But no. I’m wrong.
So wrong. I’ve seen this before, in my surgery, and at an airport when a man who’d rushed to catch his flight dropped dead in front of me. Lucy is not pretending.Time slows.
I grab at her, to stop her head cracking on the sidewalk. One leg buckles beneath her, the other at an angle the elegant Lucy would never choose. Gently I release the leg from under her. I place it beside the other, but it lolls out. Her shoe dislodges, revealing one shapely foot. I’m distracted by her legs. They are irrelevant. I know this. There’s no time to waste.
“Lucy? Lucy?” I search in every direction. A nursing student lives in our building. Where is she when we need her? Anyone? Another doctor. I need an ambulance. Nobody. Nothing but Lucy in complete disarray, motionless in her distress, helpless in this fight for her life.
“Help; help us!”
I scrabble and snatch at my phone. I stab in the emergency numbers, bark out the road names, scan the street for anyone who can help. Did the message get through?
“Help us!” I bellow, again and again. Time stalls, then stops.
Lucy’s lips begin to turn blue beneath that too-bright lipstick, twinned so carefully with her nail polish. My stylish Lucy. Her eyes are closed, every darting challenge, gone. This can’t be. This lively mind, stilled. If only it were just a trick.
There’s one silver eyelash at the edge of each eyelid, the closed lids delicate, translucent. Lucy. My Lucy. Will I lose another love? I can’t bear it. The kiss of life... I learned it so long ago, at medical college, back when my only job was to learn as much and run as fast as I could. I spur myself to action.
Lucy knows how to kiss. Our first kiss, so surprisingly sweet, hovers between our bodies, but I yank my mind to the present.
These lips are too still, helpless, devoid of all pretense, of all manipulation, of all passion; her musical voice, silenced. There’s no time to lose, but at least I know how to do this.
I drop on my knees to the sidewalk and bend to her. I tilt her head, feel her neck for a pulse, without success, and clamp my right hand around her chin – the pistol grip. I inhale deeply, open her mouth, and place my lips on hers, still warm, thank goodness. I count as I exhale. I’ve only had to do this a couple of times in my surgery. I can’t remember the counting.
I breathe into her mouth, two three. I turn my head to the right to feel my own breath exhaled from her body back at my cheek, and watch her chest fall. At the edge of my vision, her diamonds sparkle and dance in the sunlight, grotesquely lively against the stillness of her fingers.
I must breathe for Lucy – give her my own life’s breath, and do this right.
I feel for her pulse at her neck with the fingertips of my left hand, but again, there’s nothing.
I breathe for her again, knowing I must do more.
I unbutton her blouse, of softest silk. She loves this blouse; told me with pride it cost a small fortune. Normally the color brings out the rosiness of her cheeks. Now? They’re gray.
Gently, quickly, I reach behind to unclip her bra, her skin still warm and soft as velvet. Why didn’t I linger with her longer, as she asked me to do? We could have done this together, explored each other’s bodies at leisure, in gratitude, not like this, frantic, desperate. Is it all too late?
I breathe my own oxygen through her body again, to keep that sharp mind alive. I am her lifeline. Lucy’s never needed me more and I know it now, in my heart and mind and body and soul – I will give her everything I have.
My knees scream in pain as I rise a little to gain purchase. I find the space below her decolletage where her heart lives, her treacherous heart. I must press the heels of my hands on her sternum and pump, force her blood around her veins. This is no time for modesty. I can’t waste a second. To push too gently will fail her, yet I’m loath to break her ribs, perhaps to pierce her lungs.
Lucy’s face turns grayer before my eyes and urgency propels me forwards. With one hand flat across the hollow between her breasts and the heel of the other on top, I straighten my right arm and let it take my weight. Push, two, three; push, two, three; push, two three.
I turn back to her lips again, her lipstick smeared and grotesque from my efforts. She’d hate this, all of it, yet I can’t stop. I breathe for her and count again and feel for her pulse and pump at her heart again and again. I am a machine. I am her heart and her breath. I am her life, and she is mine, my one reason for being, my chance to get this right. She is the meaning of my life, this helpless, lifeless, beautiful woman, my Lucy.
I hear the siren, but do not stop; do not look up.
Boots and uniformed legs surround me. Strong arms grab my shoulders and pull me away as they tear more of her blouse and apply a machine. The shocks make her whole beautiful body kick and shudder as I rise to my feet.
She’s onto a stretcher and into the ambulance before someone approaches me.
“Sir, your wife ...”
“Lucy’s not ...” I can’t even say it.
At a shout from a colleague in the driver’s seat the paramedic drops my arm and springs into the passenger seat and the ambulance screams away, lights flashing, siren blaring.
I don’t even know where they’ve taken her.
I sink onto the front fence, my head in my hands. I’ve lost her before we could truly find each other.
