A crowd had gathered by the sloppy-joe station, cheering and playfully shoving the guy in the center. Stevens was back. He’d made a nearly full recovery. Chase’s heart warmed at the sight of him, but then she immediately thought about Jamie again.
“How is she?” Chase asked.
Norah’s expression dropped, and she shook her head. “Not good.”
“What’s that mean?”
“She’s maxed out on the vent, and sats are still barely above 92%. I don’t think she’s going to make it, Chase.”
Norah’s eyes welled, and Chase could see they must have been swollen and pink from crying like that for most of the day. She hated to see Norah cry.
“We need to give it more time, okay? It’s only been a day.”
“She should be better by now.”
“You know there’s no way to predict that outcome. We just need to give it more time.”
Norah glanced back at the crowd, satisfied no one was paying any attention to her or her tears, but she still shut them off in an almost robotic fashion.
“You’re right. We just need to give it more time.”
Two more days passed without word about Jamie. Norah wasn’t sure how to take that news, but she tried to hang on to “nonews is good news.” They occupied their time with data sheets and vaccine rollouts and, of course, any and all updates they could find on Birtimamab. Another case study had come out from St. Louis that week. A thirty-two-year-old marathon runner was treated with Birtimamab after being on life support for eighteen days. Four days after receiving the treatment she was extubated and talking. It was that hope Norah kept close as the hours ticked by. They spent every night in Norah’s bed, crammed together on the small cot, holding each other and whispering about that same hope. Chase would talk about taking Norah to the zoo to see the capybaras when they got home. She would weave fairytales about wine-tasting in the North Georgia mountains and tell Norah how she couldn’t wait to cook her famous ribeye and red potatoes and show her the view of the city from Chase’s living-room window.
Norah didn’t argue with her. She didn’t tell her these things were beyond impractical. She didn’t tell her that once they left Louisiana, they would have to go back to the way things were. Norah knew Chase knew that fact deep down. Besides, the fantasy was as nice for Norah to live in as it was for Chase.
The morning of the second day, Norah felt an undeniable pull to go back and see Jamie again. She didn’t intend to keep her plan from Chase this time.
“Do you mind if I go with you?”
“I want you to,” Norah said, slipping on her boots and lacing them tight. She didn’t fight Chase when she got into the driver’s seat this time, thinking if it was anything like her last visit, she’d be crying all the way home.
In spite of the cheery conversation and the soft melody of the radio, Norah was sick to her stomach. Something was telling her Jamie wasn’t going to make it. Call it intuition, or call it purely clinical knowledge about the very dire prognosis of someone in Jamie’s condition, but Norah couldn’t shake the dark cloud that hung over her.
There was no change in Jamie’s status when they arrived.
The ventilator was still maxed out. She was still entirely unresponsive, despite the fact her team had lightened her sedation earlier in the day. And her blood pressure had trended down enough that she was getting medication through her IV to normalize it—a sign that often signaled the beginning of the end.
Norah could see on Chase’s face that she was thinking the same thing. It wasn’t just Norah being scared, or pessimistic. Things were really as bad as she thought they were.
Something about leaving Jamie that day felt like good-bye.
Chapter Twenty-one
The phone rang at 6:58 a.m. the following morning. It was Jeff Timmons. Norah knew before she answered.
Jamie was gone.
Grief is a funny thing. Norah had mourned her brother’s death so hard she thought it would break her. She cried until her eyes physically hurt. She stayed in bed for days on end. She lost so much weight, even her sweatpants were loose on her. But losing Jamie was almost…worse. You can’t really compare loss. Norah had known Davey her whole life, whereas she’d known Jamie for only a couple of months. But the unbelievable sadness that had engulfed her since finding out about Jamie was somehow unlike any pain she’d ever known. She had killed her. Norah had killed her friend.
John took on the brunt of the work for the next few days. And Chase never left Norah’s side. She held her. She cried with her. And on the rare occasion they could manage it, she laughed with her.
“I want to start planning Jamie’s service,” Chase said on the afternoon of the third day. She’d coaxed Norah into eating a few bites of a turkey sandwich, the first thing she’d had in twenty-fourhours, and for the moment at least, Norah felt like she might survive this grief. At least as long as she had Chase here.
“God. I didn’t even think of that.”
“I’m going to take care of it, okay? I’ve already started talking to John and a couple of the others about it. I think we should do it out on that place that overlooks the bayou, the spot she always liked.”
Norah’s heart swelled. The juxtaposition between the Chase who wanted to pick wildflowers to put out and have photos printed from Jamie’s social media and call her family in on Zoom, and the Chase who had left Norah entirely alone to plan Davey’s memorial, was enough to give her whiplash. Chase had shown her repeatedly since their reunion that time had changed her. She had been there for Norah every time. And she was doing it again in the biggest way possible.
