"He can't remember..." Louise announced to the packed waiting room.
They had left Lindsey only twenty minutes earlier and once they got back to Stevie's room, she requested she be alone for awhile as well. She was upset- it was obvious, which was why she wasn't in any mood to speak to her other children about it.
She needed a moment to think. She had questions, a lot of them and instead of being irrational right off the bat, she figured she would give herself time to process it all.
"He can't remember what?" Jackson was sitting with his elbows on his knees, staring right at his younger sister from across the room.
Louise bit down on the inside of her cheek as she shifted all her weight from one foot to the other. "He can't remember mom being older..." it broke her heart telling that to them, but it was worse watching it.
"What?" Harper pushed herself up off the plastic sofa abruptly, almost like there was something she could do about it.
She had tears in her eyes as she recounted what had happened. "He looked at her like she was a total stranger..." Louise lingered, heart literally breaking as she thought back to the look on Stevie's face when he asked her who she was... "There was nothing there for him." She added. "No emotion, no love... It was like he felt nothing for her." She felt like she couldn't properly describe the feeling in the room. "He was just so surprised at how old she is now...."
It was one of those moments that felt like the world had stopped turning... Lindsey had never looked at his wife like that and it made Louise's stomach hurt just thinking about it.
"They're going to see what's going on, but-"
"How could they not have caught that on any tests?" Harper wondered, heart beating out of her chest as she thought about what the really meant.
If he couldn't remember their mother, he surely wouldn't remember any of them, or any of his grandchildren... They would all be strangers to him.
"I don't know..." Louise shrugged lightly, not sure what her sister was expecting from her. She wasn't a doctor.
"I bet mom is so upset." Grayson couldn't sit still- he was up, pacing the floors.
"What'd she say?" Nora wondered, eyes traveling over to Louise once more.
The blonde swallowed hard, tears blurring her vision as she thought back on that moment. "She just wanted to be alone after the nurse got her out of the room." She recalled.
"Maybe he just needs some time to wake up and when sees her again, he'll just..." Jackson paused for a second, not sure what else to say. "Remember." He mumbled in an unenthusiastic tone of voice.
"I don't know..." Louise admitted as she felt the tears finally stream down her cheeks. "I don't know, but mom does want us all to head home and get some rest."
Stevie had said that before they saw Lindsey. She didn't want them all staying in that cramped up room, worrying about their parents, when four of them had their own children to worry about.
"She wants us to be with our kids." She repeated the same words Stevie had said.
Nodding lightly, Jackson pushed himself up first. "Yeah, I gotta coach tonight." He announced, even though that was the last thing he was focused on.
"Addie called and said she would swing by here to hang out for awhile with mom." Grayson mentioned his conversation with his wife as he grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair.
"That's sweet." Harper nodded, picking up her purse and bottle of water to head out. "I'll be back tonight, after I pick up the kids from school." She assured, sad to be leaving but knowing it was needed.
"Yeah, I need to go too." Louise had two babies at home and her social clock had timed out long before.
She could only handle so much and then she broke... She was on the verge of having an anxiety attack waiting in that hospital.
Nora sat there, watching them each grab their belongs. "I don't want her to be totally alone here." She shrugged, knowing that Stevie would be, considering the fact that not even her husband, who was four rooms away was any comfort to her. "So I'll stay, in case she needs anything." Nora knew that their mother would never leave any of them, even they told her to.
And besides, Nora didn't have anyone else... She didn't have kids to get from school, or a house to take care of, or a husband to cook dinner for.
She had nineteen dollars in her checking and a pack of Marlboro lights...
"I'll bring you all dinner tonight." Louise mentioned as she slowly headed for the door. "I'm going to make chicken." She added, which caused all four of her siblings to wrinkle their nose causally.
No one cooked quite as bad as Louise- not even Lindsey.
"Thank you," Nora forced a little smile, already knowing their was no way they could feed their mother whatever her younger cooked. "See ya later." She waved lightly, sitting back in the chair with the throw blanket she'd brought.
"I'll bring food..." Harper whispered on her way out with a soft wink.
Nora chuckled, giving her two thumbs up. "A hero, you are."
~~~
Lindsey sat in silence for a long time, staring down at the wedding ring on his left hand as he tried hard to remember... anything about the last forty- something years.
He didn't mean to be rude to her, but that's not what she looked like the last he could recall.... No, she was like twenty- six with a long skirt, halter top, wild curls, and definitely not a mother of five. But then again, when he looked in the mirror he didn't recognize himself either.
He was confused... very.
"You said five kids...?" Lindsey asked the nurse, just to clarify that he'd heard her right.
She nodded softly, reading over the monitors for what seemed like the ten time in just hours. "You have five kids." She assured, which she knew had to be shocking for someone who just woke and didn't remember the last four decades.
"Was I mean to her?" He wondered, going back to that moment with his wife... seemed weird to call her that when he didn't remember any of it.
"She knows you're confused, so I'm sure she isn't even thinking twice about it." The nurse was actually certain that Stevie wasn't thinking of anything else, but she wasn't going to say that.
He sank down, thinking about it for a moment before he replied. "How old am I?" Lindsey wasn't sure he wanted to know...
"You're sixty- six." She replied, which caused him to wince.
"Cool..." he mumbled, not at all enthused with that answer.
