The Ring

by Florence Osmund

  “Are you related?”

  “I’m her daughter.”

  “We’re taking her to Midwest, if you want to follow us.”

  “How did you guys get in?” she asked.

  “The front door wasn’t locked, ma’am.”

  Paige quickly searched the house for her sister, just in case she was passed out in her room or somewhere. When she didn’t find her, she grabbed her mother’s purse and keys, locked the front door, and headed to the hospital. It wasn’t until she was halfway there, she realized Natalie would have no way to get back in the house. Too bad. Being with her mother right now was more important.

  She struggled to hold back the tears while anger built up throughout her body. Natalie’s addictions were not valid excuses for her bad behavior, as her mother claimed. Of course, Paige realized Natalie’s dependencies were bona fide disorders. She got that. But at some point, she had to take responsibility for them and do something about it. The “I’m not hurting anyone except myself” attitude she had was preposterous and selfish.

  The looming red EMERGENCY sign above the massive revolving doors at the hospital’s entrance brought both relief and anguish. Paige parked the car and sprinted toward the building, inhaling deeply as she braced herself for whatever news she was about to be given.

  “My mother was just brought here by ambulance,” she told the woman behind the desk. “Elaine West.”

  The woman looked at her computer screen for a few seconds and said, “Will you please have a seat in the waiting area? Someone will come out for you.”

  Paige sat uncomfortably as she watched people come and go, all in varying degrees of malaise. Fifteen minutes passed before a petite, middle-aged woman in scrubs approached her.

  “Are you the daughter of Mrs. West?”

  Paige nodded.

  “Come with me.”

  Paige followed the woman through the secure double doors and into a long hallway of curtained rooms. She stopped outside of exam room 15.

  “Your mother suffered a traumatic brain injury when she fell and hit her head,” she said in a low voice. “She’s conscious, and her vitals are stable. We’re running tests.”

  “What kind of tests?”

  “We first did what is called a Glasgow Coma Scale. This helps us assess the severity of the injury. Your mother scored a seven.”

  “Seven? Is that good or bad?”

  “It’s not terrible, but people with scores of eight and above have a better chance for recovery.”

  “Can I see her? Will she be able to talk to me?”

  She pulled open the curtain to allow Paige into her mother’s room.

  “Mom?”

  Her mother’s eyes remained closed while she nodded.

  Paige grasped her mother’s hand. “You’re going to be okay. The doctors are going to take good care of you here.”

  “Water,” her mother whispered.

  “Can she have water?” Paige asked the doctor.

  “We’d prefer she didn’t have any water. She’s scheduled for a CT scan any time now, and we don’t want her overhydrated.”

  “Sorry, Mom. Maybe when you return from the scan you can have something to drink.”

  Two young women in scrubs came into the room to take her mother to the imaging department. Paige was told she could wait in the lobby, as her mother was going to be transferred to a regular room after the scan. Paige pulled out her phone and Googled the Glasgow test while she waited. When she couldn’t find anything more than what the doctor had said, she put her phone away and sat still, letting all the voices and commotion around her blend into one dull tone. An hour passed before she was greeted by a nurse who took her to her mother’s room.

  “Mom?”

  Her mother nodded, eyes closed.

  “Can you talk?”

  She nodded again.

  “When you fell, you hit your head. Do you remember that?”

  “Headache.”

  “You have a headache?”

  She nodded.

  “Did they give you anything for it?”

  She shrugged, then attempted to raise her arm, which didn’t get very far before dropping back down to her side. “Ryan,” she said.

  “He’s gone, Mom. He died months ago.”

  “I know.”

  “Then what about him?”

  “Wanna.”

  “What did you say? Say it again.”

  “Light too bright. Tired.”

  A nurse walked in the room. “Are you Paige, her daughter?”

  “Yes, I am. I think she just said the lights in here are too bright. I know she has a headache.”

  “We gave her pain medication for the headache. It might take a while to take effect.” She went over to the light switch and dimmed the lights. “That should be better for her.”

  “How is she doing?” Paige asked.

  “The reason she has a headache is because there’s pressure inside her brain due to the fall. We’re giving her diuretics to reduce it.”

  “Will she be okay?”

  “We’ll observe her condition for the next twenty-four hours. She’s scheduled for an MRI tomorrow morning.”

  The nurse left the room. Her avoidance of Paige’s question did not go unnoticed.

  Still furious at Natalie for abandoning their mother, but feeling bad about her being potentially locked out, Paige swung by the house to put her mother’s house key in the fake rock where Natalie could find it. She called Natalie’s cell phone to give her a piece of her mind. The “service has been temporarily suspended” message enraged her even more.

  When Paige returned to the hospital the next day, she learned her mother’s condition had worsened. She tried to have a conversation with her, but her speech was so incomprehensible, it was almost useless. Still, Paige believed her mother was trying to convey something of importance to her, and so she kept at it until what came out of her mouth was abundantly clear.

  “Your sister Wanda.”

  At first, despite its clarity, Paige was certain this wasn’t what she had meant to say—Wanda was her cousin, not her sister. But when she repeated it, her mother’s unmistakable words hung in the air for a moment and then echoed in her mind over and over again.

  Wanda could only be her sister one of two ways—either Paige’s father had had a fling with her mother’s sister Bernice, or her aunt Bernice wasn’t really Wanda’s mother and her own mother was. She recalled Wanda’s age being close to her own, just a few months’ difference, which would rule out the latter. If this were true—if her father were Wanda’s father as well—it would explain why her mother was estranged from her sister and why she refused to talk about it. It would also explain why her mother had asked her sister to leave her husband’s funeral. And it would explain why she’d added Wanda’s name in her will.

  Oh my God.

  Paige wondered if Wanda had known who her real father was all this time. She pictured Wanda in her head—they looked nothing alike, but then neither did she and Natalie nor she and Jessivel.

  She and Wanda were half-sisters.

  A nurse came into the room and said they were taking her mother down for another CT scan, leaving Paige to further contemplate the latest possible crack in her father’s already damaged armor. She didn’t know who he was anymore. The father she had thought she knew—the man who had had such a positive impact on her life—now seemed like nothing more than a foggy memory.

  She attempted to calm herself down as she sat in her mother’s hospital room, tried to regain her mental bearings and sense of direction, but the numbness she felt didn’t allow for this. She questioned why she felt this way now and not earlier—why these betrayals by her father were hitting her even harder at this particular time.

  She envisioned her father’s two lives—his life as she had known it versus what had really gone on—side-by-side narratives difficult to contemplate, and even more difficult to comprehend.

  Should I let go of the father I thought
I knew?

  A woman entered the room, introduced herself as Dr. Weidner, and sat down beside her. One look at her face caused a tangible sinking feeling in Paige’s stomach.

  “I’m so sorry, Paige. Your mother didn’t make it.”

  Paige spent a few final minutes with her mother’s lifeless body before hospital staff explained the postmortem procedures. Afterward, she walked to her car with considerable purpose, knowing how dreadful her mother’s final hours must have been for her—physically, mentally, and emotionally. Anger built up inside of her as she drove to her mother’s home.

  “Where the fuck have you been?” Paige screamed at Natalie when she walked through the door, the little composure she’d been maintaining in the car fully collapsing.

  “What are you doing here?” Natalie asked through a bloodshot gaze. She had on a jacket as though she had either just arrived herself or was about to leave again.

  “Never mind why I’m here. Where have you been?”

  “You look like shit. What happened? And where’s Mom?”

  “I’ll tell you what happened,” Paige said, adrenaline now surging throughout her body. “While you were out gallivanting around who knows where, Mom fell. She’s dead, you asshole,” Paige said, the sound of her own words making her realize just how unmoored she had become. “You were supposed to be taking care of her!”

  “She’s dead?!” Natalie plopped down on the sofa and held out her hands. “But she said she didn’t need any help.”

  “You can’t be that ignorant, Natalie. Any moron could see she needed help. What do you think that talk the three of us had was for? Did you listen to any of it?”

  “What talk?”

  “Are you kidding me? So you were high then and don’t remember it?”

  “Where’s her purse?” Natalie asked.

  “What?!”

  “How am I supposed to live now?”

  “I just told you Mom is dead, and your first reaction is where’s her purse? Why don’t you get your sorry ass out of here? Now!”

  Natalie glared at Paige. “I live here,” she said. “And I’m pregnant. You can’t kick me out.”

  “Oh, yeah? Watch me.”

  Paige marched up to Natalie’s bedroom, all the while practicing breathing techniques to relieve the tightness in her chest, something she had learned in yoga class. She entered her sister’s room and armful by armful started throwing her things down the stairs, out of breath by the time she finished.

  “Take your shit and get out of this house.”

  “I have nowhere to go. You know that. And it’s not your house to kick me out of anyway.”

  Paige struggled to avoid stumbling over her sister’s clothes and other belongings as she descended the stairs.

  “I’m throwing all this stuff in your car and driving you to a motel. I’ll pay for one month’s rent for you to stay there. After that, you’re on your own, sister.”

  “You can’t do this, Paige.”

  “Oh, yes, I can. But wait. Maybe you’d rather spend the next month in jail…for obstructing a police investigation. What’ll it be, Nat?”

  While the pathetic-looking Natalie stood speechless in the middle of the living room, Paige scooped up her sister’s belongings and proceeded to stuff them into the back seat of Natalie’s car. When she finished, she snatched the door key that Natalie still had in her hand and put it in her pocket. “C’mon, you sorry piece of— Let’s go.”

  “I’m not going.”

  Paige pulled out her cell phone and proceeded to call 9-1-1.

  “Who are you calling?”

  “The police.”

  Natalie told her to stop.

  Paige stopped her call and looked up the number for a nearby motel.

  “Now who are you calling?”

  Paige left the room to complete the call.

  “You’re coming then?”

  “Where to?”

  “Just get in the car,” Paige said as she got into the driver’s seat of Natalie’s car.

  Natalie slid into the passenger seat.

  “Give me your car keys.”

  Neither of them spoke for the first several blocks of their drive until Natalie finally broke the silence.

  “So what happened to Mom?” she asked.

  “I told you she fell.”

  “That usually doesn’t kill a person.”

  “So now you’re a medical expert?”

  More silence until they reached the Rodeway Inn. Paige pulled up to Unit 8 and parked the car.

  “What are we doing here?”

  “This is your new home, Nat.”

  “I’m not staying here.”

  “You do what you want. I paid for thirty days over the phone.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “Stay put while I get the key,” she told Natalie after pulling the car key out of the ignition.

  “Like where am I going to go?” she mumbled under her breath.

  “You can go to hell for all I care,” Paige shouted back at her.

  Paige retrieved the room key from the office, opened the motel door, propped it open with a chair, and proceeded to empty the contents of Natalie’s car into the room while Natalie stood by watching. When she finished, Paige left Natalie’s car key on the bed and called for an Uber for herself. On her way out, she threw a hundred-dollar bill at Natalie, and said, “Here—go buy yourself some drugs.”

  Chapter 42

  Jessivel spent the entire week on her job search, taking to heart all that Paige had advised her to do. When she met her mother for lunch, she bragged about what she’d done.

  “Good for you, Jess,” her mother said. “I knew you’d come around one of these days.”

  “Well, maybe all I needed was a gentle push.”

  “Or not so gentle,” she said, a faint outline of a smile on her lips.

  “C’mon, Mom. I came around. Can’t we leave it at that?”

  “Looks like Paige has had a positive effect on you. She’s helping you leave the angry woman you’d become, something I couldn’t do.”

  “She’s not so bad.”

  “Maybe I could meet her.”

  “Really?”

  “I think it would be interesting seeing you two side by side, both of Wayne’s daughters.”

  “I don’t think we look anything alike. And his real name is Ryan, you know. Ryan West.”

  “He’ll always be Wayne Salter to me.”

  “Whatever.”

  “How’s Kayla?”

  “She’s fine. Her newest obsession is an old teddy bear she said Dad gave to her.”

  Her mother’s eyes popped wide open. “What teddy bear?” she asked.

  “Some stuffed bear she said she got from Dad.”

  “He gave it to her?”

  “Well, no. I think she sort of took it from his briefcase one day. Thought it was meant for her.”

  “What does it look like?”

  “Why are you getting so hyper over some old stuffed toy?”

  “What does it look like, Jessivel?”

  “Calm down, Mom. I didn’t even remember her having it until she brought it up. She went through some unpacked moving bags I had and found it.”

  “So, she has it now?”

  “What’s with you? Yes, she has it. It was dirty, so I washed it.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “Okay, what’s with the bear?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Don’t give me that crap. You’re all uptight about this stupid bear. What’s going on?”

  Her mother sat in silence while she picked at her plate of food. “There was talk about a teddy bear in some letters Wayne got from the woman in India…or London. I forget where the hell she was. Anyway, I can’t remember exactly what the letters said except that the teddy bear had striped pants.”

  “This one has striped pants.”

  “Then it’s the same one. I think, but I’m not sure, this woman hid something inside t
he bear.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. If I remember right, she was vague about what it was.”

  “Like, what could it have been?”

  “I’m telling you, I don’t know. Drugs maybe?”

  “Not Dad.”

  “I’m just guessing, Jess. I don’t think so either, but Hannah thought at one time he might have been mixed up in drugs. All I know is that something was inside that he was to hang on to until she got back to him.”

  “So I’ll look inside of it. But if it was drugs, I’m not sure what washing did to it.”

  “I have to get back to work. We better get going. And Jess?”

  “What?”

  “Promise me you’ll call as soon as you open the bear.”

  “Honey, where’s your teddy bear? Did you take it from the clean laundry pile?” Jessivel asked Kayla.

  “His name is Asher, and he’s under my pillow. Why?”

  “No wonder I couldn’t find it. Asher?”

  “Asher Angel.”

  “I have no clue who that is.”

  “Andi Mack?”

  “Who?”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Kayla, just give me the damn bear.”

  “You’re not going to take it away from me, are you? It’s bad enough you washed it. Now it doesn’t smell like Poppy anymore.”

  “I just want to see it.”

  “Okay,” Kayla grumbled as she stomped to her bedroom and returned with the bear. Jessivel pulled down the bear’s pants and examined the handsewn seam down its belly.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Get me my sewing basket, will you?”

  “What are you going to do to him?”

  “Just get me the basket.”

  “No,” she said as she attempted to rescue the bear. “You’re going to ruin it.”

  “See this seam, all the hand-stitching? I’m going to slit it open and see what’s inside. I can sew it right up again, same stitching. No one will ever know the difference.”

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why do you need to see what’s inside?”

  “Nana seems to think Poppy was hiding something in there. Don’t you want to see the surprise?” she asked, hoping it wouldn’t be a baggie of drugs.