by A. L. Jambor
"So, how do you feel about that?" Cassie asked.
"I'm supposed to feel good, right?"
"It means you're well enough to travel. You're getting better."
"I still feel like shit."
"Maybe a shower will perk you up."
Cassie looked at Mari's gown and cringed. It still bore the stains of yesterday's meals and Mari didn't seem to notice. Why hadn't the nurse attending her last night given her a new one?
The hospital was near a Target, and Cassie decided to go there on her lunch break and get Mari something new to wear, something that might make her feel like herself again.
"I'm going to Target during my lunch," she told Beth, another nurse on the floor. "Mari doesn't have anything to wear when they take her to rehab."
"Are you gonna spend your own money on her?" Beth said. "You'll never get it back."
"I can't send her to rehab in a hospital gown. Besides, she doesn't have anyone else."
"Maybe there's a reason for that."
"I'll be back."
Cassie put on her coat and left the hospital. The sky had been gray for weeks and she missed the sun. It was windy, too, and she ran to her car before her ears froze.
The Target parking lot was full. People were still returning unwanted Christmas presents and the lines at Customer Service were long. She hurried to women's clothing and looked at the PJs and nightgowns, but they didn't look like something Mari would wear. Cassie went to the sweatshirts and chose two, and then bought two pairs of fleece pants with elastic around the waist. They would be comfortable and warm, and even if Mari didn't like them, she only had to wear them while she was in rehab.
When Cassie got back to the hospital, she found out Mari had taken a shower on her own.
"I didn't know she'd gone in there until I went to take her vitals," Beth said.
Cassie left the bag with the clothes on the desk and went to Mari's room. She watched her patient as she got back into bed, walked over to Mari, and put her hands on her hips.
"What's this I hear about you taking a shower on your own?"
Mari blushed. "You said I'd feel better."
"But you're supposed to ask for help. What if you fell?"
"I used the walker to get there and the chair in the shower."
"But you could have slipped. Do you want to mess up your head and make it worse than it is?"
Mari started crying. She'd been doing that a lot, and Cassie knew that head trauma can cause intense emotions, but she still felt guilty.
"Look," Cassie said in a softer tone. "You can't do things like that yet. Promise me you'll ask for help."
"I promise."
A young woman entered the room with a food tray and put it on the rolling table.
"Do you want to sit in the chair to eat?" Cassie asked.
"I'm not hungry," Mari said.
Cassie lifted the lids and looked at the food. "It's a sandwich."
"So it won't get cold."
Mari's tone was flat. She had seemed depressed for a while, and Cassie noted it in her chart before leaving her alone.
*****
Mari was surprised when the phone on her end table rang. She reached for it and felt pain in her hip. She winced as she picked up the receiver.
"Hello."
"Hey you. How are you?"
The female voice was familiar. As Mari tried to visualize the caller, Cassie came into her room and stood at the foot of the bed.
"I sleep a lot," Mari said.
"Oh, my God, I just feel so bad. Is there anything I can do for you?"
"I don't know."
"We got a call from that guy you live with. He told us about the accident."
What the hell was this woman's name? Cassie held up the Target bag and Mari nodded. Cassie pointed to her watch and Mari nodded again before Cassie left the room. The woman was talking, but Mari missed what she had said.
"... there this weekend. We were going to send another person to finish the research, but they decided to go with that story about the guy in Missouri instead so you would have time to recover."
Mari had remembered that she was sent to Cape Alden to do research on an old murder that took place there in 1941. Why couldn't she remember what this woman looked like?
"Did they say how long it would be until you get better? I don't mean to push you, but Murray is already pissed off that you didn't get the research done before the accident so I'm gonna have to tell him something."
Mari closed her eyes as pain moved over the top of her skull and settled in her forehead.
"I don't know."
"Maybe if we looked at what you've got we could make a show out of it."
"I don't know where my laptop is."
Mari heard her whisper, "Shit." There was a long pause. "Maybe you left it in your room at the hotel."
Harry's face appeared in her mind, his warm hands, his kiss...
"He's dead."
"What?"
"He was in the car with me, the man who owned the B&B. He died."
"Oh, my God, Mari." the woman sighed. "Holy shit." Muffled voices. "Maybe someone can get it for you."
"They're moving me to another place. I don't know what it's called."
"Can you call me when you get there?"
"I...my phone is dead so I don't have any phone numbers."
The woman's face appeared in Mari's mind. She was a tall blonde with perfect teeth who acted as liaison between the producer and his minions. Mari remembered going to a bar with her. Her name was Kathy.
"Okay," Kathy said. "Geez, this is tragic. It's just so...tragic."
Mari wasn't sure if she meant Harry's death or her inability to access her laptop. She was leaning toward the latter when Kathy spoke again.
"Don't worry about it, Mari. You just get better."
Kathy hung up before Mari could say goodbye. Mari looked at the bag Cassie left on her bed and reached for it. Inside were two sweatshirts and two sweat pants. She took them out, ripped the tags off one set, and put them on. It felt good to be in normal clothes, even if they were sweats. They were comfortable, and at this point in her recovery, that's all that mattered.
When she returned to the bed, her memories of Harry had been stirred and now they wouldn't go away. She had met him the night she checked in and had liked him the moment she saw him. It wasn't that he was handsome, but he was kind, and he was easy to talk to. It was a few days before Christmas and he was expecting guests for the holiday, but then the nor'easter blew in, and everyone cancelled.
They had the place to themselves, and one night as they drank wine in front of the fireplace, they started making out. She kept reminding herself to be careful, that she would be going back to New York soon, but she liked him better than any man she'd met before, even the ones she'd lived with, and found herself trying to justify a move to south Jersey. Harry was a good man, and emotion overwhelmed her as she thought of his face.
"Oh, God," she said, tears streaming down her cheeks.
She gripped the sheet with her hands and closed her eyes. She hoped Cassie would stay away so she could sob her heart out. Mari wasn't a crier -- and she had no patience with emotional, weepy women, but now she couldn't stop crying, and what's more, she didn't want to. She let her emotions wash over her in a tsunami of hurt, and when her tears subsided, she felt her whole body relax for the first time since she woke up in the hospital.
She sensed someone in the room and turned her head. It was Nurse Cabot.
"Have you evacuated your bowels today?"
Mari started laughing. She laughed so hard it hurt her stomach, but she couldn't stop. The woman was smiling, too, and then she faded away. A shiver went through Mari, and she was grateful when Cassie returned to tell her the transport was coming. Cassie got her things together, and then put her hand on Mari's shoulder.
"I have an apartment over my garage. It's not very big, but it's cozy. I thought if you didn't have anywhere to go, that you might like to stay
there until you get back on your feet."
Mari stared at her. "You'd do that?"
"You won't be a hundred percent when you get out of rehab. I didn't know what your plans were, so I just wanted to make the offer."
Mari was quiet. Cassie wondered what was going on in her head. Did she think she'd be able to work? Had she even thought about it?
"Can I think about it?"
Cassie smiled. "Take all the time you need." She looked around the room. "I think I got everything." She looked at Mari's feet. "You better put your shoes on."
Mari's shoes were on the floor under the window. She hadn't put them on since she'd been in the hospital. She avoided looking at them because the ends were stained with blood.
"Yeah, I guess I have to."
"You can take them off when you get there."
"Will they fit over these slippers?"
She was wearing the hospital issued socks with non-slip bottoms.
"They should." Cassie picked up the shoes and put them on Mari's feet. They were a tight fit, and Mari winced. "Do they hurt?"
"It's nothing. I can stand it until I get there."
Mari began to cry again. She turned her head away.
"You'll have moments like this," Cassie said. "It's because your brain is trying to heal."
"I never used to cry and now I can't stop." Cassie went to put her arms around Mari, and Mari moved away. "I'm not good with hugs."
Cassie bit her lower lip. "I'll come see you in rehab."
"You don't have to."
"I know. I just want to see how things go."
Mari looked at her. "Thanks, for the clothes, and everything."
"You're welcome. Do what they say so you can get better."
Mari smiled. She looked so much younger than her thirty-five years, and Cassie felt like a momma bear abandoning her cub, but she had to let her go.
The transport arrived and two men came to collect Mari. Cassie watched them roll her down the hall in a wheelchair and felt herself tearing up, so she looked away and distracted herself with other patients' charts.
"This one was hard for you," Beth said.
"A little, but I'll be all right."
That night as she put her son to sleep, Cassie thought about Mari and looked out her bedroom window at the garage. The apartment was small, but for someone going through what Mari would go through, it was enough.
*****
Mari thought about Cassie's kindness as the ambulance pulled away from the hospital, and then began to feel strange. Her heart began to beat wildly, and she gripped the handles on her seat. She closed her eyes and it felt as if every nerve in her body was alert to some invisible threat. She cried out, and the attendant sitting in front of her looked around.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
Mari nodded, but he kept his eye on her until they reached the rehab in Oceanville. Mari kept her eyes closed as they wheeled her into the facility, which was similar to the hospital, and where she would share a room with an elderly woman who had broken her hip. She was thankful she'd been given the bed by the window.
It was late afternoon and the dinner trays were being delivered. She knew they would bring her something weird because she hadn't filled out the menu for the day, but it didn't matter. She had little appetite, and she missed Cassie.
As the sun went down, she lay on her bed and watched the stars appear. Her body ached and her head hurt, and oddly, she missed Nurse Cabot. As she thought of her, she burst into laughter.
"I've evacuated my bowels," she said.
"What?" said the old woman with the broken hip, and Mari laughed again.
Mari
Day 14
Ron the punisher. That's what she called him.
Physical therapy my ass, she thought.
Mari was always tired and sore when her sessions with Ron ended.
"More like physical torture," she said with a smile.
"It'll get better," Ron, an extremely fit twenty something said. "I'll be back tomorrow. Don't forget to do your stretches."
Shit. Please don't come back tomorrow.
She also felt drowsy when they finished and would lie down on her bed, always adjusting it to lessen her hip pain, and putting on the TV so the drone of voices could take her mind off the random thoughts filtering through her head. They would pass through her brain and didn't stop so she could see them clearly and understand what they meant.
"Your brain is healing," Colleen, the occupational therapist would tell her almost every day. "It will take time, maybe even a long time, so relax and try to focus on something else."
For Mari, that was TV, especially the news channels with their boring commentators speaking in nice, even tones. It was mesmerizing, and it always lulled her to sleep.
"Oh, for God's sake, George. You sound like a big baby."
Mari heard the woman's voice and opened her eyes.
"You had your appendix removed, not your testicles."
Mari rolled over so she could see them.
"I am in pain," George said. "Why can't you leave me alone?"
"Because I had five children and I didn't fuss as much as you do over a silly appendix."
George was in the bed next to her and the woman stood at the foot of the bed. Mari had done several unsolved closed cases from different eras and she recognized the woman's shirtwaist dress as from the fifties. These were two spectral visitors.
"You're coming home. You can at least watch the kids while you recuperate.
Mrs. George looked tired. When pushed to the end of your rope, a person will do just about anything, and Mari saw a look of desperation on her face. She was ready to drag him out of that bed and down the hallway by herself if necessary.
"Get up," she said. Her tone was menacing, and Mari sat up. "I'm not going to ask you twice."
Mari looked at George. It was obvious he was in pain, but his wife didn't seem to care. There is nothing more dangerous than a woman who hasn't had enough sleep, but George was doing what all men do -- ignoring what they couldn't understand. Mari kept looking from one to the other as Mrs. George ranted on about the five kids and the mayhem they were causing. It was fascinating, until Mrs. George took a knife off George's breakfast tray and stabbed him in the heart.
Shocked and shaken, Mari screamed, but the images had faded. She'd witnessed a murder, but when had it happened? A few minutes passed before a nurse named Karen came to her and asked if she was okay.
"Sorry," Mari said. "I had a dream."
"Must have been a doozy," Karen said. "How do you feel now?"
"I'm good. I'm okay."
"You know you can walk by yourself now, so you don't have to stay in here all day."
Mari knew, but walking the halls meant seeing people who weren't there.
"I know. I do walk, but Ron really made me work out today."
"Yeah, he does that." Karen glanced at the TV. "It's almost four. They'll be bringing dinner soon."
"Oh, boy!" Mari said.
Karen smiled. "So, you leave in a week. How do you feel about that?"
Mari cringed. "I'm a little worried."
"You have somewhere to go, though, right?"
"Yes I do, but I still feel so wobbly. I hate not being able to take care of myself."
"You will. You will still have to come for PT and OT."
"For how long?" Mari wore a pained expression.
"Until they release you, but from the way you're doing, it shouldn't be long."
Will they get rid of the ghosts?
"When was this place built?" Mari asked.
"I think it's been here since the end of World War II, but it's been renovated a couple of times since then. This wing was the original building, so it's the oldest." Karen looked at the TV again. "I might as well take your vitals while I'm here."
"Have you seen my husband?"
Mari looked around Karen toward the door to her room and saw a middle-aged woman holding a bouquet of flowers. She was dress
ed in a suit with a skirt that stopped mid-calf and a long jacket accented with a belt. She also wore a hat with a broad oval brim.
"This is his room. He was here yesterday."
Mari looked at Karen and clenched her teeth so she wouldn't say anything. The woman looked as if she'd been crying. She looked around the room, shook her head, and left.
Karen put a thermometer in her mouth and waited for it to beep.
"100. You should rest and drink water."
"Can I have something a little stronger?" Mari asked.
Karen smiled. "I'd wait a few months. Let your brain get better first."
"Is this wing for ladies only?"
"Uh huh."
She took Mari's blood pressure and wrote the numbers on a notepad in her pocket.
"I'll be back later," Karen said. "Buzz if you need anything."
Mari put her hand on her forehead. She didn't feel hot, and she didn't feel like resting. Her phone was dead and she didn't feel like watching TV. She looked out the window, got up, and despite her anxiety over seeing ghosts, went to the door.
As she looked into the hallway, she saw a girl coming toward her with a cart. She wore a pink and white striped shirtwaist jumper over a white short-sleeved blouse. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail high on the back of her head, and her bangs were short. She smiled when she saw Mari.
"Would you like a magazine?"
The girl rolled the cart up to her and Mari looked at the magazines. Look, Life, and The Saturday Evening Post, magazines Mari had never seen before, and all dated "May, 1962."
"We just got these in," the girl said beaming with pride. "It was my idea. I told them, 'We need newer magazines,' and they listened."
Mari smiled, and as the girl handed Mari a magazine, she saw the girl's wrists. Ugly, bloody lines ran across each, and the smiling girl faded into the ether as another young woman rolled the dinner cart toward her room.
"How are you today?" she asked Mari.
"They say I'm better."
The woman smiled. "And what do you say?"