“Don’t apologize. I told her you’re working your way back.”
“Tell me honestly. Is she OK?” My eyes sting, and every part of me hurts. My scalp, my skin, my heart most of all.
“Ligaya is in good hands,” Mom says firmly. “And she isn’t dilated, so this isn’t about rushing for the birth. She’s here to monitor the babies.”
“Can she talk?”
“They have her in another room for tests. I’ll tell her you called.”
“Do you promise she’s going to be OK?” I sound like a pathetic kid begging for comfort. It’s not a role I’ve played in a very long time, if ever. Even as a child, I tried to be the stoic older brother who didn’t take attention away from Olive. But right now, I crave the reassurance like my world depends on it.
“Please, Mom. Tell me.” I brace myself.
“I promise you, Tristan.” And then, after a pause, she continues. “I . . . I haven’t been someone you can trust for a while now—”
“Mom, stop. That’s not it.”
“Let me finish. I have not been a great mother, and heaven knows I don’t deserve your trust, but I would never hide anything so important from you. I promise you Ligaya is OK. Try to stay calm and get here safely.”
Her voice is shaky. It’s as if she’s not used to speaking in such a direct and confident tone. But her words are like a blanket around my shoulders, warding off the chill of dread threatening to sink into me permanently. It’s not until right now that I realize I had been spiraling toward a full-on panic attack.
“Thank you, Mom. Are her parents with her?”
“Of course. She’s surrounded by people who care and love her, Tristan.”
“Why areyouthere?” The question slips out before I realize how rude it is. I begin to apologize. She cuts me off.
“For you. I’m here for you.”
The whispered words do somethingto me. Like she spoke to a need more profound than my current unravelling.
More than anyone, my mother knows what a hospital represents for a family. The patient is the focus because, of course. Yet hours of cold hallways and futile blame and desperate uncertainty await the family members. That’s how it was with my father around, screaming at the doctors and calling me weak for crying.
The past is not the present. I know that. Yet my mother intuited I needed this extra reassurance. Cathy and Orlando are there for Ligaya, but my mother is an on-site eyewitness forme.
“Thank you, Mom.”
Simple words I’ve said in passing dozens of times through the years, but today it comes from my heart. She might not have been the perfect mother, but her trauma was as real as mine. I can’t even imagine the grief of a mother losing a child. So even if we weren’t there for each other through the sorrows of the past, there seems to be a future in which a different relationship is possible.
“Tristan!” she yells excitedly, pulling me from my ruminations. “She’s getting wheeled back into the room right now! I’m handing her my phone.”
There’s muffled movement, a shuffle of sheets, and then—
“Hey!”
Ligaya’s cheerful voice cracks me wide open, sunlight burning off the fog of panic.
“Ligaya! The soonest I can get there is about seven, maybe eight hours. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have been so far.”
“You’re flying back? But why?”
“You’re in the hospital. What do you meanwhy?”
“Everything is fine, Tristan. I promised you I wouldn’t risk anything. The babies weren’t moving much, so I got myself here to be safe.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? Or answer your phone?”
She sighs. “I wasn’t about to give birth, so I figured why complicate things for you. You’re about to win the Stanley Cup! The Mavericks could bring home the championship tonight. There was no reason for you to miss the game.”
