She walked over to my sleeping grandmother and kissed her forehead. I did the same, and then we left the room. Hospital staff rushed by us, and I shuddered. The last time I’d been in a hospital was when my father was hurt and later died on the operating table from his injuries. My greatest wish was to get my grandmother out as quickly as possible. There was no doubt they saved lives here, but I had little love for the place.
“Are you coming home with me?” My mother pressed the elevator button. “I can make lunch. I’m so exhausted, I might just take a nap. I barely slept last night.”
“I don’t know. I can’t think much about eating.”
The elevator doors opened, and Ezra stepped out. He wore a black leather jacket and a green sweater that brought out the green flecks in his eyes, with a black-and-white scarf around his neck. All he needed was a dog and a sailboat, and he’d be the perfect model for any high-end fashion advertisement.
“Oh, hi. I was coming to see how Nettie was doing.” I didn’t have time to hide my surprise. “Roe, is she okay?”
We stepped aside so the other people waiting for the elevator could move in. While I struggled to process the fact that he’d come to the hospital and the reasons behind it, my mother hugged him. “Nettie’s sleeping. She did have a stroke, but it could’ve been much worse. She can speak, a little slurred, but you can understand her.”
“That’s wonderful. I thought about her all morning and was pretty useless at work, wondering what was going on here.”
I finally rediscovered the ability to speak. “So you decided to come and see for yourself?”
He flashed me a smile. “I’d hoped I could take you both out to lunch. Maybe give you a break from all the sitting around.”
“My mother and I were about to go home and figure that out.”
“I’m really pretty tired, honey. I think I’m just going to take a nap.” My mother pushed the elevator button, and this time when it came, we all took it down to the main level.
“You need to eat something,” I told her as we walked toward the nearest train, several blocks away. The sun shone bright, but a sudden fall chill had me shivering. I zipped up my jacket, wishing I had a scarf.
“I’m still full from breakfast. Why don’t you and Ezra go have some lunch?” She deliberately avoided eye contact with me, staring up at the traffic light.
Ezra whispered in my ear, “I think she’s trying to get us to have lunch alone.”
“Brilliant deduction, Watson.”
“I’d like that. I really wanted to have some time to talk to you. What do you say?”
I shivered again, but maybe not from the weather. Maybe it was my close proximity to Ezra. “Mom, you’re pretty transparent.”
Her eyes danced. “Really? Damn. I thought I was better than that.”
A heavy weight lifted off my chest. It looked like Grandma might pull through okay, and Ezra and I were now able to spend an hour together without wanting to kill each other. The kissing, however, was still very much a factor, something I needed to stop thinking about.
“Are you sure, Mom? I don’t want you to be alone.” My sex life, which had never been much to think about, could wait. My family was my number one priority.
“But I do,” she insisted. “Nothing against you. I’m tired and cranky and want to rest before we go back this afternoon. And you can talk to Ezra without me hanging around.”
“Deborah, let me send you home in a car,” Ezra said, pulling out his phone. “It’s the least I can do.”
We’d reached the subway station, and my mother got out her MetroCard. “No, don’t be ridiculous. I can take the train. It’s no big deal.”
With a smile that could turn heads from across the street, Ezra shook his head. “It is to me. Let me do this, since I stole your lunch date.”
I wondered if my mother was lonely without my father. It wasn’t something we ever talked about, but she was still relatively young, and I, selfishly wrapped up in my own life, rarely gave hers a thought.
“I’m willingly giving him to you.”
“Um, hello. I’m right here, you know.”
Ezra directed that movie-star smile toward me. “Oh, I know. And don’t you agree with me that your mother should go home in a car? She’s tired and distracted, and it’s not good to travel alone on the trains when you feel like that.”
The last thing I expected was for Ezra to care about my mother’s welfare, or anyone else’s. But perhaps, I thought, watching his grin turn both questioning and hopeful, I’d been too judgmental. Holding on to decades-old anger was foolish and childish and served no purpose other than to feed my discontent. I spent my days listening to people grieving, and I counseled them on not only learning to manage old wounds and the pain, but how to forge a life beyond the past. I’d yet to learn to do that.Physician heal thyself.
Hair blowing in the breeze, my mother waited, and I knew what she’d tell me.
