Chapter 6: The Hospital

I got to her before Teo did, but only by a step.

Gran was on her side on the linoleum, gray in the face, her cards scattered around her.

"Gran. Gran, look at me."

Her lips were blue. Her eyes found mine and wandered off.

Teo was already on the phone, giving our address in a voice.

Dilly stood in the hall doorway in her pajamas with the white bird on her head.

She didn't cry. She never cries when it matters.

"The cat says her heart is too tired," she said.

"Her heart's fine," I said, and pressed two fingers to Gran's neck, and couldn't find anything.

Teo knelt on the other side of her.

He put the heel of his hand on her breastbone and started pushing, steady, counting under his breath in Italian.

He kept it up until the ambulance came.

By midnight Gran was on the sixth floor of the hospital in Oakland, in the cardiac unit.

She had a mask over her face and wires coming out of her.

The doctor said the next forty-eight hours would tell us.

Teo stood in the hall with his coat over his arm, looking at Gran through the glass.

"Go home," I said.

"I'll leave a man in the lobby."

"Fine. Go home."

"Etta."

"Please. I can't do you right now."

He looked at me a long moment. Then he went.

They let Dilly and me stay in the family lounge at the end of the hall.

Two vinyl couches, a vending machine, and a window that looked out over the parking garage.

I put my jacket over Dilly and sat by her feet.

I must have fallen asleep sitting up, because the next thing I knew, she was tugging my sleeve.

The clock on the wall said 1:20.

She was standing on the couch with her face to the window.

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