by Lynn Bulock
“I’m glad. I’ve been a terrible father…but at least I did this…” His body shook with choking coughs and finally Ronald allowed the medics to treat him. Within minutes Miranda and her sisters were huddled together again, watching an ambulance drive away carrying both of their parents.
“We can’t do anything here,” Winnie said shortly. “The firefighters will save as much as they can, and it will be hours before anyone else can possibly go in there, if we go back at all today. At least at the hospital we can watch and pray where we’re needed.” And like a general marshalling her troops, Winnie put things in order so that half an hour later they huddled in a waiting room at Stoneley Memorial Hospital. Miranda looked around her and decided she was about to learn the real meaning of the word vigil.
“Are you sure you should be up and around like this?” Winnie, hands on hips, asked Gregory what Miranda wanted to ask him. He still looked pale and a bit unsteady.
“I didn’t sign out against medical advice,” he said, which struck Miranda as a cryptic response.
“That sounds like whoever treated you told you to go home and rest for several days, but instead here you are back at the hospital on the same day that you got shot.” From the look on his face, she could tell that she’d hit the mark. “So why don’t you at least sit down with us here, Gregory. I don’t want to feel responsible for you passing out.”
“I’m the only one who would take responsibility for that. And I wasn’t shot. Even the doctors in the E.R. said it was more like a graze or a deep scratch that just happened to be caused by a bullet.”
“Just happened to be caused?” Winnie’s eyebrows were nearly in her hairline and Miranda knew she mirrored her aunt’s reaction.
“Okay, so maybe that is a little argumentative. Besides, I wouldn’t have felt right staying at home when I knew what was happening here. Even if you weren’t here, your family is a part of my church and you’ve just lost your home and you have two family members hospitalized.”
“Three,” Miranda said softly. “Father found Mama, and she’s alive. Greg’s eyes grew wider than she’d ever seen them before.
“I believe I will take you up on that offer to sit down. How about you tell me everything that happened after I left to come here?”
It took Miranda, Winnie and Portia more than half an hour to do just that. Somewhere in the middle of the conversation Winnie got up and made sure everyone who wanted it had a cup of tea in hand. Just about the time they came to the close of the story, Bianca arrived in the waiting room to add to the information.
“Okay, I finally got hold of Delia. She is catching the first flight possible and should be here tomorrow. Shaun is going to stay there for a few days and help her lone employee keep the shop going so that Delia won’t worry as much.” Miranda knew that Delia’s surf shop in Hawaii was what kept her sister going. To lose it now would be devastating. She thanked God again for the wonderful men He had sent into her sisters’ lives.
“Is there any more word from the fire department?” Miranda wasn’t sure she wanted to know. She couldn’t dwell on all that might have been lost in the fire: virtually every piece of clothing she owned, the chapbook order she’d almost finished, and much of her own poetry as well. But then, none of that mattered too much beside the fact that Trudy was alive and restored to them.
“The fire is out. It didn’t consume the whole house, but a lot of the damage was to the back of the house. Peg seems to have poured gasoline or something else just as flammable up the back stairs and set a series of small fires.” Bianca shuddered and Miranda went to her sister and hugged her.
“You need to sit down, too, and have Winnie get you a cup of tea. We need to stick together and be with each other through all of this.”
“Always the mother hen,” Bianca said, but with more generosity than usual. “You may be able to give that job up soon, you know.”
The realization that her sister could be right made joy and hope warm Miranda all over again. Little bursts of those feelings had caught her by surprise for hours, ever since her father came out of the house carrying Mama in his arms. “How much longer do you think it will be before they let us in there?”
Bianca seemed to know already where “there” was for Miranda. “I asked one of the critical-care nurses on my way back here. It could still be a couple hours. After twenty-three years you’d think a few hours would be nothing.” Her wry smile confirmed that those hours would be hard waiting.
By the time several doctors came to confer with Miranda and her sisters, it was after two in the morning and several family members had stretched out with blankets on the sofas and recliners in the family waiting room. Tate had come by, urging Winnie and some of the girls to go home with him and sleep in the guest rooms, but nobody was willing to leave. When he found out that Howard was on life support and had never regained consciousness, and that Ronald and Trudy were both being treated, he conceded that leaving might be a bad idea.
The doctor who briefed them was serious but not grim. “Your mother has a lot of problems. Fortunately the smoke-inhalation damage she suffered is minimal, and she has no burns. But from what I understand she’s been unwillingly sedated for quite some time with a combination of drugs no doctor would prescribe together.”
Rissa was the one to speak first. “Does this mean there might be brain damage?”
“We hope not. It’s too soon to tell. Right now she’s weak and slightly confused, but alert enough to talk to you. From what she tells me it’s a meeting everyone has been waiting a long time for.”
“That, Doctor, is the understatement of the year.” Bianca was the one to take charge and lead everyone into the critical-care cubicle where their mother lay on the bed. Her pale hair had been washed and brushed, and the smudges of ash and soot were gone from her thin face.
“I’ve dreamed of this moment for so many years. It’s what kept me alive in the worst of times,” Trudy said, unable to check her tears. She looked at the women flanking her bed on both sides and Miranda tried to imagine what she was seeing. How did the mind handle remembering young children who now stood there as adults?
Trudy looked down at the blanket covering her, where all her daughters had unconsciously put a hand on or near her body. Then she looked up straight into Miranda’s eyes. “Where’s Delia? Please tell me she’s alive and well. Genie and that other woman were always telling me they’d killed one of you, and I prayed they were lying to me.”
Miranda felt an overpowering presence of God’s spirit in the room. “They were wrong, Mama. We’re all fine. Delia lives in Hawaii now and it’s going to take most of a day for her to get here. But she’s well, and she’s married. Her husband Shaun is staying behind and watching her surf shop while she comes here.”
“Okay, if nobody else is going to ask, how do you know who’s who?” Juliet looked mystified.
Trudy reached out and took both of Juliet’s hands in hers. “I never forgot any of you, Juliet. Children always stay in a mother’s heart. Even though I haven’t seen you since you were only a few months old, you’re the easiest to identify. You were the only one who had my green eyes.” Trudy swallowed hard. “There’s something I need to confess to you about that.”
“I know, Mom. And so does everybody else.”
“I’m sorry for the pain that must have caused you. I can’t imagine that Ronald was kind about it.” She closed her eyes for long enough that Miranda wondered if she’d gone to sleep.
“We should let you rest. We’ll be outside when you feel like talking again.”
Trudy smiled. “That will be wonderful.” She closed her eyes again and her daughters left the room. Miranda could tell that her sisters were as reluctant to leave as she was.
“We need to see how Father and Grandfather are doing,” Miranda said. “Maybe Gregory can get more information than we could. I imagine he’s at the hospital often to visit people. He must have connections.”
When they got back to the fami
ly room, Miranda went to talk to Gregory only to find him sound asleep leaning back on one of the cushions of a bench. After everything he’d been through, she couldn’t wake him.
Bianca, who had assumed her attorney role and taken charge since they arrived at the hospital, was the one to find the right doctors. “I know that my grandfather has a living will. But it may be a while before we can produce a copy. Between the fire and our father being incapacitated as well…”
“That’s a more pressing subject,” the doctor told them. “I’m the pulmonary specialist for both your father and grandfather, and of the two I’d say you have more to worry about with your father. The smoke damage to his lungs is severe. The next twenty-four hours will decide whether he lives or not.”
The shock radiating through the room felt like a living thing. “We need to be informed every hour, then,” Bianca told him. The others voiced a muffled chorus of agreement.
“Even more often if necessary. We’ll do all we can, and he seems to be a fighter.”
“You have no idea,” Miranda said, thankful for the first time in her life for her father’s stubborn disposition.
By daybreak it was apparent that it was only his strong constitution and stubborn streak keeping Ronald alive. “I need Trudy,” he wrote on the pad he had insisted be brought to him. Having a way to write was the only reason he agreed to the breathing tube the doctors insisted he needed. Even then he wouldn’t agree to the pain medications they wanted him to have, or to be transferred to a larger hospital where they had even more advanced treatment. “Too much to do,” he wrote and underlined.
This was such a different man from the one Miranda was used to seeing. It pained her that she might only get to know him for a day or two. After reading his request for her mother, Miranda decided it was time to wake Greg and ask his help in dealing with this situation. He looked startled for a moment. “How long have I been asleep?”
“Over three hours. I couldn’t stand to wake you.”
He smiled at her. “You’re too kind. If you needed me, you shouldn’t have let me sleep this long.”
“I let you sleep until I really needed you, Gregory. I think we’re at a point where you need to get involved.” She told him about her father’s medical status, and his request to have Trudy brought to his bedside. “I want somebody else with me when I ask her what she wants to do.”
Greg took a deep breath, looking thoughtful. “Okay. I can do that. Are you prepared to accept your mother’s answer no matter which way it goes?”
“Definitely. But if she refuses to see him, I’m going to need help going back to Father to tell him that.”
Miranda had a hard time reading Greg’s expression. “I don’t think that’s going to be a problem,” he told her.
After their journey of the last twenty-four hours together, she wasn’t about to argue with him. And even though Miranda had her reservations, her mother didn’t seem to have any. When Greg broke the news to her that Ronald might not live more than another day or two, she insisted on going to him. So after prayer and discussion with Gregory, and a bit of a fight with the nursing staff, Trudy was wheeled into Ronald’s ICU cubicle. Miranda sat in the waiting room outside the ICU with Greg, gripping his hand and praying for her parents.
SIXTEEN
It was only ten in the morning and Greg felt it had to be seven or eight in the evening again. He hadn’t had a day filled with this kind of emotional upheaval in twenty years. Through everything, he marveled at Miranda and her quiet courage. For someone who only weeks before was chained to her home by panic attacks, she had made incredible progress. He continued to be moved by the examples of God’s grace in her life and in the lives of her family.
While he sat with her outside the ICU where her parents worked out issues he could only imagine, Winnie found them. Her face was puffy and tear streaked. “Pastor Greg, I hate to ask you for even more help, but you’re the only one I can imagine helping me.”
“Is it something regarding your father?” Greg wondered how possibly losing her father and brother within days of each other might affect this woman. For anyone of lesser faith he would have worried about their spiritual well-being. With Winnie he worried more about what kind of physical toll the loss would take on a woman of sixty, even one as healthy as Miranda’s aunt.
“Yes, it’s Father. He is still unresponsive and his doctors are afraid that he may never regain consciousness. And on top of everything else he’s showing signs of pneumonia.” Winnie’s shoulders slumped. “After all he’s been through lately, I had hoped he’d go quietly in his own bed. Now it doesn’t seem that’s going to happen.”
“Shall we find the hospital chapel, or do you want me to go with you to sit at his bedside?”
“I think perhaps the chapel,” Winnie said. “I need to feel some peace to discover God’s will in all of this.”
Nodding, Greg looked at Miranda. “Do you want to go with us or wait here? I can make sure on our way to the chapel that some of your sisters come join you.”
“I’ll go get them. You be with Winnie.” Miranda stood and gave her aunt a gentle hug. “This just isn’t what we expected, is it?”
“Not the best or the worst of it. I kept hoping we’d find Trudy alive and well. I never dreamed she’d turn up under our roof.”
The three of them walked as far as the waiting room, where the rest of the Blanchards gathered. Then Miranda joined her sisters and Greg guided Winnie to the small hospital chapel. He felt thankful that they had the place to themselves. With all the serious cases that came through Stoneley Memorial, there was often more than one family here seeking comfort or guidance.
They weren’t alone there for long. Before Greg could do much more than start praying aloud for guidance, a doctor rushed into the room. “Miss Blanchard, you need to come with me now. And if this is your pastor, you may want him to join us.”
A quick trip through the halls and on an elevator marked Staff Only brought them to Howard’s bedside. “His heart rhythm is irregular and I understand he doesn’t wish to be resuscitated.”
“That’s correct. Is he in any pain?” Winnie’s face looked drawn.
“No. He’s nearly comatose and beyond any pain he might have felt earlier.” In a few moments Miranda and her sisters slipped into the room by ones and twos. When Greg started reciting the Twenty-third Psalm he could hear Winnie and several of her nieces join him. With those sweet, low voices surrounding him, Howard Blanchard slipped out of this life.
“Should we tell Father?” Miranda asked when it was over.
“If I were making the decision, I might wait for him to ask. He’ll probably know without being told.” Greg couldn’t find the words to explain to her why this was so, but he’d seen it more than once in the past seven years.
“Even if you don’t tell him right away, you need to go to him,” Winnie told him. “And you girls need to go as well. Leave me here with your grandfather a while. And if someone would call Tate I’d appreciate it.”
Bianca gave a tremulous smile. “I already did that, Aunt Winnie. He should be here anytime.”
“Then let’s go back to the ICU,” Greg said. “I want to be there when your parents finish talking.”
“Me, too,” Miranda said, taking his hand.
“We’re going to break the rules,” Ronald’s nurse told them when they got to the ICU. “You’re going to help me and you’re going to keep quiet about it, right?”
“Right.” Greg knew this particular nurse and if she was asking him to break a hospital rule, it had to be important.
“There should only be two people in with Mr. Blanchard at the same time, but I think the four of you need to be in there together.”
He didn’t argue. When they got into the cubicle the sight that met them surprised him. Ronald and Trudy were holding hands and Trudy was insisting that Ronald put his oxygen mask back on. “I promise, Ron, I’ll tell them exactly what you said. You can listen and if I don’t, you can tak
e that thing off, all right?
“You’re the pastor at Unity, aren’t you? Ron wants you to marry us, and do it within the next half hour, because he says he’s ready to die. I’d believe he didn’t have a chance, expect that I’ve heard from his nurses that if he’d agree to be transferred to another hospital they could save him.” She looked over at Ronald. “Is that right so far?”
Ronald nodded, still looking as if he wanted to take off the mask. “I’ve told Ron that we both need to work some things out, to confess things to each other and to God before we consider remarrying. I’ve also told him that I’ll promise to marry him again if he goes to Portland to the…the…what do they call it?” She looked over at Ronald again and he wrote on his notepad.
“Right. The hyperbaric chamber. Will you witness that promise, Reverend Brown? And would you agree to marry us if he fulfills his part of it?”
Normally a decision like this was something Greg would approach with a couple of days of reading Scripture, prayer and talking at length to everybody involved. This time these two people needed him to make a decision in twenty minutes or less.
“I think I’ve already witnessed the promise by listening to you, Trudy. And I’ll agree to perform a marriage ceremony if you’re both sure you want it.”
“All right. Now will you get on the helicopter, Ron?”
Ronald grimaced and pulled aside the mask for a moment. “If I want to marry you, do I have a choice?”
“Put that back on. And no, you don’t.”
Greg looked over at Miranda, who had watched all this silently. Tears trickled down her cheeks. “Now how are we going to get the rest of us to Portland if you go by helicopter, Father?”
Ronald ripped off the top page of paper on his notepad. “Private plane. Take everybody that will fit with your mother,” he wrote.
While the rest of what he’d seen from Ronald Blanchard today had been different, this looked like the old take-charge Ronald. Normally he’d be dismayed by that but right now it felt like another gift from God.
