Five Minutes To Midnight

by C. B. Stagg

  “If you’ll come with me, please. Someone is anxious to see you.” I looked back at the older couple who’d been with me through all this, but Claire shooed me on. I wondered for a moment if I should let her go first. He’d been her son longer than he’d been my husband, but he had called for me. I was going.

  It was only a minute, maybe two, before I was ushered into a large room. It was not unlike a standard, double occupancy hospital room, save the full glass windows allowing a clear view in from the nurse’s station just outside.

  “Hey, babe,” I whispered, as I entered. At the sound of my voice, Christian’s head turned slightly, and he smiled. “How are you feeling?” My heart broke a little, seeing my big, strong husband in such a vulnerable position. And it broke a little more seeing the empty space beside him. Waverly clearly hadn’t made it out yet.

  He tried to sit up, but the sweat on his brow and pain etched on his face forced him back against the pillows.

  “Where’s Wave?” He tried to look around, but his movement was limited.

  “She’s not out yet. Do you mind if I stay in here with you for a little while?” His eyes were already starting to droop, but he opened the hand resting closest to me on the bed. After leaning in to kiss his palm, I placed my hand in his.

  Eventually, Christian’s parents were ushered in despite the ‘one visitor only’ rule, but he stayed sleeping throughout. “How’s our boy?” Claire smoothed the hair on Christian’s head, clear to me that no matter how big he got, he would always be her baby.

  “I have no idea. He’s been in and out, mostly asking about Wave, but Morphine is a powerful drug.”

  She smiled. “Is there anything you need?” I just shook my head. Extended hospital stays as a ‘caregiver’ were nothing new to me, so I’d come prepared.

  “Well, I think we’ll wander down to the cafeteria while we wait for Miss Waverly Anne to grace us with her presence.” Kyle called her by her full name. Always. She loved it, and I adored him for making her transition into a brand-new family so seamless.

  “Ma’am?” Claire and Kyle hadn’t gotten more than a few feet out the door when a severe, gray-haired woman in scrubs approached me. I’d watched the shift change, so I knew she’d only just begun her duty caring for my husband. “Mr. Clark needs his rest. I’ll have to ask you to—”

  I stood, but Kyle, hearing the conversation, came to my rescue. “Hi, Norma, is it?” He’d quickly glanced at her nametag, but as she nodded, she acted like Prince William himself had just addressed her. Kyle was a fine-looking man, and it was apparent where the boys’ inherited their charm. “This young lady is my daughter-in-law. She’s married to my son, the man lying in that bed. Do you know what happened to land him in your care today?”

  Still smiling, and now blushing apple red, she shook her head. Of course she didn’t know. She hadn’t been in the building five minutes before barging in, trying to separate me from my husband.

  “Well, let me fill you in. My son, her husband… ” He spoke slowly and gesticulated as if she were impaired in some way. I’d be cracking up had it not been such a tense situation. “He donated a kidney today to my granddaughter, her daughter.” The woman’s eyes widened.

  “Now, I understand the hospital has their policies about the recovery room, but her whole world is in this room and just beyond those doors. So what I’m saying, Norma, is that if you truly think it’s in the best interest of this man and their five-year-old daughter—that the woman who loves him the most in all the world not sit by his side while she waits for her little girl—I’m afraid your security staff will have to physically carry her away. Have I made myself clear?”

  She nodded robotically and turned to me. “Ma’am, if there’s anything you need, just push this button.”

  I nodded, trying to hide my mirth. Kyle winked over his shoulder as he and his wife left through the imposing double doors that kept this part of the floor segregated from the rest. I fell back into my chair. All I wanted was to know my husband and daughter were safe.

  A few hours later, my wish was granted when Waverly was rolled in. “It couldn’t have been a more perfect transplantation, and from the looks of it, we made it just in time.”

  He wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t know. That kidney had been running on fumes for months. But not anymore. Now, my little girl was getting a shot at life.

  “Mrs. Clark.” I looked up through sleepy eyes. That was me. I was Mrs. Clark now.

  I nodded. “Yes, but you can call me Katy.”

  “Mrs. Clark, I need you to come with me.”

  I looked down at Waverly’s sleeping form. She was hooked up to all sorts of machines making various noises, but her pain meds had done the trick, and she was out cold. She’d been moved to a room after just a few hours. Christian had remained until a room could be cleared out for him on Waverly’s floor. That’s the news I’d been waiting for.

  “This is Christa. She’s a nursing student, and she will stay with your daughter, but I really need you to come with me.”

  The fog of sleep was slowly lifting. “Christian? Is it Christian? Did something happen with my husband?”

  The nurse grabbed my hand. “Please, ma’am, come with me.” She pulled me from the room. The woman walked fast and spoke even faster, trying to get me up to speed. “Everything was fine, as you know. Your husband was awake and talking, even demanding to be taken to see your daughter. But about thirty minutes ago, his blood pressure dropped drastically and his heart rate skyrocketed. He’s lost consciousness.”

  She spoke as she escorted me through heavy double doors that required an electronic badge to open. Once inside, we wound around a long series of hallways, finally landing in a large, sterile room, heavy with the sour smell of sickness. In the center stood a circular kiosk-style desk crowded with monitors, creating an island of information in the center. The sign above read Intensive Care Unit.

  What?

  Around the perimeter of the room, privacy curtains hung every few feet, with beds in between. Most of the beds were unoccupied, but the noises coming from a few now and then were terrifying. Why was I being led back into the bowels of the hospital? Wasn’t this where people came to die?

  “Where is he?” I whipped my head around, starting to panic. “I need to see him.”

  We finally stopped walking. “Just wait right here. The doctor will be out to explain.”

  And she left me alone, even more frightened and confused than when she came to get me.

  I slid down the wall, sinking to the cold, tile floor, as I cradled my head in my hands. I thought it was over. It was supposed to be. They’d made it through unscathed, both of them. Waverly was doing well, Christian had been doing even better. I’d been with him just a few hours earlier.

  “Mrs. Clark, I’m Dr. Alba.” The small-framed woman seemed to come out of nowhere. She extended her hand down toward me and helped me up. “We believe your husband suffered a hemorrhage in recovery, meaning something has caused him to bleed internally.” Unable to find words, I nodded. “He’s been taken back into the OR where the surgeon is operating again in an effort to locate the source of the bleed.”

  I hadn’t prepared for this. I’d read everything I could get my hands on about kidney donation and transplant surgeries, but nothing about this. How naive of me to think that we could weather this storm without complications.

  “Is he going to be okay?” I wanted assurance, a promise.

  “I can tell you that we will do everything we can to stabilize him. If you’ll excuse me… ” She turned and walked back through the swinging doors from which she appeared, leaving me alone again in the cold hallway.

  But, she hadn’t answered my question.

  I found my way back to Waverly’s room to check on her and to get my phone. Then I called Claire and Kyle, who immediately rushed over, but it was three hours before I heard any more from Christian’s camp. I’d just returned to the ICU waiting room after spending a few minutes with Wa
ve when the woman from before soundlessly appeared again.

  “Mrs. Clark, we were able to locate the bleeding. It was a tear in the renal artery, the large vessel that normally feeds the kidney. Dr. Fitzgerald is repairing it now.” Her words were quick, clipped, like she had better places to be.

  “So, he’s going to be okay?”

  “The doctor will come speak to you as soon as he’s finished. I can’t really say more than that, but I will keep you updated.”

  She left as quietly as she’d come, my simple question left unanswered once again.

  Hours passed like days as I shuttled between Waverly’s room on the second floor and the waiting room on the surgical floor. Claire and Kyle filled in for me, never leaving one unattended while I raced back and forth to be with the other. I’d gone well over twenty-four hours without real sleep, relying solely on adrenaline to keep me upright.

  I received the text from Kyle roughly six hours after Christian went into surgery. I’d been sitting with Waverly, though it was hardly necessary. She was out and would be for some time according to her team, so I raced up to the surgical floor where a doctor was waiting to speak with me.

  “Mrs. Clark, during surgery your husband went into hypovolemic shock, an emergency condition in which severe blood or fluid loss—blood in your husband’s case—makes the heart unable to pump enough blood to the body.”

  Kyle’s arms kept me from dropping like a stone. “Can we see him?” I was grateful Kyle was able to find words.

  “We were able to repair the tear in the renal artery, but this type of shock puts Mr. Clark in real danger of multiple organ failure. He’s listed in critical condition.”

  Critical.

  A hundred different words could have come out of that doctor’s mouth to describe Christian’s condition, but that wasn’t one I was prepared to hear.

  “The next twenty-four to forty-eight hours are paramount. We’ve placed him on a ventilator, and he’ll be getting several units of blood during that time. From recovery, he will be monitored closely in the ICU until his condition stabilizes. I expect him to remain in the ICU anywhere between three and five days, depending on his recovery speed. That is, barring any further complications. I won’t mislead you by saying he’s out of the woods yet.”

  It wasn’t fair. None of it was. This was supposed to be a simple, routine surgery for Christian. He was supposed to be there when Waverly woke up. He promised we’d be a family. He said our story was getting a second chance… that we would go home to our cottage by the sea and raise our baby girl.

  He promised me everything would be all right.

  He promised.

  “I can’t lose him, too!” I screamed, sobbing, while Kyle tried to hold me together, enveloping me in his strong arms. We didn’t know each other well, but the man had been nothing but warm and welcoming since I joined the family.

  And nothing drew families closer than a crisis.

  If.

  It’s a terrible word.

  But as I walked back to Waverly’s room, my thoughts no longer included phrases like, when we get home, or when you’re recovered. No, now that doubt had wormed its way in, the phrases had become, if we get home and if he recovers. When was final, absolute. If left an alternative. If not this, then that. And all my hopes and dreams were tied up in this, not that. There’d been no alternatives in my mind, until now.

  Christian would be so disappointed with me for thinking that way. He’d tell me that I needed to have faith, that God had a bigger plan. I just wish someone would give it to me straight. I had no use for sugarcoating. The doctors tried that when I was pregnant, but I was a long way from that lost, lonely girl. I’d beaten the odds time and time again, and just when I thought I’d hit my breaking point, I was hit with something else. I could handle the truth.

  In need of escape, I took the elevator down to the lobby. As I was exiting, a man with a small boy was getting on. The child held a bunch of wildflowers in his hands, tied together with a single pink balloon as he babbled on about seeing mommy and holding his sister. My stomach rolled. It was hard to comprehend a new life in a place that was slowly draining the life out of the man I loved.

  Outside, the air was cool, and I could smell a burn in the air. The clouds were moving steadily, and people walked along the paths that led to different wings of the medical compound. The world was carrying on like my daughter wasn’t on the precipice of a long, uphill journey to a normal existence—and like my husband wasn’t, at that very moment, using someone else’s blood to cling to life.

  An older gentleman passed me, and as our eyes met, he grinned. I smiled in return, but smiles are liars, and at that moment, there was no truth in the gesture I offered. I sat on a cool, stone bench.

  Maybe forever isn’t real. Maybe it doesn’t exist.

  I was shattered. I’d never understood why the heart was used to represent love. Broken hearts were even harder to comprehend. The purpose of a heart was to move blood. A heart did its job regardless of how a person may feel emotionally. Hearts were, in reality, unbreakable. It wasn’t until the threat of losing everything I ever loved that I fully got it.

  The physical pain of loss was visceral. It started deep within my chest and pumped outward until it flowed freely throughout. And there was no break from the pain, no pause button. It was spontaneous, involuntary, and if I wasn’t careful, it would consume me fully.

  I looked up, and the dark cloud that had followed me for the last five years—the one casting a shadow over my life and my happiness—felt my despair. Because just when I’d hit my absolute lowest point, it opened up and cried right alongside me.

  Chapter 32

  Christian

  SOUNDS SURROUNDED ME, steady and unremitting. There was a rhythm to them, the melodies and harmonies stomping through the cold darkness. And just when I’d grown accustomed to one song, it would change. The music soon became white noise, but the voices were what drew my attention from the blankness of my conscious mind.

  Sometimes I heard her. My Cinderella. Does she know how much my love for her consumes me? How it has for years? Does she know how much she changed my life? Does she have any idea of the power she holds? How one night with her transformed me into a better man? Did I ever tell her? Would she ever know?

  Her voice carried with it a warmth that cloaked my heart. She was touching me, holding me. She stroked my hair and kissed my face. She was right there, but dammit if I couldn’t reach her. Willing my eyes to open, but in defiance, they became even heavier. I’d waited a lifetime to find her, and now that I had, she remained just out of my grasp.

  All I wanted was to show her who I was, and what I’d become. I’d only ever wanted to be worth a second look. Everything that had happened in my life since that night was for her. It was always for her.

  Chapter 33

  Kaitlin

  WAVERLY WAS GOOD. Better than good, actually. She was doing great. And she absolutely loved the captive audience of her medical staff and smothering attention she was getting from all her grandparents. At first, my parents were intimidated… outsiders among well-established relationships. But a grandchild in crisis changes the rules. And in no time, they were all communicating and taking shifts around the clock to be present for Wave, letting me devote my time to Christian.

  “Hey.”

  The familiar gruff voice shook me from my daze and I discovered Casey’s hulking form in the doorway of Christian’s ICU cubicle. It had been almost three days, and while Christian’s vitals had remained somewhat stable and his lab work was improving, he still wasn’t awake.

  “When did you get here?” I stretched, and he shrugged.

  “Mind if I come in? I brought you something.” He pulled a chair up beside me when I nodded. “I was in Christian’s room at home and found this sitting on his dresser.”

  He dropped a small metal object into my hand: two nails tied together with copper wire in the shape of a cross. On the head of one nail was a K, and on
the head of the other was a W. I flipped it over in my hand, examining its assemblage.

  “There’s a funny story about that cross.” He cleared his throat. “I got a call one night several years back. It was a girl who said my brother was stumbling drunk. She said she had to leave, but didn’t want him to be alone and asked if I would come sit with him. So, naturally, I came. And she was right to call. He was four to the floor, which wasn’t too big a surprise considering the night before had been his twenty-first birthday. When he finally woke up, he had little memory of the events that had taken place. Again, not surprising. When he got up to go to the bathroom, though, he fell down almost immediately. You see, this cross had stabbed him in the foot.” He paused.

  “He called the girl who’d left it behind his Cinderella. At the time, it was half lucid grumblings from a hungover, slightly-injured drunk… but in retrospect, I think there was more to it than that.”

  “It’s mine. I made it at church camp one year. It was a keychain, but I lost it.”

  Casey nodded. “That morning, when Christian woke up, all that was left of you was that cross and, until a few weeks ago, that cross was with him wherever he went. It guided him out of the darkness and into the light. He called it a sign, but I know, in the back of his mind, he was secretly hoping to return it to its owner one day.”

  He stood, walking around to Christian’s other side. “What I find most interesting about this is that, sometime between meeting you and now, he quit carrying it.”

  “Why?” My eyes gushed like a fire hydrant, unacknowledged, my mind unbelieving.

  “Because I didn’t need it anymore. I had you.”

  My head snapped up, but Casey didn’t seem surprised when his brother’s gravelly voice stole the silence from the room. In less than a second, I flung myself across his chest, thanking God for the chance to hear his voice again.

  “For years, I thought my Cinderella would be the answer to all my prayers, but then there was you, and I had to admit that some prayers weren’t meant to be answered.”