“Are you okay?” my dad asked me, ignoring him.
I nodded, mute. Then a light came on behind them, and I heard my mother’s voice. “Peyton? What’s going on down there?”
I looked back at my dad, at Ames’s face, now bright red. There was no way to explain this quickly, and I had little, if any, time left. So as my father pushed Ames into a chair in the kitchen, and my mother’s shadow grew visible, then larger, as she came down the stairs, I slipped into my car.
My wrists ached, and I could still feel his fingers, pressing hard on my chin. But shaken as I was, I knew there were people who needed me, and whatever else happened here would have to wait. As I reached up, hitting the button for the garage door on my visor, it seemed fitting that the same familiar creaking and grinding—just like my father leaving the night of Peyton’s arrest and my mom arriving home those lonely afternoons—would signal the start to whatever this was, as well. It had become the sound at which our lives in this house briefly revealed themselves to the world before going hidden again. When I backed down the driveway, I didn’t even look to see if anyone had come out to try to stop me—I didn’t want to know. I left the door open behind me.
*
At every stoplight on the way across town to the hospital, even as my head swam with everything that had happened, I checked my phone. I knew Mac: he’d tell me not to worry as soon as there was no reason to. No messages.
U General was all lit up and busy. I parked in a nearby lot, then hurried over to the emergency room, which was crowded and loud, like Jackson but with more adults and crying babies. After I waited for a long fifteen minutes, a nurse informed me that Mrs. Chatham had been admitted and wrote a room number on a scrap of paper: 919. In the elevator going up, I kept looking down at it, like it might carry some hint of what I’d find once I got there. Magical thinking, in the most real of times. When the doors slid open, I stuffed it in my pocket.
With each thing I did—pushing the button for nine, watching the floor numbers climb, taking those first steps down the scuffed, worn linoleum of the hallway—I imagined another action happening as well. My mom awakened by the sound of the scuffle downstairs, or our voices. Seeing my father and Ames in the kitchen before spinning to look for me. Going to my room, finding the note. Scrambling into her clothes, then getting in the car to follow me. Two lives moving separately, but about to intersect soon, not unlike Peyton and David Ibarra on another night. In any moment, there were so many chances for paths to cross and people to clash, come together, or do any number of things in between. It was amazing we could live at all, knowing all that could occur purely by chance. But what was the alternative?
It—not living—was close here at the hospital. I could see it in the rooms I passed, with beeping machines, curtains pulled or open, sighs and moans. At the end of a hallway, I saw a sign: FAMILY WAITING. The room, which was filled with couches and recliners, a TV playing on mute in one corner, was empty. But there was a guitar case leaning against one wall, a duffel bag beside it. And on the lone table, a purse I recognized on a pulled-out chair and a bubble gum YumYum, already licked, on a napkin. They had been here, recently. And left in a hurry.
919, I thought, going back out into the hallway. The rooms blurred as I passed them, focused only on the numbers, always the numbers. 927. I pictured my mom at the wheel, driving in the dark. 925. The hospital finally appearing in the distance. 923. That same bright, busy lobby. 921. So little time. And then I was there.
The door was open. I stopped outside, breathing hard. Just over the threshold, his huge, broad back to me, was Irv. Rosie, in a Mariposa jacket and her ponytail, seemed tiny next to him, holding his hand. Grasping her other one was Eric, hat off, his face looking young and scared. Then Layla, hair loose over her shoulders and staring straight ahead, and Mac beside her. Together, they circled the bed where Mrs. Chatham lay, oxygen mask on, eyes closed. Mr. Chatham sat in the only chair, his head in his hands.
In my pocket, my phone buzzed. I knew who it was, and that it would be the first call of many. But I didn’t budge. Instead, it was Mr. Chatham who moved, somehow prompted to spot me, and then Layla turned as well.
As our eyes met, I thought again of that long-ago afternoon in the courthouse. When faced with the scariest of things, all you want is to turn away, hide in your own invisible place. But you can’t. That’s why it’s not only important for us to be seen, but to have someone to look for us, as well.
Layla let go of Mac’s hand, then held her own out to me. As I went to stand between them, closing the circle, I could feel Mac looking at me. But my eyes were only on her. Then I kept them open, wide, as she closed her own.
CHAPTER
25