Leaving Eva (The Eva Series Book 1) (15 page)

She was glad she was alone in the bathroom. She knew the hospitals locked psych ward was only two levels up, and while the drugs may be welcome and needed, she had too much to contend with to have a breakdown now.

Finally, she felt calmer, and she dared a peek at herself in the mirror. Her eyelids and face were puffy from tears, and she took a cold paper towel and tried to repair the damage.
It’s hopeless
, she conceded. She readjusted her bobby pin once more, and walked out the door and headed toward the ICU

When she re-entered the room, Rose was still sleeping. The tube in her mouth was making the breathing sound for her, her chest rising and falling with each swoosh and click of the machine. Nothing had changed. She didn’t even know Brynn had gone, and she didn’t care that she had returned.

Brynn squeezed her hand. It was still cold like it had been for days. “I’m back, Mom,” she said, her low husky voice wavering. She was trying to sound strong. She didn’t want Rose to know how tired and scared she was. Rose would have liked the attention but Brynn’s appearance would’ve alarmed and hurt her.

Brynn held tight to her hand. She closed her eyes as she tried to forget where she was.

DON’T YOU
SEE
,
DARLING GIRL?
I chose you
. Rose was speaking to Brynn. She knew Brynn was in the chair next to her, but Rose was oddly aware that her lips had not moved and that she hadn’t actually spoken.

Brynn. Brynn. Brynn.
Rose was testing her voice. There was nothing. Rose didn’t understand what was going on.
Am I actually talking?

Brynn couldn’t hear her.

Where am I? Oh, the hospital. I’m in the hospital.

It was coming back to her now. She had been home, waiting for Brynn to come over, but lately Brynn didn’t come. Rose was mostly alone, and not aging well. She wasn’t that old but at fifty-seven, she appeared older than most people she knew in their sixties, and some even in their seventies.

Rose could hear the machines with their beeping and their blipping. When Cindy the nurse came in to take care of her, she knew that the prognosis must not be good. Cindy wasn’t telling Brynn the truth.

I’m thinking now. I’m hearing everything that everyone is saying so my brain must be working just fine. And I feel no pain. So strange to not feel any pain at all. It’s so strange to feel so peaceful. I haven’t felt at peace my entire life, and now I feel peace and no sadness, no pain. I feel nothing but warmth and peace. But, Brynn, I have to tell you what I’ve done. I have to tell you all of the things that I am supposed to tell you before I go.

Rose was contemplating how she could talk to Brynn. She tried moving her hand. It didn’t move. She tried wiggling her toes. It was the same. She tried to open her mouth and realized that the breathing tube was taped down tight and that even if she wanted to talk, she couldn’t.
Damn breathing tube!

She concentrated on waking herself up.

Nothing!

She knew Brynn loved her even though they had not been as close over the past year. Brynn had created a chasm between them that Rose couldn’t understand.

With Adam gone, it was as though Brynn had become someone else, someone who Rose did not know and it scared her. The more that Brynn edged away from her, the closer Rose tried to get. If Brynn ignored her phone calls, she continued to call. If Brynn ignored her emails, she just continued to send more emails. If Brynn didn’t text her back, she continued to text until Brynn texted her back.

Brynn needed to be away from Rose. For the first time she didn’t want to be the center of her world. She resented that Rose needed her and wanted her so much. She needed to be alone to revel in her own abandonment, in her own pain. She needed to protect her pain, even from Rose, and she held onto it desperate to keep it close to her. It was the only way that Brynn knew that she was alive.

Rose wasn’t used to a life without Brynn. Brynn had been her whole life, her entire reason for living. Rose could not function without her. She was used to calling her for everything, whether it was day or night.

When Adam and Brynn were together, Rose regularly called Brynn when she got up at six a.m. Even though she knew that Brynn often worked late at the restaurant, she still called.

“I’m out of bananas,” Rose said brightly, during one of her calls. She sounded very alert and awake.

“Mom, its six a.m.,” Brynn said grouchily. She knew she should have turned off the ringer. The early morning phone calls from Rose weren’t unusual. Rose didn’t understand that the rest of the world wasn’t on her schedule.

“I know. I’ve been up since four,” Rose said ignoring Brynn’s tone. “And I need bananas. I’m out. I also need bagels, milk, cream cheese…” Rose continued to tick down her list as Brynn lay there sleepily fading in and out of sleep, the phone lying in the bed by her ear.

“Is that Rose?” Adam said, annoyed. He would recognize that nasally voice anywhere. When Rose needed something, she sounded like a needy, petulant child, and listening to her grated on his nerves in a way that nothing else did.

“Yep, go back to sleep honey,” Brynn said patting his back, trying to soothe him, and loving the feel of his muscles through the sheets.

“Brynn! Brynn!” Roses voice as getting louder.

“Mom, what do you want?” Brynn was irritated. She was more and more demanding. Rose seemed to need her now for everything. And it seemed that there was never an option.

She always wanted Brynn to accompany her on her errands, even when Brynn was a young girl. But now Rose just assumed she would join her, as though she had nothing else to do. She called her to take her grocery shopping, to get her haircut, to go to the doctor, to the dentist. Brynn found that she couldn’t say no, to anything. After all, she had always been Rose’s entire life. And even though Brynn had a fledgling restaurant to run, a new husband, and a house to take care of, Rose wanted her undivided attention.

Brynn was frustrated with Rose. She found herself canceling dates with Adam, or changing her schedule around at the last minute because Rose needed something. If Rose’s cat got sick, Brynn was affected. If Rose forgot her wallet or needed to make an appointment or go somewhere, Brynn was affected.

Adam didn’t understand why Brynn refused to say “no” to her.

“Brynn, she’s a grown woman. She can take care of herself.” He raged at her the fourth time she had changed their dinner plans because Rose’s doctor appointment ran late. They had made the reservation months in advance for a restaurant that was difficult to get into. But now they had to cancel and Adam was furious.

“She can’t! She’s never been able to be alone and take care of herself,” Brynn said helplessly.

“She can! You just don’t let her.”

“Adam, you don’t understand. She needs me!”

“Let someone else take her, for God’s sake!” It was an ongoing conversation between the two of them.

“There is NO one else! There’s just
me
!” Brynn was completely alone in Rose’s neediness. There was no one to understand or help her, and she was frustrated that he couldn’t see it.

It seemed that Brynn was more often on the go from sun up to sun down. She would spend the days with Rose, and then she would go to the restaurant, not getting home until late at night. It crossed her mind repeatedly that if she weren’t so fearful to have a child, it wouldn’t happen this way. She never had time for her husband, and with Rose’s demands on her schedule, she would never have time to care for a child, anyway.

There was a time when Brynn appreciated her time with Rose. But the new assumption that her time was always at Rose’s expense was creating a distance between them. They were drifting further and further apart, as Brynn was manipulated by Rose’s weakness.

Their outings consisted only of Rose’s needs, never of the usual mother/daughter pleasantries that Brynn knew happened between some. There were no shopping trips, or luncheons, or outings that didn’t involve something that Rose needed. Brynn found that their conversations had begun to shift as well. She couldn’t remember a time that they talked about anything other than what Rose needed. And when Brynn did try to carry on normal conversation, Rose drifted. It was almost as though she had forgotten how to focus on anyone but herself.

Adam saw himself slowly losing Brynn. It was either work or Rose. He knew he was last in the lineup, and he pretended to be okay with it. But in his heart, he knew that he wasn’t.

“I miss cuddling with you!” he would complain to her. But she would dismiss him, or try to placate him with a distracted “I’m sorry.” He missed making dinner with her, or going to the movies on a mindless date. Squeezing in dinner was becoming increasingly more difficult and Brynn was becoming so crabby with her overextended schedule, and even when they did find time together, she wasn’t pleasant.

Now that Adam was gone, Rose thought it would be so much easier to have her undivided attention. But now Brynn was ignoring her.

Rose couldn’t take it anymore, and showed up at her door after weeks of being ignored. She rang the bell non-stop until Brynn finally answered the door. She was furious. It was an emotion that Rose had never seen from Brynn. “Stop calling me!” Brynn had raged at her, looking more like a crazed stranger than her beautiful daughter. “Stop calling me, emailing me, and texting me. I need some space, Mother!”

“Oh Brynn, stop being so mad at me.” Rose tried to pacify her. She hated when Brynn was mad at her. She tried to rub her arm, but Brynn jerked away. She wouldn’t let Rose touch her anymore. Rose couldn’t hug her, or pat her, or even get too close to her. Brynn always seemed to radiate in anger and it was usually directed toward Rose. They were so close all of Brynn’s life, but now it was as though she couldn’t stand to be near her.

“You are a selfish woman. If I gave you an inch, you took a mile. You never let me just live my life. So now, Adam is gone, and I have no one. You stole my life, and you don’t even care! All you have ever cared about was you!”

Brynn’s eyes were blazing. Rose had never seen her like this before. There was something in Brynn’s eyes that she had never seen.
Hatred? Resentment? It can’t be!

“You left us there, in that house, with
HIM
!” Brynn was ranting now. “And you left me with him even when you said you wouldn’t, and you let him hurt me time and time again. You didn’t protect me like you said you would. You promised that you would protect me and you didn’t! You did nothing!” Brynn cried out like a wounded animal, pulling at her hair as though she needed to be reminded of her pain. She thought about her razor, and she missed it. She thought about her scars and touched her side reminding herself that they were still there. She missed the control, and she felt dangerously out of control yelling at Rose.

Rose was in disbelief. It broke her heart that this girl, who she had rescued from an uncertain life in a foster home, now saw her as someone who ruined her life. This was her little girl! She wanted nothing in life other than to have a child. Brynn was her child, her only child, and the only real love of her life. Rose thought for a second of how Brynn had clung to her when she was little. She thought about how she needed her, and now those days were gone.

There was nothing that Rose could say to Brynn to convince her that she had done everything that she could to protect her and to watch over her. There was nothing that she could say to convince her that she hadn’t meant to hurt her life with Adam. She knew that Brynn wouldn’t be able to hear her. She was lost in the depths of her pain where Rose’s voice could not reach her. Rose recognized that look in Brynn’s eyes. She had seen it in her own eyes years before she ever found her Brynn. Rose knew that she would have stayed lost without her. She decided to absorb Brynn’s anger, if it meant Brynn could heal.

And now, in the hospital, Brynn’s anger was forgotten. She was Rose’s sweet girl once again.

Brynn is holding my hand!
Rose was so happy. She wished she could stroke Brynn’s head as she did when she was a little girl. She soothed her so many times when she was young, whether it was after Thomas had beaten her, or when she was just sad for no reason. Rose was always able to make her feel better, but there was nothing that she could do now.

I’m stuck lying here in this damn hospital bed, and I can’t even move. I’m dying, and I can’t make her feel better now. Don’t worry, beautiful girl.
Rose was thinking hard trying to make Brynn hear her thoughts. She had so much more to tell her.

THE DOCTOR
WAS COMING IN
. He was an older guy, Indian. Rose couldn’t understand a word he was saying although Brynn didn’t seem to have a problem.
Smart kid
, Rose thought. Brynn had always been smart. That’s how she had gotten out of their little town, moved to the big city far away, and opened her successful little restaurant in a nice part of town.

Brynn was always smarter than Rose, always smarter than Thomas. Rose knew that she was destined to do more.

That’s why Rose protected Brynn, and she needed to tell her.
I always protected you. When I knew Thomas was angry and drunk, I made sure he couldn’t come after you. I looked after you every chance I got. I swear my dear, I did.
Rose knew that Brynn thought she didn’t. But then again, Rose never told her how she punished Thomas, and how she made him pay for what he did.

The doctor was talking, but Brynn could only pick out certain words. “Unresponsive.” “Deteriorating rapidly.” “Odds she will not survive on her own.”

Brynn couldn’t say anything. Rose didn’t have any written directives. Rose left it up to her as she did with everything else.

Don’t let me go yet, Brynn. I need to wake up and tell you that I did protect you. Don’t let me go.

Brynn couldn’t think. She looked at Rose and battled with love and resentment. Rose had sucked the life right out of Brynn day after day until Brynn was forced to keep her distance just to be able to breathe. Brynn hated that she was afraid to have a child because she didn’t want to be the type of mother that Rose had been. She was terrified that after having a mother that abandoned her, and a mother who was basically a child, that she too was destined to fail as a mother. Because of her crippling fear of love and motherhood, Brynn lost the only man she ever loved.

Wake me up! Wake me up!
Rose pleaded.

“Miss? Miss?” the Doctor was speaking to Brynn interrupting her thoughts. “Do you know what your mother would want?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know.” Brynn felt helpless. She didn’t know what to do and there was no one in the world to help her now. The one person she would have turned to had abandoned her, and she was lost.

“You don’t have to know right now, but you don’t have much time. If something happens to her, then we will need to know what to do. It’s been less than a week, but things are not looking very promising.” The doctor was sympathetic but impatient. It was clear that he wanted Brynn to make a decision.

He walked out of the room, and Brynn was left alone with the beeping machines and the lifeless, comatose body, whose existence was now completely in her hands. A small part of her just wanted to pull the plug and be done with it, but she couldn’t bring herself to think it, let alone make it happen.

Brynn fell into the chair, burying her head in her hands as she started to cry. Her small body shook as she sobbed, muffling her cries in the arm of her shirt.
What do I do? Oh Mom, what do I do?
They had never talked about what to do in this type of situation, and Brynn didn’t know what she would’ve wanted. Brynn was conflicted with love for her mother who had saved her, and this woman who had ruined her.

Yet Brynn held Rose’s hand, and prayed hard for her to live.