Page 37 of The Space Between

Jeanie reaches over and laces her fingers through her mother's. "What did the doctor say?"

Melva puts her free hand to her face and sobs quietly, covering her eyes. “They think she’s going to live, but we have no idea what things will be like when she wakes up.”

A chill runs down Jeanie’s spine. “Like, they don’t know what her brain function will be? Or they don’t know whether she’ll walk again?”

Melva makes a small, strangled sound. Angela is her baby; the second-born of her twins. Her last child. And, to be fair, the one most destined to live a perfect, solid life. Seeing her mother in such despair nearly wrecks Jeanie.

“Mom…” she whispers, putting one arm around Melva and then curling her body over the top of her mother’s like a shell. “She’s going to be good. This is Angela. She’s strong, and kind, and good, and she’ll wake up here soon. She has to.” But Jeanie has no idea whether this is true. She knows science, but notthiskind of science. All she has here to rely on are her own hopes and prayers, which need to be fervent enough to bring her sister out of this.

They sit there for a long time in silence, listening to the machines, and ignoring the hot August sun outside the hospital window.

“Can I get you more chicken?” Jeanie asks her stepfather tiredly, walking around the table with a platter in hand. She sets another piece of fried chicken on her brother’s plate next to the one hehasn’t touched, nudging him as she does to encourage him to eat. Patrick has been despondent, and he is refusing to eat like he’s staging some sort of protest.

“I appreciate it, Jean, but I think I’m good.” Wendell puts up a weak hand. He’s been doing his best to hold everyone together, but the fact that his daughter still hasn’t woken up after the accident is clearly breaking him down.

Jeanie walks the platter back into the kitchen and sets it down before putting her hands on the edge of the counter and letting her head fall forward, eyes closed tightly. There’s so much pain in the house, it’s overwhelming. It almost hurts to breathe the same air as Patrick, who has stopped talking or meeting anyone’s eye. His decisions the night of the accident will no doubt haunt him for the rest of his life, but Jeanie wants him to understand that they all need him—that Angela needs him—and that he has to pull himself together right now in order to be the man she knows he can be.

Pushing away from the counter, Jeanie looks up at the bright light over the kitchen sink to dry her wet eyes, then wipes both hands across her face to catch the tears. She takes a deep breath and walks back into the dining room.

“Okay,” she says, hands on hips. “Let’s get this cleaned up. We all need to be at the hospital. Sitting around here while Mom holds Angela’s hand isn’t doing anyone any good.”

Patrick and Wendell both look at Jeanie in surprise; she hasn’t lived at home for years now, and hearing her speak authoritatively, like a real adult, shocks them both a bit.

“Isn’t it too late?” Patrick asks.

“Nope.” Jeanie looks at the thin, gold watch on her wrist. “Visiting hours are for another hour and a half, and if we’re already there and we’re quiet, I bet the nurses will look the other way and let us stay longer. So let’s go.” She waves both hands likeshe’s sweeping them up, up, and away from the table. “I’ve got this stuff, so go and get your shoes.”

The men stumble out of the room in a daze, doing as they’re told (which in and of itself surprises Jeanie, but it’s the response she’d wanted, after all), and she quickly puts the leftovers into containers and stashes them in the fridge. The dishes will wait for later.

It takes four days, but Angela finally wakes up. She has no idea what day it is, why she’s in a hospital, or why she can’t feel or move her feet, but she’s alive.

She knows her parents, her brother, her sister, and who the president is. “Lyndon Johnson,” she says in a raspy voice that hasn’t been used in days. And then the next thing she says is: “Where is Andy?” as she searches the faces in the room for that of her boyfriend.

Melva breaks into tears. “Oh, sweetheart. He would have come, but the doctors were only allowing family. Can her boyfriend come now?” Melva turns to the doctor, looking at him imploringly.

The doctor gives a serious nod. “It would be good for her to start seeing more faces, and for us to assess any sort of deficiencies in memory or thought process. But so far this is all very encouraging.” His stern face softens into a half-smile. “You’re a very lucky girl,” he says to Angela, touching her foot through the sheet on the bed. “We still need to figure out what’s going on with your legs and feet, but you’re here, you’re alive, and your family is so happy.”

Patrick looks like he’s about to faint from the joy of hearing his twin sister's voice, and Jeanie walks over to him, wrappingboth arms around her younger brother, who is now at least six inches taller than she is.

Angela looks at Patrick and he reaches out a hand to her, which she takes. "I'm sorry," he says in a raspy voice that cracks with emotion. "I'm so sorry, Angela."

Melva, Wendell, and Jeanie leave the twins together to have their moment, and they step into the hallway with the doctor, who closes the door to Angela's room so that they can talk privately.

"She's still not out of the woods," he says with a worried frown. "And I have some very serious concerns about whether she'll walk again, but my most immediate concern is her being awake, and us having the opportunity to assess her brain activity and her memory. So far so good, but let's keep an eye on that, and tomorrow we'll do some reflex tests on her legs and feet, okay?"

Wendell is holding Melva to him like one or both of them might collapse if they let go, and Jeanie stands to the side, her arms wrapped around herself for lack of anyone else to hold her.

Angela has Patrick--and soon, Andy will join them--and her mother has Wendell. Everyone has someone, but Jeanie stands there in the cold, institutional hallway of the hospital as she realizes that, as always, she only has herself.

"Jeanie!" Carol Fairchild steps out of her car and immediately puts both of her hands to her lower back, stomach thrust forward.

No, correction:giantstomach thrust forward. Jeanie's eyes go wide at the sight of her old friend's pregnant belly.

"Hi, Carol," Jeanie says, stepping down from the front porch of her childhood home. She lifts a hand as Carol waddles her way. When Carol had called the house to say she'd heard about the accident (Oh, she was so sorry to hear!), she'd also asked whether it might be a good time to stop by and say hello to Jeanie, who rarely made the trip up to Chicago anymore.

The women meet in the middle of the walkway and embrace awkwardly around Carol's baby belly. Jeanie laughs as she feels a kick from inside Carol's stomach. "Wow!" she says, taking a step back and placing both hands gently on either side of Carol's abdomen. "Do you feel that all the time?"

Carol chuckles. "All. The. Time. You have no idea!" She's perspiring in the August heat, and Jeanie leads her up to the shade of the front porch, where she's placed a pitcher of lemonade and two glasses. With Angela in the hospital, Melva hasn't had a chance to dust or keep up the house, and she'd made Jeanie promise to meet with her old friend on the front porch so that Carol wouldn't see the unwashed coffee cups on the breakfast table, or the way the rug is rolled up on one side of the living room so that the floor can be swept and mopped.

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