking insistence. I don’t answer. Instead, I say, “Seriously, guys, okay? Please. I can handle it all. Just let things be the way th
ey always are.”

  They still look horrified but they nod and begin to disperse, and in moments it’s just me, Jaimi, and Andrea the receptionist.

  “If there’s anything,” Jaimi says, blinking fast like she’s trying not to cry, “anything at all I can—”

  “I’ll let you know,” I say, wanting her to shut up before she realizes there is nothing that can be done. Before she makes me acknowledge that myself.

  “Valerie?”

  I turn to Andrea, but when she flinches back I realize it may have felt more like I turned on her.

  “Sorry,” she says, her voice shaking. “Just wondered if you maybe wanted a latte?”

  I do, actually, but on the subway ride back to work I decided that I’d stick to a 1200-calorie-a-day diet, so there will be no hundred-calorie lattes in my near future. “No, but… could you get me a coffee with one pump of caramel syrup?” That would cost me only five calories for the coffee and twenty for the syrup, according to my diet app, and I can afford that.

  “A pump of… they do that? In coffee, I mean? Just syrup?”

  “They’ll do whatever you want,” I say. “What I want, anyhow. And that’s what I want. Or just forget it, whatever.”

  She swallows hard, but I see a flash of something like anger in her eyes. It’s not in her voice, though, when she says, “Okay, got it. Jaimi?”

  Jaimi shakes her head. “I could do with a walk, actually, so I’ll come with you.”

  They depart, and as I turn away I see Jaimi give Andrea’s shoulder a pat.

  For some reason that makes me angrier than anything else has today, and I stomp into my office and slap at my phone to bring up Mara’s voice mail.

  “Oh, Valerie, oh my God, I’m so sorry about Gloria. Look, anything I can do, anything at all, I am there. And if you need to… I mean, I totally understand if you don’t have time for… God, I shouldn’t be thinking about my wedding at a— I’m not, of course, but… I’m all over the place, sorry. Okay. Call me when you can, and I’m here if you need me. It’s Mara, by the way.”

  I drop into my chair and feel a wave of helplessness try to drag me under. Everyone’s asking what they can do, and I have no answers for them. And barely any for myself either.

  I text Mara back, because I can’t handle talking to her when she’s like this, to say that if I think of anything she can do to help I will let her know and that I am still able to be in her wedding, then change the phone’s ‘do not disturb’ settings so only calls or messages from my parents will get through. I don’t want to hear any more frantic responses to Gloria’s situation. They only make me feel more frantic, and I can’t let that happen.

  On the subway, after setting my diet parameters, I began putting together a list of reasons why Gloria might have been going to or coming from Staten Island so late at night. Going to see a boyfriend? A girlfriend? We never talked about our sex lives, so how would I know? Visiting, or travelling with, that friend Leah, or another friend? Did she have another job we didn’t know about? Was she being threatened by someone and had to go to protest it or to pay blackmail or something? Was she watching a performance at the St. George Theatre over there? Did she just enjoy riding the ferry back and forth?

  I didn’t know as I made the list, and I don’t know now either. I don’t even know whether I have all the possibilities on my list. But I know one thing. I will figure out why this happened to Gloria. I’ll keep investigating, and make sure the police investigate whatever I can’t do myself, until the list is blank or I know the answer.

  Because she wanted us to get together last night and I refused, and maybe if I’d said yes everything would be different right now. I don’t know, but I have to fix this somehow, because I cannot have another sibling’s suffering on my conscience.

  Chapter Six

  Over the next few days I learn more than I ever wanted to know about coma patients. I learn that Gloria’s Glasgow Coma Scale score is 8, which means she’s in bad shape but does have at least some chance to recover. I learn about daily sponge baths and frequent changes of position so she won’t develop sores. I learn she might never wake up and if she does she might have significant brain damage.

  And I learn there might not be a damned thing anyone can do about any of it.

  I want to, of course. Though we’re not close, she’s the only sibling I have left and I can’t imagine losing her too. I keep thinking that if I’d only agreed to meet her that night none of this would have happened. So I sit by her bedside as much as I can, going straight there after work every day to relieve my parents who spend the days with her, because at least that feels like doing something.

  Gloria’s friends show up in groups of two and three every night, and I leave the room when they arrive because I can’t handle their emotions or their sympathy. I’m getting enough of both at work, too much, despite asking again for everyone to just act like nothing is wrong. Mara came to the hospital once, but she couldn’t stop crying and eventually I had to tell her to leave so she wouldn’t upset Gloria. Andy, to my surprise, called and told me how sorry he was and asked if there was anything he could do. There isn’t, of course, and I told him so, but he said he’ll call again later. I can’t say I care either way.

  Since I’ve also learned that coma patients might be able to hear despite not being able to respond, I talk as much as I can when I’m with Gloria so she’ll hear a familiar voice if she can hear. That helps me too, because while I’m talking I can’t eat.

  I manage to stick to that 1200-calorie diet. Mostly. I can’t resist a peanut butter cup when Jaimi shyly offers me one Wednesday, and I eat a few other things I shouldn’t, but even my worst day doesn’t go over 1300 calories.

  On Friday, though, when we meet with Doctor Wise at one o’clock for an official update, I know I haven’t done enough.

  “I’m afraid the news isn’t good,” he says, his face calm but sad. I have a brief flash of wondering whether they practice that expression in medical school before he goes on with, “Gloria’s coma score is now 7. We’ve had to lower her rating because she’s not responding to painful stimuli as well as she did before.”

  “You’re… hurting her?”

  He turns quickly to Mom. “No, no. It’s things like squeezing her finger at the base of the nail. Uncomfortable, but not severe pain by any means.”

  Mom relaxes back into her chair. “Okay, so she’s at 7. What happens when she gets to zero?”

  The doctor clears his throat. I know why. I’ve researched the coma scale enough to know that normal consciousness rates a fifteen and total unresponsiveness a three, so Gloria’s drop of a point is extremely bad news. She’ll never reach zero. There is no zero. Zero means she’s dead.

  The thought of zero makes me picture the size zero dress that was left hanging in the office closet Monday after we all claimed our new clothes. It was gorgeous, black with sleek silvery embroidery, but way too small for me. Jaimi fit into it but didn’t like it. I did, though. Like it, I mean. I certainly didn’t fit into it.

  I shove the dress out of my mind, not wanting to think about fashion right now, in time to hear the doctor finishing his explanation of how the coma score works.

  “So why is her score dropping?”

  The doctor turns to Dad. “We are concerned,” he says slowly, “that she may be experiencing brain swelling. We’d like your permission to drain the pressure.”

  “How?”

  He describes how he’d drill a hole into my sister’s skull, but I stop listening. I know what I have to do. The only thing I can do. The thing only I can do.

  When I threw out that bagel Gloria’s condition improved. This week I’ve slid backward with my diet, and Gloria is backsliding too.

  I know it can’t truly be connected, but I manage not to let that register with me. At least my diet is something I can lock down. I’ve been screwing up, but I won’t do that any more. I will be perfect.

  Mom’s mention of ‘zero’ goes through my head, a
nd I know how I’ll know I’ve been perfect, know I’ve done enough. I will get myself to a size zero as soon as I can. Gloria wanted to be there but she never did it, so I’ll do it for her. It’ll be challenging, but I’m small-boned enough that it’s possible. And it being hard to do is good, because Gloria has a hard task ahead of her in recovering.

  So I will do the toughest thing I’ve ever done, become a size zero, and if I don’t mess up even once that has to be enough to save my sister’s life.

  *****

  When our talk with the doctor is over, my parents and I go to sit by Gloria’s bedside. After fifteen minutes, though, two of Gloria’s friends arrive to see her, so my parents head home to get a little rest and I claim I’m going back to work but instead go shopping. My willpower already wavered once, when a sympathetic nurse offered us some packets of crackers, and though I only had a tiny nibble before regaining control I need to ensure that doesn’t happen again. I need a constant reminder to stick to my plan and do the only thing I can do to save Gloria.

  The moment I see the black dress in the store window, I know I’ve found that reminder. Undoubtedly designed by my boss, it’s sleeveless with an exposed silver zipper and a sleek straight skirt trimmed with silver embroidery at the hem. The dress in our office closet is similar, but I don’t want to take that one. I want to spend my money, quite a lot of money, on this dress, so it will keep me on the right track.

  “The dress in the window,” I say to the salesclerk, who’s so skinny she probably thinks size zero is obese. “Does it come in a zero?”

  Her eyes skim over me. “It does. Why?”

  I raise my chin. “I want one. Size zero.”

  I can see her wanting to say, “Why?” again, but she doesn’t. Lucky for her: I might have hit her if she had.

  She finds the dress, moving insultingly slowly, and begins folding it carefully. Without taking her eyes from it, she says, “Our gift boxes are ten dollars.”

  “I don’t need one.”

  She doesn’t lift her head but she raises her eyes, and her eyebrows, then lowers them and doesn’t bother replying.