"It feels like I swallowed a baseball," Dad says.
"A baseball? That's not good," I say.
"Now don't get all excited. I'm not having a heart attack."
***
Two hours later, we are in the van - Anna is driving, and I'm in the passenger seat. It's raining. Mom and Dad sit in the second row of seats. They are holding hands. Dad shifts again and again in the seat. At exit 12, he tells Anna to put the hazards on.
The windshield wipers slice through the tense silence. There is nothing to say. I lean forward in the seat, willing the van to go faster. The speedometer needle tickles against 90. The hazards tick on and off. Rain pelts the windows.
Five more exists pass. Dad asks how much longer. Mom asks, her voice trembling, "Can we call for a police escort?"
Anna's voice comes out flat and hollow. "No...they won't do that anymore."
***
When we get off one highway and onto another closer to the hospital, I call Justin. He is waiting in the ER dropoff with a wheelchair.
Dad is laboring to breathe, his face greying. He is scared. Concern and fear are etched in every line on Mom's face.
I want to scream. I want to throw up. I close my eyes, squeezing the threatening tears out to wet the fringe of my lashes. "Please, God," I pray silently. "Please, please don't take him. None of us can bear it."
***
The ER is chaos. The walking wounded limp and roll and cough and sputter through the aisle. Wheelchairs weave through the crowd, driven by harried orderlies. They do not have a room. Dad is taken back into a hallway to be settled on a gurney. Only Mom can go with him.
***
In the aftermath, those settling moments of quiet heavy realization, me, Anna and Justin sit on little square chairs. Crammed together in silence. Each of our minds are torn: between what is happening now and the fate of our father, and what was happening nearly four months before in the very same ER.
Anna sits quietly between us. I don't know whether to say it or say anything but his name - Ronnie.
***
It is not a heart attack. The EKG is clear; the blood gas is devoid of the telltale enzyme present during cardiac arrest. They order a chest x-ray and a CT scan. We wait.
***
Hours later, they have still not seen a doctor. I make a few phone calls. Justin opens his briefcase, pulls out the crossword puzzle books he keeps for airport waits. I begin filling in the tiny squares with letters. He and Anna work logic puzzles - as though making sense of a set of facts will make sense of what's happening.
***
The x-ray shows pneumonia in the lungs. Just barely. But it is there. When Justin delivers this news, Anna looks as though she will crumble into a million pieces.
***
Dad is admitted to the hospital for the night and finally transitioned into a room in the ER while waiting for a private room to open elsewhere. I go back to see him. He is weak and tired. But still in good humor. The phlebotomist is looking for veins in the crook of his elbow. She runs fingers to his wrist. "You've got some good ones down here," she says. "Well, honey," he replies. "You just pick you one out."
***
Outside his room, the shift change is taking place. I see a familiar face. The charge nurse is now the woman who told us that Ronnie died. Of all the nurses in the Atlanta hospital, it is her. My stomach burns and my heart aches. I want to run from the building.
***
Anna never goes back into the ER. I know she wants to, but she cannot. It is too soon. It is too much. And she has nothing with which to fight.
***
Sunday morning, Anna and I listen to her church service on the internet. The preacher talks about light in dark times. "Is anyone in dark times?" he asks. We pretend not to notice each other crying.
****
By the middle of Sunday, we have a guesstimated diagnosis of pericarditis: an inflammation of the heart's lining. The inflammation increases the amount of fluid around the heart and squeezes it - resulting in pain under the breastbone, intensified by drawing deep breaths.
We have a Father's Day lunch - Dad on hospital food. Anna and I order take out. We celebrate with mini-Snickers. We try to laugh. We know we are at least all together. We are hopeful that there is light in the darkness.
***
The cardiologist comes in and says, yes, he thinks that the problem is pericarditis. An echo cardiogram to be sure that there are no abnormalities. A stress test to make sure the heart is functioning properly. This name, the assurance that it is treatable, eases the tension in the room.
***
Late in the afternoon, Anna insists that Mom needs a break from the hospital. Dad is doing better but assured another night in the hospital. I tell them to go, that I'll stay with him. Shortly after dinner, Dad falls asleep. I lay on the rock-solid excuse for a couch reading the 2004 Fodor's guide to London.
The phlebotomist comes in to collect for another round of blood gases. "Dad," I say gently, touching his shoulder. "They need to take some more blood."
While the phlebotomist goes about donning the latex gloves and stretching the band that makes Dad's veins bulge, the new charge nurse comes in. "What has he been doing," she asks me.
"Sleeping. I just woke him up to have blood drawn."
She pulls out the monitor that he's been wearing around his neck and says that his heart rate is up over 160 bpm. "What should it be?" I ask.
"We'd like it to be 80."
My mouth goes dry.
I look at Dad. He turns to the nurse, "You're scaring me."
"Well," she says, "You're giving us a scare."
She leaves the room. I can see the fear in his frame, the way he tenses against the bed. "Please, God," I plead once more. "Please no."
***
Hours later, the red light is still flashing on the monitor. The number drops to 117 and flashes back up to 130, 140 and then 108. The erratic heartbeat is all over the board.
Anna, Mom and I sit on the couch together. I lean against Mom's arm. With her free hand, she pushes my bangs out of my eyes and tucks them behind one ear.
***
Anna and I head home. The nurse has just been in to tend to her "problem child." She calls the cardiologist on call who agrees to send his PA. This is not uncommon, she assures us; for us, the whole scenario is uncommon.
By the time we reach Anna's house, Mom calls and tells me that the medicine the PA ordered over the phone has taken effect. The monitor is now showing a steady green light. And an exhausted Dad has already fallen asleep.
***
Overnight, the pericarditis seems to lose its grip. Despite another 3 a.m. episode of "atrial flutter", his color returns. He is more himself. A nurse helps him take a pseudo bath and washes his hair. By 11 a.m., they have let him know he will be discharged.
I got up at 5 that morning to ride back to Athens with Chris, who is taking a class at UGA. This news of the discharge is like the letting out of a long-held painful breath. Everything inside me starts to collapse.
Chris comes and picks me up and takes me home. I fall asleep on the couch for an hour.
***
Around 4, I hear the door open. Dad comes in, looking tired and worn. He has a three-day beard salt-and-peppering his face. He's walking a bit slowly and looking for somewhere to sit down. "Hi, Daddy," I say. "Welcome home."
***
At 9 o'clock, we all head for bed. All of us are exhausted beyond comprehension. Before I go to my end of the hall, I take care to hug both Mom and Dad, tell them I love them. As if I needed another reminder how swiftly the tides can change...the sense of having narrowly escaped catastrophe burns inside me, spurring me to live for a few moments with the knowledge of how the story could've ended.
Instead of trying to overphotograph the moment, I bade myself enjoy it. The drive took hours at a languid pace along the scene highway. We volleyed between being deep in conversation, laughing maniacally, munching kettle corn and contemplative silence. We wound through Asheville down to Highlands and Cashiers. At the highest points, low-growing trees scrubbed against the peaks, already stripped of their leaves. But somewhere along our descent, we hit the altitude where it was peak fall colors. As we followed the curves of the mountain in a slow, dreamy caress, we entered a section where the tree canopy reached all the way across the road, a tunnel of fire and honey. The sun broke through the trees in a gilded dance with intermittent shadows.
