Isla's Inheritance

by Cassandra Page

  Dad was in the Intensive Care Unit.

  We met Aunt Elizabeth in the foyer. Mrs Wilson was with her, but left when we were told only family would be permitted to see Dad. To her credit, she didn’t make a fuss, just gave me a kiss on the cheek and my cousins a fond pat before leaving. Ryan glowered at her but, if she noticed, she didn’t say anything.

  We were given directions to the third floor of building twelve, on the other side of the emergency department from the main reception. I rode the lift without a word, clutching the envelope to my chest and trying to concentrate on breathing.

  Unlike the one in the emergency department, the waiting area outside the ICU was empty. The door to the unit itself was locked; an intercom was mounted to the left of the door. I pressed the button.

  “Yes?” asked a tinny female voice.

  “Um. We’re here to see David Blackman?”

  “One moment please.” There was a click as the magnetic door released to let us in.

  “Wait here,” Aunt Elizabeth told my cousins as I pulled the door open. Sarah began to object, but my aunt shook her head. “They have a two-visitor limit.”

  “Oh.”

  “Come on. Mum will let us know when it’s our turn. We can have a coffee while we wait,” Ryan said, faking enthusiasm.

  Sarah gave me a brief, strong hug and I went into the ward, my aunt following behind.

  We were met by a beautiful nurse with chocolate-coloured skin and neat dark hair pinned to the top of her head. “I’m Rachael,” she said, smiling at us. “Have you been to the ICU before?”

  We shook our heads.

  “Well, the first thing we need you to do on entering and before leaving is wash your hands.” She indicated a pump pack of hand sanitiser mounted on the wall. The pink liquid dried quickly on my hands, leaving a lingering scent of alcohol. “And please turn your mobile phones off while you’re in the ward. They can interfere with our equipment.”

  She led us into the unit: it was a large, open room with a central nurse station near the doors and a ring of beds around the walls. Each of the beds was in its own alcove, an island in a sea of whirring, glowing machinery. Curtain tracks snaked across the entrance to each alcove, but none of the curtains were closed.

  Rachael led us to one of the alcoves. In front was a smaller nurse’s station, covered in charts.

  Beyond the station lay Dad, his face relaxed and eyes closed as though he was sleeping … if I ignored the intravenous line poking out of his left arm, the profusion of cables and rubber tubes snaking out from beneath the blankets, and the clear plastic oxygen mask covering his nose and mouth.

  Although usually if Dad fell asleep on his back, he snored pretty loudly. Another sign things weren’t right.

  “Oh, Dad,” I breathed, glancing at Rachael, who sat at the nurse’s station. “Am I allowed to touch him?”

  “Sure,” the nurse nodded. “You can bring in music as well, if you like, so long as you provide headphones so you don’t disturb other patients or visitors.”

  I took the single seat beside the bed. Aunt Elizabeth and Rachael spoke together in low voices.

  It felt weird. I’d imagined Dad would be in a smaller room somewhere: maybe not a private room, but not a room with so many beds in it. He was separated from his neighbours only by a six-foot partition on either side, lined with shelves. There was also a surprising number of nurses—stationed at the entrance to each alcove, circulating throughout the room, checking the various machines, reading charts and talking to those patients who were awake.

  I took Dad’s hand and leaned in close, whispering. “Dad, I don’t know if you can hear me…” I studied his face, but there was no reaction. “I have the envelope you had on the front seat of your car. The one with the photos of … of Mum. I guess you must have gone home to get it for me. What happened? Did someone hurt you?”

  He didn’t answer. I looked down at his strong, callused hands, at my smaller ones wrapped around them. “You looked really handsome at the wedding,” I said. “When you wake up you can tell me about it.”

  I sat there in silence until Aunt Elizabeth returned. She took my other hand and stood beside me. “The nurse said the doctors haven’t made an official diagnosis yet,” she said, “but he’s in a coma. They’ve started running tests for toxins or some sort of brain injury. He’ll be having an MRI soon.”

  Tears welled in my eyes as I stared at my father’s face, trying to be strong. Across the room, a woman sat next to an elderly lady and began to sob quietly. Grief tightened the back of my throat and hot tears burned my eyes. One of the nurses began talking softly to the woman, laying a hand on her shoulder.

  Looking away from them, I took a deep breath, and another, and felt myself regain a tenuous grip on my emotions.

  “They wanted to know who his next of kin was,” my aunt said. I gasped, my control slipping; she spoke quickly to reassure me. “It’s not what you’re thinking, sweetheart. It’s so they have someone to talk to about his medical history.”

  “Oh.” She was looking at me, waiting for something. The idea dawned slowly. “Am I meant to do it?”

  “Only if you feel up to it. I can if you’d prefer.”

  The idea of being directly responsible for Dad’s wellbeing was overwhelming. What if I forgot something? What if there were things—other things, medical things, not just personal ones—he hadn’t told his daughter about? “Would you, please?” My voice was small with shame at my cowardice. “But you have to let me know if there’s anything I can do to help. Phone calls and things?”

  “Of course.”

  The talk of medical histories reminded me of something. “Sarah said she thought you gave Dad a tablet last night to help him sleep.”

  Aunt Elizabeth nodded, expression grave. “I did. It was an over-the-counter medication; I told the nurse about it. She’s going to let the doctor know. She said it wasn’t known for causing this sort of reaction. Especially not twelve hours later. But they can’t rule out some sort of allergic shock either.” She looked equal parts anxious and relieved. I squeezed her hand.

  After a while, Aunt Elizabeth left and Sarah came in. She didn’t say anything, just stood beside to me, hand on my shoulder. Then she went back out again and Ryan came in. He frowned at my father for a long moment, looking uneasy. Then he shook his head, snapping himself out of whatever dark place his thoughts had gone. “Hi, Uncle David.” He took Dad’s limp hand and shook it, then placed it back on the white sheet. I tried to smile.

  “Mum’s thinking we should head home soon. It’s dinnertime,” he told me. I blinked, surprised it was so late. I didn’t feel hungry. “She said we could come back tomorrow with some of his things.”

  “That makes sense.” I reached down the side of the chair to collect my bag and Dad’s envelope of photographs. I considered leaving one of the photos here for him but decided not to. Dad had never displayed the photos in his home; maybe he didn’t want to see them. Besides, what if it got lost? Instead, I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” I told him. “Don’t go anywhere, okay?”

  “A specialist came and talked to Mum while we were out there,” Ryan told me as we walked across the ward to the exit. “He needed her to sign a form so they can contact Uncle David’s doctor to get his records. But he said he doesn’t have any of the typical physical signs of brain damage. Something about his posture and pupils being normal. I didn’t understand any of it.”

  My heart lifted a little. I’d been trying to fend off dark thoughts about my vibrant and energetic father being a vegetable for the rest of his days. “That’s good news, right?” I nodded a farewell to the nurse at the station as I applied more of the pink sanitiser.

  “Probably,” Ryan agreed, pushing the release button to open the door. Aunt Elizabeth and Sarah were standing on the other side, ready to leave. “But, well, the doctor was asking a lot of questions about whether Uncle David did drugs.”

  “What?” I star
ed at him. “No way.”

  “That’s what we told the doctor,” Sarah chimed in. “He barely even drinks.”

  “They’re still waiting on the results of a few blood tests, so we’ll know more then.” Aunt Elizabeth sighed. “How about we go home? Ryan, we’ll pick something up for dinner on the way.”

  “Sure.”

  We split up at the hospital exit, Sarah and I heading to the multistorey car park. It was dark outside; the sun had set and a sliver of moon skimmed atop light clouds, visible between the tall hospital buildings. I took my car keys from her. She didn’t protest.

  My cousin was quiet for several minutes, finally speaking when we pulled up at a set of traffic lights. “I don’t really know what to say,” she murmured. “It’s been such a crazy twenty-four hours.”

  “I know.” And she didn’t even know the half of it. The idea made me grimace, turning my face away so she couldn’t see my strained expression. “I just want to go home and sleep.”

  “I’m not sure I can.”

  The light turned green and we set off. “I think I could. The bed at Dom’s place was okay, but not as good as mine. I missed my pillow.”

  Sarah laughed. My smile was genuine then, glad my comment had achieved the desired effect. “That’s right, I’d almost forgotten you were a dirty stopout last night.”

  “We’ve had other things on our minds,” I pointed out. “And I slept in the spare bed.”

  “Ah, but where did he sleep?”

  “In his room. Although,” I added after a moment, “I didn’t sleep alone.”

  “What?” Her voice rose with delighted shock.

  “Their cat slept on the bed too.”

  She groaned.

  “If it’s any consolation, it was a boy cat.”

  “You’re such a disappointment,” she sighed.

  “Sorry about that.”

  The conversation reminded me I hadn’t called Dominic since that morning. Guilt gnawed at my stomach like Hamish with a bone, although it took me half the drive home to figure out why.

  When I was worried about Dad that afternoon, I’d gone looking for Jack instead of calling my boyfriend.

  That’s silly, I scolded myself. I’d sought Jack because I’d hoped there was a way he’d be able to find my father, not because I’d rather confide in him.

  Jack was also the only one I’d told the details of the confrontation I’d had with Dad last night … but Jack understood that stuff, right? It would be unreasonable of me to expect anyone else—Sarah, Dominic, the others in my family or among my friends—to think that sort of talk was anything but crazy. Sarah and Natalie went through a crystals-and-chakras phase during early high school, but they’d both more or less moved past enthusiasm for the supernatural by now.

  Dad would have understood and not thought I was crazy. Although he’d hardly needed to be told about it after it happened, either.

  To shut my confused thoughts up, I resolved to give Dominic a call when I got home. At least that would ease my guilt, if not any of the other horrible feelings.

  We pulled up in front of the house. Sarah walked up the drive while I locked the car, her own keys jingling in her hand. “Oh!” I heard her exclaim. “I wonder who these are from.” She bent and picked something up off the doormat.

  Someone had left a small posy outside our house: a few pink and lavender flowers in full bloom, bound with a bit of string. There was no note, but I thought I knew who had left them. The flowers were in the same spot Jack had left my bracelet on the night of my birthday.

  The guilty feeling returned.

  Chapter Ten