Mad Max: Unintended Consequences

by Ashton, Betsy

  “They won't let me see her.”

  “I'll speak with your dad. You and Alex should see her. She doesn't respond right now, though.”

  “How long can you stay?”

  “Until Mom's better.”

  Emilie paled, beads of sweat popping out on her upper lip. Her eyes glazed over. I waited. She shook herself and rose on unsteady legs.

  “Don't plan on leaving soon. We're going to need you. Mom's never going to be the same.”

  Before I could respond, the counterpoint of two doors sounded—Emilie's bedroom door closing softly and the front door banging open. Alex was home.

  I went downstairs to hug my grandson, who was full of news about his day. He spotted the uneaten Oreos, poured some milk, and sat at the table. I sat opposite, picked up an Oreo, and twisted it apart. I leaned over and dunked my cookie into his milk before licking the sweet icing and crunching the cookie. Alex chattered about what went on in school before asking about his mother. I gave him an even more sanitized version of what I told Emilie. When I was done, he smiled a chocolaty smile.

  “You look like a pirate.” Alex bit into his third Oreo.

  “Avast, matey.” I winked my good eye.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Before I left the hospital, I asked Whip about the kids' routines, but he didn't know. After all, he'd been on the road most of their lives. Even when he was home, Merry made the everyday decisions. Well, I needed doctors appointments, key school dates, after-school activities, clubs, sports, and private lessons. I sighed.

  I was so out of practice. It'd been more than two decades since I thought about any of this stuff. I was good at it then, even if Merry disagreed.

  I stared at the calendar on the refrigerator. A couple of doctor and dentist appointments, but nothing about daily and weekly routines. Merry must have kept all this in her head. Well, I couldn't do that. If I didn't write it down, I'd miss something. I had my own hectic schedule in New York where I balanced charitable events with board meetings and social outings with Raney, Eleanor, and my other friends, the rest of the Great Dames.

  I went right to the source. Or sources. The kids. After dinner on my first day in charge, I kept them in the kitchen. Whip was at the hospital.

  “So, how long are you going to be babysitting us, Mad Max?” Alex carried a large bowl of chocolate ice cream to the table.

  “Is that what I'm doing? Babysitting?” Where did Alex get such ideas?

  “I didn't mean it like that, but I'm almost eleven. I don't need a babysitter.” Alex stumbled over his tongue.

  “I know you don't, but can you drive yourself around?”

  “No…”

  “He means, how long can you stay?” Emilie glared at her brother.

  “I promised your dad I'd help for a while.”

  I kept my commitment vague. I didn't want the kids to think I'd returned to Richmond permanently. I leaned over and ruffled Alex's hair, even though I broke the gel he put on it to make it stand up straight. I knew full well he hated it. Tough. I liked doing it.

  “A while is going to be a long time, like I said.” Emilie grabbed an apple from the bowl on the counter.

  “Perhaps. Tell me everything you do. Don't want to miss anything.”

  Emilie refocused on the task at hand.

  I laid the calendar on the table, and together we began filling in activities, times, and dates. Emilie had swim league on Saturdays and soccer three afternoons after school. She also took tennis lessons once a week.

  “I'm in a creative writing group after school twice a month. My English teacher leads it. We have lots of fun. We meet on the second and fourth Tuesdays after school. I need a ride, ‘cause I miss the last bus.”

  Creative writing? We didn't have courses like that when I was in junior high or middle school or whatever they called it today. Then again, what some students turned in for homework must look like creative writing.

  “Okay, Alex. You're next.” I turned to my ice cream-smeared grandson.

  “Ice hockey on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. We finish at the end of March. I'm in the computer club. We meet twice a month on Wednesdays after school. I miss the last bus too.”

  “First and third Wednesdays?” Life as a soccer mom equaled chauffeur. I was going to need a car. Merry's was totaled. I'd have to rent one.

  “Yup.”

  Alex started to wipe his mouth on his sleeve. He looked up, probably to see if I was watching. I was. I raised a single eyebrow. Alex fetched a napkin.

  “Next, test dates and vacation schedules. Anything else that's important.”

  I filled in one month's activities and was shocked at how complicated a kid's life had become.

  How could Merry allow the kids to fill up their lives with classes and meetings? Or was this the normal life of a child today? What happened to being kids, doing kid things? Playing, reading, going to movies, lying around daydreaming, studying? The kids needed a PalmPilot. I'd have to teach them to be kids before I left.

  “What about you?” Emilie stared at the page of squares filling the center of the table.

  “Board meetings in New York, the occasional doctor's appointment, and a ski trip to Aspen.”

  “Cool. I want to learn to ski. Can I come too?”

  “Not this time, Alex. It's all old ladies like me.”

  “Rats.”

  “When are you going?” Emilie picked at a bit of spilled food on the placemat.

  “Next month.”

  “Oh, I forgot. I get to sleep over at Andy's or Ben's every Friday and play video games all day on Sunday.” Alex kept his eyes on the table.

  “Nice try.”

  We'd concentrated so hard on the calendar, none of us heard Whip come in. “You know better than that.”

  “Phooey.”

  “How's Mom?” Emilie glanced at her father.

  Whip looked like his nickname. He sat vigil day and night at the hospital while he waited for any bit of good news.

  “No change. Want to go see her tomorrow?”

  Alex and Emilie nodded.

  “Can we go for ice cream afterward?” Alex asked, ever the bottomless pit.

  “Use your indoor voice.”

  Ah yes, that old programmed response. I developed it when Jack was Alex's age. I hadn't forgotten everything about child rearing.

  “Sure. Want to come along, Max?” Whip asked.

  “I don't think so. I'll see you when you get back.”

  “She's coming.” Emilie glared at me, daring me to say “No.”

  Guess I'm going to see Merry and eat ice cream.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Less than two weeks after I overloaded the monthly calendar, a chirpy weatherman announced Richmond was going to get two inches of snow the next day. As the school closures crawled across the bottom of the screen, I couldn't believe every school district threw up its hands and canceled classes.

  “We don't have a lot of plows.” Emilie grinned. “We get a day off whenever it snows.”

  “Two inches? In New York, we have to get a foot or more before we even delay the start of the school day.”

  “This isn't New York,” Alex said. “Besides, now we get to sleep in tomorrow.”

  With nothing I could do about a lost day of classes, I went to bed. When I looked out the window the next morning, I was surprised to see more than a foot of snow lying like a sheet across the driveway and lawn. Then I chuckled.

  I tiptoed downstairs and returned immediately. I rapped on Emilie's door until she opened it. I hit her with a snowball. Her yells woke Alex, who suffered the same fate.

  “Get dressed. We're going to make a snowman.”

  “You're crazy.”

  Alex fled to his room. The sound of drawers being opened and shut told me he was looking for his warm clothes.

  “Hey, you guys named me Mad Max.”

  Emilie scooped a dab of slush off the floor and rubbed it on my face.

  By the time both kids were down
stairs and out the garage door, I was flopped on my back in the driveway, making a snow angel.

  “Come on. It's fun.”

  Emilie lay next to me. Before long, Alex laughed and threw snow at his sister and me. We had a rousing snowball fight before we built a snowman. We must have made enough noise to wake the neighborhood, because soon doors banged open up and down the street. Kids' shrieks filled what little space there was between snowflakes.

  I sent Alex rooting in the garage for a snow shovel, but he returned empty-handed.

  “How do you clear the driveway?”

  “Snow removal is spring. We just wait until it melts.”

  I waved both hands at the kids and went inside to make hot chocolate and breakfast.

  After the doctors reduced Merry's medications, I expected her to wake up and start talking immediately. That didn't happen. Even out of the medically-induced coma, she was often unable to speak. A deep chill settled into my bones.

  Dr. Jenkins handed us off to the neurologist, Dr. Maloney, who would be in charge of Merry's care for the next stage. Whip and I met with him several times while she was in the hospital.

  “I want you both to understand Merry's recovery will be slow. She's conscious, medically speaking, but she's nonverbal.”

  “Meaning she can't talk,” Whip said.

  “That's right. She's following basic verbal and physical commands, so we know some of her cognitive function is returning, but she hasn't spoken.”

  “When'll that happen?” Whip ran his hand across his chin, palm rasping on whiskers, eyes clouded with worry.

  “I don't know. We're continually monitoring her brain function. We see progress.” Dr. Maloney referred to Merry's chart. “She sustained a great deal of damage to her pre-frontal cortex.”

  “English, please.”

  I had no clue what part of the brain he meant, although pre-frontal indicated it was probably at the front of her skull.

  Dr. Maloney pointed to a model of the human brain. “Here. When she hit the windshield, she sustained injuries to this section.”

  “What does it control?” I clamped down on my jaw, but I forgot to tighten my diaphragm. I stifled a hiccup.

  “Her analytic abilities.” The doctor turned the model around to face us. “Merry's brain was injured here and here. Some areas control speech; others control physical abilities—walking, balance. Still others control emotions.”

  “She could be so damaged she won't come back the way she was?”

  “That's possible. Once we move Merry to the rehab center, we'll put her through a battery of physical, occupational, and speech therapies. We'll monitor her progress. In a few weeks, we'll have a better idea of how much permanent impairment she'll have.”

  A few weeks? Damn.

  “She has a traumatic brain injury, what we call TBI.”

  “Thought that only occurred in military accidents,” Whip said.

  “Any brain injury can be characterized as traumatic, so no, they're not limited to war injuries.”

  “Merry may never be normal again?” Whip's face grew paler.

  “I'm saying she may return to near normal, or she may suffer from some kind of disability. Regardless, Merry has a long road ahead of her. You need to be prepared.”

  “Prepared for what?” Whip bore down.

  “Merry may have permanent problems with balance and other physical movement.”

  “We can manage that.”

  “She may have speech impairments.”

  “Okay.” Whip relaxed a little.

  “She may exhibit changes in her personality.”

  “Like what?” Whip leaned forward, elbows on his khaki-covered knees.

  “Irrational fears. Taking no interest in what she used to like. Verbal abuse. Substance abuse. We just don't know.”

  Whip stood, shook the doctor's hand, and opened the door.

  “Where are you going?” I didn't like Whip's expression or the dejected set of his shoulders.

  “Out.”

  Whip returned home late that evening. The kids and I ate at our regular time, and I waited in the family room until his key clicked in the door. I met him in the center hallway.

  “We have to talk.” I turned on my heel and marched back to the rear of the house. Whip followed and slumped into his chair. I poured drinks and sat opposite him.

  “What are you thinking?”

  I still hadn't had time to talk with him about my limited role in the family. No time like right now to lay it out.

  “Guess Merry's going to be in rehab for weeks, huh?” Tired blue eyes met mine. “She may not recover.”

  “She may not. We can pray for total recovery, but we should plan for the worst.” Like it or not, we had to address our fears. “What are you going to do if she doesn't get better?”

  “What do you mean?” Whip looked like he'd finally heard what I said.

  “How are you going to raise the kids?”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, Dad, you. If Merry can't be their mother, you have to take over the day-to-day responsibilities.”

  Anger rose and my cheeks heated. I never could prevent my face from flushing when I got angry. Whip either didn't notice or didn't know the warning signs. At any rate, I was pissed off. How could he be so dense? Someone had to be there for his kids. It should be him.

  “Aren't you going to help?”

  “Help, yes, for a short period of time. It's not my job to raise them. It's yours. You'll need to change your life.”

  “I travel too much.”

  “Then hire a nanny or a caretaker. You can't expect me or your folks to do this permanently. We've raised our kids. Now it's your turn.”

  Whip looked as if he'd never considered having to take care of the kids. Alone.

  I squeezed his shoulder when I left the family room. He'd never looked so forlorn, but he couldn't dump his duties on me. Not unless I wanted to be the dumpee. I didn't.

  I bade Emilie a tearful farewell and headed back to New York to get ready for a long-awaited skiing trip to Aspen. I promised to call and text her daily.

  “I'm so worried, Mad Max,” Emilie said on my last night at the house. “I don't feel Mom very much.”

  “What do you mean, you don't feel her?” Once again Emilie left me thumbing a lift on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

  “She doesn't feel like Mom. I mean, sometimes it's like Mom is trying to break through. Other times it's like a stranger is in Mom's body.”

  I kind of got what she meant. I, too, watched Merry struggle to find a word or pick up a cup or walk between parallel bars, but Emilie's assessment went to the core of my fears. What would I do if Merry didn't come back?

  “Give it some more time.” I zipped my roll-aboard and set it on the floor. “Now, what do you want me to bring from Aspen?”

  “You. To stay.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  I landed at LaGuardia at rush hour. I should have been relaxed from skiing with my girlfriends, but Emilie's daily updates kept dragging me back to Richmond.

  Merry used a cane or walker most of the time. Those sections of the brain weren't permanently damaged. Her speech was more intelligible, but she suffered bouts where she forgot words or mangled them. I looked up “brain trauma.” Aphasia, thinking you're saying a word correctly but you really weren't, was a symptom.

  I spent another week in New York, doing whatever I wanted. An extended vacation. I continued to withdraw from the day-to-day rearing of the children. I returned the first week of April to check things out. Since my conversation with Whip, he'd hired a series of high school girls to watch the kids after school. Most didn't work out, because either they didn't drive, and therefore couldn't pick the kids up after school, or they were too interested in boyfriends to monitor homework. I heard all of this in detail from Emilie, with occasional crowing updates from Alex.

  “Richmond has plenty of colleges. Have you tried an older girl? Or a boy?”

  I was frustrated with Whip's
failures. Was he making bad decisions? Was he programming the efforts for failure so I would come back and stay?

  “I've tried. Not having much success. Can't find anyone I trust to stay overnight.”

  Overnight? My gut sank.

  “You're planning to go back on the road? Merry's not even home.”

  “That's what I do. I supervise work crews all over the world.”

  “To the potential detriment of your children. Send someone else. You don't have to be everywhere.” Everywhere but home, I wanted to shout but didn't.

  I'd learned it didn't do any good. Whip could be as stubborn as I was, and I redefined “mulish” when I dug in my heels.

  I began a schedule of two weeks on, two weeks off, not always contiguous. Still, I was able to spend half my time at home in New York and half my time messing around with the kids. I couldn't think of a worse situation. No one was satisfied. I got more and more resentful. Why couldn't Whip see he was shirking his responsibilities?

  No matter how I tried to convince myself I didn't need to live in Richmond, Emilie and I grew closer with each call and text message. I helped her with her homework; I encouraged her to break out and be a child; I listened to her fears. Alex's grades plummeted, and he became more irascible. Daily, I grew more concerned because what Whip was doing wasn't working.

  I hopped on my now familiar US Airways regional jet through National to Richmond. Whip called and asked me to meet him at his favorite diner for coffee. I picked up my rental car and headed for the diner. I listened to what was on his mind. Turned out to be plenty, but it all boiled down to one thing: He wanted me to come back full-time until Merry could take care of the children.

  “Losing ground faster than I can imagine. I'm a fuckup at the house and at the office. I need help, Max. Don't have anyone else to turn to.”

  I didn't believe that, but Whip did. I knew from talking with Bette that the Colonel faced a double bypass—“at least, I think it's only a double,” she said—in the next couple of weeks. I knew Emilie was stressed out and Alex was basically running wild. What I couldn't figure out was how this family collapsed in the months since Merry's accident.

  I closed my eyes and felt my cheeks grow hot. I wanted to shout, “Grow up. Crack down on Alex. Make him do his homework. Be there for Em. Be there for your wife.” I doubted it would help the situation. So now it was up to me.