– Harlow
Today is my dad’s birthday. And it’s also the day that Jesse Morrow, the airmen I met at the office, is having surgery. I feel that it’s fitting to swing by the hospital and honor Jesse’s request that I be there, before I honor my dad’s memory with my brothers.
I hope that things go well for Jesse, because otherwise it’s been a sad time for me. I can’t help but wish that Whitney was here by my side. Then I have to remind myself that she’s the enemy.
I tell the receptionist that I’m an employee of Dr. Davis’ and she lets me through to the surgery ward. Peering through the glass windows, I can see that Jesse is out of surgery, but just barely so. He looks groggy and is hooked up to machines.
I open the door and gently slip inside. Dr. Davis isn’t here.
Lance is here though— Whitney’s boss— and there’s a nurse in the room too.
“Hi Lance,” I whisper, surprised to see him here. He looks just as surprised to see me here, and understandably so.
“Harlow,” he says. “Nice to see you. This is my sister Mae. She works here as a nurse.”
“Nice to meet you, Mae.” I shake her hand.
“I met Jesse while I was doing a consult with him for future physical therapy sessions,” Lance explains. “He was a little bit… nervous… about this surgery so he asked me if I could stop by and see him.”
“That’s what he asked me too,” I tell him.
“He must have made a favorable impression on a lot of people,” Mae says, smiling. “Because he asked me the same thing, so I made sure to swap shifts with another nurse, so I could be here for him as well.”
I look around the dimly lit room, amazed that so many people have come together to wish Jesse well. He’s an amazing guy, and I really do wish him all the best.
“Well, we’ll step out now, so that the two of you can talk,” Mae says. “Nice meeting you.”
“He can talk?” I ask her.
She smiles and shrugs a little bit.
“He has some ways to communicate,” she says. “It’ll be a little while until he’s fully comprehending and talking. But you can always come back and visit him later.”
“Great,” I tell her, making a mental note to do so.
“Bye Harlow,” Lance says, “Nice seeing you.”
“Same here.”
They slip out the door and then I walk up close to Jesse’s bedside.
“Hey there, buddy,” I say. “I brought you something.”
It’s just a get well soon card, with a gift certificate to Dion’s Pizza, for when he’s feeling up to it. But he just stares at me blankly, as if he doesn’t recognize me.
“I’m Harlow. We met recently?”
He mumbles something, but I don’t think he’s very coherent.
“I hope you get well soon,” I venture, unsure of what to say.
He blinks at me and slightly smiles, as if he’s recognizing me, and trying to say that he hopes so too.
“You hope so too, right?” I ask him.
He gives me a faint thumbs up, and I chuckle.
“You sure do have your ways of communicating,” I tell him. “Lance’s sister, the nurse, was right.”
He smiles at me again.
I’m thinking of what else to say when I hear a ruckus by the door behind me
“Harlow!”
I turn around to an angry Dr. Davis, storming into the hospital room after pushing his way through the door.
“What are you doing here?” he demands.
“Jesse asked me to come,” I explain, incredulous at his outburst. “Remember? You were there?”
“But I never said that you could.” He looks angrier than I’ve ever seen him. “In fact, it’s a terrible idea.”
“But… why?”
“Harlow.”
Dr. Davis shakes his head back and forth, as if at a loss for words.
I have a feeling that the fact that Dr. Davis doesn’t want me here talking to Jesse means the news isn’t great for Jesse. I don’t want him to be worried. So I dart my eyes back and forth at Jesse’s bed and say, “I was just coming to wish Jesse a fast recovery and let him know that everything went just fine. Right?”
I’m nodding my head vigorously, pleading with him to agree with me so as not to scare Jesse. Luckily, though, when I look back at Jesse, he’s falling asleep, with the thumb of his hand still partly raising in the thumbs up position.
Finally, Dr. Davis squints at Jesse, rolls his eyes, and then turns back to me as he says, “Well isn’t it obvious? This is a surgery site. You’re not even wearing a mask. You could contaminate it.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, feeling stupid. “But I just wanted to comfort him, because he was so scared.”
“He has no idea you’re even here,” Dr. Davis snaps. “He’s on morphine.”
His tone tells me that he thinks I’m an idiot. I peer again at Jesse’s bedside and notice all the IVs and tubes everywhere.
But he gave me a thumbs up sign, I want to protest. He smiled at me.
But as usual, Dr. Davis has a way of making me feel stupid.
Of course it was useless to come. He’s probably so out of his mind on pain medicine he won’t even know I was here. If anything, I should have come prior to his surgery, to reassure him one last time that everything will be fine. Right?
“Well, is he going to be okay?” I ask.
“He’s fine, Harlow. Please, get out of here.”
“Will he be able to rejoin his unit?”
“Harlow.” Dr. Davis lets out an exasperated sigh. “You know there’s no way to know that yet. It is far too early.”
“Okay. Well. Can you please let him know that I stopped by, and that I’ll be in touch?”
Dr. Davis nods impatiently as I realize I don’t have Jesse’s contact information. Something tells me this isn’t the right time to ask for it.
“Thanks,” I say instead. “And I’ll just leave this card here for him.”
I place it on his bedside table, beside other cards, flowers and balloons that are on display. I’m glad to know Jesse has other people cheering him on through his surgery.
“Fine. I’ll see you later, Harlow,” Dr. Davis says, as he begins checking on Jesse’s medication, as if he’s a recovery ward nurse or doctor, instead of a plastic surgeon specialist.
“See you later.”
I walk back to the parking garage, trying to convince myself that I did everything I could to be here for Jesse. And also that there wasn’t something sinister about the way that Dr. Davis rushed me out of the room.