She kicked a hole large enough to get through and entered the apartment. The foul scent of urine caused her nostrils to flare open. Racing to the bed, she found Sterling, an eerie shade of blue, semiconscious, inches away from the telephone, which was off the hook, lying next to the bed.
Shocked when she saw Sterling’s neck and limbs jerking wildly and the opaque white bubbles foaming around her mouth, Carmen dropped to the floor. “Sterling, baby!” she shouted. “What’s wrong?”
She cradled Sterling’s head in her arms and watched in horror as her eyes rolled up in her head and her tiny body continued to jerk and shake violently in spasmodic convulsions.
Less than five minutes later, the paramedics transferred Sterling into the ambulance and whisked her off to nearby Chamberlain Hospital.
Tears raining inside her soul, Carmen punched in Spice’s pager number. No response. Where the hell was she? Carmen left messages at Spice’s home and her apartment, then rushed after the ambulance.
Driving ninety miles an hour, Carmen thought of Sterling when she was first born. Should she die, Sterling would never know the truth—that she was Carmen’s baby. The baby born of rape, the baby she hadn’t been able to keep.
It was now 12:35 P.M.
Carmen caught up with the ambulance just as they wheeled Sterling into the emergency room. Sterling’s eyes opened. Even though she seemed barely conscious, she managed a small smile at Carmen.
“Get the mag!” the emergency room doctor shouted as he quickly assessed Sterling’s condition. “Push the mag!” he shouted louder.
Carmen was told by the doctor that he was giving Sterling a dose of magnesium sulfate that would stabilize her seizures without harming the fetus. He explained that Sterling was suffering from pre-eclampsia, or toxemia, which meant that if she did fine, they would give the baby three to four hours to calm down and then proceed with inducing labor or delivering the child by C-section.
While the doctors scheduled a series of tests to determine Sterling’s condition and the extent of the injury to the fetus, Carmen kept calling Spice. No answer. She paged her again. Several minutes passed—still no answer. Carmen dialed Mink’s home. The machine came on, and she left a message. Carmen was beside herself with worry.
Who else should she call?
Without the doctor having to tell her anything, Carmen knew that Sterling’s blatant drug use, coupled with ten years of chain smoking, had compromised her system. The stress she lived under, Carmen surmised, was the icing on this bitter cake.
After Sterling’s initial examination, the team of doctors informed Carmen that in the past twenty-four hours Sterling had experienced perhaps as many as two hundred seizures. Until the patient was breathing on her own and could confirm their assumption, they couldn’t know for sure.
“How long has she had this pre-eclampsia condition?” Carmen asked.
“It’s hard to tell. Ms. Witherspoon might not have known. Unless her obstetrician ordered a dip-stick protein check during her checkup, this problem could virtually go undetected.”
“So you’re saying that Ms. Witherspoon—”
“My assumption is that Ms. Witherspoon experienced periods of high blood pressure, severe headaches, and possibly swelling of the hands and feet lately. It’s possible with her continued use of heroin that she failed to factor in the danger of these symptoms to her person and her fetus.”
Drugs. Would this be the only commonality that mother and daughter shared? Carmen thought.
Silence.
As they stood just outside Sterling’s room, the strident steps of a nurse broke into Carmen’s thoughts.
“Doctor, we’ve intubated the patient, but she isn’t responding well to the medication.” She handed him Sterling’s chart.
Dr. Katbi turned to Carmen after the nurse left. “Ms. Witherspoon’s heart rate is at one fifty, which is extremely high. I’m concerned that if we wait too much longer, the fetus won’t make it.”
Please stop talking. Please stop talking, I can’t think. I can’t lose my child. Oh, Lord, what am I going to do? I don’t understand a word he’s saying.
“I don’t have any jurisdiction over Ms. Witherspoon. I’m just a family friend,” Carmen said. You’re her mother, tell them you’re her mother. Her voice broke as she added, “I don’t know how you should proceed—” Her chin touched her chest, with tears closely following. What would Spice do?
“We cannot predict the possibility of another seizure.” The grave look on Dr. Katbi’s face said that Sterling’s chances for recovery were tenuous.
Carmen dialed Spice’s home and beeper over and over until her fingers were numb. Then she had another thought. What if Spice called the restaurant? Carmen smacked herself in the forehead with her palm. Damn!
The familiar sound of Develle’s voice offered a polite “Hello.” “Could you punch me in to Kia’s office, please?” Carmen asked, keeping her voice as steady as she could.
“Certainly, I’ll connect you now.”
“Kia, listen carefully. Sterling is in the hospital—it’s serious. Spice isn’t at home, and I can’t reach her anywhere.” Carmen’s heart and body ached with an indescribable emptiness. “I’ve been dialing her pager for the past twenty minutes. She hasn’t called back yet.”
“Today’s Sunday—her day off. Usually she doesn’t turn her pager on. Wait. Are you dialing her new number?” Kia rattled it off.
Minutes after Carmen coded in the new pager number, there was a call at the desk for Carmen.
“Carmen,” Golden said, “you sound terrible. What’s wrong?”
“It’s Sterling.”
“What’s happened?”
“I found her at home, unconscious. She’d had a series of seizures—the doctor—Golden, she’s very ill. Where’s Spice?”
“At church. She’s conducting her first new membership meeting. Don’t worry, I’ll get word to her.”
Five minutes later Spice was on the line. Her voice was shaking as she spoke. “Carmen, if she doesn’t make it before I get there, tell her everything.”
“Spice—”
“No. Hear me out. Tell her our story. And tell her I love her.”
“Spice, she won’t die.” With tears falling down Carmen’s face, her heart tearing in two, she hung up the phone.
Five miles from town, living in an old dilapidated house, Carmen and Spice couldn’t afford a phone. The nearest house was a mile and a half away. Both Carmen and Spice were pregnant. The night Spice was ready to deliver, Carmen was drunk and couldn’t take Spice to the hospital.
“Ms. Enriquez,” the doctor said, walking toward her briskly, “Ms. Witherspoon’s had another seizure. We’ve got to take the baby, now. If there’s a choice over the mother or the child’s life, we need a decision now from her mother.”
“Her mother. Her mother”—Carmen choked back the words—“would want you to save her daughter. Save Sterling, Dr. Katbi. I’ll be responsible.”
Spice tried to walk the distance to the neighbor’s house, and halfway there she passed out on the side of the road. Wak ing up from a drunken stupor, Carmen spotted the blood and went looking for Spice. When she reached Spice in the cold darkness of February, the baby, between her bloodied legs, was stillborn. Days later, with Carmen’s guilt overwhelming her, Carmen and Spice had a conversation.
“I don’t want my baby,” Carmen said, crying. “When it’s born, you can have it.”
“No, that’s wrong. I can’t take your baby.”
“It’s my father’s child. I can’t love it. I know you can.”
Carmen sat there holding her daughter’s hand, waiting for the doctors to take her into the OR.
By the time Carmen’s baby was born at home, she’d finally persuaded Spice to care for her daughter. “No one else can love her as much as you can, Spice. I wouldn’t trust my baby with anyone but you.”
The surgery didn’t take long. The doctors delivered the little baby boy by cesarean section. It was
two o’clock when they wheeled Sterling into the recovery room, and Carmen went to her side. Sterling was groggy, but her eyes were open.
Carmen gripped her child’s hand. “It’s a boy, Sterling.”
“A boy. That’s nice.” Her voice was hoarse and her eyes a sunken gray, like the reflections from the visage of an angel.
“The doctor said that you could see him when you woke up. He’s beautiful, Sterling.”
“Carmen. Where’s my mother? Why isn’t she here?” Sterling’s voice bordered on panic.
“Don’t worry, baby. Spice is on her way.”
Together, Carmen and Spice went down to Tupelo General Hospital, so the doctors could examine the baby and send off to Jackson, Mississippi, for a copy of the baby’s birth certifi cate. “I’m the mother,” Spice said.
“I’m a witness,” Carmen added.
Nothing more, in twenty-seven years, was ever said.
A telemetry monitor, tracking Sterling’s heart rate, was at the head of the bed. At present, the monitor showed the patient’s heart was stable.
Sterling glanced at the numerous plastic tubes taped at her wrist and winced. Carmen could only imagine the pain that Sterling felt. Even though painkillers were being administered through an IV into Sterling’s arm, her intense discomfort was still evident. “The doctors say you’re going to be fine, Sterling. You and the baby are going to be okay.” Carmen wiped the moisture from Sterling’s forehead.
The afternoon sunlight streamed in through the windows. From where she stood she could see the red, gold, and green treetops that typified the tints of autumn. How beautiful, she thought. How melancholy.
Outside, the flowers were falling like her hopes, the leaves falling like her years, the clouds fleeting like her illusions, the rivers becoming frozen like her life—all bore secret relations to her destiny.
Carmen turned when she heard fast footsteps coming through the door.
“Hey, sis,” Mink said as she entered the room with Dwight, trying to appear cheery. Mink hugged Sterling, then kissed her forehead. “How you feeling?”
Overwhelmed with tears, Sterling couldn’t answer.
“Spice is going to be here soon. Don’t you worry.” Mink looked up at Carmen with desperation in her eyes. Carmen looked away.
Sterling’s voice was weak. “She’s not going to make it in time.”
“In time for what, Sterling?”
Sterling looked away, and lopsided tears slid down the corners of her eyes.
“Ms. Enriquez,” the nurse said, “there’s a telephone call for you.”
“Thank you.”
Carmen followed the woman to the desk.
It was Golden again. “Is Spice there yet?”
“No—Golden, not yet.” She wept silently for a moment and felt Golden’s pacific presence. “I forgot to tell you earlier that Sterling is in the intensive care unit at Chamberlain Hospital,” she said. “She’s just delivered a baby boy. She’s in a lot of pain.”
“I’ll be right there.”
“Where’s Spice?”
“She left a half hour ago. I’m on my way.”
“Please pray for Sterling, Golden. Please. Pray.”
When Carmen returned to Sterling’s room, the young woman said, “Please don’t leave me.” Sinking deeper against the pillows, breathless, she scrambled to reach and touch Carmen’s hand. “I don’t want to be alone. I don’t like the darkness . . . the quiet.” Her eyes widened with fear.
“I’m right here, baby.” Carmen closed her small hand over her child’s, fighting back the tears as she watched Sterling struggling for air.
“My head hurts, Aunt Carmen. Oh, my God, my head is killing me.” Sterling started to cry.
“I’ll get the doctor,” Mink said, running from the room.
Dwight turned to look through the glass walls of the intensive care unit at the duty nurse, who was already leaving the desk.
“Nurse,” Mink said once they were back in the room, “my sister is in pain.”
“That’s subjective,” she said briskly, leaning over and listening to Sterling’s chest with the stethoscope.
Sterling was fighting for air. Fresh beads of perspiration covered her forehead.
Carmen noticed the stale scent of urine again, as it had been in Sterling’s apartment. Neither Mink nor Dwight seemed to notice the smell, but Carmen could inhale the sour scent from Sterling’s perspiration as well. And she knew then that Sterling might not make it.
The fear on Sterling’s face was greater now.
Everyone stepped aside when the doctor entered the room.
Carmen watched Sterling struggling to keep her wits. So like Spice, she thought, putting up a brave front. How funny that she should turn out so like Spice and nothing like me.
“Ladies, sir, can you step outside for a moment?” Dr. Katbi said. He joined them in the hall. “Ms. Witherspoon isn’t responding to the medication as we would have liked. I’m sorry. We’re doing the best we can. Under the circumstances, with the patient’s substance abuse and current condition . . . She’s too unstable now to get a CAT scan. I sure hope it’s preeclampsia, because the mag will eventually fix it. If she’s had an aneurysm, the mag sulfate isn’t going to help her at all; she could have another seizure.” Dr. Katbi glanced at his watch. “I’ve scheduled a CAT scan at three. If necessary, we’ll have her ready for neurosurgery should the test confirm that theory.”
Dwight sniffed, then wiped his nose with a handkerchief from his back pocket. “The baby, I keep forgetting about him. Somehow he doesn’t seem real, you know.”
Mink shook her head. “I know.”
“What’s taking Spice so long?” Carmen checked her silver Timex.
Mink looked up at Dwight. “I’m ashamed to say, I don’t know how to pray. Anyway, maybe God’s not even listening.”
Dwight wrapped his arms around both his wife’s and Carmen’s shoulders.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say that this is payback for all our sins,” Carmen said. “But you know what, the Bible says that we ‘all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.’ That means that no matter how well we try to disguise our sins, God knows our thoughts, even those we’ve tried so hard to hide. And even though he hates sin, he loves us.”
Neither Dwight nor Mink understood that Carmen was speaking of herself and the ultimate sin of lying to her child.
The three of them returned to Sterling’s bedside.
“I didn’t believe at first that this was happening to me,” Sterling said softly. The curtains were drawn, and even though it was daylight outside, the room was lamplit, and their shadows appeared as ghosts along the wall.
“You should rest, Sterling. Don’t talk now.” Mink took her hand, rubbing it slowly. “Shhhh.”
Though Carmen was closer to Mink and Sterling when they were younger, she couldn’t feel more love for either of them than she did at this moment.
Carmen sat on the end of the bed, leaning in toward Sterling. “Take it easy, baby. The doctors are taking good care of you. You’re going to be fine.”
Sterling flinched. “No, I won’t.” She blinked several times, trying to control the breathlessness she felt before speaking again. “I’ve got to face this.”
“Sterling,” Carmen said. “Don’t. I can’t—”
Carmen, feeling the shivering of Sterling’s small body, and knowing that she was suffering a great deal of pain, turned away from her, letting the silent tears fall.
“Listen to me,” Sterling pleaded, gasping. She was obviously fighting the pain that made her body convulse in rhythmic waves. “I was jealous of you and Spice, Mink.” She grimaced, and her body stiffened, then relaxed. Beads of sweat were more prevalent now, outlining her lips.
Carmen imagined her Timex was ticking loudly. It was 2:45.
Moving forward, Dwight mopped the sweat on Sterling’s face with a tissue. “Shhh now.” He forced a brave smile.
“Carmen, Carmen,” Ster
ling called out. It was increasingly difficult to hear her.
“I’m right here, baby.” Carmen wiped her eyes, then turned to look at her.
“I want you to know that I’ve never forgotten all the wonderful moments you spent with me and Mink. You taught me how to color when I was six years old. Remember? You always listened when I played a new tune on the piano. And even . . .” She stopped, smiling. “And even when Mink and I were little you used to break up our fights. You even tried to break up the fight we had when we were big girls. Remember?”
“Don’t,” Carmen whispered through tears.
There was no self-pity in her voice when Sterling asked, “I’m going to heaven, ain’t I?”
“Yes,” Dwight stated.
Mink wiped away her tears, unable to speak.
“Of course you will,” Carmen added. “But not now, honey. You’re going to get better. You’re coming—”
Sterling stretched out her arm to touch Carmen’s arm.
Should I tell her? God knows I want to tell her. Right now! Help me, Lord. It’s not fair! Help me help my child.
“I’ve made a lot of mistakes, but if people really, really knew me, they might not judge me so harshly.”
Both Mink and Carmen were crying openly now. The look on Sterling’s face showed relief. Obviously she needed to bare her soul.
It was then that Carmen knew for sure that Sterling wasn’t going to make it. She was struggling to gain understanding and respect on her way out. Carmen could read Sterling’s thoughts.
“Please listen to me. Please. I’ve got to let you know.” Sterling tugged her bottom lip in with her teeth. She clamped the sides of her head with both hands. The monitor beeped, informing them she had just gotten another severe pain, but Carmen knew with certainty that Sterling felt something else, too. She felt peaceful even through the pain.
Carmen watched the wavy lines on the monitor moving more rapidly now, erratically. She looked up through the windows, pleading with the nurse who was monitoring Sterling from the circular station.
Mink cried soundlessly, turning into Dwight’s chest, whispering, “I can’t take this.”
One Better Page 31