Second Lives

by P. D. Cacek

  Turn left at the main lobby then walk fifteen steps and turn left again at the coffee kiosk – nod to Stu and Belinda, the morning baristas – pass the gift shop – Open, Please Come In – turn right into the elevator bank, punch the Up button, wait, enter, listen to the soft instrumentals he’d memorized by the second week, exit, turn right…walk twenty-four steps, turn left and….

  Danny stopped so quickly it caused his mother to fall against him. She grabbed at his chest to keep from falling and he heard the paper scrubs tear.

  “Danny!”

  “Why are we doing this, Mom?”

  His mother looked up at him with tears in her eyes. “It’s a miracle, Danny. Sara’s alive and you need to be there.”

  She squeezed my hand.

  Danny pulled his mother’s hand away. “No, Mom, she’s dead.” I felt her squeeze my hand and she moaned. I heard her…I heard…. “You heard what the doctor said, Sara died on the kitchen floor. They only kept her body alive for Emily.” She squeezed my hand. “I read that sometimes, at the end, they make sounds or twitch, you know, but she’s dead.”

  His mother raised her chin. “No, Danny, she’s alive. They didn’t tell us until they were sure, but she’s back in her room and she’s waking up. You have to be there when she does. It’s a miracle, Danny, now come on!”

  It wasn’t a miracle and he knew it, and probably the doctors knew it too. Some of the pamphlets he’d been given mentioned that there were occasions when the body – not the person, just the body – wouldn’t know it was dead. It might twitch or make sounds or squeeze hands, but it was dead. Sara was dead.

  Danny stopped, but this time his mother seemed to expect it.

  A crowd of people – doctors, nurses, maintenance personnel, men and women in business dress – were standing outside her room, jostling for position in front of the glass wall. They were talking quietly to one another, nodding and smiling. It reminded Danny of the mob of parents and grandparents gathered outside the NICU nursery window. The only thing missing was someone taking pictures.

  And then the flash from a smartphone went off.

  “Excuse us. Excuse us, please.” His mother was addressing the crowd as she pushed through them. “This is Danny, my son…Sara’s husband.”

  “He’s here,” someone said.

  “It’s him,” another voice answered.

  They turned and looked at him and all of them were smiling.

  “What the hell’s going on?”

  No one answered, but, along with the pats on the back and handshakes and best wishes, Danny kept hearing two words repeated over and over again. The same two words his mother had used earlier.

  A miracle.

  While there was a large crowd in the corridor outside the room, there was a smaller one inside. Huddled around the bed were Sara’s parents, his dad, Dr. Palmer, two ICU nurses, the anesthesiologist and another man in a white lab coat who Danny didn’t recognize. Sara’s mother saw him first and ran to him.

  “It’s a miracle, Danny, there’s no other explanation for it. Emily’s going to have her mommy back. Oh, God…thank you, God. It’s a miracle, that’s all it is, Danny. A miracle. Come on, she’s awake.”

  “What?”

  “She woke up?” his mother asked, pushing him from behind, pushing him closer. “Did you hear that, Danny? When did it happen?”

  “Just a few minutes ago. Sara? Sara, Danny’s here.”

  Dr. Palmer and his father, standing at the foot of the bed, turned and smiled at him, then stepped aside to give him room.

  She was wearing a pink hospital gown and a crown of EEG leads; an IV needle was taped to the inside of her left elbow and an air mask covered the lower half of her face. Multicolored peaks and valleys moved across the black screen of the monitor above her bed, registering and recording her heartbeat and respiration and brain activity.

  Sara looked up at him and blinked.

  She was alive.

  Danny felt the room shudder around him.

  “I don’t….”

  “Get him a chair,” Dr. Palmer said and one instantly appeared behind. “Sit down and take a couple deep breaths.”

  Danny collapsed into the chair and gulped down two lungfuls of air that felt so cold it burned.

  “I don’t know what to tell you, Danny,” Dr. Palmer continued. “You were there, you know what happened. She was flat-lined and then. It’s—”

  “A miracle.”

  Dr. Palmer smiled. “I suppose that’s exactly what it is. So, feel like saying hi to our miracle?”

  Before he could get back on his feet and take the very short, very long walk to her side, Danny needed to ask one more question.

  “She’s not going to…? I mean…?”

  “I’d like to tell you she’s fine and will stay that way,” the doctor said, “but the truth is that I don’t know. While there have been cases of coma patients waking up and spontaneously breathing after the respirator is removed, Sara was…. I guess she just wasn’t ready to leave.

  “Physically she’s fine, considering she’s just gone through a Caesarean section and was bedridden for the last few months. Everything’s working the way it’s supposed to.” Dr. Palmer nodded to the doctor Danny didn’t recognize. “Danny, this is Dr. Carter. Dr. Carter’s a neurologist. Would you like to continue, doctor?”

  After shaking Danny’s hand and congratulating him on Emily’s birth, Dr. Carter nodded to the monitors above the bed.

  “From the scans and her reflex responses, everything looks good…better than good. Her EEGs show a fully functioning brain, but I want you to remember that Sara was clinically brain dead for fourteen weeks. Even though the scans don’t show any anomalies or obvious bleeds, there is some indication of memory loss, which is certainly understandable and may or may not be permanent. Without more tests, we don’t know what her actual mental state is at the moment. It’s very likely Sara won’t be the same person you knew. Do you understand?”

  Danny nodded and realized that while the doctor had been talking to him, he’d been looking into Sara’s eyes and she’d been looking back.

  “We’ll run a battery of tests when she’s more recovered, and even then we might not know the full extent of the trauma….”

  “But she’s – ” Alive “ – okay. For now?”

  Dr. Carter stepped back. “See for yourself.”

  It only took Danny two tries before he was able to stand, and by then he was even able to walk around to the side of the bed without assistance. Sara’s eyes followed his slow progress to her side, but she flinched and pulled her hand away when he tried to take it.

  “It’s okay, Danny,” Sara’s father whispered. “She doesn’t recognize any of us right now, but like the doctor said, it might not be permanent. All we can do is hope for the best. The important thing is she’s back and that’s all that matters.”

  Danny nodded and moved his hand away.

  “Sara? It’s me…Danny. Are you…? How are you feeling?”

  Sara’s eyes darted away and back, then her hand moved cautiously to her belly and she grimaced.

  “Are you in pain?” he asked and she nodded. “Dr. Palmer?”

  But the doctor was already at the bedside, opposite Danny, moving slowly as he turned her face toward him. She didn’t flinch at his touch or try to pull away.

  “Sara, I know you’re uncomfortable right now and we will get you something, but I need you to tell me how much pain you’re in, okay?”

  The frown between Sara’s eyes deepened but she nodded.

  “Good girl.” Dr. Palmer nodded and one of the nurses removed the mask from Sara’s face. The hard plastic had left behind a red groove pressed into her skin and it was all Danny could do to keep from trying to smooth it out. “Now, take a nice slow breath, as deeply as you can.”

  She to
ok a breath and coughed, whimpering in pain. The sound was raspy and wet and jagged, but she was breathing.

  Sara was breathing.

  She’s alive.

  “I know,” Dr. Palmer said, “I know it hurts, but you did very well. Okay, now tell me how bad the pain is on a scale of one to ten with ten being the most. You remember numbers, right?”

  Sara gave him a look Danny remembered so well and held up both hands, ten fingers extended.

  Because there were other ICU patients who weren’t ‘medical miracles’, those gathered out in the corridor had to restrain their elation. Inside the room, there were no restrictions. Both his and Sara’s mother began crying loudly, while both their fathers attempted not to and began spouting platitudes on the strength of the human spirit. Dr. Palmer and Dr. Carter puffed out their chests and congratulated each other. The only two people who didn’t say anything were Danny and Sara.

  “Okay, this should help a lot,” Dr. Palmer said as the nurse upped the dosage on the electronic morphine drip attached to the IV in Sara’s arm. Danny watched her eyes dart around the room as if trying to find someplace safe to land, and then he saw her face relax and she settled back against the pillows with a sigh. “How’s the pain now?”

  Sara held up three, slightly curved fingers.

  “Good, now, I want you to answer me verbally this time, okay? Do you understand? Good. How do you feel, Sara?”

  Her mouth opened and a sound like sandpaper against tile came out. She touched the base of her throat and looked at the doctor. Hurts, she mouthed.

  “I bet it does, you’ve been on a respirator for…quite some time. Nurse, could you give her a little water on a sponge, please?” The nurse took something that looked like a small foam paintbrush from a cup of water and held it to Sara’s lips. She sucked greedily but still winced when she swallowed. “Your throat will be sore for a couple of days, but we can give you an anesthetic spray to use. Would you like more?”

  Sara nodded and the nurse dipped the sponge brush again and held it until Sara finished. There seemed to be less pain when she swallowed.

  “I’m so sorry, baby,” Danny told her. “I never wanted any of this to happen.”

  She looked at him without recognition, the room’s overhead light turning her clear green eyes hazel.

  “Sara?”

  Her eyes shifted from him to Dr. Palmer.

  “How do you feel?”

  “B-better,” she whispered and another cheer went up.

  Dr. Palmer turned toward the door. “Okay, everyone, thank you for your support, but I think it’s time we let the new mother get some rest.”

  There was a low undertone of grumbling as the hallway slowly cleared of Sara’s admiring public.

  “I…I don’t understand.” She spoke slowly, her voice so thick and husky Danny didn’t recognize it. “I’m…not a…mother.”

  The room got very, very quiet.

  “Ah,” Dr. Palmer said, “no, you probably wouldn’t remember that. You’ve been very sick for a very long time, Sara, but let me assure you, you are a mother and your little girl is perfect.”

  Sara tried to sit up and cried out in pain. Danny forgot and touched her arm.

  “No, honey, don’t, you’ll hurt yourself.”

  She drew back in terror. “Don’t touch me! I don’t know you!”

  “Sara?”

  “Why do you keep calling me that?” Her voice was little more than a raspy whisper, but there was something else in it. Something Danny didn’t recognize. “My name is not Sara.”

  Dr. Carter stepped closer to the bed. “What is your name?”

  Sara looked at him and pulled the sheet and blanket higher against her chest. “What kind of doctor are you that you admit a patient and not know her name?”

  “It’s hard to explain. Please, Mrs…?”

  She lifted her chin with rigid dignity and narrowed her eyes in a way that Danny had never seen before.

  “My name is Miss Elisabeth Regina Wyman and I reside at Number 10 Gramercy Place. If you would be so kind as to notify my mother of my whereabouts, I’m sure she is desperately worried.”

  Sara’s mother pushed the doctor aside and reached for her hand. Sara pulled back the same way she had with Danny.

  “Sara! I’m your mother.”

  Sara looked at her mother with a mixture of horror and suspicion. “You most certainly are not my mother! What sort of hospital is this?”

  “Honey, please,” Danny said, “don’t get excited, you’ll hurt yourself.”

  “How dare you address me in such a manner? I do not know you, sir, and I do not wish to. Doctor, if doctor you are, please send these people away.”

  Dr. Palmer looked as startled as the rest of them, but turned and motioned toward the door. “Perhaps it would be better if you …gave us a few minutes alone?”

  Sara’s mother was sobbing against her husband as they left the room. Danny’s parents left without saying a word.

  Danny looked at the woman in the bed one more time and left.

  It wasn’t Sara.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “You promised him. Let him go, Ryan.”

  Ryan took a deep breath and squeezed his eyes shut.

  “Let him go.”

  He was panting, his arms and back quivering from fatigue, and his hands, his useless hands felt like balls of lead.

  The man kneeling next to Jamie reached over to turn off the defibrillator.

  “Stop,” Ryan said. “Zap him.”

  The orderly looked at his partner. “Sir, if he’s DNR….”

  “I said zap him! Did you hear me?”

  Jiro made the mistake of touching his arm. “Ryan, stop this.”

  “Shut up, Jiro.” He didn’t take his eyes off the man. “I have his power of attorney and I’m telling you to do it.”

  The orderly leaned back. “If he’s DNR, sir, hospital policy states—”

  “Ryan,” Jiro interrupted, “ he didn’t want this.”

  Ryan kept staring at the orderly. “He does. He changed his mind. Do it.”

  Nodding, the orderly readied the machine while his partner tore open Jamie’s shirt and applied two rubber pads on his chest.

  “Charging to three hundred,” the man said, placing the paddles against the pads on Jamie’s chest. “Clear!”

  Jiro gasped, backing away as Jamie’s body lurched against the paddles and collapsed. Ryan didn’t move. The first man leaned back while his partner, adjusting a stethoscope to his ears, leaned forward to listen to Jamie’s chest.

  He shook his head.

  “Again,” Ryan said.

  The man with the stethoscope leaned back as his partner recharged the paddles. “Clear.”

  Jamie’s body arced and lay still. There wasn’t a sound afterward. It was so quiet Ryan could hear the water lap against the sides of the pool as the second man leaned forward to check Jamie’s heart.

  And nodded.

  “He’s back.”

  Before the orderlies blocked his view, Ryan saw Jamie’s chest rise and then spasm as he began coughing up water.

  “Easy,” the man with the stethoscope said. “Take it easy. What’s his name?”

  Ryan opened his mouth, but he couldn’t take in enough air to produce words.

  “Jamie,” Steve answered for him.

  “Jamie?” the orderly shouted. “Jamie, can you hear me? Jamie…open your eyes. Can you open your eyes for me?”

  Jamie groaned. Ryan moved closer and saw his eyelids fluttering.

  “That’s right, Jamie, open your eyes…come on. There, that’s it. There you are. Okay, just keep breathing, you’re okay.”

  Ryan took another step. Jamie was blinking, trying to focus.

  “I’m here, Jamie,” he said. “I’m here.” />
  Jamie looked at him then closed his eyes. It’d only been for a second but Ryan saw something that didn’t make sense. Jamie’s eyes were gray, like a lake at twilight, but when their eyes met just now, they had looked brown.

  “Okay, he’s stable,” the second orderly said, “let’s get him up to ICU.”

  The orderlies picked Jamie up and put him on the gurney, covered him with a blanket and wheeled him away. Ryan followed them.

  No one followed Ryan, but Jiro stopped him, briefly, as he passed.

  “He really didn’t want this, did he?”

  “Of course he did,” Ryan lied then hurried after the gurney.

  He caught up with them as they were entering the ER. One of the ER doctors was standing next to the gurney, nodding as the orderlies explained the situation while simultaneously listening to Jamie’s heart. Jamie was moving more now, turning his head from side to side. Ryan reached under the blanket and took his hand.

  “Jamie,” the doctor said, “can you hear me?”

  Jamie grunted.

  “Jamie, it’s Ryan. You had an accident but you’re okay now. Open your eyes.”

  Jamie wrinkled his forehead and Ryan laughed. The doctor looked at him.

  “He hates getting up in the morning,” he told her, then turned his full attention back to Jamie. “I know, but you have to open your eyes, baby. Come on, now, open up.”

  Jamie’s eyelids fluttered, parted, closed, and fluttered again.

  “Come on, Jamie. Open your eyes. There’s a very nice lady doctor here who wants to see those big baby grays of yours. Come on.”

  Jamie kept trying and shaking his head.

  “Nein, nein…vo iz mein tokhter?”

  “What did he say?” the doctor asked.

  Ryan stepped back. “I have no idea.”

  “It’s Yiddish,” one of the orderlies said. “He asked where his daughter is.”

  “Daughter?” Ryan looked down at his lover. “He doesn’t have a daughter. What’s going—?”

  Jamie was saying something else and the orderly moved closer, motioning Ryan to be quiet.

  “What? I mean, vos?”

  Vos? “What’s going on?”

  The man motioned again and added a loud shush. “Say that again. I mean, oh, God, what is it? Oh, right. Jamie? Jamie, ich farshtai nicht. Um…nochzogen? Yoh?”