Chapter 10 - The surgery and recovery
"The ambulance on the highway, the fancy hospital. How much?" "It doesn't matter." "It matters to me." Walt pulled a piece of lined paper from the drawer beside the bed. He had already written on it in shaky capitals. $20 a month. "Sign it, Walt. At 20 a month, you'll be paying me back from the grave." "Then you'll wait." Martin looked at the paper. Then he signed it right under Walt's name. "I'll wait," he said.
The surgery took 5 hours. The waiting room at the VA was beige with a television and nobody watched and a coffee machine that made a noise like a small engine. Ray sat with his elbows on his knees. Caleb sat between the two men, swinging his feet, a cup of hot chocolate in his hands. At the second hour, he spilled it, all of it, down the front of Martin's dark wool coat.
The boy froze. His face went white. His mouth opened and Martin knew what was coming. "Sorry, sorry, sorry." "Okay," Martin said before the first one could get out. He dabbed at the coat with a napkin, not hurrying. "Hey, show me how you count a pulse. I never learned, right?" Caleb stared at him. Then, slowly, he took Martin's wrist, laid two fingers on it, and looked up at the clock. "64," he said after a minute. "You're not tired." "Good to know."
May you like
A little later, Martin went to the coffee machine and came back with two cups. He sat down beside Ray. He held out the second one, hot steam curling off the top. Ray looked at it. "What's this?" "The second one," Martin said. "It's for whoever's waiting with me." Ray took it.
At 4:12 that afternoon, the doors at the end of the hall opened and Dr. Nasser came out with his mask pulled down and a lunch menu folded in his pocket. He looked at the three of them and smiled. "He's asking for the boy," he said.
