Secrets and Lies | ✔️

Chapter 37 - Charlie

Ch.37 - Charlie

Charlie dragged a chair across the room and parked it next to the hospital bed. He plopped down and propped his elbows on his knees, dropping his face into his hands. The headache he'd woken up with now pulsated behind his right eye and his shoulder was beginning to throb. He wished now he'd taken the pain medicine Talia had offered before he left the house and wondered why he felt the need to go without. Maybe because he'd been doubling up on the sleeping medicine he had been prescribed? A lot of good it was doing since it still took forever to fall asleep. And when he finally did it was nearly time to wake up.

He inhaled sharply before looking up at the frail woman in the hospital bed and felt the knot in his chest tighten. She still had the breathing tube coming out of her mouth and her chest rhythmically expanded as the respirator pushed air into her lungs. The monitor above her head beeped without interruption as it kept track of her blood pressure, pulse and oxygenation, and a long thin tube snaked into her nose, delivering the nutrition she couldn't take by mouth.

It seemed more like a torture chamber than a hospital.

Charlie knew the doctors and nurses meant well, with their medications and neuro checks and constant re-positioning, and he was more than grateful for all their hard work. It took a special kind of person to make a career of helping others at their worst. But how would his mother feel about all this? She'd never been the kind of woman who believed in making a fuss, and this seemed almost more than a fuss. Yes, their efforts were keeping her alive, well it kept her breathing anyway. But this...this was no kind of life.

"Mom, please wake up," he pleaded for what felt like the thousandth time. He took hold of her hand. It felt cold and limp as it lay between his. He cupped his other hand over hers and blew a steady stream of air into the opening between his palms, warming her fingers.

His mother didn't look good lying there motionless; arms covered in bruises from where she'd been stuck with needles and IV's, and somehow she seemed even smaller than before. One of the doctors who'd stopped in that morning said they faced the threat of ventilator-associated pneumonia, a common occurrence among the critically ill, but not too worry because they were taking measures to ward off infection. Additional measures meant additional medications to add to her steadily growing list of pharmaceutical needs.

He'd been afraid before, but never like this. This fear went to the pit of his stomach.

Charlie leaned in closer. "Mom, the doctors said I should talk to you, they said you might be able to hear me. If that's true, I really need you to listen." He squeezed her hand. "It's so hard for me to see you this way, you've always been so strong. And I hate to admit it, but you're scaring me. You're scaring Talia, too. She thinks of you as a mother and this is tearing her up. We need you--I need you. I'm not ready to let you go and I don't know how to say goodbye. Please don't make me. I know this must be hard for you, harder than anything you've ever done, but I need you to try."

Charlie's voice caught in his throat and he took a shaky breath. "Do you remember when I was young and you helped coach my Little League team? I wasn't very good and I said I wanted to give up, it was too hard. But you wouldn't let me. You told me that I would deprive myself of so much if I let fear of hard work get in my way. And you were right. My team went on to win the Little League World Series." He chuckled softly at the memory and shifted in his chair. "Remember that? I scored the walk-off home run. You were so proud... And now I need you to work hard. I promise, I'll be right here by your side, just like you were by mine. You won't have to do this alone. Just please--you have to try."

Tears ran down his cheeks and he brushed them away. Charlie closed his eyes and raised her hand to his lips. This couldn't be happening. It wasn't fair. No one lived forever, he knew that. But this wasn't right. Enid Wilson was much too young to die.