19 November 2022: If he’s still alive
Time: 14:00 ISH
I felt like my entire world just shifted off its axis when I heard those words. I feel like my brain is physically protesting understanding the meaning of them: “If he’s still alive.” What did that mean? This was just a simple accident, what sort of damage had happened to lead to those words, “If he’s still alive?” Does that mean that he could die? Who’s he? Surely, they’re not talking about Kevin? My Kevin. I was briefly glad that my brother-in-law was here to offer support while I struggled with the information before me. But there was no one else in that emergency room and the flurry of people in and out of it seemed to indicate that whatever was happening inside was not good. Life threatening even. Is that what this meant? That Kevin could die? I couldn’t understand.
I feel like I blacked out for a few seconds when I heard those words…self-preservation at its finest. The background noise seemed to reach me from a long tunnel, it was muted, dull, and incomprehensible. A hush had already fallen around the Emergency Department: Everyone knew Kevin; they’d worked with him for years, almost 2 decades in some cases. They knew what was happening and did what they needed to do to keep Kevin alive. And the unspoken thought screamed from every direction:
Would it be enough?
“What did you just say?”
I felt my brother-in-law step closer to me, put his arm around my shoulders and Dr. G– stopped speaking while I struggled to grasp the situation. To this day I’m still not sure what it was that the doctor said when I blanked out, the jargon far exceeding my knowledge of medical terminology; or maybe my brain had temporarily blocked my ability to understand it. But one thing seemed to be very clear: The people going in and out of emergency room 6, the lab techs running blood bags in; the frenzy surrounding the prone figure on the bed; the machines beeping; the cardio-ultrasound machine; the lights shining brightly overhead; the sounds of doctors and nurses yelling out directions and vitals; all of them were fighting to save Kevin. This is bad.
So I do the only thing I can: I cry. I run to the closest bathroom and try to slam my way thru the door, barely acknowledging the two cops standing guard outside a room down the hall. But the door doesn’t open, at least not fully. Instead, I’ve slammed the door, or maybe it was the handle, against a person, a woman. Specifically, I slammed that door with my full weight behind it, against her head. A blonde, 40’s-ish woman with pink-looking clothing around her ankles as she plays on her phone while she tries to do her business screeches and grabs her head. I notice the second door is open into another emergency room and there appears to be someone in there. The woman yells that I should knock and while I briefly think I should’ve shoved the door harder, it’s a fleeting thought, and there is no room for animosity or anger towards this person.
Knock? That was the least of my concerns. I just need a quiet place to think. To cry. God, I want to scream! All I know is I needed to get out of that room, out of the hospital if I could, but that wasn’t going to be possible. Not for a while. So I turned into the wall there, just beside the restroom door. I curled into it, I wanted to crawl into it, and tried not to collapse, tried not to lose my breath. I fought against the misery straining to escape and looked for anything that would help me keep my hold on sanity, anything.
The cops there knew me, I don’t know how, but Officer A– called me by name, “Andrea, what happened?” I tried to calm myself enough to speak, but I still couldn’t breathe. “Kevin…had an accident….he…shot himself…with a nail gun…” I don’t know whether that was enough to explain what had happened but I’m pretty sure they understood the brevity of the situation. Their faces looked concerned; it seemed like they understood this was life or death.
Please don’t be death.
And the female officer, I have really got to learn (or probably remember) her name, she looked like she wanted to come give me a hug but stood in place, remembering her position on the room she helped to guard.
END FLASHBACK
Grace. The female officer…her name is Grace.
I generally try not to use actual names, or even pronouns, while writing; I prefer to leave people their anonymity wherever possible.
But as I was re-reading something I’d written years ago now, the reminder that I should probably remember her name struck me.
Grace.
It feels like a theme I’ve been looking for but was right in front of me the whole time. I don’t know whether I can properly explain what I’m feeling right now. Many of the themes I talk about or around remind me, and hopefully whoever is reading this, to remember to be kind to yourself, to be patient, to take the stumbles as part of the process and not a return to the dark days, to remember healing doesn’t mean you’re broken. To give yourself grace.
It almost feels like someone or something was trying to tell me something I didn’t know I needed to hear yet.
I don’t know whether anyone else believes in that sort of thing, in signs or whatever you want to call it. But I always have.
They could just be thousands of pieces of information you’ve taken in that your brain has scrambled into a coherent thought, a pattern… Or maybe I’m seeing things where nothing exists.
But I don’t believe that.
I believe in grace.
Leave a Reply