Save Me

Chapter Eighteen

It was dark by the time Rose got home and pulled into the driveway. Her neighbor across the street was putting out his trash, and she waved to him. He didn’t wave back, though he had to have seen her. She cut the engine, got out of the car, went around the backseat, and lifted John, still asleep, from his car seat. Stale Cheerios fell to the driveway as she hoisted him to her shoulder, grabbed the diaper bag, and closed the door. She walked the sidewalk to the house, grateful for the darkness, the starless night like a cloak, hiding her from view.

She went up the sidewalk, then the flagstone path to the house, a four-bedroom colonial of solid gray stone, with a half circle of white roof sheltering the entrance. It seemed impossible that they could lose the house, but everything that had happened since Friday seemed impossible. She found her house key and let herself in, waking Princess Google, the world’s worst watchdog.

She set her bags on the couch and went straight upstairs with John, walking evenly so she wouldn’t wake him. She switched on the hall light, changed him, and put him down. He stayed asleep, his arms open, his fists balled, and his legs flopped apart like a frog’s. She tiptoed from the room and was going downstairs to try to find a sitter when the phone started ringing. She ran to the wall phone in the kitchen, and the caller ID read REESBURGH MEMORIAL.

Rose picked up instantly, alarmed. “Yes?”

“Mom?” It was Melly.

“Honey! I was going to call you soon. How are you doing?”

“They put a little girl in my room.”

“Oh well.” Rose should have thought of that, as a possibility. “That happens, sometimes.”

“That’s what Leo says. He called to say hi.”

“That was nice.”

“The mom is sleeping over with her. She’s on the other side of the curtain.”

Rose heard noise in the background. “What’s that sound?”

“She has the TV on, really loud. I can’t even hear Nick at Nite. I don’t know where the nurse went and we didn’t do our nails.”

Rose hated that Melly was there alone. “I guess she got busy. Do you see the button-”

“Mom, it said on their TV that Amanda was in the hospital. I heard it. They said her name, Amanda Gigot. Is Amanda in the hospital?”

Oh no. “Yes, she is.”

“This hospital?”

“Yes.”

“Is she sick?”

“Yes. She has what you had, from the smoke.” Rose didn’t want to lie, but she couldn’t tell the whole truth, not with Melly by herself. “She needs more oxygen, and they’re keeping an eye on her.”

“I don’t want her to come in my room, Mom.”

“She won’t.”

“She better not.” Melly sounded anxious. “I’m already sharing it with a little kid. I shouldn’t have to share it with Amanda, too. Mom, can I come home?”

“Not yet.”

“But I don’t want to stay here, all by myself.”

Rose felt a guilty pang. “I’m going to call some babysitters and see if I can get someone to stay with John, so I can come back to the hospital. Okay?”

“Please come soon, Mom.”

“I’ll try. In the meantime, can you rest a little?”

“No, the TV is so loud. If you were here, you would say, ‘turn that down!’” Melly did a fair impression of Rose as fishwife.

“Let me see if I can do something about that TV, then get a sitter.” Rose checked her oven clock. 9:25 P.M. “I’ll call you as soon as I can. I love you.”

“Love you, too.”

“Hang in there. Bye.” Rose hung up, then hit redial to get the main switchboard at the hospital. The operator picked up, and she asked, “Can you transfer me to the nurses’ station on the third floor?”

“Certainly,” the operator answered. There was a click, and the phone rang and rang. Nobody picked up, so Rose hung up and redialed.

“I’m the one calling the third floor,” Rose said, when the operator answered. “My daughter is in the hospital, and I want to speak with the nurse outside her room. Her name is Rosie, and the TV in-”

“Hold the line.”

“No, wait!” Rose heard the same clicks and the same ringing. She waited ten rings and hung up. She took her phone from her pocket and plugged it into the charger near the toaster. The phone came to life, the red star telling her there was a message, so she pressed to the phone function. The last call was from Leo’s cell, and she pressed voicemail, for his message:

“Babe, I got your text, and I’m sorry, too. I’m up to my ass in alligators here, so don’t wait up. Hope you found a sitter and give the kids my love. You, too.”

Rose pressed END, happy to hear his voice, then pressed her way to her address book, thumbed to her B-list babysitters, and got busy. Almost half an hour later, she hadn’t been able to beg, borrow, or steal a sitter. She checked the clock, and it was almost ten o’clock. She felt terrible, but she had to call Melly with the bad news. “Honey?” she said, when Melly picked up.

“Mom! When are you coming?”

“I’m so sorry, sweetie, but I can’t. I tried, but I can’t get a sitter. I’ll keep trying, and if I get lucky, I can-”

“Mom, please? I don’t like it here.”

“Did the nurse come back?” Rose could hear the TV, blaring in the background.

“She did but she had to go. Mom, please. Please come.”

“Did you tell her about the TV?”

“No, I felt funny.”

“Mel, see the button on the side of the bed? It’s a white plastic thing and it’s attached to a white cord. Can you press it?”

“Yes. I’m pressing it, but the nurse isn’t coming.”

“Keep pressing it, and she will.”

“She’s not, Mom.” Melly started to cry, softly.

“Honey, don’t cry, everything’s all right. Don’t be upset. When the nurse comes, put her on the phone. I’ll tell her to tell the lady to lower the TV.” Rose heard Melly sniffling, then some noise and talking, and it sounded like the nurse was in the room. “Melly, put the nurse on. Melly? Hello?”

“Yes,” replied a cool voice, clearly not nurse Rosie.

“Hi, this is Rose. Who is this?”

“It’s Annabelle. Are you the mother?”

“Yes, please, help her. She was in that school fire yesterday, and the woman in her room is blaring the TV. The news is upsetting her.”

“Relax. I have it under control. Hang on, please.” The nurse sounded calm, and in the next minute the background noise stopped and the TV silenced, but Melly was still crying softly, which broke Rose’s heart.

“Hello, Annabelle?” she said. “Are you there?”

“Pardon?”

“Can you just comfort my daughter? She’s a good kid, she’s just scared, and she’s been through a lot in the past few-”

“I’m sorry, but we have to hang up. There are no calls permitted this late.”

“No, wait. Don’t hang up. I want to talk to my daughter.”

“There’s an automatic cut-off for phone calls after ten. I’ll take good care of her.”

Rose felt her temper flare. “Let me say good night to her, for God’s sake.”

“Please, hold on.”

“Melly? Melly?” Rose said, but the line went dead. She tried to call back, but there was no answer. She tried the switchboard and asked again for the nurses’ station, but the phone rang and rang, all over again. She hung up, noticing the red light was blinking on her phone, which meant incoming email.

She pressed the button to see the list of senders, but they were all messages sent from Facebook. She scanned the names in the messages: Kim Barnett, Jane Llewellyn, Annelyn Baxter, moms from the class and school committees. When she’d moved to Reesburgh, she’d friended everyone in the class. She clicked the first name, and the email came on the screen:

Kim Barnett has sent you a message on Facebook. “I KNOW THE GIGOT FAMILY AND THEY ARE HEARTBROKEN! HOW DO YOU LIVE WITH YOURSELF?”

Rose set down the BlackBerry. Reesburgh was a small town, and the Internet made it even smaller. She didn’t need to read any more.

She got the gist.