I pulled a chair close to the bed. Took her hand. It felt fragile. Too light. Like she was already halfway gone.
“I’m here,” I whispered. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here when it happened, but I’m here now and I’m not going anywhere.”
She didn’t respond. Didn’t open her eyes. Just lay there breathing with the help of machines, and I sat there holding her hand and trying not to think about what happened if those machines stopped.
Jack appeared with water I didn’t want and a sandwich I couldn’t eat. He set them on the table beside me withoutcomment, then settled into the chair against the wall like he was planning to stay.
“You don’t have to stay right here. We don’t know when she’ll wake—” I started.
“I’m staying, Pauline.” He met my eyes. “I’m not leaving you alone with this. Don’t argue. We’ll focus on your grandmother.”
I turned back to the bed. Squeezed my grandmother’s hand. “Okay.”
Dawn came eventually—grey light filtering through blinds that didn’t quite close. The hospital began its morning routine—shift changes, breakfast trays, doctors making rounds.
But it was the sound of monitors screaming that tore me awake from where I sat on the bedside chair.
Alarms. Loud, piercing, the kind that meant something terrible was happening. Nurses rushed in from everywhere, and someone was pushing me back, moving me away from the bed while they swarmed around my grandmother.
“What’s happening?” My voice came out strangled. “What’s?—”
“We need you to wait outside.” A nurse—kind eyes, firm hands—guided me toward the door. “Just for a few minutes. Let us work.”
“No. I need to?—”
“Pauline.” Jack’s hands on my shoulders. His voice in my ear. “Come on. Let them work.”
He pulled me into the hallway. The door closed between us and whatever was happening in that room, and I stood there with my back against the wall, watching through the window as strangers worked to save the woman who’d saved me first.
I couldn’t see details—just shapes, movement, the organized chaos of a medical emergency. My grandmother somewhere in the center of it, small and still while machines beeped and monitors flashed and people did things with hands that moved too fast to follow.
Jack stood beside me. Didn’t try to offer comfort because there wasn’t any comfort to offer.
Time stretched. Minutes felt like hours. I counted heartbeats because I couldn’t count anything else.
Then the alarms stopped.
The frantic movement slowed. Normalized. The nurses stepped back from the bed one by one, their body language shifting from crisis to something that looked almost like relief.
A doctor emerged. The same one from this morning. She looked tired but not devastated, which had to mean something good.
“She’s stable,” the doctor said.
That word again. Stable. I was starting to hate it.
“What happened?” My voice sounded foreign. Too scared.
“Another small stroke. We were able to intervene quickly, prevent further damage. But…” The doctor paused. Seeming to choose her words carefully. “These recurring events indicate significant instability. We’ll be monitoring her closely, but you should prepare yourself for the possibility that she may not recover from this.”
Prepare yourself.
As if there was any way to prepare for this. As if you could ready yourself for the moment the person who raised you stops existing.
I nodded like I understood. Like those words made sense. As if anything made sense.
The doctor left. Jack’s arm came around my shoulders, and I leaned into him because standing suddenly felt like too much effort.
“She’s still here,” he said quietly. “That’s what matters right now. She’s still here.”
