When the woman cleared her throat for attention, Mark’s trance broke and he looked up. She had sweats on with a bun, as well as bags in her hands and under her eyes. She had brown, curly hair with little strands poking out of the Arizona Wildcats hat on her head. Her shoes were old sneakers with a little tear on the top, and her makeup was minimum but still very beautiful.
She has money problems, Mark thought seconds after, and is fighting for the past to become a reality again but hasn’t realized yet that normality doesn’t exist. She’s fighting for nothing. But her face is kind, probably because she doesn’t know who I am, staring at me like another cancer sponsor. My actions are very different than that. I’ve done horrible things to your family. She seems like a wonderful woman, married to a wonderful man, with an outstanding child, but I’m not a good man in any shape or form. I’m the devil, the killer, and the rage your child doesn’t need. Kick me out and punch me in the throat. I won’t move.
The woman reached out an arm. Mark closed his eyes tight, waiting for pain to strike and in a way craving a blow to the face. He knew it would be like a loving lamb protecting her child from a hungry, devious wolf. But she spoke in a gentle tone instead.
“Nice to finally meet you, sir,” the woman said, obviously struggling to speak in this same gentle voice but dimly pronounced from her exhaustion. Mark shook the hand loosely with a confused expression and a slightly open jaw. There was awkwardness in the air, a stench of forced emotions and tolerance.
“Do you know who I am, ma’am?”
“You’re the man who rear-ended my son’s Camry, I know exactly who you are!” the mother said in an unexpectedly harsh voice. Her semi-trancelike state almost instantly dissolved, and she yanked her hand back as if touching a stray dog sprayed by a skunk. Mark felt immense shame, shame he prepared for, and fell silent with his mouth slightly open. Then, in a quiet, regretful tone, he responded.
“I’m really sorry, ma’am. I-I talked to your son. He’s wonderful! I made matters worse for your family and, and—”
“And what?” the mother sneered while raising her voice again. Mark flinched and raised his voice so it was impossible for her to hear him wrong. Nurses turned around to watch, asking for security or someone to give him the boot and kick him out.
“And I’ll pay for everything that I’ve caused. I’ll help with medical bills, the car bills, and I can bring food to help you, Tyler, and your husband!”
The mother rolled her eyes, crossed her arms, looked down, and interrupted quietly with disgust. “Ex-husband. He’s in the cafeteria. A very nice man, but you’ll never see that side of him.”
The mother saw Mark’s eyes tear apart from the guilt, which made her again remember the promise to her son, something she wished she could ignore. So the woman bit her lip, and her eyes locked onto his with fire in them that said please give me any alarm so I can ruin the rest of your miserable life. They moved into a waiting room just outside the sixth floor’s metallic doors, with two walls of windows overlooking the parking lot and city and another that led to the elevator and a pair of saloon-style doors that led downstairs by foot. On the single row of red cotton-stuffed metal-leg chairs in the back right corner against the windows sat both Tyler’s mother and Mark, while on the left corner sat a family of nine who were silently crying. Quiet tears of fear. The mother’s weeping was easy to find. She was the one who’d had heavy bags, no makeup, and pajamas. Mark couldn’t help but notice them; they reminded him of the past. They were poor, in debt, and losing someone younger than them all, he surmised. There was a black purse next to the mother, and tucked inside was formula and a diaper. Tyler’s mother never noticed. She heard the cries but never looked over; these noises were heard every day in the sixth floor overlooking the city. Those soft weeps from families never shook her anymore. Sadness was always in the air, in the water, and in the heart, which will never leave unless their child walks out with their life.
The mother bit her lip and spoke.
“When Tyler was diagnosed, I thought he was going to die. I thought his life was over. I sometimes dream of the days before this place, and before the divorce.” She paused, then continued a few moments later.
“Why him? I always wondered why Tyler, of all people, would get cancer. He prayed more than all of us, he would be the one who’d go to heaven.” She paused again as she chipped her nail polish off her finger. Then, very unexpectedly, the woman chuckled lightly.
“You know how all of this came about? It was about a year ago, when I was selfish. When I didn’t think of others. I was losing a man I loved, and Tyler, my sweet boy, all he wanted to do was comfort me. I heard him sit there in pain. I knew he was in pain. But I was so…so absorbed in myself, that all I did was buy him Tylenol and not even take the box out of the grocery bag. Then I’d cry at night, and he’d cradle me and tell me to trust God. Oh, I was angry at God, but I trusted my boy and I prayed—although I was tired of his talk of life being okay, and I was tired of him acting as if the divorce wasn’t a big deal. Then one day during school, Tyler collapsed. He wasn’t getting enough oxygen and he collapsed.” The mother was violently crying with anger. Her voice wasn’t loud, but wasn’t quiet.
“He had a tumor in his throat and on his head. In his kidneys and his spine. He had it in his legs and wrapped around his heart. It was my fault. Mine! And every night it’s in my thoughts. So I pray every night, I pray because he…he told me to pray. I don’t care about myself anymore, I don’t. If I died right now, I wouldn’t care if I went to heaven or to hell. I love Tyler, and because he told me to pray, I will…I” Then the mother suddenly halted her conversation, finding herself wrapped in Mark’s arms. She was shocked.
“No more,” he pleaded, “no more.”
She hugged back, wrapping her hands halfway around Mark. Many mothers weren’t afraid; he had a fatherly look of an old police officer with a big heart and a personality filled with love and authority, but no strangers, or even officers besides Aaron, knew what was occurring in Mark’s head. But one thing was certain: Mark began to love Tyler, maybe almost as much as he loved Mary. The mother, though, drenched in sadness, still had endless rage for Mark and pushed his huge body off.
“Please don’t…don’t ever touch me again.” The woman turned herself in her chair and tried to forget the connection they’d shared, the two-second embrace, and hoped he would as well. She wasn’t ready to forgive Mark and didn’t want their embrace to be a sign of forgiveness, only a sign of human decency. Although Mark didn’t think of forgiveness, he began to think about Tyler. Tyler was all he could think about.
The sunken eyes and high chills in a warm car during summer. I killed him, Mark thought. No, I murdered him. This sweet boy. Oh, this sweet child. What could be worse? The mother looked down on the large city of moving cars, mountains, and working-class men and women. It was calm and quiet. No sound vibrated through the windows, while men and women went on with their day. Every single one had problems they bickered about. The sixth floor was a society made up of young and heavily trialed children, the innocent who were shown the darkness of the world they could not yet understand. It was a society boxed in mirrors that showed the world of carelessness, people who did not carry the same weight of gratefulness that the children do there, bickering and craving less important needs like a new car or better grades in college. While looking through the glass and your reflection, boxed in a single floor, you feel ignored, passed by from the appearing and disappearing automobiles on the busy road, letting your boxed society handle your reflection, and your boxed society alone observing through the one-way mirrors. Even when you leave, there’s still a part of you that would always stay. A part that you will always see what was boxed up and hidden in plain sight.
The mother spoke in a calm voice while turned in her chair. “I’m not going to sue you, officer. Tyler, after the accident, woke up before surgery smiling and told both his father and I how you treated him like a normal human, not someone who was sick. This is something that means a lot to the boy. Then this morning he told both the doctors and us that he never told you about the cancer and where he was going, giving you suspicion of drug abuse and illegal use. I was so furious, and I… You wouldn’t understand.” She kept back the anger, which felt like needles in her throat to be so kind to the man who caused it all. “It was foolish of me to tear up. But Tyler is a very sharp boy. He, no matter what, understands my thoughts and feelings.” The mother let out a short laugh, yet not with humor but acknowledgement. “Without hesitation, Tyler made me promise not to harm you in any way and named off the ways I could.” This time she laughed with gentle humor. “He told me economically, socially, mentally, or physically, and I couldn’t break that promise to him. In that moment, Tyler was experiencing drastic intoxication of pain, he was so taken aback from his injuries, you could see the pain in his eyes.” She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and began again. “I arrived last night from work and they were the first words that came from his mouth. Within a heartbeat, I would have gladly declined his plea. His father and I would have ruined you in every way I could.” For a moment, she stopped talking to absorb the power of her words while also realizing she’d lied, never being able to decline his pleas, especially when he had been so certain with his words the night before, so convinced. Her lip quivered. “But I’m not going to disappoint Tyler. It’s dangerous.”
Mark bathed in guilt. Children, he was being crushed again and again and again. He felt blood on his hands and tears on his shoulder, continuously being poured on by what the mother said.
When did everything change? When was I not the man I am now? he thought. I need Mary. I need Tyler. God, please don’t kill them all, please not my Hand Mitten, please not the child. Although this request was selfish, Mark wished not to feel guilt. The mother looked over and again saw the love he possessed and this constant, silent trickle of tears making his face shine and his clothes wet. It reminded her of the simpler times, when Tyler was a child with simple problems and immediate answers that were solvable. Answers like a kiss on a cut, a time out for mud tracks in the house, a scoop of ice cream for standing up to the class menace, or a bed to sleep in from a nightmare. She was still outraged at Mark but knew what he needed. The woman stood up, tired of his quietness and looks of self-disgust, wiped off her tears and rubbed the dribble off from her nose, to reach forward and squeeze Mark into a warm hug. All the little battles were practice for hugs like this, and she had perfected it. These were the hugs for the nightmares. Mark quickly halted his quiet and shocked tears, finding himself back in reality with tense muscles. But soon he loosened up and accepted the hug. They both knew how it felt to have blood on their hands. This hug gave them both relief. Mark was able to keep the tears in his head, and the woman’s tension also left, yet the embrace, this second moment, was not forgiveness, but understanding. But not too long did these comforting conditions last. “My name is Mary.”
Mark shuddered to her response and she quickly backed away. He placed a hand to his mouth and froze in overwhelming, desolating fear. “Sorry, say again?”
“I said my name is Sarah. Are you okay?” Sarah questioned. Mark sat forward in his chair and laid both hands on his thighs, with a slight slant of the neck looking toward the ground’s tile and the sealed metal door’s crack. Then he closed his eyes and tried to control his breathing. He started tapping both thighs with his hands, breathing through his nose and out his mouth, and thinking to himself, It’s Sarah, her name is Sarah, it’s Sarah, her name is Sarah.
“Sorry, I thought you said Mary,” Mark stated. “My name’s Mark.” Mark grabbed his knees in stress with huge, sweaty palms and continued to grab and release, grab and release, feeling the force of memories trying to weaken his control, pulling off finger after finger of his grip on reality. Sarah sat back down and her curiosity struck; she was fascinated. Sarah had found a trigger.
“Who’s Mary?”
“She’s my wife.”
“And she’s dead?”
“No, please no. She’s alive. She’s at home,” Mark said, feeling another finger slip off.
“Why are you afraid of her name?”
Mark froze in his spot. Another ten seconds passed just like the meeting with Sarah at Tyler’s hospital room door. As a psychiatrist, Sarah could glean exactly what Mark was experiencing. He was getting worse, the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder was a given, but some unknown psychological problems were there as well. He was slowly losing reality like he was on a progressing dosage of LSD; she could see the advancement from his voice, his features. This is bigger than I first believed, Sarah thought while continuing to stare at Mark’s absent face. Much bigger than I believed.
Finally, Aaron was on his way outside. He’d had a long talk in the cafeteria with Tyler’s father, and Aaron told him everything. During the past hour, Tom had run up to the sixth floor, gone through the bolted door, and found Tyler’s room, but knew it wasn’t right. Freezing at the door, about to enter in with confidence to talk to both Tyler and Mark, Tom turned around. Mark needed time.