by Cd Brennan
On autopilot, her thoughts returned to Rory. Maybe a barbell had slipped and choked him to death. Or even worse, landed on his head and smashed his brain. Oh, sweet Jesus! He was dead. She took a deep breath and cut that shit right out. She wouldn’t regress to what she’d been before. She’d learned to panic from her momma, always harping on her about her medicine, warning her what could go wrong. All. The. Time.
If he was dead, wouldn’t she feel it? Like they did in the movies when they were close to someone, a spiritual or love bond putting them on the same psychic wavelength.
Her anger had dissipated, overwrought with worry now. She’d never felt for anyone like she did with Rory. Maybe that was it. Even in the short time they’d known each other, Grace knew he was special. She just had to get her head around how special she was to him.
She took a right at the light and headed down Division Street. Hopefully the exercise would stabilize her sugar if she kept up her pace. She removed her hat and scarf to cool herself down but the fatigue was like cement blocks tied around her ankles.
One thing, the worry kept her mind off Mr. Dickhead and her job. She’d get to the bottom of it tomorrow.
As Grace waited at a crosswalk, a dizzy spell took her and she grasped the light post on the corner. She just had to make it home, and she’d be fine. Maybe another six blocks in total, nothing much. She could do it. Her momma had warned her about this before she left Texas. But she was a grown woman, and she had to live her life on her own without the constant hovering. Even at twenty-three, her mother wanted to follow her around with an insulin shot like the mothers did today with their toddlers and an EpiPen for allergic reactions.
And even though she was scared to leave, Grace had been determined. One day at a time. Just like one step at a time through this crosswalk.
She was sweating profusely now so she stripped off her jacket. The cool air revived her for a minute but then another dizzy spell immediately followed. She stood still until it passed. Was she going to make it?
She was in the residential area so not one business where she could beg to use their phone and call. Which she should have done in the first place, but she’d been so mad she wasn’t thinking. And now look where she was.
Grace would just have to make it home. She could feel herself getting weaker by the minute. Her legs wobbled, but she pushed through. She was an athlete now, and she was sure many of them had been in this same predicament during a game, when they had given it their all for a win and had expended as much energy and more than their body would allow.
Grace Marie Bowman was a rugby player. Grace was an athlete. She was…a winner.
And then…everything went black.
Chapter 19
Rory sat beside her bed in the hospital, her hand in his. He’d lied to the hospital staff and said she was his partner, and since they had no way of verifying differently, they let him stay. Plus, they said it was helpful to have a coma patient surrounded by loved ones. They often responded much faster. He’d only moved away from her bed twice.
Rory caressed her arm, using his voice as much as possible, but it was mostly about rugby because, well, that was what he knew.
He finally admitted out loud to Grace he wasn’t sure he wanted to play rugby any longer. But coaching, yeah, that might be his path. He talked about the Americana play, and how he would do it differently with the Lady Blues. He talked about his plans for the team and how Grace would shine as a rugby star. He just knew it. That was the kind of person she was.
When he ran out of things to say about rugby, he whispered to her about his childhood, but mostly about his father. The man he hated and admired in equal measure.
His throat was dry from talking. He’d never spoken so many words in his life. He couldn’t think of anything else to say, so he started to sing “The Dark Island,” a song his mum sang him when he was a wee bubba. An auld wan, she had called it.
Away to the west's where I'm longing to be,
Where the beauties of heaven unfold by the sea,
Where the sweet purple heather blooms fragrant and free,
On a hilltop high above the Dark Island.
Oh, isle of my childhood, I'm dreaming of thee,
As the steamer leaves Oban and passes Tiree,
Soon I'll capture the magic that lingers for me,
When I'm back once more upon the Dark Island.
So gentle the sea breeze that ripples the bay,
Where the stream joins the ocean, and young children play;
On the strand of pure silver, I'll welcome each day,
And I'll roam for ever more the Dark Island.
Oh, isle of my childhood, I'm dreaming of thee,
As the steamer leaves Oban and passes Tiree,
Soon I'll capture the magic that lingers for me,
When I'm back once more upon the Dark Island.
At the end of the second round, Rory couldn’t sing it anymore. It reminded him too much of home. But that was the only song he knew the entirety by heart. He sat quietly for a bit thinking. What would Grace like to hear? He wasn’t much of a singer, more of a mumbler.
Ah! A perfect one for Grace. But since he didn’t know the words, he Googled on his phone.
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost, but now am found
T'was blind but now I see
Nurses came and went, but Rory never stopped. A couple of them commented on his accent, and he acknowledged them with as much grace as he could muster. But then he would turn back to Grace, give her hand a squeeze, and start again. It was liberating in a way. There was no one to judge him here. He could say anything, be anything. Cloaked in the darkness of the hospital room, only the soft hospital noises and his voice were a constant hum in the room.
Grace was on a ventilator, the machine making whooshing sounds as it breathed for her. She also had an IV in her arm for fluids.
Her skin was paler than normal. He brushed the air away from her face, not that it needed it since he’d been doing the same for the last couple of hours.
He wished she would wake up. Just wake up, Grace.
Del, Gillian, and Irish had left hours ago, but before them almost half the men’s Blues and all the Lady Blues had stopped in to see how she was doing. They talked in whispers as if she was sleeping, but she couldn’t hear them. Her sleep was one of the dead.
He wasn’t sure how a coma happened with diabetics, but he didn’t want to look stupid, so he Googled it on his phone. Grace had Type-1 Diabetes and needed to take insulin every day. The doctor surmised she hadn’t been taking her medicine, or not enough medicine, which was essential for her well-being as a Type-1 if she didn’t watch her diet. Which she hadn’t, not that Rory had seen.
She hadn’t mentioned her diabetes to him after that first time. So when the doctor asked him questions about the milligrams of insulin she took and the frequency, Rory had no answers for him. Which looked suspect of him as her partner. The doctor probably knew at that point that Rory was little more than nothing to Grace, but he let him stay.
Wake up, Grace.
It was late and visiting hours were almost up. Would they let him stay? He worried they wouldn’t. But sometimes they let parents sleep over with their kids. At least in hospitals in Scotland. His ma had stayed with him twice.
Tears came unwillingly so Rory squeezed his eyes shut, pressed his fingers to his eyes. He was greetin’ like a complete tosser. He took a deep breath to settle his feelings and to find that spot inside where no emotion existed. That click of the lever where he could turn back to stone.
But this time, unlike all others, he couldn’t find it. He bowed his head onto the bed and let the tears come. For Grace in a coma. For a fucking horrible youth. For rugby. For failure. For his family. For his uncertainty of America. For his love of Scotland. For his love of Grace.
He was so tired. That was the reason behind all the drama.
It was because he w
as exhausted. Just wake up, Grace, dammit! He squeezed her hand harder as if that would, by some miracle, make it happen.
The greenish glow of the machines distorted the features on her face. Grace’s usual happy repose was now consumed by ugly shadows so that her eyes appeared like a zombie’s. In a way, she was. Alive yet not living. That was his take on the coma, no matter how Google explained it to him.
His breakdown had worn him out so that he felt numb. Maybe he’d just close his eyes for a minute. If they wanted him to leave, then they would wake him. Rory moved his chair closer to the side of her bed and laid his head on the mattress. He took Grace’s hand and placed it on his head, then closed his eyes.
And what only felt like a minute later, the noise of others in the room woke him. He went from a deep sleep to upright in a millisecond, blinking himself awake since it was still dark. His attention went immediately to Grace, who lay in the same position she was in last night. At some point, he must have shifted and her hand had fallen from his head so that the same hand now rested on its side, cupped, her fingers relaxed.
“Did she wake up?” He addressed the room and waited for an answer from either woman.
The heavyset nurse with a short, blond bob answered him as she hooked up a new IV bag. “Unfortunately not, but the doctor did instruct the breathing tube be removed this morning.”
His heart stopped at that. What the fuck? “Won’t she…ya know…” He couldn’t get himself to say it. The panic had frozen his throat, a buzzing sensation filling his head and chest.
The nurse looked up with a furrowed brow. “You mean die?”
Argh. Of course! How cruel could people be? With the slight nod of his head, her face relaxed to one of concern. “No, hon, she won’t die. The ventilator was just a precaution yesterday until we could stabilize her with medicine and ascertain her condition. She had no medical information on her person for us to know she was diabetic.”
That was because she didn’t want people to know, but that was good news.
“But she could remain this way for days or even weeks.”
When he dry-retched, the nurse hurried over to him. “Are you okay?”
Rory nodded. But retched again.
“Here, come to the bathroom. We don’t want you to get sick everywhere.”
Fair enough. He let her lead him into the small toilet and shower area in the corner of the room. She turned on the light and closed the door. Bent at the waist, his hands resting on his knees, he heaved a few more times, but nothing would come up. He straightened and took a deep breath.
At the sink, he washed his face and then dragged his wet hands through his hair. After drying, he walked out of the bathroom and shut the door quietly behind him. Only one nurse remained, the other one. She was readying something on a tray in front of Grace, who still didn’t stir. “Are you sure you want to see this? It might make you woozy.”
See what? “I’ll stay with her.”
“Are you her husband?” she asked. She wasn’t one of the nurses from last night, so she must have not gotten the details from the others. He was just glad they let him stay.
“I’m her boyfriend.”
The nurse gave him only a cursory glance before she untapped the ventilator from around Grace’s mouth and slowly pulled the tubing out. Rory wanted to retch again. Just the sight of something coming from her mouth like that. Bile started coming up again, but he held his stomach and turned away toward the window. He wouldn’t leave her.
Finally, at the sounds of clinking, Rory looked back to see the nurse wheeling the medical stuff away from the bed. She stayed, though, watching Grace, probably to make sure she would breathe on her own. Although Rory couldn’t see any indication that she was, Grace must have passed the test since the nurse wheeled the cart out of the door. She’d left it open, though.
There were pink marks around her face from the medical tape, her lips thin and colorless as before. He needed to know. He needed to see for himself the rise and fall of her chest. The oxygen giving life to her still. The sheet and blanket were tucked under her arms that bunched her hospital gown around her chest. He’d just take a quick peek…
He lifted the gown at the collar and peered at her chest. He felt like a perv, the rise of her breasts just there in his eyesight.
“Is everything okay in here?” a deep male voice said behind him.
Rory jumped back. A man in a white coat with a stethoscope around his neck and a clipboard in his hands stood at the end of the bed.
“Aye, I think so.”
The man looked at him skeptically, but then went back to the charts that had been stashed in a slip attached to her bed. “Are you her partner?”
Rory shoved his hands into his pockets. “Aye.”
“We found a Texas driver’s license in her wallet but no emergency contact information, no phone.”
“She doesn’t have a cell phone.”
The doc raised his eyebrows at that. And for some reason, pride for Grace surged in his chest. She was unique and different, and he loved that about her.
“Do you have a number for her parents?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“Unfortunately, she doesn’t have any healthcare either. Or at least nothing we can find in the system under her name. We need to get a hold of her next of kin.”
Jaysus, that sounded scary. It must have shown on his face since the doctor reassured him, “Not because anything is going to happen, but to arrange for either a long stay here or if they want to transport her back to Texas…”
Oh, right. “She didn’t talk about her family much.”
“Is there anyone who would know?”
That was the shit part. Even though she’d befriended quite a few of them, they knew Grace very little. It was completely apparent now they hadn’t even cared enough to delve a bit deeper. And Rory had been so self-involved with his own stupid angst, he was just as bad. “Not that I know of off-hand, but I can ask around.”
“We’d appreciate it.”
The doctor turned to leave.
“Is she okay?”
“She’s comfortable for now. She’s suffering from a diabetic ketoacidosis coma. Basically, because her blood sugar was so high and sustained for so long at that level, her body became dehydrated and went into shock. If she doesn’t wake up in the next twenty-four hours, we’ll put a feeding tube in.”
He wanted to shake her awake. Jesus, Grace, wake up. “Okay, thanks.”
He nodded and left. Rory turned to Grace, “I’m going to the cafeteria to get something to eat and a coffee. Maybe call Coach and Del and see if they know anything. Did you want anything?”
No reply. Not even a stir of a fingertip. No movement at all. As Rory was leaving, another nurse called over her shoulder to someone behind her, “Just going to change this one’s diaper, and I’ll be right there.”
The disgrace of it all. But Rory had to check himself. These people were trying to help her. It was more his disgrace. A woman he cared for and knew very little about. Not anything of import like the milligrams of meds she needed. She must have been suffering. But why hadn’t she said anything?
If she’d wake up, he’d spend every minute getting to know her. Everything about her. He prayed for the first time in years. He clasped his hands together tightly as if that would more strongly convey his hope. He rode the elevator down with his eyes pinched closed, repeating his plea over and over in his head.
At the counter, he asked for a large coffee, and at the last minute requested a donut from one of the display cases. He’d never had one before. Probably full of carbohydrates and calories, an exorbitant amount of sugar. But Grace would want him to.
After taking a seat as far away from others as possible, he called Del, but no answer. Just as he thought. It was still too early in the morning. Rory hesitated to take a sip of his hot coffee and a bite of his donut. It was fucking good. Too good. And that’s why he’d stayed away from the shit before. But he coul
d see why people loved them.
He scrolled through his contacts and called Irish. He answered on the third ring. “What the feck, Ror, it’s like”—rustling and another voice—“totally dark out.” Rory heard him say, “It’s Rory.”
Thank God, Gillian was there. “Look, can I talk to Gill a minute?”
Without even an acknowledgement, Gillian came on the phone. “Hey, Rory, how is Grace doing?”
“Well, that’s what I called about. I should’ve thought yesterday when you were here, but do you know how to get a hold of her parents? The doctor is asking for it.”
“Oh yeah, shit.” There was a pause. “I don’t, Ror, would Coach know? He’d have to take her details for renting the room in the house, I’d imagine. For the club and everything.”
Gillian was a smarty pants. Way too good for the likes of Irish, but he’d never say. “Thanks, Gill, I’ll try him.”
Coach told him he did have her parents’ name, address, and phone in Texas on the rental application and would text over the information. After he hung up, Rory finished only half his donut, but took his coffee to go. His body ached, and what he wouldn’t do for a long, hot shower. But he’d stay as long as the hospital would let him.
He was so tired everything around him felt surreal, as if he was walking through water. Voices from others barely registered as he floated in and out of the elevator and to the nurses’ station where he handed over the information for Grace’s parents.
When he entered, there was no one there, and it broke his heart to see her lying there all alone, the world still moving and churning just outside her door.
His chair had been moved back against the wall so Rory stood next to the bed and grasped her hand. He set his coffee on the tray next to the bed. Even though pale and unresponsive, she was the most beautiful sight in the world to Rory. He kissed her on the forehead, then on her lips. They were dry. And she didn’t smell like her usual self, the extreme odors of disinfectant of the hospital overwhelming everything else. He bent and whispered in her ear. “Tha gaol agam ort.”
