Brain Trust Read online

  My phone rang again. Spidermonkey. “You didn’t call me back.”

  “She didn’t answer.”

  “Do you have a feeling?” he asked.

  I didn’t want to answer. I did have a feeling, a feeling that something wasn’t right. It was a Watts thing and we were rarely wrong, even me. But my intuition was nothing compared to my dad’s.

  “Mercy.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You looked through the entire house?” Spidermonkey asked.

  “Uh huh.” I thought I would throw up the feeling was so strong.

  His voice got tight. “I want you to go to the garage and see if her car is there. Okay?”

  Why didn’t I think of that?

  “On my way,” I said, jogging down the porch steps to the brick walk overgrown with a riot of flowers, dragging a yapping Wallace behind me. The smell was cloying and made my nausea worse as I got to the garage. I keyed in my code and flung open the door. “Oh, crap!”

  “What? What?” Spidermonkey’s voice burst out of my phone.

  “Her car is here.”

  “Maybe someone picked her up. Your Aunt Miriam, for instance.”

  I said maybe, but in my heart I knew it wasn’t true. I just knew.

  “Call the police,” said Spidermonkey. “Or I’ll call them.”

  I stepped out of the garage and turned back to the house. On the back porch, looking at me with unblinking green eyes, was a black cat.

  Chapter Two

  “OH MY GOD!” I exclaimed.

  “What Mercy?” yelled Spidermonkey.

  “The cat.”

  “Cat? What cat? Do your parents have cats?”

  “Yes. I mean, no. It’s the other one,” I said, watching as the cat, known to my family as Blackie, went into a stiff, impossibly high arch and then slinked down the porch stairs.

  “I don’t understand,” said Spidermonkey in a tight voice I’d never heard him use before.

  “It’s the cat that shows up when something’s happened or is about to happen. He belongs to us. He’s been with us forever.”

  “Mercy, what are you saying?”

  “Call the police. Something’s happened to my mother,” I said.”

  “Mer—”

  I hung up. Wallace had stopped yapping. Her leash was taut and she walked mechanically toward the house. I followed, letting her and Blackie lead me.

  Instead of going up the stairs to the house, we veered to the left toward Mom’s side garden. It was separated from the backyard by an eight-foot-tall wrought-iron fence. Through the bars, I could see the ornamental ivy and a couple of sculptures done by our neighbor, Sandy. I unlocked the gate and Wallace pulled me past a cubist-style sculpture that Mom said was a chicken and, in the same moment, I realized Blackie had disappeared and someone was lying on the ground behind a pair of trash cans by the side door that led to the servant stair.

  Wallace exploded into barks and we ran through the garden. Mom. She lay face up on the hard bricks.

  “Mom!” I dropped to my knees, shoved Wallace back, and put my fingers to her pale, exposed neck. Strong heartbeat. Thank God! “Mom, can you hear me?”

  “Help,” she whispered. I never heard anything so sweet.

  I quickly ran my hands over her, finding no blood or obvious signs of trauma.

  “Tell me what hurts,” I said.

  She didn’t answer.

  “Mom, can you hear me?”

  “Yes.” Her voice was odd, sort of high-pitched and nasally. I found out why the second I tilted her face toward me. The left side of her face drooped and it was clear from the way her left arm and leg lay limp that she was completely paralyzed on that side.

  I brushed her hair out of her face and pulled out my phone. “Mom, it’s going to be fine. I’m calling an ambulance.”

  “Ambulance? What for?” she slurred. “Help me up. I have to get up.”

  “You can’t get up right now.”

  “Help me up.”

  “It’s alright, Mom. It’s okay. I’m here.”

  “Why won’t you help me?”

  I dialed 911 and the dispatcher said, “911. What is your emergency?”

  “My mother is having a massive stroke. I need an ambulance right now.” I gave her our address and she calmly asked for Mom’s symptoms. I named them and she said a patrol car had already been dispatched to our location and she was sending firefighters and an ambulance.

  “I have to go.”

  “Ma’am, you need to stay on the line with me,” she said smoothly.

  “I can’t. It’s a gated street. I have to call the guard.”

  “Well—”

  I hung up and called Mr. Knox.

  “Miss Mercy, what can I—”

  “Open the gate,” I said. “Right now. Open the gate.”

  “What?”

  “Open the gate!” I screamed. “My mom’s having a stroke. You have to let the police and ambulance in.”

  “Oh my god! I’m opening it. Hold on. I’m coming!”

  I hung up and picked up Mom’s limp hand. I rubbed it hard. “Can you feel that, Mom? Do you feel me holding your hand?”

  “Where are you?” Her eyes were locked to the right and she couldn’t see me. I dropped her hand, crouching down to get into her eye line.

  “There you are,” she said.

  “It’s okay.”

  “Help me up.”

  “You can’t get up, Mom,” I said.

  She flailed out her working arm and grabbed at my tee. “If I can just get my feet under me.”

  “The ambulance is coming.”

  “What for?”

  I had to work to control my panic. When had she last called me? When was that? “There’s the siren. They’re coming.”

  “Who’s coming?” Mom was getting less intelligible by the second.

  “The ambulance.”

  She said something I couldn’t understand and Wallace crept around the side of her head to where she could see and licked her cheek. It was so sweet and gentle that I started crying.

  “What’s wrong?” The half of Mom’s face that could move looked puzzled. She had absolutely no clue and didn’t appear to be afraid at all. I didn’t know what to make of that. You’d think she’d be terrified.

  The sirens got closer and I heard a pounding of feet. Mr. Knox ran up, red-faced and missing his hat. “What happened? Carolina can’t have a stroke.”

  “Did you leave the gate open?” I asked, wiping the tears off my cheeks.

  “I did. They’re coming. I can hear them.”

  “Go out front and wave,” I said.

  He ran back to the front of the house and I heard him yell, “Over here!”

  I leaned down low, putting my face beside Wallace, who continued to lick Mom’s cheek. “Do you remember what happened, Mom?”

  “I can’t get up.”

  I smoothed her hair back from her widow’s peak. “I know. Do you remember what happened?”

  “What happened?” she asked.

  I guess not.

  “Down here!” yelled Mr. Knox.

  A couple of cops followed by four firefighters ran into the garden, trampling the shade plants.

  “Be careful of the plants!”

  What the hell am I saying?

  Happily, they ignored me. I moved out of the way, holding Wallace to my chest, as they got to work. They confirmed and called for a stroke protocol. They put in an IV line and I pictured the ER springing into action, clearing a CT and calling neuro. The thought was comforting. It would be fine. It would.

  One of the firefighters taped her line and then asked me, “When did you find her?”

  “Like five minutes ago.”

  “Do you know when it happened?”

  “No.”

  His grizzled face clouded.

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “We have to know in order to treat her.”

  “I know. I’m a nurse.”

  “Do you hav
e any idea?” he asked as the EMTs arrived hauling a gurney and winced as the rose thorns snagged their uniforms.

  I picked up my phone from the bricks. “She called me. Let me look at my log.”

  “Good. Get the time. We need the exact time you talked to her.”

  I pulled up the log and calculated quickly. “One hour and fifty minutes ago. We’re within the window.”

  “You’re sure?” asked the lead EMT.

  I held out my phone. “It kept breaking up, but I heard her voice.”

  They nodded and began talking to Mom, telling her what was happening. I could tell she didn’t understand, but she complied with what they asked her to do. She answered questions, but she was thoroughly confused and kept asking why they were there.

  When she was taped and ready, they lifted her onto the gurney and ratcheted it up to waist height.

  At some point, Mr. Knox had put his arm around me, but I hadn’t even realized he was next to me until he asked, “Where are you taking her?”

  “SLU is Level I,” I said.

  “That’s where she’s going,” said the EMT. “Can you follow?”

  I nodded and they rushed Mom away. I heard her call my name and I ran after. My purse was gone. Where was my purse? Where was my truck?

  They slid Mom into the ambulance.

  “Mercy?” her voice was so soft; I could barely hear her.

  “I’m coming, Mom.”

  “Mercy?”

  “I’m coming.” I looked at Mr. Knox. “I don’t have a car.”

  He hugged me, careful not to squash Wallace between us. “I’ll drive you. Wait here. I’ll get my car.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  We took off running down the formerly peaceful Hawthorne Avenue behind Mom’s shrieking ambulance. It seemed to take forever to make it to Mr. Knox’s pagoda, out through the gate, and to the designated parking spot where his Camry sat under an ancient oak tree.

  The car roared to life and Mr. Knox peeled out, ignoring the looks from curious walkers. He was an amazing driver. My dad must’ve given him aggressive driver lessons. We went up on sidewalks, changed lanes on a dime, and scared the crap out of everyone we encountered.

  I caught glimpses of the ambulance up ahead, but then I’d lose sight. Mom would be wondering where I was. Was she asking for me? Was she scared now? Had it dawned on her what had happened?

  I squeezed Wallace so tight she yelped. “Sorry.” I kissed her on her wrinkly head and kept looking for the ambulance. We turned onto Grand and I saw them again. “There it is!”

  “Almost there,” said Mr. Knox.

  The ambulance turned and we followed, only a couple minutes behind, thanks to Mr. Knox’s take-no-prisoners driving.

  He screeched to a halt behind the ambulance as they yanked open the back doors. I jumped out of the car and ran to Mom’s side as they pulled her out. “I’m here.”

  “Where’d you go?”

  They pushed her through the trauma doors and things went fast. I never realized how fast until I was on the patient side. It was a blur. Running through the halls, signing things, finding CT, and watching Mom go in. I couldn’t go. I wanted to go so bad. The ER doc came up and took one look at me. “Mercy Watts?” He looked at his chart. It was Dr. Calloway. I worked with him before. He was good. Thank God.

  “The patient is your mother?” he asked like he didn’t think I had one.

  I nodded.

  “I’m sure you already know the situation. She’s had an acute stroke.” Dr. Calloway glanced through the chart. “She looks good.” He blushed furiously. “I mean, her vitals.” A smile flitted over Mr. Knox’s face. Unlike Dad, Mom wasn’t a publicity hound. Lots of journalists wanted to interview her, mostly just to get her famous face on camera, but Mom had never been interviewed. She kept a low profile, but people knew her, and she didn’t like that one bit.

  “I don’t know how she could possibly have a stroke,” I said. “She has no risk factors. None.”

  Dr. Calloway kept looking through Mom’s slim chart as if an answer would appear. “No family history?”

  “No. What are you thinking?”

  “AFib can go undetected until there’s an event.”

  I nodded, but that didn’t feel right. Mom was so damn healthy. She ate salads on purpose and jogged for fun. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I knew it had happened, but still…

  “What are they doing to Carolina?” asked Mr. Knox and Dr. Calloway noticed him standing beside me for the first time.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “This is Mr. Knox, a friend of the family.”

  Dr. Calloway tilted his head, noting the uniform.

  “And the Hawthorne Avenue gate guard. He helped me get here.”

  “Ah, yes. The uniform was confusing. I couldn’t place it.”

  Mr. Knox chuckled. “It was designed in 1948, so I get that a lot.”

  “I bet,” said Dr. Calloway. “As for Carolina, she’ll have her CT. It will show us if her stroke is hemorrhagic or ischemic.”

  I said nothing, the implications racing through my head.

  “Okay,” said Mr. Knox. “What’s the difference?”

  Dr. Calloway looked at me. Maybe he wanted me to say something, but I didn’t. I was too busy praying for ischemic.

  “A hemorrhagic stroke is caused by ruptured blood vessels in the brain,” said the doctor.

  Mr. Knox stiffened. “That sounds bad.”

  “It’s not great. An ischemic stroke is caused by a clot that has blocked the blood supply to parts of the brain.”

  Mr. Knox just squeezed my shoulders. I think it was dawning on him that my mother might be screwed. “You can fix it?”

  “Let’s see what the CT tells us,” said Dr. Calloway.

  I stared at the door to the CT room and scratched Wallace’s head. She gave me a gentle lick.

  A single door down the hall flew open and a doctor jogged down to us, her long black hair flowing out behind her like a silky scarf. She shook my hand and said, “I’m Dr. Siddiqui, your mother’s neurosurgeon. We’ve confirmed that she’s suffered an acute ischemic stroke. We need to perform a contrast CT to visualize the vessels affected.”

  “Where do I sign?” I asked.

  “Any questions?”

  “How fast can you do it?”

  “We’re ready the moment you sign.”

  I signed and Dr. Siddiqui ran back through the double door.

  “You’ll be able to see her in a minute,” said Dr. Calloway. “Do you know Siddiqui?”

  “Not really. Neuro isn’t really my thing.”

  “She’s very good. If I had a stroke, she’s the one I’d want,” he said.

  High praise and it matched what I’d heard in passing about Siddiqui: brilliant, intense, and at the very top of new treatments.

  “So…is this good?” asked Mr. Knox.

  “It’s better than hemorrhagic,” I said.

  “What will they do now?”

  “Hopefully, she’ll get tPA.”

  “That sounds familiar,” said Mr. Knox.

  A nurse waved at Dr. Calloway. “Mrs. Fellows is ready for the cath lab.”

  He patted me and said, “I’ll be right back.”

  I nodded and stared at the doors. I didn’t notice someone else had come up. “Mercy?”

  I blinked and, for a second, I had a hard time peeling my mind off my mother. “Yeah?”

  She hugged me and it took a second to click. “Rita. I’m sorry. I…”

  “I know. I heard you were here and I wanted to come down. I just love your mom.”

  Tears filled my eyes. Rita and I were in nursing school together. She was a senior when I was a freshman and had gone into the master’s program for nurse anesthetist like Mom wanted me to. It sounded like a whole lot of work to me, especially with Dad’s demands.

  “Where is she?” asked Rita.

  “Contrast CT.”

  She nodded and said, “I brought you something.” She han
ded me a piece of red cloth.

  I stared at it in my hand.

  “It’s a vest for Wallace.”

  It was so hard for me to concentrate. What was she saying? Wallace? Vest? “She’s not cold.”

  Rita took the vest back and held it up, showing the International Therapy Dog emblem. “I’m amazed that they let the Wonder Pug in without it.”

  “She isn’t a therapy dog,” I said.

  Rita took Wallace out of my arms and slipped the vest on. “Yes, she is.”

  “What?”

  She gave me a wink. “It was in the paper and online. People will believe anything if it’s online.”

  “What was online?” I asked, taking Wallace back from Rita.

  “That Wallace the Wonder Dog is your therapy dog.”

  Mr. Knox chuckled. “I saw that.” He nudged me. “You’ve got anxiety.”

  “I do right now.”

  “You told people in Sturgis that Wallace the Wonder Dog was your therapy dog,” said Rita. “You just forgot to bring her vest.”

  “I just said that to get her in a restaurant.”

  “And now it’s a fact. I got the vest from Cabot. He heads the program for our region.”

  “Cabot gave you this vest? He thinks I’m a slutty dingbat,” I said with a sneer.

  “And as such, he’s deeply in love with you.”

  “Ew.”

  “I know, but you need this dog. Personally, I think we ought to have therapy dogs free-ranging in the ER. We’d get a lot less freaking out.”

  I tugged on Wallace’s curly tail. “She’s working for me.”

  “I doubt you’d be screaming,” said Mr. Knox.

  “I’m screaming on the inside.”

  Rita gave me another hug. “I’ll be checking in.” She crossed paths with Dr. Siddiqui, who had a new sheath of paperwork. “She’s clear for tPA. We need to discuss the risks.”

  “I know them,” I said. “Give it to her.”

  “I have to talk to you.”

  “Time is brain. Please just do it.”

  “You understand there is a possibility of death?”