Page 151 of In Sheets of Rain

60

Not A Chance

Ihad a sudden urge to phone my mother. I didn’t phone home often. Usually, I did it when I knew she would be at work. Which said a lot about me I didn’t want to confront right then.

Talking to Dad was so much easier. Less emotional blackmail for a start.

But she wouldn’t be at work now, and I felt compelled to hear her voice for some reason.

I picked up my cell phone and dialled their number, waiting for her to breathlessly answer the phone because she’d been too busy. Or to not answer at all because she was curled up in bed.

Sharon answered, which didn’t surprise me. Sharon was always around at my parents’ house.

“Hey,” I said. “It’s Kylee.”

I could hear voices in the background.

“Ky,” she said, immediately making me sit up and take notice.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Dad,” she said. “He tripped and fell on the way to clearing the mailbox. The ambulance is here.”

I gripped the cell phone too tightly and started to count my breaths.

“Is he OK?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “He’s conscious. Talking. But he can’t walk.”

“Ask the ambo if it’s his NOF; his neck of femur.”

I heard her relay the question to the paramedic. I heard the paramedic’s reply.

“Yes,” my sister said, and I couldn’t breathe.

* * *

“He’s out of the theatre,” my mother said. “They’ve put him in ICU for his recovery.”

“OK,” I said down the phone.

“He’s having some trouble waking.”

I closed my eyes. Michael’s hand came to rest on the back of my neck, grounding me.

“We’ll go up there,” he said at my side.

I looked at him, and nodded.

“Mum,” I said. “I’m coming home.”

* * *

The Intensive Care Unit at Waikato Base Hospital was like any other. I’d been in many as a paramedic and a couple as a medical sales rep. I’d never been in one when someone I loved was in there — possibly dying.

It smelled of disinfectant, and everyone talked in hushed voices. Blue curtains divided cubicles, one end open to the nurse’s station. Green screens and ECG readouts. IVs and oxygen masks. The rhythmic beep of a heart machine.

My father was in the farthest cubicle from the door. His head was elevated, his big body taking up so much of the bed. My father was a tall man; well over six feet. His skin was pale and sweaty. His eyes were closed. I was relieved to see he was only wearing a Hudson oxygen mask. He hadn’t been intubated. That was something.