Authors: Barbara Allan
Suddenly, I felt 100 percent better—I could’ve done cartwheels down the hall … only IV Poley probably would have objected.
“Brandy, one other thing … and maybe I shouldn’t even mention this, but …”
“Well, you
have
to now!”
Uneasily, Tina said, “Kevin and I were at the Octagon last night, and I saw your old friend there again—that Mia?”
“I had the feeling she kind of hung out there.”
“Well, I saw her talking to somebody at the bar, and it might … never mind.”
“Teen!”
“Well, she was talking to that redheaded clerk from Carson’s shop. I don’t remember her name.”
“Tanya.”
She shrugged. “They weren’t doing anything suspicious, but … they were talking. I hope mentioning that was the right thing to do.”
If Mia knew Tanya, then Mia probably knew Carson—and maybe in a pharmaceutical way.
Finally, my sweet, dear friend did my makeup using Benefit pink face power in “Dandelion,” Shiseido eyeliner in “Bronze Goddess,” Bobbie Brown mascara in “Coal Black,” and Chanel lip gloss in “Cry Baby.”
As if I weren’t spoiled enough already, out of her seemingly bottomless bag, Tina produced a pale blue cotton-knit DKNY robe and matching nightgown, plus a pair of warm blue UGG slippers.
What did I ever do to deserve a friend like Tina?
As my wonderful spa and salon treatment came to an end, the latest teddy-bear nurse arrived with a wheelchair
to take me down for my CT scan (the results of which I hoped would confirm that I still
had
a brain).
Ever have one of those? (A CT scan, I mean—not a brain.) (Well, obviously you have a brain.) (No offense.) You have to lie still, entombed in a big cylindrical X-ray machine, for what seems like a thousand years, give or take. If you’re the least bit claustrophobic, you’re in trouble.
Of course, none of the technicians appeared to know anything about my results—or if they did, they weren’t talking.
Be that way.
I returned to my “suite,” only to discover that Dr. Englund had indeed taken me up on my “magnanimous” offer, my bed having been switched with my roommate’s.
Yes!
Less whining, fewer steps to the facilities. Anyway, I sincerely hoped that this new arrangement would turn her disposition sunnier; it’s no fun being around a grouch.
Supper was clear broth, orange Jell-O, apple juice, and vanilla ice cream. Nothing to write Duncan Hines about, but I ate every morsel.
After the trays were cleared, my roommate spoke to me for the first time, her voice timid and a tad embarrassed, from behind the curtain.
“Thank you for trading places,” she said.
I reached out and pulled back the barrier. “No prob—and I’m sorry about this being Grand Central Station.” I wasn’t being facetious.
She smiled a little and her wan face looked almost pretty. “I apologize for being such a …”
Bitch?
I thought.
But said, “No problem, really.”
“I guess I should have been more understanding.… I’m Linda Taylor.”
“Brandy Borne. What are you in for?”
I was making it sound like jail, but then there
were
similarities, including not being able to pick your roommate.
She said, “Hysterectomy.”
“Oh.” Something I hoped never to go through.
She laughed dryly. “My doctor acted like it would be no big deal.… That’s a
man
for you.”
“Dr. Englund?”
“No, he’s fine! It was my gynecologist who ripped everything out, then went on vacation.”
No wonder the woman has been temperamental.
She was saying, “It’s not like I wanted more children—I have two—but now, it’s just …” Her hand with the IV went protectively to her abdomen. “… it’s like the door’s completely closed.”
She seemed near tears.
To ease her through the moment, I asked, “Where are they, your kids?”
“They live with their father.”
“We’re not so different. My son lives with
his
father.”
“You been divorced long, Brandy?”
“Not very.”
“I’m an old hand at it, I’m afraid. My kids wanted to come visit—Robby’s thirteen, Matt’s nine—but I really didn’t want them, you know …
seeing
me this way.”
“Sure.”
Linda seemed to study me for a while before saying, “I shouldn’t bother you with my problems.”
“It’s okay.”
“I mean, you seem to have your own share.”
“That just might be an understatement.”
“… sorry. I never
meant
to eavesdrop.”
I laughed a little. “How could you
not,
when my family’s around?”
We talked for another hour, bonding as you do with someone who shares a like experience. When Linda began to yawn, I said good night and closed the curtain.
I gave myself another dosage of pain medication and pulled the covers up around my neck.
“Brandy?” Linda’s voice seemed far away.
“Uh-huh?”
“What do you want to do about your flowers?”
“There’s no room over here … you enjoy them.”
“Thanks … they are nice.”
I yawned. “Sleep tight.”
“Thanks … thanks.…”
Sometime later, the night nurse tiptoed in and took my blood pressure.
Shortly after which, the world turned wild, the mundane hospital tedium going haywire—doctors and nurses pouring in, frantically pushing equipment.
Panic spiked through me.
Was something wrong? Something wrong with
me?
But the parade passed my bed, converging on Linda’s side of the room.
Soon it was clear …
…my roommate was in serious trouble.
I clasped my hands, and like any true agnostic in trouble, I began to pray:
Dear Lord, make her journey painless …
“Stand back!”
… give her peace …
“Again!”
… bring comfort to her family
…
“Stand back!”
… and friends.
“She’s gone.”
Amen.
A Trash ‘n’ Treasures Tip
“You break it, you bought it.” Don’t you believe it. See Minnesota ruling, Ye Little Ol’ Antique Shoppe vs. Kafer.
T
he day after the death of my hospital roommate, my life began again.
My brain scan came back okay, and Dr. Englund came around for one last look, after which I was released. Even though I felt perfectly fine, and had been making my way to and from the restroom all by myself like a grown-up, a nurse’s aide insisted on taking me out in a wheelchair—hospital policy, protection against lawsuits, no doubt. The aide, a heavyset young woman (who thankfully was not attired in the Teddy-Bear Brigade uniform), deposited me at the curb like luggage at an airport. Lawsuit threat or not, the aide disappeared back into the hospital with an automatic-door’s
whoosh
while I waited alone for Peggy Sue to bring her car around.
The parking lot was busy with patients and visitors, and assorted others, including Jennifer, who had arrived for her stint in the flower shop and was getting out of her emerald-green SUV. She saw me and waved and summoned up a small smile. I half waved back and gave her a slightly bigger one, trying to meet her more than halfway. Like she’d said, this was a small town, and if we took a stab at civility, the notion of me going after her husband again would remain buried for both of us.
But I wasn’t disappointed that Peggy Sue pulled her
chocolate-brown Montana up to the curb in time for me to avoid another stilted exchange with Jen.
Peggy Sue was a chatterbox driving us to her house; she loves to take charge of a crisis, especially when it doesn’t directly involve her.
She was saying, “We’ll put Mom in the upstairs guest room, and you can have the daybed in the basement sewing room. It’s small but not really cramped. It’s just for sleeping, anyway.”
I nodded.
She gave me her most patronizing smile (which was pretty damn patronizing). “Of course, I’ll expect a little
help
out of you girls—you know, do your own laundry, cook a few meals now and then …”
I gave her a sideways look, and she corrected herself. “Well,
Mom
can cook … I realize that’s not your strong suit.”
“Remind me to be offended later.”
She pretended to find that funny, then said cheerfully, “You better just stick with cleanup patrol.”
“Aye-aye, Captain.”
She chattered on, and I looked out the window, barely listening, only enough to recognize a cue where I was meant to leap back in; those wouldn’t come often.
After a while, my sister took her eyes off the road for a moment. “You’re kind of … quiet.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“… Are you feeling all right?”
“I guess.” I gave her an arched-eyebrow look. “You know, I did just get out of the hospital.”
We turned off the bypass and onto a blacktop road that led to her upscale housing addition.
She asked, “Brandy, is it … is it that woman who passed away that’s got you down? The one in your room?”
I nodded.
“These things happen,” she said. “I’m sure God had a reason.”
“For a woman dying of complications of a hysterectomy? And what reason would that be?”
Peggy Sue pulled up into her driveway. “Well … I don’t claim to know.… But I’m
sure
there is one. The Lord works in mysterious ways.”
I said, “Doesn’t He, though?”
She shut the car off, sighed. “Brandy, we’re going to be sharing living quarters until the new house is built … so I hope you’re not going to make your stay unpleasant.…”
I gave her my sweetest and most insincere smile. “Not any more than usual.”
“You
are
guests.…”
“I know. And I appreciate this, Peg. I really, really do. But let’s just try not to impose on each other, any more than we have to.”
She blinked, as if trying to translate my words from Esperanto. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, Mom and I will stay on only as long as we absolutely have to. And we’ll do our share. But spare me the ‘Christian’ values. You’re red state, I’m blue state, and never the twain shall meet.”
Peggy Sue looked mildly horrified. “You and Mother
are
Christians—
aren’t
you?”
“By our definitions, yes. Maybe not by yours. And that’s somewhere I think we shouldn’t go.”
“Well …”
“I’ll gladly sleep in the sewing room and be grateful for the privilege—really, truly. But Mom and I don’t need to be preached at, in either the spiritual or secular sense.
Capeesh?”
“What a terrible thing to say.”
“It’s Italian.”
Peg’s eyes and nostrils flared. “That’s not what I meant!”
I held out my hand. Absolutely straight, I said, “Truce?”
Her hard look melted, and for a just second there, I thought maybe she really did love me.
“Truce,” she said, and took my hand and squeezed it.
Uncle Bob, Ashley, Mom, and Sushi were waiting in the large sunny kitchen where a computer banner welcoming me home—well, welcoming me to
their
home—had been slung across the doorway. Nearby, on the round oak table in the casual dining area, was a white sheet cake decorated with one word:
KA-BOOM!
(Mother’s touch, I’m sure.)
There were hugs and kisses and promises to get along, and I even got a little teary-eyed; maybe it was the extra medication. Then we served up the cake and Whitey’s peppermint ice cream, my favorite. I even gave a little tiny spoonful to Sushi (but don’t tell the vet).
When the dishes were done—by yours truly—Mother helped me get settled into my temporary digs downstairs. Tina, bless her generous heart, had earlier in the day dropped off a big box containing some of her summer clothes, shoes, and purses, which Mother and I unloaded, and began hanging on a portable clothes rack. A note pinned to a Trace Reese dress of hers I’d coveted last year claimed that the donation hadn’t even made a dent in her closet.
What a pal!
I don’t care what anybody says: it pays to have a clotheshorse for a friend.
If you’re wondering what Mother was doing to take the place of her demolished attire, here’s the wacky if not unexpected lowdown: she raided the community theater’s wardrobe department. At the moment, Mother was dressed as the title role of
Madwoman of Chaillot
in an 1890s black lace blouse with mutton sleeves, a black alpaca skirt, a half dozen long-beaded necklaces, and a white feather boa. But instead of button-top shoes, she wore Birkenstocks.
The most chilling thing about the ensemble was how natural it looked on her.…
My temporary quarters consisted of a brass daybed, a modern white dresser, and a full-length oval mirror on an oak stand. An expensive, state-of-the-art sewing machine against a wall meant I had no excuse for walking around with a split seam.
On the pale yellow walls were framed samplers Peggy Sue had created, her initials in the corners. A few were sayings, painfully cornball, like
HOME SWEET HOME
and
A PENNY EARNED IS A PENNY SAVED
(like she’d ever saved a penny!), but others were sentimental scenes of bygone times, like Christmas carolers, and Victorian children sliding down a snowy hill. I had no idea my sister was into that kind of thing, and it gave me a twinge of sadness that I hadn’t.
Mother, finished with her fussing, joined me on the edge of the daybed.
I began, “There’s no sense worrying Peggy Sue, so let’s keep this conversation between us.…”
Mother, always up for a conspiracy, nodded, eyes dancing with childlike excitement … and deviltry.
I continued: “It’s now become crystal clear that …” I found myself goggling at her madwoman getup. “What
else
was available in the wardrobe room?”
“That
fit
me? Lady Macbeth.”
Define “fit.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well. Nothing contemporary?”
“Just
Everybody Loves Opal,
but I can’t risk wearing costumes from an ongoing production. That way lies madness.”
She always has a reason, yes she does; deeper you probe, the more likely you are to find one, and the less likely you are to like it.