Chapter 8 - Learning to listen
At 11:00 that night, the sedation wore down and the breathing tube came out. And the first thing Walt Hollis asked for was his grandson. A nurse told him as gently as she could where Caleb was. Walt pulled the IV out of his own arm and asked for his boots. The nurses got the IV back in. It took three of them and a doctor. And it took Walt saying several things in a voice the whole floor could hear. He would sign himself out. He would refuse the surgery. He would walk to wherever they had taken his boy if he had to do it in a hospital gown in the snow.
The county set the hearing for December 26th at 9 in the morning. A judge would decide where Caleb would stay while everything was sorted out. Walt's cardiologist set something else without surgery. The doctor said the valve might give out in days, not months. Two deadlines, one old heart.
Martin came into the room at 1:00 in the morning on Christmas Day. Walt was awake staring at the ceiling. "Get out," Walt said. Martin didn't argue. He didn't explain. He didn't say that he'd only been trying to help. He pulled a chair to the side of the bed, sat down, and put his hands on his knees where they could be seen. "What do you want?" He said, "I'll only do what you say." Walt turned his head and looked at him for a long time. "That's a new trick." "It's not a trick. It's the only thing I haven't tried."
The clock on the wall in that room ran exactly on time. Martin had never noticed how loud a correct clock could be. "I want the VA," Walt said finally. "My own doctors, my own records. I earned that hospital in 1969, and I'll be cut open there or nowhere." He swallowed. "I want to pay my own way. And I want my grandson back. Tell me how."
So Walt told him, and Martin listened. And for once, he did not improve on the plan. He called Belmont and canceled everything that hadn't already been done. He didn't call his board member. He didn't call his lawyer. By noon on Christmas Day, Walt had been transferred by ambulance to the veteran's hospital across town and Martin had followed in his truck carrying a pair of cracked leather work boots on the passenger seat because Walt had refused to leave without them.
The cardiologist at the VA was a man named Dr. Akmed Nasser, 47, with a soft voice and a habit of drawing diagrams on the back of whatever paper was nearest. He drew a heart on the back of a lunch menu and showed Walt the valve and the new valve and where it would go. "You're a good candidate," he said. "But you need it soon." "Not until the boy's settled," Walt said. Dr. Nasser looked at him over the menu. "Then we'd better settle him fast, Mr. Hollis. Your valve doesn't know there's a court date."
At 3 that afternoon, the county brought Caleb for a supervised visit. He came in wearing a donated coat that fit him, a blue one with a hood, and under it, Martin noticed, he still wore the flannel shirt. The case worker stood by the door. Sandra Greer stood beside him. She was off duty. It was Christmas. She had come anyway. Caleb stopped at the foot of the bed. He looked at the machines. He looked at the monitor with its green line and its number, 78. He read it out loud softly, like a prayer. Then he walked to the side of the bed and took his grandfather's hand. He didn't put two fingers on the wrist. He just held it.
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"It's okay to be tired, Grandpa," he said. "I'll still be here when you wake up." Walt Hollis, who had welded pipe at 40 below and who did not talk about 1969, put his other hand over his eyes and didn't take it away for a long time.
Then Caleb let go, reached into his flannel shirt, and walked over to Sandra Greer. He held out the folded paper with both hands. "That's my uncle Ray," he said. "I lied. I said there wasn't anybody. I thought if you called him, Grandpa would give me away." He took a breath, "But Grandpa needs to rest, so you can call him." Sandra unfolded the paper. Then she looked at the boy with an expression Martin would remember for years. "That," she said, "was a very brave thing."
