Page 87 of Rook

“Rook said you love birds,” I said, looking at the blanket that was covered in all the different birds you could find in California.

Lorna absentmindedly traced her finger around the edge of a Stellar’s Jay as she pushed another cluster into her mouth.

“He said that’s where you came up with his name. Rook. Like a type of crow. He said that if you had more kids, you would have named them Wren, Lark, and Hawk.”

Lorna was actively looking at me then. I got the feeling that she was maybe trying to trudge through the heavy medication and depression that was holding her back. Like she wanted to engage with me, but just couldn’t seem to be able to.

“I’m sure you have a lot of questions. About Rook. And me. And just… everything that has happened. I’m going to be visiting from now on. So I can work as a go-between with you and Rook. So when you’re ready to ask me things, I can get answers for you. Then come back and deliver them as soon as I ask your son.”

At the word ‘son,’ a strange little whimpering noise escaped her.

I turned back to my bag, pulling out the four pictures Rook had chosen to send, putting them all on one sheet of paper so no one could lose it.

There was one of her holding a little reddish-haired infant. Another with her arm around a slightly sullen-looking teenage Rook.

Then, on the bottom, a recent picture he had me take of him. Right beside it, he’d included one of our wedding pictures. The one where he’d pressed his forehead to mine when I’d been panicking.

We’d both decided that maybe, for the time being, it was best for her to think we were a legitimate married couple. We didn’t want to confuse her. Or have her slipping up and telling her doctors who might tell Nancy.

So the wedding picture was meant to legitimize us in her eyes.

I watched as her gaze moved slowly from picture to picture.

When she got to the most recent one of Rook, her finger moved out to trace his face.

And when she settled on the wedding photo, her eyes welled up.

“Oh, I didn’t want to make you cry,” I said, panicking that I might trigger… something.

Instinct had me trying to take the trigger—the pictures—away.

But Lorna snatched the sheet back, hugging it to her chest.

“Sorry. Of course you can keep it. I can bring you more pictures next visiting day, if you want. Rook had a hard time finding older ones, but he did get a few. I wanted him to include the one of him from the Christmas when he got his first little toy laptop. You can just see in his eyes how much he was going to grow to love computers…”

I went on like that, describing the pictures Rook had found, stories he’d told me from when he’d been growing up. I hoped it acted like a tether, like a rope she could use to pull herself back out of her mind and toward her life.

By the time the nurse came by to tell me that visiting hours were coming to an end, I was actually hoarse from speaking.

“Well, I have to get going,” I said, going over to tuck her blanket back up a little bit, then stealing the candy wrapper and stashing it in my pocket. “But I will be back in just a few days, okay? It’s been really nice talking to you, Lorna. I will bring Rook back your love.”

I was about to turn and leave.

But then a hand closed around my wrist, giving me a squeeze.

It was over in a blink.

But it felt like progress.

“He loves you too,” I told her, finding my eyes suddenly flooded as I gave her a smile before making my way out into the hall.

“I know, it’s hard,” the nurse said when she saw me, giving me a sympathetic smile.

“She’s in there,” I said, sniffling. “I saw signs of her trying to… come out, if you will.”

“I feel the same way. I really think she’s on the right meds now. We just need to get the dosage right. And I think the visits will help. Even if you snuck in contraband,” she said with a little wink.

“Rook said her favorite food in the world is fettuccine alfredo. I’m not above sneaking a plastic bag of it in there inside my shirt,” I told her, getting a tinkling little laugh as we walked back to the nurse’s station.

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