You'll Never Know

by Katie Cross

  “Rachelle, honey?” Mira asked softly.

  “Yeah.”

  “You all right?”

  She came up next to me, standing so we stared out at Bitsy’s darkening backyard. I could still smell hints of flour and sugar on my clothes.

  “Just … a bit lost.”

  “Your mom loves you, you know.” Mira put a hand on my shoulder. “I think she’s showing it the best way she can.”

  The words stung. Maybe Mom did love me. Maybe she only loved television and food. In the end, it didn’t change the past. And whatever rendition of love she operated on? I wanted nothing to do with it.

  “I don’t know if I believe that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Her best?” I spat. “Really? Sitting on the couch, eating food, forgetting I existed. She hasn’t even asked about my ankle in weeks. She forgot my birthday last year. Or maybe she just didn’t want to deal with the fact that I had just lost forty pounds. She didn’t even go to my high school graduation.”

  Mira opened her mouth to speak, but stopped. I waited, silently daring her to defend her again.

  “Yeah,” she whispered. “It’s been really hard.”

  Tears filled my eyes. “I can’t do it, Mira. I can’t forgive her. What’s worse is that I don’t want to. I don’t think she deserves it. That sort of charity? That sort of compassion? I never got that from her. Never!”

  Mira blinked, her face devoid of judgment, expression, or emotion. Tears filled my eyes.

  “She doesn’t deserve it,” I whispered. “I can’t live like this anymore. I’ve already decided that I’m going to move out as soon as I can. William has already told me about a few friends that have apartments.”

  “That may be for the best.”

  “It’s the only way, Mira. I can’t face her anymore.”

  “Can I give you a hug?”

  Mira held out her arms, her eyes sparkling. The tears welling in my eyes dropped down my cheeks. I fell into her embrace for several long minutes.

  “You going to be okay?” she asked, pulling away to look right in my eyes.

  “Yeah.”

  She put a hand on my back. “Whatever happens, just give it time? Time really does heal all wounds. And remember we love you. More than you could ever know is possible.”

  Chapter 16

  Hope

  I woke up the next morning feeling as if I hadn’t slept.

  My eyes were like sandpaper, my legs heavy. Several minutes passed before I could collect my scattered thoughts and roll out of bed. As always, the television droned in the background when I made my way to the bathroom, using the wall as a support instead of my crutches. My first appointment with the physical therapist was next week, but Dr. Martinez had advanced me to partial weight bearing. The freedom, on occasion, made me giddy.

  Still, I cursed those crutches.

  By the time I splashed cold water on my face, brushed my teeth, and put my hair into a French braid, my mind seemed to have caught up with my body. I stared into the mirror, able to easily conjure up five nice things about myself. The momentum stopped there.

  I am not defined by my roles, I thought. But … I don’t know what I am defined by.

  No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t bring up a forgiving thought about Mom. Neither of us had moved toward each other. Neither of us had made any attempt at reconciliation.

  It felt too raw.

  With a hiss, I stepped out of the bathroom, surprised to see Mom on the couch. She’d been in her bedroom every minute I’d been home, and I’d wondered if she listened for my return or just stayed locked up. But now she sat on the edge of the couch, a hand on her left shoulder. I paused. Was it the morning light, or did something seem … off?

  I opened my mouth to ask, then stopped. No. Now I was just imagining things.

  After sliding into a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, and my new ankle brace, I shoved my feet into flip flops and stepped back out of my room. Mom attempted to stand but fell back with a gasp. I paused.

  “Mom?”

  She put a hand to her chest.

  “Rachelle.”

  I hopped toward her. Beads of sweat popped up along her pale face. She blinked as if dazed. Her breathing came fast and shallow.

  “Mom? You don’t sound too good.”

  “Chelle. Get…”

  “Mom?” I crouched next to her. “What’s going on?”

  “Call … call 911.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Her body seemed to give out from beneath her. She fell back against the couch with a cry. “Can’t … can’t breathe!”

  All the blood drained from my face as I ripped my phone out of my pocket and dialed 911. In a shaky voice, I said, “Send an ambulance! I-I think my mom is having a heart attack.”

  Hours later, a female doctor in a crisp white coat and scrub pants stood next to the gurney as I slid inside Mom’s room in the ICU. The nurse assistant who’d escorted me from the waiting room, where I’d been since Mom left the ER and went into surgery, slipped away. The doctor regarded me with warm eyes and extended a hand. I accepted, then glanced at the bed, where Mom lay in a lump.

  “You must be Rachelle, Melissa’s daughter?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m Dr. James, a bariatric specialist. I’m working with your mother’s cardiologist, Dr. Wu, to get both of you through this the best we possibly can.”

  She had a firm handshake and bright green eyes. When she looked at the bed, hesitation flitted across her face.

  “I’m sorry,” I murmured. “It’s been a long day. What’s a bariatric doctor again?”

  “I specialize in patients who are morbidly obese.”

  “Right. Thanks.”

  A weight doctor, I thought. It’s finally come to this. How strange that a doctor who specialized in obesity should be so thin.

  “It must not be looking good,” I whispered, my voice shaky.

  Dr. James frowned. “No. It’s not. To be honest, we were lucky to get her here at all.”

  My gaze trailed over to the bed, even though I wanted nothing less than to see her there. Her pale face seemed anemic beneath the glaring lights. I hardly recognized her, she was so pale, lost in the white sheets and mess of tubes in the terrifying room. White, green, and blue lines oscillated in waves on a machine next to her bed. A nurse in pale blue scrubs bustled around her, adjusting monitors and IV machines and scrawling out numbers on a paper towel.

  I recalled the flashing lights outside our house. The puzzled expressions of the paramedics as they attempted to get Mom onto the gurney but were unable to move her. The glazed, pained expression in Mom’s pale face, as if she were slipping away moment by moment. Her breath had fogged up the mask they put over her mouth. Once we’d made it to the hospital, everything had moved so fast that I’d just stood back, waiting for someone to tell me what was happening. The whole thing felt frightening and foreign, like it was happening to someone else.

  “Was it just her heart, then? I-I’m still not sure what happened.”

  “No,” Dr. James said. “Things aren’t looking very good for several systems in her body, but it was her heart that caused this. Her heart’s weak for many reasons, mostly because of her weight.”

  I nodded. Her words seemed to flow in and out of my mind. My brow furrowed.

  “Is … is she going to be all right?”

  Dr. James hesitated, as if holding back an instinctual nod. She glanced at Mom in what seemed to be an instantaneous assessment. For several moments, neither of us spoke. The weight in my chest grew.

  “It’s very difficult to say right now,” she murmured. “Your mother has suffered a massive heart attack. They put in a stent to open the blood flow back up, but we found that she needs far more intervention than that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Open heart surgery. We need to replace four blood vessels currently feeding her heart with new ones. In other words, a quadruple bypass. Without it, she may
not survive.”

  The words fell like bombs. Quadruple bypass. Open heart surgery. May not survive.

  “Can she even survive the surgery?” I asked in a hoarse voice.

  “That’s one of the questions Dr. Wu is worried about and why I’m here. Our first problem is that our OR table doesn’t support someone of her weight. Her lungs are another issue.”

  “What’s the weight limit?”

  “Five hundred pounds. WestEnd has been working on getting newer beds for a while now, but they’re very expensive.”

  “She’s more than five hundred pounds?”

  Dr. James nodded. “We’re trying to find a hospital we can transport her to that has newer operating tables and can accommodate someone of her size. For now, she’s mostly stable while sedated, so we plan to keep her that way until her surgery. Hopefully by the morning. Unfortunately, we also found several lung issues related to her obesity that need to be dealt with right away.”

  “Lung issues?”

  “Something called Pickwickian Syndrome.”

  “I-I’ve never heard of that.”

  Dr. James folded her arms in front of her. “She doesn’t breathe deeply enough because of her weight, which alters the levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide in her blood. Over time, that can be detrimental to her heart. I believe it predisposed her to the heart attack. Now that she’s here, I want to look into her liver as well.”

  “I see,” I murmured.

  Like a landslide, everything was falling apart. Tears welled in my eyes, but I blinked them back. Dr. James gestured to the machines that swooped down toward Mom’s arm, where an IV had been taped.

  “We’ll monitor her closely. It would be misleading for me to say that your mother will simply recover from this. Perhaps she will. But it’s more likely that some time will pass—not to mention a lot of rehabilitation—before she’s back to a functional state.”

  If she survives the surgery, I thought.

  The air in the room seemed to grow heavy in the long silence that followed. Dr. James put a calm, affectionate hand on my shoulder. “We’re going to take good care of her, Rachelle. Please let me know if you have any questions. I’m going to go look at a few of her lab results and talk to Dr. Wu. I’m sure he’ll be in to talk to you this evening.”

  “I’ll let you know. Thanks, Dr. James.”

  All her words ran through my head like a ticker tape as her hand fell away. Pickwickian Syndrome. Therapy. Rehabilitation. Functional state.

  “I’m going to step into the hallway and confer with the team in charge of caring for her. As soon as I have any information, I’ll make sure you’re told.”

  “Thank you. That would be very helpful.”

  The nurse was still moving around the room, making notations, studying screens. I wondered if she knew Megan. When slim Dr. James stepped into the hallway, I sank to a chair against the far wall, my knees weak. Part of me could hardly believe it was Mom who lay in that bed. The speed at which it had happened stunned me. At the same time, the inevitability of it made me wonder if I hadn’t been waiting for this day all along. What other end would she meet after such a life?

  Another gentle touch rested on my arm. The nurse crouched next to me. “You all right?” she asked.

  “Yeah … I’m fine.”

  “My name is Dana. If you need anything, I’ll be here until seven tonight.”

  I glanced at the clock. Just past noon. Dana reached over to Mom’s bed and pulled a contraption off it.

  “Just hit the call light and let me know if you need something. Don’t worry, I’ll be in and out a lot today. Right now, assuming we can get the bed across town, we’re hoping for surgery around six in the morning. I’ll keep you updated as more details come in, all right?”

  I nodded, even though none of it really made sense.

  Dana glanced around. “Is there someone we can call? Any family members you want here so you’re not alone?”

  Bitsy was gone to see her father. Lexie to the big family reunion—and at least ten hours away, at that. Mira had left for her sewing convention. I’d texted Sophia on the way to the hospital to let her know I wouldn’t be in because Mom was being rushed over. The thought of calling Janine ran through my head, but I stuffed it away. Not only had I left without explanation last time, but she couldn’t do anything and I didn’t want to face my emotions right now. No one could do anything. Thanks to Mom’s reclusive lifestyle, there was no one left in our life.

  Just as I opened my mouth to say no, my phone rang. I glanced down.

  Megan.

  “Yeah,” I whispered, tears filling my eyes. “I do have family. She’s calling me right now.”

  Ten minutes later, I stood at Mom’s bedside, repeating all the stats and numbers Megan had asked me for.

  “What does the monitor on the left say?” she asked. “The one with the green line?”

  “The heart rate?”

  “Yeah.”

  “126.”

  “High. How about the blue one?”

  “97.”

  “Good. You said Dana is your nurse?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Excellent. She’s one of my best friends and my old workout buddy. If you’re comfortable with it, you can add me to your approved list and give me a four-digit code. Then I can call and get updates and ask all the right questions.”

  I closed my eyes with a relieved exhale. Just knowing I wouldn’t be alone eased some of the ache in my chest. Megan had worked in this very unit. She knew these terms. These patients. These people. She’d be honest with me. She’d dumb things down for me.

  She’d be by my side.

  “That would be amazing. Thanks, Megan.”

  “Just let Dana know. I’ll call her at the desk once you tell her.”

  “Of course. As soon as we hang up.”

  The confidence in her tone, although it meant nothing regarding Mom’s situation, calmed me. Megan had a way of taking charge. I needed that.

  “Megan, how did you know I was here?”

  “Mira texted me.”

  “What? How did she know?”

  “She said Sophia called her.”

  “Oh.” I drew in a deep breath, then shook my head at the strange stepladder of conversations. I thought about calling Lexie—if Megan knew then surely everyone knew—but held off. Likely she wouldn’t be paying attention to her phone while swamped with Bradley’s family, and I didn’t want to distract her with worry. “Thanks for calling.”

  “Are you kidding?” Megan cried. “Of course I’m here for you. Look, Chelle. There are a few good things here. Dr. Wu is the best cardiologist in the hospital, and Dr. James is a very thorough physician who can make things happen. That’s huge.”

  “Good.”

  She drew in a deep breath and let it back out, the sigh audible even over the phone. In the background, a male voice spoke quietly.

  “But still … “ she said. “This is going to be tough.”

  “Can you tell me she’s going to be okay?”

  My knuckles ached from how tight I clutched the phone. I moved it to the other ear and leaned back against the counter. Mom lay there, inert, her forehead wrinkled slightly as if in a perpetual grimace. Of course Megan couldn’t tell me that. But still … something deep inside me wanted to hear it, a desire that warred with the bubbling rage that simmered beneath the fear.

  “No,” Megan said. “No promises. I’m sorry. Sounds like she’s stable right now, from what you’ve told me, which is good. Her numbers are fairly strong, and Dana will take good care of her.”

  My shoulders slumped. “I know.”

  “If they can get her a table outside of WestEnd Hospital, Dr. Wu is the surgeon with the best chance of getting her through. If he can operate over there, which is another question I’ll ask Dana.”

  “Okay.”

  “But I’m more worried about you than her.”

  I shoved a hand through my hair.

  “I’m fine
.”

  “You’re not.”

  My nostrils flared, but I let the rush of anger go. She was right. “No,” I whispered. “I’m not.”

  “You need to take care of yourself first. Have you had anything to eat?”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Eat something small anyway. There’s going to be a lot of people coming in and out. Protein bar, or something. You’ll need to keep up your energy. Okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  Her voice softened. “Seriously, Rachelle. How are you?”

  “I yelled at her.”

  “What?”

  “My mom. I yelled at her a couple of days ago and haven’t spoken with her since. We got in a fight, and it was really ugly. Now she could die.”

  Megan sucked in a sharp breath. “Yikes. What was the fight about?”

  Explaining the fight was different now because I felt no rage. Just hot, heady shame. Impossible to fight. Tenacious and sticky and relentlessly dark. Somewhere, in the midst of all this, came currents of fear and guilt and terror. The image of little Rachelle as she lost her dad slipped through my mind constantly.

  “What do I do, Megan?” I whispered. Tears filled my eyes again. “There’s nothing I can do to help her here. I’m so … helpless. She could die today or tonight or during the surgery or after the surgery. I’d never have a chance to apologize.”

  “You wait and hold onto hope. Don’t give it up yet, okay? Miracles happen all the time. Just hold on. Your mom may not make it, but your family is still with you. If it gets ugly, I will fly out first thing in the morning. My mom can cover for me at Adventura. Bitsy, Lexie, and Mira will be at your side as soon as they can, I’m sure. Rachelle, whatever happens, we got you.”

  “I know,” I whispered. “Thank you.”

  “You can get through this, Rachelle. You’re steel, girl. Solid, steel girl power.”

  Chapter 17

  Compassion

  Minutes ticked by, and nothing changed. No definitive news. The other OR was shuffling their schedule, trying to deal with their own onslaught of emergency surgeries. Things were moving behind the scenes. Meanwhile, Mom lay in a heap on the bed, breathing through a tube, oblivious to everyone fighting for her life.