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A gentle tap on her arm and something cool on her forehead pulled Kate from a depth she’d never felt before. As she stirred, intense pain zigzagged across her temple. Though it throbbed even to blink, she opened her eyes. That woman, the nurse who’d looked at her funny in Renzo’s room, was now looking down at her, smiling.
Wait. Was that just a minute ago?
Kate reached for her head and moaned. “What happened?”
“You fell. Got a nice bump on your head, sweetie.”
As Kate’s head cleared, she remembered. Despite the crashing pain in her head, she pushed herself to her elbows.
“My husband! My son! I gotta’ go.”
The nurse pushed her down as the doctor she’d seen working on Renzo walked in.
Kate looked at his expression and froze.
“Mrs. De Luca,” he said, his voice quiet and kind, as he pursed his lips and gently shook his head.
Kate’s eyes and nose burned. She shook her head, worsening the pain. Her voice failed her as she whispered, “No.” Her burning throat grew thick as she fought for air.
“I am so sorry. We did everything we could, but your husband and son lost a lot of blood. They did not survive the gunshot wounds. I’m very sorry.”
Kate wanted to scream and yell at them, but her strength was sapped. She looked up at the doctor, holding her breath as she shook her head at him. Tears washed over her eyes, her nose both runny and congested.
“No,” she whispered again. “That’s not right. Check again. Please.” She shook her head and pointed beyond the curtain to the hall. “I saw them. They were alive. I—I. Please! Check again!”
Heat surged in her face as she tried to sit up, but an agonizing pain slammed across her skull, causing the room to spin. She fell back onto the pillow and covered her face with her hands. A heaviness fell across her defeated body as she shook with sorrow and rage. She wanted to scream but lacked any energy. She wiped her hands down her face as she fought the searing pain crossing her head. She refused to accept this nightmare.
The doctor slipped out the door, but the nurse stayed and held Kate’s hand as she spoke to her quietly, calmly.
“Try not to move, ma’am. Is there anyone we can call for you?”
Kate pressed the palms of her hands on her eyes as she turned to look at the nurse.
“Can you call my mom?”
She barely recognized her own voice. It sounded so small. Like a toddler’s.
The nurse patted her hand. “Of course.”
Kate gave her her mom’s name and number. The nurse left the room leaving Kate alone with her living nightmare.
She whispered quietly.
Marco. Renzo. Please come back to me. Don’t leave me. Why is this happening? Who did this? I hated seeing you guys looking like that. I hope it didn’t hurt. I hope you weren’t too afraid. Please. Please. Please. Walk through that door and take me home. I’ll make you a nice spaghetti dinner with some gravy. I promise I’ll call it gravy, Renzo. I promise you don’t have to get your hair cut, and you can put your feet on the coffee table, and you don’t have to make your bed anymore. Just please come back. I hit my head and it hurts so bad. Maybe that’s why this is happening. It’s just a dream, right? I got a concussion and this is all a dream. Marco, please walk through that door smiling and surprise me with Renzo holding flowers or something. I want you to help me out of this bed with your strong arms and take me home and take care of me. Please, please, please....
***
“No! Please! Please Marco! Please!”
Kate’s mom, Louise, pushed back the curtain and ran to Kate’s bedside.
“Kate!”
Feeling something shake her shoulder, Kate pulled herself up through the deep fog.
“You’re dreaming, Kate. Wake up, sweetheart.”
Kate stopped thrashing and opened her eyes. The hospital room was dimly lit, but she recognized the face in front of her.
“Mom?”
Seeing her mother’s worried face hovering above her brought Kate to the devastating reality: her husband and son were dead. She began to wail, but then stifled it to a quiet whimper. She reached up to her mother’s face with a weak hand.
“I’m here,” said Louise. She wiped Kate’s sweat-drenched hair from her forehead. “Dad’s here, too. We’ve been sitting outside waiting for you to wake up.”
On seeing her dad, John, standing behind her mom, both looking sorrowfully at her, Kate let out an agonized moan. She sat up and reached out to them. They huddled together as Kate buried her face in her mom’s chest. She cried as her parents wept in silence. After several minutes, Kate pulled back and wiped her eyes and nose with the handkerchief her dad held out for her.
She blew her nose and sucked in jerky puffs of air, letting them out slowly. Her head pounded and her eyes, nearly swollen shut, ached as she looked up at her parents.
They looked old. Tired.
Her dad walked around to the other side of the bed and sat next to Kate, reaching across to take her hand. As they cried, Kate’s mind whirled between the realization that Marco and Renzo were gone and her refusal to accept it. Suddenly, she straightened, eyes wide, her mind clear. She smeared her hair from her face, pushed back the sheet and blanket, and threw her legs over the side of the hospital bed.
“I want to see them.”
Her mom’s mouth hung open, as her dad stood and shouted at her. “What? Kate, no.”
Kate nodded furiously. “I want to see them. Now.”
She scrambled out of bed, pausing to let the dizziness pass, as the cold linoleum drifted up through her stocking feet. She saw her winter jacket and purse laying across the end of her hospital bed, her winter boots dripping on the floor below. She noted her attire: her sweatpants and sweater. No hospital gown—yet. Louise gently touched her arm.
“Kate. No.” Her mother’s voice cracked. “You’re not ready.”
“I’ll never be ready for something like this, Mom. I need to see them.”
Louise let her daughter go. Kate pushed back the curtain and walked gingerly out into the bright hallway, her head pounding. She looked up and down the hall but saw no one. She took a chance at the first left she encountered and turned, walking a short distance. Halfway down and to her right was a nurses’ station. She stopped and shouted at the group of nurses busying themselves with various tasks behind the counter.
“I need to see my husband and son. Now.”
The strength and determination of her voice surprised her, considering how weak her legs felt and how much she’d struggled to stand upright. A peripheral view of her parents walking toward her from her right didn’t sway that determination.
One flustered nurse said, “Okay, let me see what rooms they’re in.”
“They’re not in a room,” Kate shouted. “They’re dead!”
Her angry, loud voice surprised her. Surprised everyone.
The other nurses stopped what they were doing to look at Kate, as Louise wrapped an arm around Kate’s waist.
“Please, sweetheart. Come back to your room.”
Kate yanked her shoulder and pushed herself from her mom. She took a step back from everyone.
“No! Where are they? Why is everyone staring at me? Find out where they are! I need to see them. Please.”
She felt the hysteria building in her stomach, crawling toward her throat.
Hold it together, Kate. Now’s not the time to collapse. You may never get another chance to hold them.
The nurse who’d been sitting with her earlier ran up the hall to Kate and waved the other nurses off.
“Mrs. De Luca?”
Kate turned to the familiar face, her arms outstretched. “Please. I need to see them,” she whimpered. “Please.”
“Okay,” said the nurse in a calm voice. She took hold of Kate’s arms. “Let me—” she looked around and then back at Kate. “Let me see where they are ....” Kate felt the woman’s sincerity and saw it in her concerned eyes.
“Wait right here. I’ll get them ready for you, okay?”
Kate’s quivering hand went to her lips as she nodded.
Get them ready ...
Her head felt as if it would split down the middle. She was grateful for her dad’s strong arm around her waist as they waited. She rested her head on his shoulder where, at that moment, it seemed to fit perfectly.
“Try to breathe, honey.” His deep voice was quiet, soothing. “Just try to breathe.”
She nodded at him and tried to do as he suggested.
Kate’s mother stood in front of her, as Kate took slow, unsteady breaths. She couldn’t bear the look of her mother’s pained face, so she squeezed her eyes and pressed back her own burning tears. She continued to mimic her dad’s dramatized slow breathing.
In and out. In and out.
Kate heard the distant voice of the nurse and opened her eyes to see her walking toward her. “I have them ready for you, Mrs. De Luca. Come with me.”
Kate looked at her mom and up at her dad, who kissed her forehead before letting her go. She left her parents standing under the bright lights of the cold hospital hallway, and walked alongside the nurse down an endless corridor. They took an elevator that brought them down two flights. They turned left off the elevator and continued down another long hall. This one seemed gloomier. Deserted. At the end of the hall stood a set of double-doors. The nurse used her badge to open it, and then put her arm around Kate’s waist as they walked in together.
After a short walk, they turned left.
“They’re in here,” said the nurse, her words stopping Kate’s heart and breath. The woman opened the door and stepped aside, giving Kate a sad, but compassionate, smile.
Kate looked past the metal-framed door and into the room. The nurse backed out and quietly shut the door.
Her steps felt heavy as Kate entered the chilly steel room. Medical equipment, now quiet, was pushed to the side, no longer needed for the lifeless patients lying before her. She felt a choking panic rise in her throat as her dizziness returned.
Her first glimpse was of their dark curls. She scanned their bodies, covered by clean, pale blue sheets. Their arms lay over the sheets, resting at their sides, their beds touching. The room was silent. Still. No life-saving machines or pumping noises. Just the distant sound of life outside the morbidly serene, dim room.
She struggled to believe the lifeless bodies were those of her family. Her life. Marco and Renzo’s thick, dark hair, as beautiful as if they were still alive, fell back and away from their gray, wax-like faces. Their extreme stillness sickened her.
A fog swirled inside her head as she moved slowly toward them, the crisp sheets hiding the ugly reality.
