While My Sister Sleeps (18 page)

Molly was about to say something rude, but thought better of it. She had made her point with dignity. “One last thing,” she added. “I've said all of this in front of Robin. She looks satisfied.” Quietly, she ended the call.

KATHRYN
barely slept, but when Charlie suggested a sleeping pill, she refused. To escape the pain felt like desertion.

She made it until three in the morning before returning to the hospital. Molly was asleep, but not on the pull-out bed. She had climbed up with her sister and lay with her back against the bedrail and her face against Robin's shoulder.

Kathryn sat quietly in the chair. Molly needed comfort, and Robin could give it. Kathryn couldn't. She didn't have the strength.

When a nurse came to check on Robin, Molly stirred. She
looked up in confusion, staring blearily at the nurse, then at Kathryn. Quickly, she pushed herself up. “I didn't mean to fall asleep,” she said to Kathryn, but it was the nurse who answered.

“Don't get up,” she said. “Your sister is fine.”

Your sister is fine.
The words echoed through Kathryn's stupor until Molly broke in.

“You should have stayed home, Mom. You need sleep.” She was sitting cross-legged by Robin's knee. The nurse was gone.

“I need to be here.” Kathryn tried to explain. “I know they say nothing's happening in her mind”—she held up a hand— “and I do accept that, Molly. But I'm still her mother. That will never, ever end. Robin is my daughter. As long as her heart continues to beat…”

Molly inched her way to the foot of the bed and slid off. Sinking to the floor by Kathryn's chair, she leaned against her leg. Kathryn rested a hand on her head, but found no comfort in the gesture. It was lost in grief. Like Molly's question.
What happens now?
Or was it Kathryn's question?

She knew the short-term answer. There would be a meeting with Robin's team that morning.

The long-term answer was more troubling.

HE MEETING WAS HELD IN A CONFERENCE ROOM.
The intensivist and neurologist were there along with two of Robin's nurses and a social worker. The neurologist sat at the head of the table. On his left were his colleagues, on his right four Snows.

It wasn't that Kathryn felt hostility. The doctors were kind people who were doing a difficult job the best way they could. Their voices were gentle, their eyes sympathetic. But she knew she wouldn't like what they said, which made them the enemy.

Numbness was a shield. Taking refuge in it, she caught only general threads of the conversation. The neurologist laid out the EEG strips and summed up what he saw. The intensivist added the results of his own empirical tests. The nurses talked of their repeated efforts to elicit a response from Robin. The social worker listened.

Kathryn definitely caught the bottom line. There was no
hope that Robin would recover. With her brain devoid of activity, she would never again respond or wake up. The respirator might keep air moving in and out of her lungs, which would keep her heart pumping and her blood circulating; but without that, her body would shut down.

There was no treatment for brain death. In accordance with hospital policy, Robin would be transferred to a regular room. If the family so chose, she might go to a long-term care facility. If not, the hospital would continue to provide medical care. This point was reiterated often and by each member of the team. Robin could be kept alive indefinitely.

The intensivist described what would be done to prevent dehydration and starvation. He talked of the surgical insertion of a feeding tube and emphasized that since Robin felt no pain, pain control was unnecessary. He deferred to the social worker for a discussion of the emotional issues involved in long-term care, but it was the intensivist who raised the possibility of ending life support.

Kathryn tuned in here, her heart beating double-time. The rest had been warm-up. This was the point of the exercise.

She waited only until the hospital team had left the room before looking from Charlie to Molly to Chris. “The answer is no,” she told them all. “We are not ending life support. I'm not ready to let her go.” When none of them spoke, she looked at Charlie. “They imply that Robin is only a body, but she's still my child. This is happening too fast. I can't think.”

“You need time,” Charlie said.

CHRIS
left the conference room. While the others returned to Robin, he got coffee in the lounge, but he tossed it out before
he drank much. Erin was home with Chloe. He wanted to hang out with his wife and daughter awhile.

He was waiting at the elevator when the social worker joined him. She had a round face and a headful of curly hair. “How's your mom?”

Stubborn
, was his first thought, but he took his cue from Charlie. “She needs time.”

“That's understandable. End of life issues are tough. How about you? Where do you stand?”

He eyed the elevator pad. “The tests are clear. Time won't change that.”

“It won't change the tests. It might change your mother's feelings. Do you have kids?”

“A daughter.”

“Can you think of her and try to imagine what your mom feels?”

“Not really. I'm a guy. It's different.”

The elevator arrived. They stepped on and rode down in silence, but when Chris would have nodded a good-bye, she said, “Can I buy you a cup of coffee? There's a quiet part of the patio where we could talk.”

He had already tried coffee. It hadn't helped. But he hadn't tried talking. This woman seemed to understand Kathryn. He wondered if she might understand him, too. He could use an ally at this point.

Moments later, they were crossing the patio. The sun was warm, but well-placed lindens offered shade. Beyond the trees were the bluffs, beneath the bluffs the river, across the river another state. Chris loved a good view—before Chloe, he and Erin had often climbed local peaks—but today he was oblivious.

The social worker chose a table away from the rest. “Were
you close to your sister?” she asked as soon as they were seated.

He nodded. “We're a tight family.” “But you and Robin—were the two of you close?” “We were when we were kids. Then we got our own interests. But you can't be a Snow without being involved in Robin's life. Her running is everything.” “You don't sound bitter.” “Why should I be? It's exciting.” “Do you ever envy her the attention she gets?” “No. I'm support staff.” And happy enough to be that. Support staff felt less pressure. He liked going to work, coming home, seeing Erin and the baby, watching the Sox. He didn't have to make decisions like his parents or work weekends like Molly. If he had wanted to be a CEO, he wouldn't have become a CPA. Enough said.

“Support staff is important,” the social worker acknowledged. “I'm the numbers guy for Snow Hill.” “Is that why you agree with the test results?” Chris shrugged his assent. “It isn't like there was only one test. Don't you trust them?”

“I do. But it's like I said before. Tests don't give the whole picture. They don't take emotions into account.”

“If you believe the test,” Chris argued, “Robin has no emotions.”

“Your parents do.”

But he parted ways with his parents on that. “How can they let her live like this? It's no existence.”

“It may be the only one your mom can handle right now.” He lifted his cup, then put it down without drinking. “She isn't the only one affected. It's like with Robin's running. Everyone is involved.”

“This is different. It's a process.”

He considered that. “When does it end?”

“When your mother accepts that Robin is gone.”

“So we all just stand around and wait for weeks—months
— years?
” He had done his homework. Terri Schiavo was kept alive for fifteen years. He couldn't imagine his parents doing that to Robin.

“Like I say, it's a process.”

Chris sat back. “I vote for organ donation, but Mom won't hear of it.”

“It's a tough concept to grasp when a loved one's heart is still beating.”

“Then why did they mention it at the meeting?”

“Because it's an option. And for some people trying to decide what to do, it's a help. Donor families often feel that good can come from bad. I take it none of you know how Robin felt about this?”

Chris shrugged. “Not me. But hell, I'm just a guy.”

“Hold on now,” the social worker said with a smile. “You said that before. Is it an excuse?”

“For what?”

“Not getting involved? Guys have emotions. Don't you love your wife?”

“Yes.” The phone in his pocket rang.

“And your child?”

Nodding, he pulled out the cell, looked at the panel, and felt a nagging worry. He had known this was coming and was not in the mood.

“Work call,” he told the social worker dismissively and was about to re-pocket the phone when she rose.

“Answer it,” she said, reaching into her purse. “That's how you can help your family most right now. Here's my card. Call
anytime.” She left before he could tell her that his family didn't need counseling.

Frustrated, he opened his phone. “Why are you calling on this line?”

“Because you're not at work,” said Liz Tocci, “and right now I don't feel welcome calling Snow Hill. Do you know that your sister fired me?”

“Liz, this is a bad time.”

“I'm still fired. That means I'm out of work.”

Turning his back on the hospital, Chris faced the bluffs, but the view held no escape from Liz. He hung his head. “Do you
know
what's going on here?”

“Yes. Robin is on life support, and it's a bad time, but I wasn't the one who asked for this. Your sister went berserk, just flew off the handle over a petty issue. I was counting on at least one more year at Snow Hill. I don't have enough of a following yet to go out on my own, and finding a new job is hard when you've been fired from the last. The more people learn about this, the worse it is for my career.”

“Tell them you quit.”

“I didn't quit. I was fired. That wasn't part of the deal when I agreed to come.”

“What deal?” Chris asked, annoyed. “I introduced you to my mother. Any arrangement you had was with her.”

“Oh, come on. We both know I was coming for you.”

He was silent for a minute. “I didn't know it, Liz.”

“Excuse me? What about those lunches? What about our
phone
calls?”

“They were always work-related.”

“Don't be dense, Chris.”

Chris might be. But he wasn't stupid. “The only thing going on was in your mind. I'm married.”

“To a very sweet young thing who will bore you to tears. I can be patient on that. This business with Molly is something else. Talk to your parents. I want to be reinstated.”

“Liz,” he said pedantically, “my parents are with my sister, who is dying. I will not talk with them about this.”

“Do you want them to know about us?”

“
What
us? There
is
no us. We were together when I was in college. That was eight years ago.”

“I have pictures,” she taunted.

“That's old news.”

“Nuh-uh. These pictures are new. There's one from last year's Christmas party and another from the Snow Hill booth at the Concord design conference. We look pretty chummy. Combine that with an eight-year-old picture, and your wife might be upset. Your mother, too. You never told her about our relationship, did you?”

No, Chris hadn't. He was a guy—and that was
not
an excuse. Guys didn't call their mothers each time they slept with a woman, particularly when the mother in question was straight-laced and the woman in question was ten years his senior. Kathryn would never have understood the attraction. Frankly, Chris didn't either just then.

“Are you trying to blackmail me?” he asked.

“It won't come to that. I know you'll do the right thing.”

MOLLY
stayed with her parents in Robin's room, but conversation was sparse. Nurses came and went. The respiratory therapist stopped by. Charlie filled out paperwork regarding Robin's continued care. Kathryn sat silent, holding Robin's hand tightly. And there Robin lay in a pale, beautiful mockery of life.