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After talking to Hope on the phone Mitchell went to work. He wasn’t bouncing, but he walked with more of a spring in his step than he had in the past month or so. It had been so good to hear Hope’s voice again. When he entered the clinic and Stephanie silently handed him a slip of paper, his good mood dissolved. On it was a name and phone number.
Monika Horvath.
‘Your mother came back yesterday after you’d left. She said she’ll be in town for the night if you want to see her. She’s staying at the motel,’ Stephanie said.
He snatched the piece of paper, crumpling it as he shoved it into his pocket. No part of him wanted to see this woman who claimed to be his mother.
His phone rang and he jumped. Glancing at the screen, he half expected it to be Hope again, but it was Beth.
‘How are you doing, darling?’
‘I’m okay. I talked to Hope this morning.’
‘You did?’
‘She called. Jordan told her about my . . . about the woman showing up.’
‘What are you going to do?’
He pulled out the piece of paper and smoothed it out on his desk. ‘She left me her number, so I guess I’ll call her.’
‘I think that’s the right thing to do.’
In all the years she’d fostered kids, Beth had seen the good, the bad and the very ugly, but Mitch knew her heart was always fixed on reconciliation if it was possible and if it was safe.
‘You don’t have to form a relationship with her, darling, but you owe it to her to at least call and have a conversation. Just remember there’s always two sides to everything.’
*
After lunch that day Mitchell stood outside the door to unit seven of the Macarthur Point Motel, rubbing his arms. He wasn’t cold, he was nervous. He dragged in a deep breath then let it out slowly. It had taken him all morning to work up the courage to do this. His heart was racing, and he couldn’t seem to refill his lungs.
He knocked on the door but there was no reply. Frowning, he knocked a second time. He knew Monika was there because a car with New South Wales registration plates was parked outside the unit and the receptionist said she hadn’t seen her leave all day.
A moment later the door swung open.
His mother—if that’s who she was—stood in the doorway. She stared at him, ashen faced, her hair matted to her head. The smell of vomit emanating from her was so strong he almost gagged.
‘Thank God you’re here,’ she slurred as she slumped against the door jamb.
Mitchell stepped back in disgust. ‘Are you drunk?’
She shook her head wearily. ‘I’m sick.’
He took another look at her and a stab of guilt ripped through him. She did look sick.
She stepped aside so he could pass, then closed the door behind him. The tiny motel room felt like a fridge. Other than the queen-sized bed, there was a small seating area by the window, two chairs and a tiny excuse for a coffee table between them. The bed was unmade, the sheets a rumpled mess. It was so cold he could almost see his breath.
Compassion kicked in. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
She let out a shuddering breath. ‘I’ve had this awful pain in my stomach all night. I thought it would go away, but it hasn’t.’
‘When did it start?’
‘It’s been coming and going for months now, but last night it was so bad I couldn’t sleep.’
‘Why didn’t you call an ambulance? You need to get to hospital.’ He pulled out his phone, ready to make the call.
‘I don’t have ambulance cover.’
He stared at her in disbelief. Ambulance cover was less than a hundred dollars a year. Surely everyone had cover.
Her legs buckled, and he reached for her before she collapsed. Even through her clothing he could feel her skin was burning up.
‘Come on, you need to lie down.’ He helped her onto the bed and pulled the covers over her. It was so cold her teeth were chattering. He picked up the remote control for the air conditioner. She’d set the temperature to the cold setting—as low as it would go. He fiddled with the settings and changed it from air conditioner to heat.
Then he called the first person he could think of who would know what to do. Hope.
She took forever to answer. ‘Mitchell?’
She sounded awful, then he remembered she’d just finished night duty. His apology for waking her would have to wait.
‘I’m at the motel with my mother. She’s sick. Burning up with a fever and she’s just collapsed.’
‘Is she breathing?’ He pictured Hope sitting up in bed, instantly alert.
‘Yes, but it sounds laboured to me. Shallow and fast.’
‘What’s her colour?’
‘Pale. I’ve never seen anyone this pale. She’s like a ghost. Almost translucent.’
‘And her skin? Hot or cold?’
‘Burning up. Definitely got a fever. And the air conditioner feels like it’s been on all night. It’s frigid in here. But she’s sweating heaps. All her clothes are damp.’
‘You need to get her to hospital,’ Hope said. ‘Can you drive her there? It will probably be quicker than calling the ambos.’
‘I don’t know if she can walk.’
‘Why? Is she in pain?’
‘Yeah. I think so.’ He glanced at her. Monika lay in a tight ball on the bed clutching her abdomen with both hands.
‘Where’s her pain?’ Hope asked.
He turned to her. ‘Where’s your pain?’
Monika ran her hand in a sweeping motion across her abdomen.
That didn’t narrow it down. He wracked his brain for human anatomy but came up blank. He was so muddled he couldn’t even remember what side the appendix was on. All he knew was she looked like a horse with colic. But with colic, you had to keep the horse up and moving. Was it the same with people?
Monika tried to sit up, but the pain was obviously too intense, and she slumped down again. ‘I’m sure it’s nothing,’ she gasped. ‘It’s probably something as embarrassing as constipation. I’m not going to the hospital for that.’ Each word took an effort.
He put the phone on speaker. ‘Could it be constipation?’ he asked Hope. ‘Maybe I should call Jordy and get him to come over.’
‘I can’t diagnose her over the phone and Jordy won’t be able to either. She needs X-rays and blood tests. Get her to the hospital, Mitch.’
Monika moaned. ‘No. I don’t want to go to hospital. Once they get you in there, that’s the end of you.’
‘Mrs. Horvath, my name is Hope Rossi. I’m a friend of Mitchell’s and I’m a nurse. It sounds like you really need to go to the Emergency Department.’
‘I can’t.’
Mitchell took the phone off speaker and put it to his ear, turning away from Monika. ‘She doesn’t have ambulance cover. A trip to Emergency in Warrnambool from here will cost thousands.’
‘Can you get her in your car and drive her there?’
‘I guess I don’t have a choice.’
‘Call me from the hospital.’
‘Thanks again Hope. I couldn’t do this without you.’
‘You don’t have to,’ she replied.
As he hung up, he forced himself not to stop and think what Hope’s comment meant.
By the time he’d scooped Monika in his arms and carried her to his car, she’d stopped protesting which troubled him even more. In the car he rang Jordan who promised to call the hospital and let them know to expect him. Then he put his foot to the accelerator and tore down the highway to Warrnambool.
Pulling up out front, he and ran inside, grabbed a wheelchair and took it back to the car. Monika sat slumped back in the front seat, her face deathly pale. He tried to quell his fear and stop his hands from shaking as he pushed her through the doors straight up to the triage desk. Thank goodness it was still early, and the department was nearly empty.
The triage nurse asked Monika a few questions and he hung back to give her privacy. She sat slumped sideways in the wheelchair, like a puppet without strings. He hoped she wasn’t going to be sick. Moments later another nurse appeared and wheeled her through the double doors.
Mitchell stood there, unsure what to do. The receptionist beckoned him over to the glassed window.
‘Are you a relative?’ she asked.
‘Um, er,’ he stammered. ‘She’s my, er, mother.’
A look of relief washed over the receptionist’s face. ‘Great. I can get some more details from you. Do you have her Medicare card?’
Damn. He hadn’t thought to bring her bag or anything. ‘No, sorry. I can call someone though and get the details.’ He could ask someone at the motel to go into her room.
‘That’s fine. If I can have her full name, date of birth and address that will be enough for me to put her in the system for now.’
‘I don’t know.’
The receptionist stared at him.
He ran his fingers through his hair. How was he supposed to explain he wasn’t even sure this woman was related to him? And if she was, he knew nothing about her.
‘It’s complicated,’ he told the receptionist. ‘I haven’t seen her for a long time. I don’t even know where she lives.’
‘But you can give me her full name and date of birth.’ The receptionist was looking at him warily now.
‘Her name is Monika Horvath, but I’m sorry, I don’t know her date of birth.’ Things like that weren’t the kind of things a four-year-old remembered about their mother.
The receptionist frowned. ‘Do you have any other family members who might know?’
He shook his head. ‘I don’t think so.’
Now she was glaring at him. He didn’t blame her. He sounded suspicious even to his own ears.
‘Right. Well you can take a seat over there and when we know what’s going on with your mother someone will let you know.’
‘Thanks.’ No argument from him. The last place he wanted to be was at Monika’s bedside while a doctor did tests and asked more questions.
While he waited, he called Jordan and told him what had happened, then called Hope again.
‘How is she?’ Hope asked.
She must have been waiting for his call, phone in hand. He felt so guilty for keeping her awake, but when he tried to apologise, she told him not to be silly.
‘I don’t know how she is. I’m still in the waiting room.’
‘Do you need anything?’ she asked.
I need you.
‘I can come down if you want me to,’ she said, as if reading his mind.
His heart sped. ‘Would you?’
‘I’ve already called work and told them I can’t come in tonight. I can be there in a few hours.’
‘You’d do that for me?’
‘It’s what friends do, Mitchell.’
He heard the smile and the warmth in her voice, and it made his heart full. ‘Thanks, Hope. I can’t tell you how much that means.’
A woman hurried towards him. She wore a stethoscope around her neck and a grim expression on her face.
‘I’ve gotta go,’ he said. ‘The doctor is here.’
‘Dr. Davis?’
He stood and nodded, holding out his hand. ‘Mitchell.’
‘You’re Monika’s son?’ she asked as she shook his hand firmly.
‘Um, yeah.’
‘You’re a doctor too?’ she asked.
He shook his head. ‘Vet.’
‘Ah, right. I’m Kim Wilkins, the ED consultant on today.’
She indicated he sit down again, and she sat next to him on the edge of the chair. His nerves hummed. Surely if it was bad news, he’d be taken into a private waiting room.
‘We’ve done blood tests,’ Kim said without preamble, ‘and while we don’t have any results yet, I’ve got the preliminary report back on the CT scan.’
He waited.
‘Your mother has a bowel obstruction, which is what’s causing all her pain.’
‘Okay.’ He allowed himself to relax. He’d figured it was either gallstones or kidney stones causing the pain. A full bowel was easily sorted with an enema.
Kim went on. ‘But unfortunately, the cause of the pain is a very sizable mass. Most likely a cancer. And mostly likely malignant.’ She paused. ‘There are also some nasty looking spots showing up on the scan.’ She rushed on. ‘But right now, I’m mostly concerned she may have also perforated her bowel, so I want to get her into surgery as soon as I can.’
‘Good. Right. Yep.’
Kim frowned. Clearly, she expected him to be showing more concern.
‘Is there any other family you want to call?’ she asked. ‘I need to know about her medical history. Medications. Allergies. That sort of thing.’
He shook his head. ‘I don’t know if there’s anyone else.’
Kim’s brows drew closer together.
He ran his hands through his hair. ‘Look, Kim. The thing is, I haven’t seen or heard from my mother for thirty-six years.’
Kim’s eyebrows shot up.
‘She left when I was four. I was raised in foster care.’
‘Oh.’
Yeah, “Oh”.
‘Do you want to see her?’
‘I guess I should.’ He stood, and Kim followed suit.
‘Can I call pastoral care for you? Or someone?’
‘No, thanks. I’m good. I’ve got a friend on her way.’
He followed Kim through the doors into the noisy emergency department. At the closed curtain to his mother’s cubicle, Kim stopped to face him.
‘I won’t sugar-coat this: your mother isn’t the picture of health.’
He nodded. He could tell that the moment he first saw her. She was skinnier than a retired rescue greyhound and had the skin and smell of a chain smoker.
Kim kept her voice low. ‘She’s probably got a stack of co-morbidities and this tumour is huge.’
He frowned. ‘Are you saying she won’t make it?’
Kim shook her head. ‘No. She’ll get through the surgery, but with the size and position of the tumour and, well, let’s be honest, if what I can see on the scan are mets on her lungs, they’re probably in other places too. Most likely brain and bones. I don’t think she’ll have that long.’
‘Thanks.’ Mitchell appreciated the doctor’s lack of sugar coating.
He swallowed hard before opening the curtain. Monika lay in the bed, connected to an IV line. A nurse was administering something through the drip.
‘How are you feeling?’ he asked.
‘I don’t want an operation, Mitchell. Please,’ she begged in a frail voice. ‘Don’t let them operate on me.’
‘There’s no choice,’ he said. ‘You need to have surgery.’
‘Can’t they give me something to make my bowels work?’
‘It’s not that simple, Mrs. Horvath,’ the nurse explained. ‘You really need this operation. And the surgeon is good, I promise. You’re in safe hands.’
Monika’s eyes filled with tears. She turned her head towards Mitchell. ‘Take me home.’
Kim shot him a questioning look. He shrugged. He didn’t even know where her home was.
Pulling up a chair, he sat beside her and patted her hand awkwardly. He wished he knew what he was supposed to do or say but he was clueless. At least she was too unwell to attempt a deep and meaningful talk about the past. He certainly wasn’t ready to dredge it up and especially not in a public setting like this.
He sat in silence, listening to the nurses laughing about something, to the sound of a little boy in the adjoining cubicle who was eating ice-cream and jelly and being praised by his parents for being so brave, to the ticking of a clock and the clicking of the IV pump as it pushed the fluids into Monika’s veins as fast as the pump could go.
As he stared at the woman in the bed, he still found it hard to believe she was his mother. Her unexpected arrival had stirred up old insecurities he thought he’d long buried. For a long moment, as he sat there, the boy he once was when she left him surfaced and all the anger, frustration and resentment rose. He remembered all the years of being the poor foster kid. The kid who wanted to make friends but didn’t know how because he was too scared to let anyone into his life. Unloved. Unwanted. Inadequate. Could he open himself up to a relationship with this woman? He wasn’t sure.
Finally, when the orderly arrived to transfer her to theatre, he stood and briefly touched her shoulder as if it might burn him.
‘Good luck. I’ll, um, I’ll...be here when you wake up.’
Her eyes opened, and a tiny tear streaked down her cheek. ‘Thank you, son,’ she mouthed as she was wheeled out of the cubicle.
Mitchell stood watching them until they turned the corner and went out of sight. He couldn’t recall ever feeling so small or so helpless. Or so sad.
Why did it feel like he’d finally found his mother and now he was going to lose her again?