Chapter 19

In the evening, people began to leave for the night. Don's aunt and uncle kindly agreed to take my kids back to the house for the night, and his parents decided to head for the hospitality suite. His brothers decided to hang around the hospital a little longer, in case they were needed.

The pastor dropped by about the time everyone was leaving. He talked to my parents-in-law for a few moments, then spoke to me. He tried to talk to Don, but Don wasn't responsive, and the pastor quickly saw the futility of it.

"Let us pray," he said to me, his way of closing any visit.

I took Don's hand and bowed my head reverently. At that moment, Don looked up.

"Don't let..." He spoke very earnestly, as if trying to tell me something very important. "Don't let this man..." His voice trailed off, and I could see him struggling to say whatever it was he had to say. I waited, thinking it was going to be something very important, judging from his expression.

At last, after considerable effort, he managed to finish his sentence: "Sell you any thong underwear."

I burst out into hysterical laughter, my reverent mood shattered, and headed for the hall. In the hall, I stood giggling, very much on the edge of hysteria. It was funny, of course, but it was also sad. I knew that Don, who had been a very dignified guy at bottom, would be horrified if he knew he'd said something so oddly inappropriate about the pastor.

I stood there in the hall, my giggles growing precariously close to sobs, and my brothers-in-law, who had been in the waiting room, stuck their heads cautiously around the corner.

"Are you all right?"

"Fine," I choked out, waving them off. I was amused by their matching expressions of masculine horror: Oh, God, it's a woman in hysterics, what do we do? "I'm okay."

Somehow I got myself back under control. The pastor came out, having prayed with Don, and patted me on the shoulder and said good night. I headed back into the room to a surprise: Don sitting up on the edge of his bed, trying to get to his feet.

I scooted across the room and shoved him back down. In his weakened state, I was able to keep him seated, but he continued struggling to get up. "Hey," I said. "What are you doing?"

He glared at me and tried harder. "I have to go to the bathroom."

"Okay," I said, pushing him back down again. He sounded almost lucid, and he was very, very determined to get out of bed. And as always, when Don had decided he was going to do a thing, he was damn well going to do it. I knew, however, that if he stood up, he'd fall over, and possibly do himself a serious injury. I called for help, and my brothers-in-law materialized, and helped me keep him from standing up.

I retrieved the little bedpan urinal, and helped him pee into it. After what seemed like a very long time, I said, "You're done, right?"

"No," he said grumpily. "I'm not."

I was sure he must be, and I moved the urinal away. He was right, however; a stream of pee went all over the tile floor, and I quickly moved it back.

"I told you," he grumbled, sounding remarkably like the old Don.

We finished taking care of the problem, and his brothers helped me wrestle him back into bed. I wiped up the mess on the floor and got cleaned up, and then said good night to his brothers. Don was leaning forward, over his pillow, still fighting to breathe.

"I love you," I told him, kissing his forehead.

"Mmmm," he mumbled. "I love you too."

Before long, he'd sunk back into what appeared to be a peaceful sleep.

I turned off the lights and stretched out on the fairly comfortable bed/couch. Alone at last, I let myself cry.

*****

March 13, 2007

In the morning, I woke up and cried some more. Finally I got off the couch, stiff and sore, and looked at Don carefully. His eyes were perhaps a third of the way open, but he was clearly unconscious. That looked strange, but I saw that he was still breathing.

“Hey there,” I said.

No response. I shook his shoulder a bit. “Hey, buddy. How’s it going?”

Still no response. I frowned and, spurred by hunger, decided to go grab breakfast before the inlaws came. My inlaws apparently had the same idea, because they called me and told me they were getting breakfast with Don's aunt and uncle, who'd already brought the kids across town.

When I came back from the McDonald’s downstairs, Don was still pretty much the same, and a nurse was in the room. She offered to clean him up, and I agreed that would be a good idea.

Two nurses bathed him, but he didn’t move, or respond in any way. Once he was clean, they put him back on the bed, his head resting on the pillow and turned toward the window. His eyes were still partly open, his mouth open, but I was beginning to realize that he really wasn’t there any longer.

The nice female doctor came in to check on him. I told her what I’d observed, and she studied Don carefully.

“It looks to me like he’s changing quickly,” she said. “If his parents are nearby, you’d better call them.”

“They just called and said they were getting breakfast,” I said. “Do they have time to eat?”

She looked at me sympathetically, and shook her head. “I think you’d better go ahead and call them.”

Read Chapter 20 here.