Life - Message From The Past

35-Sorry Officer

Austin ran into the room. "You have to go! Chast just texted me. The nurse is on her way back up!" He caught his first glimpse of his weak mother. "Mom?"

Jeremy placed his hand on the teenager's shoulder. "Austin, get in the bed. We have to go!"

"Mom!"

"Austin, please!" Madeline pleaded. "You will see her soon! Just get in your mother's bed."

"It'll never work!" Austin had second thoughts.

"It will. Trust me." Madeline persuaded Austin and he got into Gwen's bed.

Madeline passed him the cables. "Lay on your side and hold these next to your chest." Austin held onto the cables as she covered his body leaving his freshly shaved head exposed. "I will drive by in fifteen minutes to pick you up. Text me if you have any trouble."

Austin nodded and Madeline took off for the door. She could not see Jeremy. "Where did he go?"

Madeline heard the familiar ding of the elevator arriving and darted for the small coffee room beside the nurse's station. She held her breath and as she waited her cellphone buzzed.

Patricia could be heard talking to herself as she passed the room Madeline waited in. "Poor kid, I wish I could let her in but...." The head nurse continued to talk to herself as she sat at her desk and resumed the mountain of paperwork.

Madeline peeked out the coffee room door then walked as softly as she could towards the elevator. She only looked back when she turned down the hallway with the elevator. The doctor quietly called for her accomplice in a muffled voice. "Jeremy? Jeremy?"

The door to the public washroom opened. "Maddie." Jeremy took a deep breath. "That was too close for comfort."

"How do we call the elevator without it making the ding?" Madeline whispered.

"I have no idea." Jeremy shrugged. "We'll have to take that chance. We have to go now!" He pressed the call button and the doors opened. "No ding?"

"Get in." Madeline rushed Jeremy and the wheelchair scraped the opening. They looked at each other and scrambled inside.

Patricia's head shot up with the noise and rushed to the sound. With no one around she frowned and walked back to her desk checking her watch. "I need a coffee."

Jeremy was about to hit the floor number but Madeline stopped him. They waited another few moments before he pressed the GL button on the panel.

The elevator arrived at ground level and they made their way to the staff entrance. Madeline pulled on Jeremy's arm. "Let me deactivate the alarm before you go through. Or Patricia will know something fishy is going on!"

Madeline swiped her entry card but the red light did not change. "What happened?" Jeremy looked at the doctor.

"I don't know. It worked getting in!" Madeline shrugged as Jeremy took the pass card from her hand, breathed on it then wiped it on his shirt.

"Try it now." Jeremy handed the card back.

"Ah. Okay." Madeline scrunched her face up as she took the card back and tried it. The light turned green. "It worked!" She held the door open for Jeremy and Gwen.

"Open the sliding door, Maddie!" Jeremy directed the doctor as he engaged the wheel locks and ever so gently raised the woman he loved from the wheelchair.

"Hey Harmony, Mr. Fartham is bringing your mother inside." She reached out for the youngest daughter then watched Jeremy be ever so careful transferring Gwen onto the mattress. "How are you feeling, Gwen?" The doctor knelt beside the mother.