Tunnel Vision

by Gary Braver

“This is Kyle Kerr. I’m the resident physician at the emergency center at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Your son Zachary is here. Unfortunately, he was in a bicycle accident and is in our intensive care unit.”

  “Oh God, no!”

  “The good news is he’s alive and breathing. But he sustained a head injury. He’s unconscious. Is there someone there who can drive you to the hospital?”

  “Is he going to be all right?”

  “We don’t know at this stage. But if you can get someone to drive you in, that would be good. If not, we can have the local police come for you.”

  “How bad is he?”

  “He has a concussion and there’s been some subdural bleeding which we’re working on.”

  “No, God. This isn’t happening.”

  “I’m very sorry to call with such news. But can you get someone to drive you here?”

  She tried to concentrate on the question. The only neighbor she was close to, Ginny Steves, was away for the weekend. “No.”

  “Then we’ll call the Carleton police.”

  She agreed and hung up. Barely able to maintain control, she called her sister, Kate, who lived south of Boston, to meet her at the hospital. She dressed, and within minutes a Carleton squad car showed up in front of the house.

  Maggie had only a vague recollection of the drive—sitting in shock in the rear of the cruiser, lights flickering, no siren, no conversation with the officer behind the wheel—her mind iced with fright.

  Twenty minutes later, the car pulled up to the entrance of the emergency room. The officer escorted her inside to the reception desk. In a matter of moments, the resident physician, Dr. Kerr, came out.

  “How is he?” Maggie said.

  “The good news is that there are no broken bones, no damage to his spine or internal bleeding,” the doctor said. “We’ve secured his airways and stabilized his blood pressure. But he experienced trauma to his parietal lobe,” and he put his hand on the left side of his crown. “The CAT scan showed intracranial bleeding, so we performed a procedure to lower the pressure.”

  “A procedure?”

  “We put a burr hole in his skull to relieve the subdural hematoma.” Dr. Kerr continued, but Maggie nearly passed out at the thought of their drilling a hole in her son’s skull.

  “We implanted a pressure bolt to monitor the swelling. It’s normal procedure for this kind of injury. We’re also hyperventilating him to keep his blood pressure augmented.”

  “Is he going to have brain damage?” She could barely articulate the words.

  “At this point, it’s hard to tell. But he’s young and healthy, and that’s in his favor. But we can’t get a full assessment of brain injury until the swelling subsides. We induced a barbiturate coma to lessen the activity. And we’ll be attending him aggressively to be certain that there’s no swelling.”

  While they spoke, Maggie’s sister, Kate, arrived. They hugged, and Maggie told her what the doctor had said.

  “I want to see him,” Maggie said. “I want to see him.”

  “Certainly.”

  “How did it happen?” Kate asked as they headed down the hall.

  A Boston police officer took the question. “He was bicycling home and hit a pothole at the corner of Huntington Avenue.”

  “He was less than a block from home.”

  The officer nodded woefully. “There wasn’t any ice or snow on the streets, but this time of year they get chewed up pretty bad.”

  They brought them into the ICU and past a few beds to a cubicle. When they pulled back the curtain, Maggie nearly fainted in horror. Zack lay in a bed, his face bandaged and tubes and wires running from his wrists, neck, and skull to a cluster of beeping monitors. An IV hung above him and a catheter tube ran down his leg to the other side of the bed. His eyes were discolored and swollen closed, and he was breathing on a respirator that was hooked up to an intratracheal tube. His right arm was also bandaged from the fall. For an instant, Maggie could not process that this was her son, not some unfortunate stranger. Then she broke down.

  A nurse came in and put a chair beside the bed for Maggie. When she was able to compose herself, she rested a hand on Zack’s arm. “Zack, it’s Mom. I’m right here, honey. You’re going to be all right.”

  “The good news is that he’s stable now,” the nurse said, “and his vital signs are strong.”

  Maggie nodded. Then she whimpered to herself, “I can’t lose him.”

  “You won’t,” Kate said.

  “Zack, you’ll be fine. You’re going to wake up soon.” As Maggie said that, she had a fleeting flash of her getting him up for grade school.

  Please don’t let me lose him, too.

  Thirteen years ago, Zack’s older brother, Jake, was left to die in a pool of his own blood, his face reduced to pulp. He had been at a Cambridge club, frequented by gays, and was set upon in a dark parking lot by two brutes named Volker and Gretch who were high on beer and pot. Apparently one of the men had shouted slurs to which Jake was heard shouting, “Go to hell, asshole!” Then they were upon him. Because the only witnesses were a female cousin of one of the killers and then friends, everybody lied, claiming that the two were elsewhere. A slick lawyer managed to dismiss DNA analyses as faulty. After the acquittal, one of the killers said justice had been served, adding that it was too bad about Jake’s death, but that may have saved some little kid from sexual molestation.

  Jake’s death had all but killed Maggie’s husband, Nick, who lapsed into a profound depression. Eventually he said that he could not go on with life as it was and renounced the world, joining an order of Benedictine monks at the other end of the state. They divorced, and in so doing Nick had left a gaping hole in Zack’s young life and Maggie full of grief and contempt. Three years ago, Nick died of cardiac arrest and was cremated.

  Volker and Gretch.

  Even after all these years, the very syllables of the killers’ names made Maggie’s stomach leak acid.

  For maybe twenty minutes, she and Kate sat by Zack’s bed without speaking. Then Maggie said, “I don’t even know him anymore. Since Nick died, he barely talks to me. He’s like a stranger, like someone else’s son.”

  “He’s on his own now,” Kate said. “He’s got school, he lives in the city. Kids do that. They grow up and go off on their own. It happens to every parent.”

  “Does it? Weeks after he and Amanda broke up, he finally told me. I’m like the last person to know what’s going on in his life. I sometimes feel childless.”

  “What was he doing biking in the middle of the night anyway?”

  “At a friend’s house playing cards.” Then she added, “He’s got a gambling problem.” The moment the words hit the air, she wished she could pull them back.

  Kate glared at her in dismay. “He has?”

  “He’s in debt. I don’t know how much, but he’s been trying to gamble his way out.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Bills and overdraft notices used to come to the house till I spoke to him.” She shook her head. “I’m a lousy mother.”

  “No, you’re not. And you’re not responsible for his financial problems.”

  “I wish I believed in God so I could pray. I really do.”

  At the foot of the bed, she spotted Zack’s backpack with his laptop in it. He brought it wherever he went because he was working on his master’s thesis to meet a deadline. The topic was the influence of Darwinian theory on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. As he had explained it, he was using a core argument in an early Darwin essay, that revenge is the strongest human instinct, and applying that to understanding character motivations in the novel. His main argument was that revenge drove Victor Frankenstein to create life artificially in hopes of killing death.

  Maggie looked at the backpack, knowing how much he had put into the paper. Then she began to sob again. Kate put her arm around her. “He’ll be back.”

  Maggie’s eyes roamed over the monitors, coming to rest on
the orange squiggle monitoring his heart. As she fixed on it, she sent up a silent prayer that there would be billions left in that big stallion heart. “The last time I was here was when he was born. Twenty-four years ago. June six, seven eleven at night. I can still remember when they handed him to me.”

  “Of course you can,” Kate said.

  Zack had arrived a week early, while Kate and her husband, Bob, were in California on business. “Did you know he was born with a caul?”

  “A caul?”

  “Part of the amniotic sac had covered his head. The nurse gasped. I guess she was new and hadn’t seen that before. The doctor broke the sac and removed it from his face. Later he said that in olden times a caul was a sign that the baby would have mystical powers.”

  “I never knew that.”

  “Others believed it was a sign the child would grow up to be a demon.”

  “And like most legends, it’s just that—an empty legend.”

  “I suppose, but I wish I hadn’t heard that.” She glanced at Zack. “Like maybe there’s some kind of curse or something.”

  “Pardon my French, but that’s plain bullshit.”

  Maggie squeezed her hand again. “What if he doesn’t wake up?”

  Please bring him back, she prayed.

  But, ironically, Jake’s murderers killed God for her. For a year or more she had stumbled along with her life on autopilot, her will all but extinguished. Eventually she moved out of near lethal grief to a state of seminumbness in order to raise Zack. Three years after Nick secreted himself in his monastery, a Brother Thomas Albani from the same order showed up with an urn of Nick’s ashes. To add insult to injury, the ashes sat on the fireplace mantelpiece at home at Zack’s request.

  “What if this is punishment?” she asked.

  “Punishment for what?”

  “For not believing. What if this is God getting back at us?”

  “My guess is that this was an accident pure and simple,” Kate said. “You’re a dedicated teacher who does volunteer work for abused children. If God’s in a punishing mood, He’s got the wrong person.”

  3

  Maggie spent the night in a chair beside Zack’s bed. She didn’t sleep much, dozing off and waking in fits. Zack did not move throughout the night—his face remained pale and inert, his eyes sealed shut. His only movement was the rise and fall of his chest to the respirator. The only signs that he was alive were the pulsing and squiggles of the monitors.

  At one point during the night, the resident doctor asked her to step outside while he, a nurse, and an aide examined Zack. When they were finished, the physician spoke to her. “The good news is that he’s still stable and there are no signs of intracranial bleeding.”

  “Thank goodness,” she said. “But when’s he going to wake up?”

  “He’s in an induced coma, so it’s hard to predict. He did sustain a serious concussion so we have to wait until the pressure and swelling come down. Then we’ll back off on the barbiturates and ventilation.”

  The word coma sent a shard of ice through her heart. “But he will come out of it, right?”

  “We certainly hope so.”

  “You mean he could still remain in a real coma?”

  “Well, there’s a slight chance, but we don’t expect that.”

  She studied the doctor’s eyes and thought she saw another hideous possibility. “What about brain damage?”

  “We see no signs at this point, but it’s still hard to tell,” he said. “But we’ll be treating him aggressively.”

  * * *

  Later that day, the doctors reported that the swelling had gone down in Zack’s brain and that they would reduce the barbiturates. It was the best news so far. At Kate’s insistence, Maggie overnighted in a hotel nearby instead of commuting to Carleton. Meanwhile, Kate drove to Maggie’s place and packed a suitcase of clothes for her.

  Sometime before noon, Damian Santoro called Maggie to ask if he, Anthony Lawrence, and his roommate, Geoff Blessington, could come for a visit. She agreed. They arrived in the early afternoon and sat around the bed, staring in disbelief at Zack, who looked like a battered corpse in the bed. Maggie explained how the accident had happened and summarized what the doctors had said.

  The news was sobering, but they found solace in the fact that Zack had suffered no internal injuries.

  Maggie looked at the three of them. “You’re his best friends,” she said, “and I’d appreciate you being straight with me. I know he gambles more than he should. I also know that he’s fallen into arrears on rent and other matters. I don’t mean to put you on the spot, but does he owe any of you money?”

  They glanced at one another, each hoping another would take the question. Finally Anthony responded, his eyes fluttering. “No, not much.”

  “How much, exactly?”

  “I don’t know … maybe … four hundred dollars.”

  Maggie looked to Geoff. “What about you, Geoff?”

  “Only about three fifty. But it’s not a problem.”

  “Damian?”

  “I think a little over six hundred.”

  Maggie felt a small stab in the chest. “I’ll take care of it.” Then she asked, “Besides borrowing from you all, how does he get by?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Please, this is no time to cover for him. He’s in serious debt.”

  There was hemming and hawing, then Anthony said, “I think he sometimes sells stuff.”

  “Sells stuff? Like what?”

  “Like his books. Sells them back to the bookstore. Clothes. I don’t know for sure.”

  Maggie did her best to contain her shock. She had regularly sent Zack money, and he was borrowing from friends and selling textbooks. “I appreciate your candidness.” She pulled out her checkbook.

  “You don’t have to do that, Mrs. Kashian,” Damian said.

  “Thank you for your generosity,” she said, and wrote them each a check. “Please be honest with me. Do you think he … he has a gambling problem?” She stumbled as she nearly worded the question in the past tense.

  Anthony’s eyes widened in exaggerated surprise. “Oh no, nothing like that.” And he looked to Damian and Geoff for help.

  They shook their heads. “It’s not like we played every night or anything,” Geoff said.

  “But something must account for all his debts. Please, if you know something, I’d appreciate your telling me.”

  After an awkward silence, Damian said, “He may be playing online poker.”

  She nodded and imagined Zack during the wee hours of the morning huddled over his laptop, half-deranged to beat the odds.

  As if reading her mind, Anthony said, “Mrs. Kashian, I really don’t think he’s got a gambling problem. It’s more like his back’s to the wall and he plays to pay down creditors. But I seriously don’t think he’s addicted.”

  “Hi,” said Kate as she entered the room.

  She said hello to the three visitors, then went over and kissed Zack on the forehead. She then convinced Maggie to have lunch downstairs, leaving the three friends to sit with Zack. Anxiety had killed Maggie’s appetite, but she realized that she was becoming light-headed from hunger.

  * * *

  Half an hour later, they returned to the ICU. When she entered the cubicle, Maggie let out a cry. “What happened?”

  Damian was leaning over Zack with his hand on Zack’s forehead. “I’m just putting some holy water on his forehead.”

  “Holy water?” For a shuddering moment, the figure of Damian dabbing Zack’s forehead filled Maggie with horror that Zack was being given last rites.

  “He’s okay,” Kate said. “He’s still asleep. Look at the monitors.”

  Maggie stared stupidly at them until her mind caught up. Then she snapped her head at Damian. “Please don’t do that,” she said. “We’re not religious.”

  Before she could continue, Kate cut in. “That’s very nice of you, Damian. Thank you.” She put her arm around Magg
ie, giving her a squeeze to cool it.

  Maggie said nothing, but she eyed Damian and the small vial with apprehension. Her disdain for all things religious was palpable. And religious people made her uncomfortable.

  A nurse burst into the room. “Is everything all right in here?” She had heard the commotion.

  “Yes, everything’s fine.”

  The nurse studied everybody, then checked Zack and the monitors and IV and straightened out his covering as an awkward silence settled over the scene like a skim of ice. Breaking the silence, Kate asked the nurse if there was anything she could do to help.

  “Actually, it would help if the next time you brought in a pair of sneakers.”

  “Sneakers?” Maggie said.

  “To protect his feet. God forbid, if his condition persists, his feet will contract. We exercise them, of course, but the shoes keep the toes from balling up.”

  “But he’ll wake up, won’t he?” The syllables choked out of Maggie.

  “I’m sure he will. It’s just a precautionary measure.”

  Maggie nodded and gave the woman a toxic look to leave the room. She did, and a menacing silence resettled on their collective horror of Zack remaining in a state of indefinite unconsciousness, wearing Nikes to prevent his feet from curling into claws. After a spell, Anthony nodded to Geoff and Damian and announced they were going to leave.

  “No offense,” Damian said, “but I’m wondering if first we could say a little prayer for Zack.”

  Before Maggie could respond, Kate said, “I think that would be very nice.”

  Maggie nodded. “Fine.” A little prayer wouldn’t hurt, she told herself. And it would make up for her overreaction.

  “Thank you,” Damian said, then asked everyone to join hands around Zack’s bed.

  The moment was awkward, and Maggie felt a tinge of discomfort, uncertain if it was guilt for her falling away from her Catholic upbringing or for betraying her conviction that religion was a sham.

  “We join our hearts to thank You, Heavenly Father, for Zack’s salvation. He lies in a coma, and we pray that You show Your healing powers and restore him…”

  While he continued, Maggie glanced around the room. Anthony and Geoff were standing with their eyes closed, hands joined to Kate, who also kept her eyes closed. As Maggie’s eyes came to rest on Zack, she wished Damian would wrap this up.