For several centuries I simply stood and stared and occasionally flinched as a bloody hand or instrument appeared in the air above my sister. The smell of chemicals, blood, sweat and fear was almost overwhelming. But finally, when I could feel the earth turning dead and airless and the sun growing old and cold, they all stepped back from the table and several of them began to push her toward the door. I stepped back and watched them roll her through the doors and down the hall, and then I grabbed at the arm of one of the senior-looking men who filed out after. It might have been a mistake: my hand touched something cold, wet and sticky, and I pulled it away to see it splotched with blood. For a moment I felt light-headed and unclean and even a little panicky, but as the surgeon turned to look at me I recovered just enough.

“How is she?” I asked him.

He looked down the hall toward where they were taking my sister, then back at me. “Who are you?” he asked.

“Her brother” I said. “Is she going to be all right?” He gave me half a not-funny smile. “It's much too soon to tell” he said. “She lost an awful lot of blood. She could be fine, or there could be complications. We just don't know yet.”

“What kind of complications?” I asked. It seemed like a very reasonable question to me, but he blew out an irritated breath and shook his head.

“Everything from infection to brain damage” he said. “We're not going to know anything for a day or two, so you're just going to have to wait until we do know something, okay?” He gave me the other half of the smile and walked away in the opposite direction from where they had taken Deborah.

I watched him go, thinking about brain damage. Then I turned and followed the gurney that had carried Deborah down the hall.

Sin determinar

TWELVE

There were so many pieces of machinery around Deborah that it took me a moment before I saw her in the middle of the whirring, chirping clutter. She lay there in the bed without moving, tubes going in and out of her, her face half covered by a respirator mask and nearly as pale as the sheets. I stood and looked for a minute, not sure what I was supposed to do. I had bent all my concentration on getting in to see her, and now here I was, and I could not remember ever reading anywhere what the proper procedure was for visiting nearest and dearest in the ICU.

Was I supposed to hold her hand? It seemed likely, but I wasn't sure, and there was an IV attached to the hand nearest me; it didn't seem like a good idea to risk dislodging it.

So instead I found a chair, tucked away under one of the life support machines. I moved it as close to the bed as seemed proper, and I settled down to wait.