Chapter 10

Oh, holy Mary. Was this happening again?

I looked across the desk at the nurse manager of the emergency department at Midtown General. We were seated together in her office because she’d asked me to come in to talk. The HR rep wasn’t here with us, like when I’d been called in for a meeting and then let go from the emergency department at Detroit Saint Raphael. Didn’t someone from human resources have to attend if you were going to be fired? Was this some kind of awful reprise? I tried to think of what I could have done, and the only thing that came to mind was how I’d fallen asleep in the employee lot in my car with it running (but thankfully still in park). The shuttle bus driver, Grover, had seen me and knocked on the window until I’d woken up.

“Damn, Nicola, are you all right?” he’d asked, obviously concerned. I’d told him that I was, just maybe a little under the weather which made me extra-sleepy. I’d asked that he not share the story of my nap with anyone but he’d probably driven back to the hospital and immediately spilled to his friend Yolanda, the security guard with the Minnie Mouse voice who’d taken down a threatening guy the night before with such skill that other patients had applauded.

“Am I…” I started to ask my manager now, but then thought that it was better to make her spell it out. “Why did you want me to come speak with you today, Shirley?”

And then, rather than frowning solemnly and talking about Major Problems, she began a different conversation.

“She knew that I took a job at Presbyterian,” I explained later the next day, “and she said that she wanted to make sure that I was happy in my position at MGMC because they didn’t want to lose me permanently to another hospital, since I’m a reliable employee and a good nurse.”

Michael considered that and then nodded. “That’s cool.”

“Thanks,” I answered. “It was very nice to hear. I’m happy that they think I’m doing a good job, because I do try pretty hard. I’ve also been considering how I deal with patients and I realized that I’ve been acting like I don’t care about them, which isn’t true. It’s just a lot in the emergency department, a lot of work and a lot of trauma. But many of those people have come there under terrible circumstances. Sometimes the worst circumstances of their lives.” I thought about Jude lying on that bed, and then about the paddles charging for his heart. “Anyway, I recognize it about myself and I’ve been working on changing it.”

He scratched his foot. It had warmed up a lot, and he was wearing only a bathing suit and sunscreen that I’d given to him and his sister. He also had on a hat I’d strongly suggested that he wear. We were sitting in my yard watching Tamara try to stand on her head—the front yard instead of the back, because I was concerned about their bare feet behind the house. I’d checked this area fairly well for glass and/or sharp metal objects but I hadn’t had time to look everywhere yet. Also, when Shannon got home from work, she could see us right here and she wouldn’t have to worry about where they were. She did worry a lot, she’d told me. She checked on the location of Michael’s phone so often that she’d almost gotten fired from one of her jobs.

“Were you being mean to people at your hospital? I thought that nurses were always nice,” he commented. “One time, we had to go there for my grandma, and they blew up the gloves for us to play with.”

“I didn’t know that you guys had other family around here.”

“She died,” he said. “Before, we used to stay with her a lot, but now that she’s dead…”

“Yes, that would mean you can’t stay with her,” I agreed. Next, we talked for a while about the shed in the back and the improvements that Jude had helped them to achieve. It was a lot sturdier and there was a floor, for example, and also all the spider webs were gone. When that topic was played out and Tamara still hadn’t managed to balance on the top of her head, we moved to baseball. Michael always had a lot to say about that so he told me how the teams and his favorite players were doing this season.

It gave me a chance to let my eyes close. I was fully asleep when the kids yelled loudly and I jerked back to my senses. Shannon’s dilapidated car was pulling into their driveway and both her children continued to holler at her, in case she hadn’t yet heard the cacophony or seen them also waving wildly. She walked over to join us and first hugged them, then asked about how their day had gone.

“It was boring,” Michael said, and she looked unhappy about that. When he went inside my house for another snack, she took the empty chair next to mine as Tamara prepared to demonstrate the gymnastics she’d been working on.

“Long night?” she asked me, then applauded for her daughter. “That was a good one, Tam!”

“Thanks, Mommy!” She thumped down onto her butt.

“Did you put those pillows on the ground around her?” her mother asked.

I nodded. Besides this latest fall, Tamara had already tumbled onto them multiple times. I’d also put the cushion under where she was trying to balance her head. “Do you think that I look tired?”

“You usually do,” she said, “but even more lately.”

And this was with all the makeup I’d layered on using the new tricks I’d learned from Cora, my colleague in the Presbyterian Hospital emergency department. I’d guessed that I still looked bad and that was why I’d purposefully been avoiding my reflection in the mirror next to the door as I went out.

“Also, I think you were asleep in that chair when I drove up,” Shannon added. “You were like a dead body.”

“I’m alive.” Barely. “I’ve been picking up some extra work doing home healthcare,” I explained.

“Jesus, really? You’re doing even more? All Jude ever talks about is how many hours you’re at those hospitals.”

“He does?”

She nodded. “He doesn’t like it,” she said. “He worries about you driving around in the middle of the night, too, that somebody’s going to rob you or you’re going to fall asleep.”

That last one was getting even more likely. This morning when I’d left the hospital, I’d slapped myself across the face to stay awake. Or had that happened yesterday? Time was getting weird again. “I have to,” I stated. “I need the money.”

“Tell me about it. I’m going to get canned from the bar. It’s so slow there. But I hate the uniform, anyway.” She made finger quotes as she repeated, “‘Uniform.’ I’m tired of flashing my tits around,” she sighed. “I’ll have to find something else. I’ve been trying to save to take the kids on vacation this summer, to get them out of the city to see new stuff, but something’s always happening. My car’s about to give it up again.”

“I know a guy who knows a guy,” I said, thinking of the person who had fixed my engine when it had sounded explosive, Sergio’s connection. “He helped me out.”

“I’ll take any help I can get.”

“Well, how about a different kind of job?” I asked. “They’re hiring at Presbyterian Hospital for a receptionist position and something in billing.”

“Those are nine to five, right?” When I nodded, she looked at me with the same doubtful expression that her son had worn when I told him that yes, he definitely he had to flush, every time. “I don’t know. I’ve never been too good at that kind of schedule.” She shrugged. “I want to do what I want to do and not be tied down to that shit.”

“You don’t seem like that at all,” I stated, “unless you’ve been lying and you’re actually off messing around when your kids think that you’re at work.”

“The fuck are you saying?” she hissed. “I’m not lying to my kids!”

“Mommy, watch my headstand!” Tamara called, and Shannon turned her eyes forward but still continued the conversation with me.

“I work my ass off and I don’t mess around. I haven’t had a boyfriend in more than a year and I haven’t even smoked a fucking cigarette unless I bummed it, because they’re too expensive.”

“That’s what I mean,” I told her. “You are a nine-to-five person even if you like to think of yourself differently. It’s hard to come to terms with aging.”

“I’m not old! What the fuck?” Her head snapped forward again. “Oh, she almost did it!”

“That one was so close,” I called to Tamara. “You’re going to balance soon.” I also kept my eyes on her as I spoke to her mom. “I’m not saying that you’re old, but you’re also no longer an eighteen-year-old doing whatever you want all the time. A job at the hospital would be steadier and regular hours would make it easier to get childcare. Presbyterian offers benefits and would pay better even without getting tips.”

“I’m not getting many tips when we don’t have customers.” Shannon was quiet for a moment. “You think they would hire me?”

“It’s worth a try. I don’t know if I have any pull there but I’ll put in a good word. At least you wouldn’t have to show your breasts. They frown on that behavior among hospital employees.”

She looked at me and then grinned. “Ok. How do I do it?”

I had to leave for my own job soon enough, but before I did, she’d completed the application. “Thanks,” she said, and I told her sure but then she said it again. “Thank you, Nicola. I mean it.” But I hadn’t done anything except dispense some advice that she’d needed to hear. I bet that if I’d put it on a post-it, though, she would have gotten mad. Maybe it was better to discuss things face-to-face.

I headed to Presbyterian and I did talk to HR about her (although I wasn’t sure how helpful my recommendation would be) and then I got so busy that I forgot about Shannon and her employment. The warm day had turned into a hot, muggy night under a full moon that seemed to have made everyone in the city of Detroit go out, get crazy, and get injured in fights and car accidents. All that happened on top of the usual problems that brought people into the hospital, so we were swamped. At the end of my shift at one that morning, I was behind on charting for some patients who were stuck in the ED and then we got two new admits twenty minutes before I was supposed to be out the door. Needless to say, I was not out the door when I was supposed to go, and I wasn’t sure exactly what time it was when I finally made it to my car and started the drive home. I looked at the clock a few times but I thought something had to be wrong with it, since the numbers looked really fuzzy.

I must have made it back. I did, for sure, because somehow Jude was there, opening my car door.

“Have you been sitting in this car all night?” he asked me. “What are you doing?”

I stared at him and squinted due to the sun that shone so brightly behind him. I was in the garage, my garage, but I didn’t remember getting here.

“Is your nose bleeding? Did you get hurt again?”

His voice was way too loud. “I just fell asleep,” I told him. “My nose isn’t bleeding.” But when I put my hand under it, I found that I was wrong. “Oh. I’m probably dehydrated.”

“Nicola, what the ever-loving fuck? You’re sleeping in your car and spontaneously bleeding? What is going on?” He opened the door as he talked and reached in, undoing my seatbelt. “Let’s wipe that off. The kids are here and they’re going to get worried if they see you so bloody.”

“Ok,” I answered. I tried to search around for my packet of wipes but I couldn’t find my purse. “Did I lose my purse?”

“No, it’s here. Put on your shoes.”

My shoes were off?

“I didn’t hear you come in, but I saw your car this morning so I thought you were in your room,” he said. “You weren’t in your room, and you scared the living shit out of me.” He was lifting me out of the seat as he spoke and also using his sleeve to wipe my face, because I hadn’t found my wipes yet.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“The question is, what are you doing? Killing yourself? This is crazy.” We were moving towards the house, and I saw the kids playing in the yard. I brought up my hand to cover my face in case there was still blood there.

“Hi, Nicola!” Tamara called, but Michael stared.

“Why were you in your garage like that?” he asked.

“She’s all right,” Jude told them.

“I’m fine,” I agreed, but my voice croaked because my throat hurt. I had also been blowing my nose a lot, which would have accounted for the bleeding. “What time is it?”

“Time for you to stop doing this,” he said. “What are you accomplishing with all this work?”

Well, I was keeping a roof over my head and his, and I was trying to get myself into a position so that I could fix Eddie’s. Otherwise, his would fall in.

Jude didn’t listen as I tried to tell him that, though. He was lifting me up the steps, taking my feet right off the ground with his grip around my waist, and then he kept carrying me into the house. He plopped me down onto the couch with enough of a thump that I felt my nose start to spout again. “Sugar,” I mumbled, and he told me to stay there.

“Right there!” He strode angrily toward the kitchen.

“Why are the kids home from school?” I rasped out. “Why are you home from work?” Oh, I remembered: it was summer, but that didn’t explain Jude’s presence unless… “Wait, is it Saturday?” I asked, and stood up. “I’m supposed to be at Eddie’s. He’ll worry if I’m not there.”

“He already is worried. He called me when you didn’t show and that was when I went to look for you. Put your ass back down on that couch.” I did, and he viciously tugged over one of my grandma’s old armchairs and sat in it, facing me. Then he took my chin, a lot more gently, and held a wet cloth up to my nose.

“I can do it myself,” I said. “A nosebleed isn’t a big deal and I’m fine. I’ll take a shower and go over to his house.”

“What’s the date?”

I paused, stilling my hand from wiping off my face. “What?”

“Do you even know what month it is?”

“Yes! It’s…June,” I said, with as much conviction as I could muster. I was pretty sure that it was.

“It’s July,” he informed me. “Tomorrow is the Fourth. Remember the holiday?”

“Holy Mary,” I sighed. “Then I’m supposed to go to my parents’ house for their annual barbecue but I think I picked up—”

“If you’re going to say that you’re working more, stop speaking,” he interrupted. “No.”

“What?” I asked again, before his words totally registered. “What are you saying? I have to go.”

“No,” he repeated. “No, you can’t do this anymore. What if you’d fallen asleep on the road instead of in the garage?”

“I wouldn’t do that. I’ve been working nights for a long time, and I’ve never fallen asleep while driving.” No, not while I was actually moving, but I had dozed off one time at a stop sign, and there was the recent occasion when Grover the shuttle bus driver had encountered me in the parking lot, and I had nodded off at red lights a few other times over the years. Also, on more than a handful of instances, I’d had to pull over to power nap. Yes, I’d gotten tired before, especially when I was doing extra gig-work like I was right now. I’d worked through illnesses too. Once when I was a little sick, I’d felt too tired to drive home, so I’d had to sleep in the hospital lot for several hours, until I had to drive directly over to the other emergency department for that job. I’d known that I shouldn’t have gone in that day, but it had been New Year’s Eve so I couldn’t have missed getting paid time and a half for the holiday. I regularly went in when I had a slight cold like I did now, and it was fine.

“Nicola, you’re a fucking mess. I saw you turn into the wrong driveway yesterday morning, and I saw you trip up the steps two days ago because you were too tired to lift your feet. You fell asleep in the shower, you fell asleep at the kitchen table, you fell asleep—”

“I don’t know what else to do!” I burst out. “He has to have the work done on his house. I have to keep paying my mortgage. What would you suggest? Believe me, whatever you’ve thought of, I have as well. I’ve sold belongings, I’ve sold plasma, I’ve sold my hair. That was a few years ago when I had it really long,” I explained. “I’ve tried other jobs like waitressing, I’ve put too much on credit cards, I’ve even asked my parents for a loan.” They’d said no, and that I needed to learn to live within my means.

“Have you talked to Eddie about this?” Jude demanded. “Because he needs to know how bad it is. He doesn’t understand how you’re killing yourself for him, and he should.”

“No, he doesn’t need to know. I owe him, Jude. I owe him and this is how I’m paying him back. If it kills me, I’m still going to do it.”

We stared at each other.

“You worry about Sergio mishandling his nailer, but it will be worse if you make mistakes at the hospital,” he said flatly. “You’re too exhausted to maintain this pace and you’re going to start messing up with patients. What if you hurt someone?”

“What do you suggest?” I asked again. “You tell me. Tell me a better idea, and I’ll do it. I mean it.” I coughed and my throat hurt more. “Tell me.”

Of course, he didn’t have an answer to get me out of my financial crisis, but he did announce that if I tried to leave the house today then he would physically stop me. I called out for my shift at Midtown General for that night because he was right that I wasn’t going to be able to make it, and he walked behind me up the stairs when I went to my bedroom.

It started to make me angry. Who was this guy to order me around? “I’m fine,” I told him in what sounded like a snarl.

“We’ll talk about this more when you’re in your right mind,” he informed me, and closed the door. I fell asleep again.

Much later, although I wasn’t sure when, I had another of the experiences of waking in a state of utter, frightening confusion. At first, I didn’t even know where I was and then I was sure that I was late for something. I looked around and didn’t see my phone and then I stumbled out of bed but couldn’t find it to tell me the time and date and to look at my schedule. Had yesterday been Saturday or Sunday? Was it still June? I had a sinking, nauseating feeling that several days might have passed and that would have meant that I’d missed multiple shifts at both hospitals.

I had to fix this! I tottered to my door and then almost fell down the stairs as I ran into the kitchen, but as I looked frantically back and forth, I couldn’t see my purse there, either. I had a memory of losing it—I had been looking for it recently, and it had been in my car. Jude had found it there.

Ok, I needed to go to the garage, but I didn’t have my glasses on and I must have taken out my contacts so I wasn’t seeing as well as I needed to. I threw open the front door and then threw up my arm, because the sun was so intense that I almost turned into a pile of ash, vampire-style. I grabbed the railing for balance with my other hand but the rusty metal wobbled, since that was another thing that was on Jude’s list of house parts to repair or replace. And I suddenly remembered that he was mad at me, so here I was lost and blinded by poor vision and the bright sun, with him hating me, and probably no job because I would get fired again for failing to show up. I covered my face with my hands, unable to face this horrible new life.

“What in the hell is the matter with you, Nicola? Are you putting on a play? Is this your entrance?”

I lowered my hands and squinted in the direction that the words had come from. “Eddie?” I asked incredulously.

“I guess you haven’t totally lost your mind,” he answered. “Jude has been sitting here telling me that he thought you might be a few cans short of a six-pack.”

“I didn’t say that,” the voice of Jude told me, and I walked cautiously down the steps and toward the two fuzzy figures in my yard. They became clearer as I approached and I saw Eddie in his wheelchair and my housemate in one of the old beach chairs that we mostly left unfolded now, since the kids came over so often. I stared from one man to the other.

“Good morning,” Jude told me, and I automatically said it back before I turned to the other person on my lawn.

“How did you get here?” I asked Eddie.

“That guy came and got me.” He pointed at my housemate. “Sit down before you fall on your ass. You do look horrible.”

“Not horrible,” Jude corrected. “Just tired. But you should sit.” He pulled the other chair closer and I took it.

“I think I’m supposed to be…” I couldn’t think of where I was supposed to be, but it was definitely somewhere else. “I can’t find my purse and I can’t find my phone.”

“Your purse is on the floor in the kitchen—on the floor on a towel, and your phone is on the counter, silenced and charging. You already called in sick to Midtown General,” he told me. “You don’t need to be anywhere, except later you might want to make an appearance at your parents’ barbecue.”

“Why are they barbecuing today?”

“Today is the Fourth of July. It’s the morning of the Fourth.”

I rubbed my eyes and then my temples. “Are you sure?” I asked him. “What happened to yesterday?”

“Nicola, you slept for twenty-one hours,” he said. “I’ve been checking on you to make sure that you were ok, and you’ve been totally asleep.”

I held up my hand to shade my eyes from the brightness again. “I don’t understand this.”

“First, we need to get out of the sun.” He got up and shifted the position of his chair, helped Eddie to move his, and then pulled me up and carried mine until we were all in the shade of my oak tree. “Is that better?” he asked me.

“I slept for twenty-one hours?”

“Apparently, you needed it.”

I also needed to go to the bathroom, and I also needed to eat. I sat for a while to get my bearings and then I took a shower and got dressed, and Jude stayed with Eddie as I reheated a plate of food that he must have cooked during the time that I was unconscious. I rejoined them outside, and the kids had come over, too.

“You’re Rumpelstiltskin!” Tamara crowed when she saw me.

I thought I remembered that guy from a fairy tale, and if I was correct in my identification, then she meant that I looked like a scary gnome. “I’m Rumpelstiltskin?” I’d actually thought I looked better when I’d seen myself in the bathroom mirror. It had been a little hard to get a full picture, though, because Jude had done something so that the water came out hotter and it had felt so good that I’d stayed in for a while. The glass had been pretty steamy, so maybe I’d misread things. I’d put on lotion, gotten dressed, and even dried my hair a little, all the time feeling like I might be in a dream. I’d checked my phone as the food heated, though, and I wasn’t actually missing anything.

“You mean Rip Van Winkle,” Michael told his sister. “He’s the one that slept. We watched old cartoons about those guys,” he explained to me. They were sprawled in the grass under the tree and I was glad that I’d checked this area for sharp objects. I took my old chair and Tamara sat up and then walked behind me.

“Your hair is pretty,” she announced, so I supposed that she really didn’t think I was a Rumpelstiltskin lookalike. “Can I braid it?”

I hadn’t had anyone do that since Brenna, who loved to style us all. “Yes, but please don’t get anything sticky in it,” I stipulated, and she smiled happily and started to make sections.

“Does your hair grow out of your head in this color?” she asked, holding up a large hunk. “My mom’s doesn’t.”

“My hair is naturally auburn, but no one’s hair is naturally blue like your mom’s,” I answered, and she went back to petting my head as she braided.

I finished the bowl of pasta while Eddie and Michael talked baseball and it seemed like Jude pretended to be interested. He was also monitoring when I was done, because the moment that I finished chewing the final bite, he told the kids to go look at what he’d done to the shed. I reminded them not to take off their shoes, not until I got back there to look more closely at the ground.

“You’re sounding more like yourself,” Jude said as they left. “I’m glad.”

“You like hearing her order people around? Because you’re next,” Eddie told him. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back. “This is a good street. It’s nice out here.”

He didn’t get outside enough, and I knew it. Guilt filled my throat and I coughed.

“You’re still sick, though,” Jude pointed out to me. “You still need to rest. You can do that after we have our discussion.”

“What discussion?” I asked. “I feel like I’m not understanding everything. It’s like one of your sci-fi movies where time is out of whack.” I shook my hair, loosening the braids that Tamara had made.

“When you missed going over to Eddie’s, he and I talked for a while. We thought that the two of you should have a conversation about the future and how things should go, moving forward. And I’m here to make sure that you listen.”

“I’ll can hear perfectly,” I told them both, offended. “There’s nothing wrong with my ears.” It actually did feel as if I had some blockage in my Eustachian tubes, but that was to be expected with a little cold like I had.

“You can hear, but you also need to absorb it,” Jude said and before I could argue anything back, Eddie spoke up.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me that you needed money?”

“I don’t,” I said. “I’m fine.”

“Jude showed me around the outside. Your damn door is too narrow for my chair to fit but he told me the house is falling down inside, too.”

“It is not!”

“No, it isn’t,” Jude agreed. “But it needs work. Otherwise, you’ll end up with the same kinds of problems that Eddie has with his roof and with the pipes that you paid to fix. He told me about that issue,” he explained. “He also explained how he hasn’t needed to worry about property taxes in seven years because you pick them up, and how you’ve taken over paying his mortgage—”

“I had two, but she already took care of one,” Eddie put in, and Jude nodded solemnly.

“That’s a lot to take care of,” he said.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me that you were working like this?” Eddie asked. “I figured you had some rich family in Grosse Pointe giving you money and you were living around here and driving your shitbox to have fun slumming.”

“I don’t enjoy slumming!” I retorted, and then amended that to, “I’m not slumming, either. I’m doing fine. I love my house and my car is good. I like my job, too.”

“Jobs,” my housemate said, emphasizing their plural nature. “And you can’t keep this up.”

“I’ve kept it up for seven years when you weren’t around to see, and there’s no reason for me to stop now.”

“I’m not taking your damn money anymore,” Eddie announced. “You piss me off, Nicola. You piss me off!”

“You better take it, or the roof is going to fall down on your stupid head!”

“We’re going to sit here, without name calling or swearing at each other, and come up with a solution,” Jude said calmly. “The three of us are going to figure this out.” Eddie only glared and I had grave doubts about our capacity to solve any of it. I was also furious at Jude for intervening and at Eddie for reneging on our arrangement. Neither of them understood that I had this under control.

But then I leaned my head back against my beach chair and closed my eyes again. I could have crashed my car. I could have hurt someone else and I could do that to a patient in the emergency department, too. And as hard as I hustled, this situation was not getting better. Like Eddie’s roof, it was deteriorating and I had the sense that it was going to fall apart before long. Maybe something needed to give.

I opened my eyes to see Jude watching me. “When I was in Detroit Saint Raphael, you told me that things could turn around,” he said.

I shook my head. “You can’t really remember what I told you that night.”

“I remember you saying that things could get better. They already have for me. Let’s do this for you, too.”

“All this schmaltzy shit makes me want to upchuck,” Eddie informed us, but then he sighed. “Yeah, let’s make the world a better place and all that. Come on, Nicola. Put on your thinking cap. We can make some changes.”

I was going to try. I had to.