The sloshing sounds of tires cutting through watery roads flooded my head. Pounding. The view through the windshield was a grey, abstract watercolour. I pressed harder on the accelerator and the car sped over the Skyway bridge. Gripping the wheel with both hands, I steadied the car’s movement towards Hamilton where my father lay in a hospital bed, and my mother waited at home for me to arrive.
We had talked earlier in the morning. I had some good news that I wanted to share. But she was my second choice. When the news came just before 7:30, I picked up the phone to call my father, anticipating his laughter. Then the thought struck me – would he already be at work? Or on the bus? I didn’t want to distract his routine, so I opted for my mother.
Two hours after we spoke, she called again. I was putting in earphones, heading for a workout. Her voice was frantic. My father was hit by a car and was in the hospital.
Suddenly I was racing across the QEW through a cold, January rainstorm.
It was a minor accident, I told myself. He was probably annoyed that he would be confined to a bed, instead of onsite at his hospital parking attendant job – a role he took on after retirement proved too mundane. My poor mother, I thought. She would have to nurse him back to health.
I turned off the highway and entered the quiet, suburban neighbourhood on the edge of Stoney Creek. As I pulled up to the house, my mother’s figure appeared in the driveway and I barely stopped the car before she jumped in, directing me to the hospital.
He was hit on his way to work, she explained, reiterating the message she received. We made our way through the streets with the rain hammering the roof. I let her off at the emergency entrance and found a parking spot at the top of the building under the downpour. Maneuvering through the hospital maze, I found my mother in the emergency area, where we were ushered into an office and handed a bag of my father’s belongings by the social worker who called my mother earlier. His watch. His shoes. His belt. Some loose change. Clothing had most likely been discarded after being cut off his body.
We were led to the fourth floor into a small, private waiting room with a tiny couch and a couple of armchairs. Once the door was shut, we sat in silence. Then I turned to my mother. We needed to call the family.
The door suddenly opened and another social worker arrived and began to talk, each question causing more wrinkles to appear on my mother’s forehead. Eventually I cut in to stop the chatter – when can we see him?
You will be called, she said with a weak smile, before closing the door behind her.
I turned to my mother. Was she hungry? She shook her head but urged me to find something for myself.
Food wasn’t my first thought, but I needed to move.
Recalling something the social worker mentioned about a cafeteria in the basement, I found the stairwell and followed the smell of damp cloths and grease until I came to a handwritten sign that said it was fish-and-chip day. The smell of frying fish took me back to the week before when my father had taken my mother and me to one of his favorite fish- and-chip shops in Etobicoke for her birthday. It was a place where he used stop for lunch, back in the days when he worked as a courier – more than 40 years ago.
Fifteen-minutes later I was heading back upstairs with a warm Styrofoam container.
My mother and I shared the meal in silence. Within an hour, my sister and Uncles arrived, filling the tiny room with small talk.
It was about an hour later that we were permitted to see my father.
He had retired years earlier with a modest pension and some talk about slowing down and enjoying life. But the monotony of the days prompted him to volunteer at the children’s hospital. After a few months, he was asked to take on more hours and receive a small salary. He agreed, saying that it gave him something to do every day.
He preferred to take the bus to avoid the hassle of driving through the city and parking. Plus, he could read the paper on the ride. I wonder if he saw the write-up about my book – the news I wanted to share.
That morning, the rain was heavy as he made his way across the pedestrian walkway, just steps from the hospital grounds. January mornings at 7:18 am are dark. We are not sure if the driver didn’t see the pedestrians on the walkway, or if he was not paying attention. When he ran through the crosswalk, disregarding the stop sign, the impact sent my father over the hood of the car, hurling him in the air for a moment, said a witness, and pitching him on the road.
I’m not sure if these were facts were relayed by the chatty social worker or the police who came to see us at the hospital to deliver my father’s lunch bag they had retrieved from the road. All I knew at that moment as I neared his bedside was that he was no longer there.
Blood had dried around his nostrils and there were streaks of dark red around his ears as if someone had quickly wiped the skin. A tube protruded from his mouth forcing his body to move up and down.
I stood close to my mother and looked up to see my sister covering her mouth, tears running down her face. I didn’t cry.
Speak to him, the nurse urged. He may be able to hear. I obliged, telling him my good news. My mother squeezed his hand, my sister talked. We stood by the bed and watched his body move up and down, and I stared at red crusting in his nostrils.
He would need surgery, we were told by the neurosurgeon. The brain was swelling, and a piece of his skull needed to be removed to allow for the expansion, so it could subside once again. He also needed a cast on his fractured leg.
My mother signed the forms and I walked to Tim Horton’s with my sister. Rain had turned to snow and the sidewalks were slippery. My best friend arrived and we drank coffee as the small room became stuffy.
It was after midnight when we learned that the brain had continued to swell even after surgery. We were encouraged to get some sleep and see the doctor in the morning. By the time I retrieved my car from the rooftop lot, snow had collected on the roof.
It took hours before we were ushered into the meeting room the next morning. It’s going to be fine, my mother said, a painted smile on her face. “I have a good feeling.”
I said nothing, the dark red smear just under an ear imprinted in my mind.
The doctor arrived and was followed by a nurse who placed a box of Kleenex on the table. My mother still smiled.
The doctor began to talk. It was a diagnosis that I already knew a day earlier. Despite the surgery, the brain was continuing to swell, the doctor explained. The part of his brain that controlled my father’s senses, his speech, his thoughts, had been destroyed in the accident. When he arrived at the hospital, the chances or recovery were slim, but the neurosurgeon was determined to try. Even if he survived, he would remain unresponsive for the rest of his life. Only the breathing tube was holding his life in the air.
My mother cupped her face in her hands and allowed herself to cry. I put my arms around one side of her, while my sister held the other. I asked my friend for a few moments and he closed the door quietly as he left.
My father didn’t believe in hospital machines keeping a body in limbo. A waste of taxpayer dollars, he used to say. We signed the organ donor forms before leaving the hospital, just in case his 72-year old body had something of value that could save another life.
The next day was Sunday and the three of us ate breakfast together as the sun lit up a blue sky. I thought about my father. A husband of 52 years to my mother, who quit school in his teens to support his brothers and sisters. A man who moved to Canada with his family and worked in a chocolate factory to earn a living. A father whose opinion infuriated me on so many occasions and yet softened me when I watched him being led by his Jack Russell terrier. A man who was waiting in a hospital bed for his family to end his life.
As we opened the front door to head to the hospital for the last time, my mother stopped us suddenly. “Wait a minute,” she said, grasping our hands. “We need to make sure.” Holding on tightly, she bowed her head and prayed. “Is this the right decision?” she asked squeezing our hands before letting go.
Quietly, we filed out of the house, walking down the driveway toward the warming car that would take us to the hospital.
I heard the noises before I saw them. A movement at the corner of my eye directed my gaze to the tree across the street. It was moving in a flutter of activity. The screeches became louder, commanding attention.
“Mum, is that a Bluejay?” My eyes were fixed on the tree.
She followed my gaze to the tree filled with what looked like a dozen, noisy and chattering birds.
“Your father was just telling me the other day how he missed seeing Bluejays when he moved from Caledon to Hamilton,” she said, as her eyes filled with water. “We have never seen one here before.”
As the comment escaped her lips, the tree became restless. The squawking increased, rising higher and louder. Suddenly in one swoop and a flash of blue and white, we watched as the flock of birds jumped off the branches, and soared over our heads and across the top of the house in one swift motion. We stood in the driveway and watched as they disappeared into the sky. The tree was still. All I could hear was the sound of the car idling.
I watched as a smile appeared across my mother’s face and as her eyes filled with tears she said, “This is the right decision.” And we got into the car for the last trip to the hospital.