The Sleepless Roads

Chapter 5

Tubes. Wires. Machines. Beeping. The forced, harsh rasp of the respirator. On the other side of the glass, under yards of gauze and medical tape, was not the girl he knew. She was a container for saline solutions and other people's blood. A testament to modern medicine's ability to keep absolutely nothing held together in the shape of a person. Padraig couldn't feel her anymore, not even this close.

"The brain trauma is too extensive," Evelyn volunteered from beside him, seemingly reading his thoughts. They stood quiet vigil from outside her ICU room, eyes locked on the badly swollen face at the nucleus of bandages and apparatus.

Conversations were taking place in hushed tones behind them, between her mother and the neurological specialist that had examined her, that they both knew would soon make this distance, this sterile barrier, obsolete.

"There's nothing to be done for it."

"Evelyn, you know I never--"

"I know, dear. She hasn't been well in quite some time. This is tragic, not surprising. Let's not go confusing the two. No one could rationally blame this on you."

Padraig frowned and accepted that she was right. Though he was not often a rational man.

"Your daughter seems to think otherwise." Rightfully so, he added to himself.

"She is grieving. We all are. Some of us just deal with it differently than others. Her anger will fade in time. Or not. But you must know that at least some of this is projection. You were there for her in ways that not many can claim. Not even Catherine."

Padraig felt an unexpected hand on his arm, a gentle squeeze, though her eyes never left her granddaughter's face.

"She talked about you often in her more lucid moments. Maybe even more when she was less so." Morgan's strength had come almost entirely from her grandmother. It was probably the only thing that had kept her going as long as she had. "More than anything she wanted to know where you had gone."

"I wanted to visit."

"No, you didn't." There was no anger, no malice in her tone, no venom behind the words. It was a simple statement, as matter of fact as if she were remarking on the weather. "I didn't. And I was...am...her grandmother, for god's sakes. Who wants to hear their grandchild talk about the voices in their head, or how the demons are close now, or how she has to die to keep the monsters from finding her?"

Padraig stiffened at her comment, reflexively, paranoia creeping in, only to be relieved by another gentle, reassuring squeeze of his arm. There was, of course, no way she could know.

"Someone who wanted to help her fight those monsters, I suppose."

"You tried, Padraig. Even she recognized that. She always seemed calmer around you or thinking about you. On the bad days, I would bring you up just to...to have a conversation about something real to her, I suppose.

"She would always tell me how you were out there looking for a way to fix her, were going to find a way to make it better, that you were going to take her home. And she'd smile, and stare out the window, and hum that song of yours..."

She felt him pull away and realized she was treading on raw nerves. "But you can only do so much," she quickly appended. "You can't slay demons that don't exist."

Padraig gave a slight nod. They settled back in to a sorrowful, companionable silence, the only two people left in the world who had genuinely tried to understand what was left of the girl in the hospital room. The two people who felt most like they had failed her, although for vastly different reasons.

"Did she...ever say anything else?" Padraig ventured, trying to get an idea of how they'd gotten here in the four years since he had last seen her. "Was there any indication that she was going to try to..." His voice trailed off, failing to find any diplomatic way to continue.