I sat beside Maggie’s bed in the hospital ER.
A young, solemn doctor had declared me healthy and “lucky.” The pain in my neck and shoulders, caused by the force of the air bag throwing me back onto my seat and headrest, was muscular and would subside in a few days. He prescribed muscle relaxants with codeine.
I held Maggie’s hand as we sat in silence, waiting for a doctor to come and stitch up her leg. Other than the cut, she’d suffered only bruises, mostly on the left side of her body. She would be sore, but fine. We were assured it would be a short wait until a doctor could come and put the needed stitches in Maggie’s leg.
I rocked in my chair. “I’m so—”
Maggie threw me a hard look. She’d already told me to stop apologizing. She squeezed my hand and I squeezed back, hiding my apology in the soft pressure.
She leaned back against the pillows and closed her eyes. “It was a surprise, you know. To see it was you. Well,” she gave a snorting laugh, “the whole thing was a terrible surprise. But to see it was you driving the car. You’re the last person I expected to see lying in a heap on the road. In your living room, maybe. But not on the road.”
I opened my mouth to reply but my attention was caught by the actions of a nurse across the corridor from us. She was standing in front of the nurse’s desk, her hands full of clothing and a large plastic bag. I watched as she placed the bag on the desk and folded a pair of blue pants. She put the pants into the plastic bag, and then started folding what looked like a pair of boxer shorts. The hair raised up on the back of my neck as I watched the nurse carefully fold the articles of clothing and place them in the bag, which had the name “Zinik, Jaris” written across it in black, bold print.
I sprang up and half ran across the corridor toward the nurse. I heard Maggie call, “Kate, where are you going?”
I reached the nurse’s station and grabbed the bag, but, in an amazing show of reflex, the nurse managed to hang on to it. She pulled hard and we did a fast tug-of-war. “What do you think you’re doing?”
I let go. The nurse jerked and had to take a quick step backward to keep from falling.
I pointed. “What are you going to do with that?”
She stared down at the bag for a moment, then up at me with a look that said dangerous person. “Are you family?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’m family. Not his family. Not Jaris Zini-whatever’s family.” I grabbed her arm. She pulled away, swinging her arm hard to the right. She’s scared of me. “Please, I’m sorry. I’m not crazy. I’m not going to hurt you. I just need to know what you are going to do with that bag of clothes.”
“What business is it of yours? I’m packaging them up for the family to take home.”
“He died, didn’t he?” I said, pointing to the name on the bag.
She crossed her arms, the bag flapping softly against her ribs. “I can’t discuss this with you. You need to leave. Now.”
“Please, I just need to know. My husband died two months ago, here, in this ER. When I left the hospital, they didn’t give me anything.” I gestured to her hands. “No bag of clothes. No nothing.” I saw her face soften. It wasn’t quite sympathy, but she wasn’t going to holler for security … yet. “My sister had to come back later to get his things.”
The nurse pulled a frown. “That’s unusual. But we’re a busy hospital, and sometimes mistakes happen. We try hard to make sure the family members have all of the deceased’s belongings before they leave the hospital.”
“I’m missing his watch,” I said. It was only after I had spoken the words I realized it was true. His watch. That’s what had been missing from the pile of his belongings left on my bed the morning after his funeral.
The nurse patted Jaris’s bag. “I have to go and give this to the family. If you like, you can talk to one of the nurses at the desk. Maybe one of them can help you.” She walked away.
I looked at the nurses behind the desk. One was on the phone; two others had their backs turned to me, talking. I cleared my throat.
“Kate?” I heard Maggie call from across the hall.
I poked my head in the door. “You okay?”
“Yes, fine. I thought the doctor would be here by now. Good thing I’m not bleeding to death,” she said with a small smile. She looked pale.
“I’ll go see if I can find one.” I left before she could protest.
I tapped the nurses’ desk with my knuckle and smiled when the nurse, still on the phone, turned toward me. She leaned back in her chair and laughed into the receiver. The other two nurses were gone. I turned and searched the hallway until I spotted another nurse marching toward me. I hurried to her, stopping just in front of her.
“Excuse me, I—” She brushed past me, not breaking her fast pace. I trotted behind her. “I need to ask you a question.”
“Yes?” She hustled down the hall, moving like she was in training for a triathlon. “What is it?”
I felt the effort of keeping pace with her in my lungs and aching muscles. When was the last time I’d gone for a walk? I was horribly out of shape. “I wanted to ask you what happens to people’s clothing, belongings, that sort of thing.” She was really moving fast.
“Lost and found is on the main floor, near the cafeteria.” She said as she turned a corner.
I followed. “No, not lost things. I mean—”
The nurse came to a sudden stop and turned to face me. “Main floor. By the cafeteria.” She spun and continued her one-person race.
I raised my chin and yelled to the ceiling. “I want my dead husband’s watch!” I cupped my hand over my mouth, embarrassed.
The nurse reversed track and walked back to me, eyebrows pushed together, mouth hanging down in a loose frown. She looked thoughtful and annoyed. “What’s his name?” she said.
“Kevin Davis,” I said softly, trying to make up for my outburst.
“Fine, you go sit in the waiting room and I’ll see what I can find.”
“Actually I’m here with a friend. I … we were in an accident. She’s in examination room 3. I’ll wait there.” I remembered that I was also supposed to find a doctor and see what was taking so long for him to treat Maggie.
The nurse gave a curt nod. “Kevin Davis. Exam 3. Okay. I’m busy, but when I can, I’ll pull the chart and see what happened.” She turned and walked away, hollering over her shoulder, “I can’t promise anything.”
I made my way back to the nurses’ station, on the hunt for a doctor.
An hour later the doctor was putting a bandage on Maggie’s freshly stitched leg. Maggie kept smiling at the doctor and telling him what a wonderful job he was doing. It was a good strategy. The doctor seemed to take extra time and care with stitches. He was going over a list of dos and don’ts with Maggie when the nurse walked into the room. She held a file folder in her hand. She looked at me, then back at the file folder. “You’re Mrs. Davis?”
“Yes, Kate Davis.”
She shrugged. It didn’t matter. She’d gone to the trouble of digging up the chart and she was going to tell me what was in it regardless if I were Mrs. Davis or King Tut. “According to this,” she pushed her finger toward the folder, “there was no watch. Not only that, there weren’t any clothes, either.”
“I don’t understand.”
She glanced at the chart. “Kevin Davis arrived at this hospital naked.”