Silence is Worth a Thousand Words

Dial Tones and Tears

The next day at school I was a mess. I had a tear-stained face, which I had tried to clean up with no avail, and my hair and outfit were given no attention. I spent most of my classes pretending to be listening, while trying to ignore my best friend Andrea (it's Ahn-drey-ah, not Ann-dree-uh..she hates it when people get it wrong). She's more hyper than usual today, which is saying a lot.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Andrea was repeatedly poking my arm.

"Ugh, Rea, can you not? I'm not in the mood today!" I snapped, making her recoil and give me a hurt look. "I'm sorry, it's just--" I'd been delaying telling her about my dad.

"What?" She looked genuinely concerned. Not that that was surprising--we've been friends since preschool, and I love her to death. Sure, sometimes she gets on my nerves, but I'm sure I annoy her too. We're both so far from normal that our friendship works perfectly.

"I'll tell you somewhere else, okay?"

"Yeah," she spoke softly, giving me a small, reassuring smile.

At the end of that period we had lunch, and Rea and I took our normal spot out on the grass, under the big tree in front of the school.

"So.." Andrea looked at me questioningly, but I could tell in her eyes and from knowing her for so long that she was okay with not knowing if I wasn't ready to tell her.

"It's my dad--he's in the hospital," I managed not to break down. Yet.

"Oh my god, Maggie," Rea threw her arms around me. She was making it harder to stay calm. A few tears escaped from my eyes, but I wiped them away as quickly as they came.

We talked about everything, from family to school to life in general. When the bell rang, I was immediately reminded that I would have to face three more awful classes.

That evening, as I sat by Dad's hospital bed, I told him about those forty-five minutes of happiness.

As I walked out of the huge doors, escaping the paper mache happiness of the hospital for a minute, I saw Logann's truck pull up. When he got out of the car, he looked solemn.

"The doctors called me today. They said that we are legally forced to at least attempt contact with Marianne. We have to call her until we get an answer, and we have to ask her if she is willing to come down here and help out. If we can't get in touch, then whatever, but we have to try," seeing my disgusted expression, he grimaced,"Trust me, I don't want to do this anymore than you do, but we don't have a choice." I want nothing to do with our biological mother. I can't even call her mom anymore--she doesn't deserve the title.

When we got up to Dad's room, my brother called Marianne five times, and each time the same thing happened:

Hello, you have reached Marianne Wilkins, please leave your message at the tone.

He finally gave up, coming to sit beside me at my father’s side. He squeezed my hand, and I knew that he was trying to be strong for both of us. I couldn’t imagine Logann not being strong, not being my rock. He has always been my turn-to person..and now he’s breaking. I don’t think I can stand that. I don’t think I can live with that. My dad and pretty much every adult calls my mom leaving "the incident". I hate that word. It sounds like she left accidentally, like it was a mistake to leave our family and shove our father, the man she was supposed to love until death, into a state of self-depreciation and depression. It got so bad at one point that he came home drunk every night and eventually got himself into the hospital. We were worried that he was going to drink himself to death, all because our mother decided she was too good for this family. Family is supposed to be always, something you can't just run away from. But apparently family means something else to Marianne Wilkins. Apparently she couldn't deal with the responsibilities of being a mother. Apparently she couldn't sacrifice her needs for her family's. Apparently she couldn't get over her fears of attachment for the good of her own kids and a man she pledged her life to. Apparently she would rather break our hearts than make one small adjustment in her life. Apparently she was just too good for us.

Two days later, I was sitting against my dad's hospital bed, talking to him about my day at school. Then something happened that would change my life forever. Beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeep.

I panicked.

"Logann! Nurse! Doctor! Anyone!" Tears were streaming down my face now. I grabbed my father's hand. It was getting colder.

Logann burst in the door.

"What? What's wrong? Mags, what's wrong?" Logann stopped, pale, in the doorway. "Oh God..Nurse!" He rushed to my side, and a white-clad woman bustled in the door. She checked monitors and tubes, charts and bustled in, checking monitors and tubes and charts. She was taking too long. Come back. Please.

“His heart is giving out,” I could barely hear her anymore. The ringing in my ears was getting so loud. “..doctor. We’ll try everything we can, but he most likely won’t survive much longer. I’m sorry.” No. No. No. That one word repeated in my mind. No. No. No. No.

She shuffled out, calling over her shoulder, “Dr. Richmond will be right with you!”

Logann wrapped his arms around me, to steady me and himself. Doctor Richmond came in the door with a rolling table, on top of which was a machine that looked like something out of a horror movie. He made adjustments and connected things. Everything was getting blurry, either because I was getting light-headed or because I was crying. Maybe both. Come back. Please.

“Clear!” Dr. Richmond cried out. The two nurses that had trailed in behind him stepped back, and Logann pulled me away from the bed.

Chunk. My father’s unconscious body suddenly jumped, scaring me half to death. The evil voice chimed in again, Death. Just like what Dad is soon facing. I scolded myself. Don’t think that way. They’ll find a way to save him. They have to. The doctor placed the shock paddles on my father again and again. “Clear!” Chunk. “Clear!” Chunk. I realized I had Logann’s hand in a death grip. I don’t even remember holding it. “Clear!” Chunk. The beeping grew faster, and I looked up at the monitors surrounding dad’s bed. I didn’t know much about medical things, but I knew that the most important monitor didn’t look like it was supposed to. “Clear!” Chunk. His lifeline was slowly becoming just that--a line. Beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeep. “Clear!” Chunk. Come back. Please. Beepbeepbeepbeepbeep. “Clear!” Chunk. My father’s hand was so cold. Too cold.

“Oh my god..Logann..he’s..” I buried my face in Logann’s shirt, trying not to scream and curse the world. I wished that I could leave too, go somewhere where I didn’t have to feel this pain. It was the worst pain. Worse than the time I broke my arm when I was six--so much worse. Worse than the time our mother left, worse than the time my first boyfriend cheated on me, worse than any other pain in the world. It was like someone took my beating heart and threw it on the ground, smashing it into trillions and trillions of pieces. It was like one of those sad scenes in a movie where someone dies. Those movies don't capture it right at all, though. The pain is much more intense than simply crying to sad music for five minutes in slow motion. It changes your life forever.

"Gone." Logan whispered, almost to himself.