Chapter 7: Visiting Hours

The Elk Fork hospital has one waiting room, and at six in the morning the whole Cheadle family was in it.

My aunt and uncle sat in the corner with paper cups.

My mother sat with her hands in her lap, still in her coat.

Daisy stood by the vending machine with her phone dark in her fist.

When I came through the doors, she turned.

"You have some nerve," she said, softly enough that the desk nurse wouldn't hear.

"How is he?"

"A doctor's with him. They said it's a blockage." Her chin shook, and then it steadied. "If he dies, it's on you."

"Daisy."

"It's on you, Della." She stepped closer. "Again."

She said it very quietly.

Nobody in the corner looked up.

I had heard some version of that line for eight years, in the kitchen, in the car, at the Fourth of July.

Again.

She was twenty-three, and she said it like she had been practicing.

I looked at my mother, and my mother looked at the floor.

"I came to see my father," I said. "I'm not here to fight."

"You already did."

"Then I'll wait."

I sat down in the farthest chair, with my coat on over the bare place on my back.

Peg came out of the hallway at seven.

She had a small knitted bag over her arm and her hair pinned up neat.

She sat in the chair beside me without a word and put her hand over mine on the armrest.

It was a thin, dry, strong hand.

I turned mine over and held on.

A doctor came out at half past and told the family that Russ had a blockage, that it was treatable, and that they would place a stent that afternoon.

"He's awake," the doctor said. "He's asking for people. Two at a time, please."

My mother and Daisy went in first.

They came out ten minutes later, and my mother had been crying.

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