Free Accidents of Marriage by Randy Susan Meyers Page B

darling.”
    “But she’s all right, isn’t she?”
    “Everything will be okay.”
    Emma tugged on the whistle hanging from her lanyard. “Does she have to stay there?”
    “We’ll find out when we get to the hospital. I’m sure it will be okay.” Grandma’s voice shook. Emma didn’t know what else to ask.
    Her grandmother reached into the pocket of her denim skirt and gave Emma a pile of wet naps. “Wipe your face, you’ll feel better. Give some to Caleb and Gracie. Everyone should cool off.”
    Emma handed one to each of the kids. They opened the square foil packets in unison and wiped the alcohol-saturated squares over their faces. Grandma started up the car.
    •  •  •
    Children younger than twelve weren’t allowed in the surgical waiting room, so Emma had to watch Caleb and Gracie in the main lobby. For hours. At eight that night they were still huddled on a hard bench. Sick-looking people hunched against their pain kept appearing through the revolving hospital doors. Others came from the elevators, heading over toward the nearby cafeteria or going outside.
    Some were too scary to look at, dragging bags of fluid hanging from poles or with faces so swollen they looked about to burst. Why were they going outside? To smoke? Get air?
    Other people, healthy-looking people, carried in bright gift bags, plants, and piles of magazines, but they were also frightening, with their faces all pinched with worry.
    The wooden benches and chairs afforded no comfort. Caleb’s head lay in Emma’s lap; Gracie leaned against Emma’s other side. Daddy wanted her, Gracie, and Caleb to go home with Aunt Vanessa. When Aunt Vanessa wouldn’t leave the hospital, he suggested that Kath or Olivia pick them up, but Emma refused to go anywhere.
    What if her mother died?
    No one told Emma what was going on.
    Daddy said he was fine and it was nothing, but he’d walked all bent over when they’d seen him. Bandages wrapped his chest so thickly that he couldn’t button the middle part of his shirt. How could it be nothing?
    She didn’t want him to make her leave, so she just stayed quiet, taking care of Caleb and Gracie and waiting for news.
    “Is Mommy going to die?” Caleb’s thumb in his mouth muffled his words.
    “Of course not. Don’t even think that.” Emma smoothed his hair.
    “But she could, right?” he insisted. “It’s possible.”
    Gracie sat up. Red marks from Emma’s shirt seams lined her face. “Could Mommy die?”
    Hours of crying had left her sister’s eyes red and swollen. Finally, frightened that Gracie’s loud sobs would attract attention and their father would be called, Emma warned her that Daddy would send them home if Gracie didn’t stop. The effort of not crying contorted Gracie’s face until it looked as though pain twisted her features.
    “She’s not going to die,” Emma said. “We just have to be good. And pray.” Emma didn’t know why she said that—praying was a foreign concept—but she had nothing else to offer.
    Gracie laced her fingers and pressed her palms together. Her mouth moved silently as she clasped her hands. Caleb picked at his sad grimy bandages. None of them had received anything resembling religious training, unless you counted going to the bar mitzvahs of second cousins, or having Passover at her mother’s parents’ house and Easter at her father’s. Christmas and Chanukah meant no more than food and presents.
    Should she pray to the God of Jews or Catholics? Emma made secret little crosses on her chest, imitating Gracie, trying to make deals with God. She’d obey her parents for the rest of her life if God kept her mother alive. She’d take care of everyone and never be mean. Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech Ha’Olam, she chanted in her head. Emma didn’t know what the words meant, but Grandma Anne said them each year as she lit the Chanukah candles. Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech Ha’Olam, please keep my mother alive.
    “But she could