The paramedic had asked me how long Maggie had been unwell.<\/p>\n
I had answered him more than once.<\/p>\n
Three days.<\/p>\n
Maybe four.<\/p>\n
I wished the number would become clearer if I thought hard enough.<\/p>\n
It didn't.<\/p>\n
I sat beside Maggie and tried to remember the last time I had seen her feeling completely well.<\/p>\n
I wanted a definite moment.<\/p>\n
Something I could point to.<\/p>\n
A morning.<\/p>\n
A conversation.<\/p>\n
A time when I had looked at her and known everything was normal.<\/p>\n
Instead, I kept returning to the same uncertainty.<\/p>\n
She had been unwell for days.<\/p>\n
I had not understood how serious it was.<\/p>\n
And now she was lying beside me, barely able to keep her eyes open.<\/p>\n
I looked at her face.<\/p>\n
"Maggie."<\/p>\n
Her eyelids moved.<\/p>\n
I leaned closer.<\/p>\n
"It's me."<\/p>\n
She opened her eyes slightly.<\/p>\n
I wanted to ask her what had happened.<\/p>\n
I wanted her to help me put the pieces together.<\/p>\n
Then I saw how tired she looked.<\/p>\n
I swallowed the question.<\/p>\n
"Never mind, sweetheart."<\/p>\n
She watched me for another second.<\/p>\n
"You just rest."<\/p>\n
Her eyes closed again.<\/p>\n
I sat back.<\/p>\n
There was something cruel about needing answers from the one person who was too ill to give them.<\/p>\n
I knew Maggie had answers of her own.<\/p>\n
She knew what she had felt.<\/p>\n
She knew what she had experienced during those days.<\/p>\n
Perhaps there were things she had tried to tell me.<\/p>\n
Perhaps there were things I hadn't understood.<\/p>\n
I couldn't know any of that while she lay so weak.<\/p>\n
And I had to stop expecting her to explain herself.<\/p>\n
The paramedic looked at me.<\/p>\n
"Do you need something?"<\/p>\n
I shook my head.<\/p>\n
"No. Thank you."<\/p>\n
He nodded.<\/p>\n
I hesitated.<\/p>\n
"Actually, can I ask you something?"<\/p>\n
"Go ahead."<\/p>\n
I looked toward Maggie.<\/p>\n
"Would it make any difference if I knew exactly when this started?"<\/p>\n
He considered the question.<\/p>\n
"Any information about her symptoms and when they began can be helpful."<\/p>\n
I nodded slowly.<\/p>\n
"Right."<\/p>\n
I looked down at my hands.<\/p>\n
"I just can't give you an exact answer."<\/p>\n
He didn't criticize me.<\/p>\n
He simply continued attending to Maggie.<\/p>\n
I was grateful for that.<\/p>\n
I had already criticized myself enough.<\/p>\n
The ambulance made a gradual turn.<\/p>\n
I felt the movement through the seat.<\/p>\n
My free hand reached toward the side for balance.<\/p>\n
Maggie's hand stayed inside mine.<\/p>\n
I watched her face until the movement settled.<\/p>\n
She didn't seem to notice the turn.<\/p>\n
Or perhaps she was too exhausted to show it.<\/p>\n
I couldn't tell.<\/p>\n
That was becoming one of the hardest things.<\/p>\n
So much of what I understood about Maggie came from the way she reacted.<\/p>\n
A raised eyebrow.<\/p>\n
A sigh.<\/p>\n
A quick answer.<\/p>\n
A slight smile.<\/p>\n
Now I had almost none of those familiar signs.<\/p>\n
I had to watch her eyelids.<\/p>\n
Her fingers.<\/p>\n
The faint movement of her head.<\/p>\n
I was trying to understand a whole conversation from almost nothing.<\/p>\n
The paramedic checked her oxygen mask.<\/p>\n
I watched him adjust the edge carefully.<\/p>\n
"Is that uncomfortable for her?"<\/p>\n
He glanced up.<\/p>\n
"It can feel unfamiliar, but we're making sure it's positioned properly."<\/p>\n
I nodded.<\/p>\n
"Okay."<\/p>\n
I looked at Maggie.<\/p>\n
She had never liked having something covering her face.<\/p>\n
I wondered what she thought of the mask.<\/p>\n
I wondered whether she wanted to push it away.<\/p>\n
I wondered whether she understood why it was there.<\/p>\n
There were so many things I wanted to ask.<\/p>\n
I had to keep reminding myself that questions required strength to answer.<\/p>\n
And strength was what she seemed to have so little of.<\/p>\n
I lowered my voice.<\/p>\n
"I'm sorry this is happening."<\/p>\n
Her eyes stayed closed.<\/p>\n
I didn't expect a reply.<\/p>\n
I wasn't even sure whether I should have said it.<\/p>\n
But the words had been sitting inside me.<\/p>\n
"I'm sorry, Maggie."<\/p>\n
I rubbed her hand gently.<\/p>\n
I wasn't apologizing for the ambulance.<\/p>\n
Or for the paramedic.<\/p>\n
Or for the oxygen mask.<\/p>\n
I was apologizing because she was suffering and I couldn't make it stop.<\/p>\n
I knew that wasn't something I could control.<\/p>\n
Knowing didn't take away the feeling.<\/p>\n
For a little while, I stopped speaking.<\/p>\n
The paramedic continued working.<\/p>\n
I listened to the sounds around us.<\/p>\n
The steady noise of the vehicle.<\/p>\n
The siren outside.<\/p>\n
The faint movement of equipment whenever the ambulance shifted.<\/p>\n
I had never spent so much time listening to a person's breathing.<\/p>\n
It was a terrible thing to admit.<\/p>\n
But I had taken that sound for granted.<\/p>\n
Maggie had breathed beside me through years of ordinary life.<\/p>\n
I had never sat there counting the movement of her chest.<\/p>\n
Now I couldn't stop.<\/p>\n
I looked at the oxygen mask.<\/p>\n
I watched it move.<\/p>\n
I looked at her hand.<\/p>\n
I watched for her fingers to shift.<\/p>\n
Then I looked at her eyes.<\/p>\n
I waited for them to open.<\/p>\n
My whole world had become a collection of small signs.<\/p>\n
I remembered the paramedic saying she was responding.<\/p>\n
That word had comforted me.<\/p>\n
I held on to it again.<\/p>\n
Responding.<\/p>\n
Not talking.<\/p>\n
Not sitting up.<\/p>\n
Not explaining what had happened.<\/p>\n
But responding.<\/p>\n
I leaned forward.<\/p>\n
"Maggie, can you hear me?"<\/p>\n
For a moment, nothing happened.<\/p>\n
Then her eyelids lifted.<\/p>\n
Relief moved through me so suddenly that I almost spoke too loudly.<\/p>\n
"That's it."<\/p>\n
I lowered my voice.<\/p>\n
"That's good, sweetheart."<\/p>\n
Her eyes turned toward me.<\/p>\n
I felt myself smiling.<\/p>\n
I knew I must have looked exhausted.<\/p>\n
I knew the worry was probably written across my face.<\/p>\n
But I tried to give her something gentler to look at.<\/p>\n
She stayed awake for a few seconds.<\/p>\n
I didn't ask her anything.<\/p>\n
I simply sat close.<\/p>\n
Then her eyes began to close.<\/p>\n
"That's all right."<\/p>\n
I held her hand.<\/p>\n
"Rest."<\/p>\n
She did.<\/p>\n
The paramedic checked her again.<\/p>\n
I watched him without interrupting.<\/p>\n
I understood something I hadn't understood at the beginning of the ride.<\/p>\n
I had been treating every moment Maggie opened her eyes as an opportunity to ask another question.<\/p>\n
But opening her eyes was already an effort.<\/p>\n
Looking at me was already an effort.<\/p>\n
Even that brief moment of recognition seemed to take something out of her.<\/p>\n
I didn't want to demand more.<\/p>\n
So I stopped rehearsing questions in my head.<\/p>\n
At least for the moment.<\/p>\n
I stopped trying to force the missing days into a neat explanation.<\/p>\n
I couldn't make the past clearer by asking a sick woman to work harder.<\/p>\n
The truth would have to wait.<\/p>\n
Maggie needed the strength she had.<\/p>\n
I looked at the paramedic.<\/p>\n
He was watching her carefully.<\/p>\n
I felt grateful he was there.<\/p>\n
Without him, I wouldn't have known what to do.<\/p>\n
I could hold her hand.<\/p>\n
I could speak gently.<\/p>\n
But I couldn't give her the care he was giving her.<\/p>\n
That realization frightened me.<\/p>\n
It also made me thankful.<\/p>\n
I looked down at Maggie again.<\/p>\n
Her wedding ring caught a little of the light.<\/p>\n
I touched it with my thumb.<\/p>\n
I wanted to tell her how badly I needed her to get better.<\/p>\n
Instead, I said something much simpler.<\/p>\n
"I'm here."<\/p>\n
Her hand stayed in mine.<\/p>\n
The ambulance continued moving.<\/p>\n
And I let the missing days remain unanswered while the paramedic cared for the woman I loved.<\/p>\n
The paramedic had asked me how long Maggie had been unwell. I had answered him more than once. Three days. Maybe four. I wished the number would become clearer if … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37520,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37526"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37546,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37526\/revisions\/37546"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}