Colors of Goodbye

by September Vaudrey

  But when it came time to look her best, Katie tackled her appearance with commitment, wielding the same deft skill with her makeup brushes that she demonstrated with her paintbrushes in art class. If we were going out as a family and she wasn’t done putting on her makeup, she’d holler from the bathroom, “Wait! I’m not cute yet!” But ready or not, in sweats or a dress, the girl was cute.

  From the earliest days of driver’s ed, it was apparent that Katie’s free-spirit personality and the skills required to be an attentive driver were a mismatch. Katie’s driving led to stories that live on in Vaudrey family lore.

  One summer afternoon, Scott and Matt picked Katie up from driver’s ed, and Scott agreed to let her drive them home. He moved to the passenger’s seat, rolling down his window for fresh air while she buckled up behind the wheel and tossed her driver’s ed notebook onto the dash.

  “Matt! Wait till you see what a great driver I am,” she said, grinning at him in the rearview mirror. Matt double-checked his seatbelt and gripped the seat in front of him in mock terror.

  All went well as they merged onto the four-lane road for home. But when Katie sped into an eight-lane intersection and took a sharp left, everyone lurched to the right, and her driver’s ed notebook flew out Scott’s open window, spinning its way across the asphalt.

  “Aaagh!” she screamed. “My notebook!”

  “Never mind the notebook—just slow down!” Scott said. Katie hit the brakes and pulled into a nearby gas station, shaking. Matt, her dutiful older brother, hopped out and, dodging traffic, retrieved her notebook—which had been run over by passing cars and now bore a distinct tire tread across its front cover.

  “Thanks, Matt!” Katie said. “Phew! That was a close one, heh-heh-heh! Sorry, everyone!”

  “Bug, you’ve got to slow down around corners!” Scott admonished.

  “I know, Dad,” she said. “I will. But you gotta admit, it’s pretty ironic that it was my driver’s ed notebook that got run over. I can’t wait to show my teacher!”

  Once she got her license, Katie put down half the money for a gold ’97 Ford Taurus. Scott and I paid the other half. But driving remained a challenge. In the first year alone, she ran into the side of our garage with her Taurus, backed into a giant brick building with my minivan, and finally rear-ended a flatbed construction truck—which scared her and improved her attention behind the wheel.

  When she bought the car, we reminded Katie that she would also be assuming the cost of keeping it fueled and in good repair. This presented its own set of challenges. Running out of gas was not an uncommon occurrence, and spending money for noncritical repairs seemed a waste in Katie’s carefree economy. But her definition of “noncritical” didn’t exactly match ours—and once, when Sam was a new driver, it nearly caused considerable harm.

  The latch on Katie’s driver’s-side door stopped working, but she kept driving the car unrepaired by using the manual lock to hold the door shut. She failed to mention the broken latch to anyone because she knew we’d make her fix it. Sam borrowed her car one day, unaware. He rounded a corner and the door flew open, almost pulling the Taurus into the path of a Hummer. He swerved to avoid the Hummer and narrowly missed hitting a light pole before bringing the car under control.

  “Katie!” he yelled when he got home. “How could you not tell me about your car door? You about got me killed!”

  “Oops!” she said, trying to laugh it off. “Sorry!”

  But Sam was angry. And so were we.

  “How long has your car door been broken?” Scott asked.

  “Only a couple of months,” she said.

  “A couple of months? Katie, you can’t just ignore repairs,” he said. “You could have caused Sam a serious accident.”

  “But the repair guy wanted me to pay $300 to fix the stupid latch!” Katie protested.

  We all stared at her, incredulous.

  “Fine, I’ll get it fixed,” she said, as the harm she had almost caused her brother sank in. “Sorry, Sam.”

  Sam forgave her. And she took the car to get fixed, begrudgingly shelling out the $300—but looked for opportunities over the coming months to remind us of the “hardship” of spending that kind of money on “a mere door lock.”

  The transfer to Fremd was more than just an artistic boon for Katie—it was a social boon as well. She dove into her new friendships at school and at church and began dating a young man named Dan, whom we liked very much. During those years, she developed some of the deepest friendships of her life.

  That fall in her 3-D art class, Katie worked hard on crafting a small pewter sculpture of a penguin as a Christmas gift for Dan, in honor of their mutual fondness for these playful, comedic creatures. But a week before Christmas break, she came home from school in a fury.

  “Someone stole my penguin!” she said. “It’s almost done—I just need to polish it—and now it’s gone!”

  “Could you have misplaced it?” I asked.

  “No! I stored it in a cup in my art station yesterday, and this morning the cup was empty.”

  “Ugh, I’m so sorry, Katie. Can you make another penguin?”

  “You don’t understand, Mom! Each step takes so long. I would have to resculpt it from clay, fire it, make a mold, and then pour the pewter and polish it. All I had left to do was the polishing. Plus I don’t want to make another one—I want to find that one! I am so angry!”

  “Sweetness, I’m really sorry.”

  “I’m getting my penguin back,” she said, teeth clenched. “I’m making a ‘Wanted’ poster!” She disappeared into her bedroom and emerged an hour later, poster in hand. She’d drawn a picture of her penguin—very sweet—but the words were not so sweet:

  Wanted: Penguin Kidnapper. Whoever stole my pewter penguin statue from Studio Art 3D—GIVE IT BACK! No questions asked. If it’s not returned, I will find you out! You have been warned.

  “That’s a little aggressive, honey,” I said, “Perhaps a sassy, lighthearted poster would be more effective at coaxing the person to return your penguin.”

  “This is a coldhearted art thief I’m dealing with, Mom,” she said, grinning—but with fire in her eyes. “You can’t go soft with a penguin-napper!” She held the poster high. “I’m making copies.”

  The next morning, she hung her “Wanted” posters around school. Three days later, she came bouncing into the kitchen after school. “My posters worked!” she announced. “The penguin-napper returned my penguin!”

  Whoever had taken her penguin statue had indeed returned it, unharmed, by placing it next to the faucet of the art room sink, where someone would be sure to find it—which they did—and return it to its rightful owner. Katie polished the tiny, whimsical figurine and brought it home to wrap.

  “Win-win!” she said. “I got my penguin back, and I have a great story to tell Dan!”

  Life is a series of stories, and she added this one to her pile.

  15

  2:45 A.M., SUNDAY, JUNE 1

  I step into the room the hospital has set aside as a place for us to sleep. Scott and the organ donation lady are just finishing up the paperwork that details which organs we want to donate. Katie would say to give them all, so whatever Scott has decided is fine with me. The lady hands me a clipboard, and I add my signature to the necessary lines. She thanks us and is gone.

  I peek into the room next door where Sam and Tember lie in twin hospital beds, still dressed in their street clothes but fast asleep. A mound of spent Kleenex towers on the nightstand between them.

  Scott slips off his Birkenstocks, strips to his boxers, and climbs into one of the beds in our room. I change into the scrubs and slip-free hospital socks folded neatly on the other bed and set my cell phone alarm for 3:45 a.m. so I can meet Gail’s husband, Bill, downstairs. He’ll take me to O’Hare to pick up the California kids. I slip between the crisp hospital sheets and lay my head on the cool, white pillow.

  It feels weird for Scott and me to be lying in separate beds and
to simply say, “Good night” to my husband of twenty-four years as if this were just another bedtime. But what else is there to say? What words can describe this life-altering day?

  I lie still for a moment. “Good night, Scott.”

  He sniffles and clears his throat. “Good night.”

  At the end of a normal day, my husband often struggles to turn off his brain and find slumber; I cannot imagine he will be able to sleep tonight. But within moments, to my amazement I hear deep, rhythmic breathing coming from his side of the room.

  Thank you.

  I jolt awake and look at my watch—3:30 a.m. Where am I? I sit up and the mattress beneath me crinkles. A hospital bed. Katie. All that has transpired comes crashing into my mind. The nightmare has followed me into a new day.

  Scott’s steady breathing fills the silence, and I turn off my phone alarm before it wakes him. I slip out of bed, pull on yesterday’s clothes, and sneak out of the room. Before heading to the airport, I must see my girl.

  The hallway lights are still dimmed, and all is quiet. The nurse at the ICU station nods as I walk by but avoids making eye contact with me—my first taste of the awkward ways people respond when your kid has died.

  I push back the curtain to Katie’s room, half hoping to find her sitting up in bed, smiling. But there she lies, just as I left her forty-five minutes before. The gentle rise and fall of her chest and the steady drip-drip-drip of the saline plinking into her IV line provide the only motion in the room. Never in her life has Katie lain so still in bed. Since childhood we have teased her about her arms-flailing, legs-thrashing habits while sleeping. Anyone who ever shared a bed with her—in hotel rooms, on camping trips, or during sister sleepovers—paid the price with bruises the next morning. Her stillness now is unnatural. All the Katie-ness has fled.

  I lift her hand and stroke it. I notice the deep-purple fingernail polish she wears—Lincoln Park After Dark from OPI. It took me three trips to Ulta last Christmas before I could find the signature color she had requested for her stocking. The polish on her middle fingernail is chipped.

  Katie is still wearing the Philadelphia collar—a stiff neck brace intended to protect her spinal cord from injury—from when they stabilized her at the accident scene. It looks terribly uncomfortable. My head knows she can’t feel a thing, but heart overrides logic, and I call for the nurse.

  “I’m just wondering,” I say. “Does the Philadelphia collar still serve a purpose? She’s already brain-dead. I’m pretty sure we’re not worried about the risk of paralysis at this point. Could we please take that thing off? I want her to look more like herself when our older kids arrive later this morning to see her.”

  “Good point,” the nurse says. “I need to get the doctor’s permission to remove it, but I think he will agree with you. I’ll call him.”

  I kiss Katie goodbye, lay her hand by her side, and hurry downstairs where Bill, my airport chauffer, awaits at the curb.

  At O’Hare, I explain our situation to a ticketing agent, whose eyes widen. “I don’t have a ticket, but can I please get a pass through security to meet my kids at the gate?” I ask. “I don’t want them to learn about their sister from a text message on their phones when they get off the plane.” The agent calls a supervisor, who authorizes a pass that gets me through security. The Arrivals board indicates the kids’ flight has already landed—twenty-five minutes early.

  My mind races. How do I break the news to the kids that their sister is gone? I get one shot at doing this right—and whatever I say will be forever etched in their minds. I think through different approaches, but every approach ends with “and your sister is brain-dead.” No “right words” can soften this blow.

  I rush to ascend the escalator that leads to their concourse, but a stream of people from the LAX flight is already descending. Dang. No meeting the kids at the gate. No reaching them before they open their phones. I stand there watching, helpless and sick to my stomach.

  It’s a two-story escalator so tall that the top of it disappears into the floor above. At first, only people’s feet are visible from where I stand. I watch pairs of shoes descending into view, my eyes straining to spot any that might belong to one of my kids. Soon I recognize a pair of white Nikes attached to two slim legs. I know those legs. Bethany, my beautiful, graceful oldest daughter, descends into view. Matt, Andrea, and Adam are close behind. Bethany spots me and we lock eyes. Ashen-faced, she holds her opened cell phone in her left hand. She lifts her phone toward me.

  “Is it true?” she mouths, a look of horror in her eyes.

  No need for perfect words. She knows. I nod. As she steps off the escalator, her delicate frame begins to wrack with sobs. I catch her in my arms. The rest of the kids step off and we move to the side, clinging together, weeping.

  “What happened?” they ask. “You said she was stable. Why did she die?”

  “Her heart is still beating,” I explain, “but last night the doctors declared her brain-dead. The things I told you over the phone were true—she is stable, she is in a coma, and it’s very grave. But I wanted you to hear this final news from me, face-to-face.”

  “Some girl I barely even know just texted me, ‘So sorry for your loss,’” Bethany says, glaring at her phone. “I didn’t want to believe it, but somehow in my gut, I knew. I just knew my sister was gone.”

  As we walk toward baggage claim, I wonder for the first time—but not the last—whether I did the right thing by not telling them the full truth the night before. Matt and Bethany are so different from each other. What might have been best for him would not have been best for her, and vice versa. I had to make a decision on what would be best for both of them together, and I had decided to just get them to Chicago in one piece and then tell them in person.

  Another thought hits me: Maybe I chose to tell them in person for my sake, not theirs. Maybe I could not bear to tell them last night. I had already witnessed Tember and Sam receiving this news. The horrific wail that erupted from our youngest daughter’s throat will haunt me forever. I don’t know that I could have handled two more such reactions—and over the phone at that, where I could not have caught them in my arms and comforted them as I had just done at the bottom of the escalator at O’Hare. Maybe I put off telling them last night because it was best for me. My face reddens at this thought. Mothers are supposed to do what’s right for their kids, after all. We’re supposed to make sacrifices for them. Had I been selfish?

  Right or wrong, I’d done the best I could at the time—and I won’t get a do-over. God will need to fill the gaps.

  During the drive back to the hospital, the kids pepper me with questions. I explain all the medical stuff that has happened and tell them that Katie is being prepped for organ donation surgery—they affirm the decision—and that Dad and the “little kids” are still at the hospital, where we all spent the night.

  “How is Dad?” “How is Sam?” “How is Tember?” They want a status report on each family member. A million questions flood their minds, and I do my best to answer each one.

  Bill drops us off at the hospital entrance.

  “Thanks so much,” I say. “I am forever grateful.”

  “Is there anything else you need?” he asks. “Anything else I can do?”

  “Toothpaste,” Bethany says. “I forgot toothpaste.”

  “What flavor?” Bill asks.

  “Cinnamon.”

  “I’m on it.”

  On the ICU floor, we find Scott in Katie’s hallway. He has already been to see his middle daughter. Now he embraces our oldest kids in his arms, and in his eyes I see a mixture of deep compassion and wretched helplessness. I know he would do anything to be able to keep the kids from the reality they are about to face. Irrational as it may be, I know he feels like a failed protector.

  I remember Tember’s request: “Don’t let them go see Katie without us!” We head to the room where Sam and Tember still lie sleeping. Bethany sits down on Tember’s bed, Matt on Sam’s, and th
ey gently rub their younger siblings awake. Tember opens her sleepy eyes and, seeing Bethany’s face, throws her arms around her sister’s neck, holding her tight. Tears force their way from between tightly closed eyelids. Matt wraps his kid brother in strong arms, and Sam buries his face in Matt’s chest. We give them some time.

  “We’re so sorry, you guys,” Bethany says to the two of them. “Sorry you had to do this without us yesterday.”

  “We’re all together now,” Matt adds. “Let’s go see our sister.”

  Sam and Tember get out of bed, giving hugs to Andrea and Adam. Still wearing their drama party clothes from yesterday, they simply need to put on their shoes, and then Scott leads the way.

  I walk ahead and step behind the curtain doorway to Katie’s room. The nurse has removed the neck brace, and Katie looks more comfortable, more herself. I try to view her through her siblings’ fresh eyes.

  They step into the room. Someone lets out a tiny gasp. The flood of pain in their eyes makes me feel ill. Bethany immediately hovers over Katie with a maternal air, picking up her sister’s hand and stroking it, as I have. She blinks her long lashes and two tears escape, rolling down her cheeks and dripping from her chin.

  Matt is eerily silent on the other side of the bed, his hand resting on Katie’s arm, his lower lip quivering. Andrea grips and strokes his other arm, her tears falling to the ground, one after the other in rapid succession.

  Matt later writes a blog post about his reaction to seeing Katie for the first time:

  As I round the corner and the nurse moves out of my line of vision, it becomes real. There is no more busying myself with travel details, no more fooling myself, no more believing the best and hoping for a miracle. Katie lies motionless on the bed, a half-dozen tubes coming out of her. Her brown hair curls from beneath a gigantic bandage on her head. Her eyelashes and the rest of her makeup are untouched, ready for her first day of work at a new job. Her perfect white teeth peek out from behind the ventilator tube in her throat. But it is her arms that catch my eye. All five of us kids have the exact same shape of forearm, and there are hers, with bandages holding IVs in her skin. Her nails are painted a vibrant purple. This surely is Katie. This is my sister.