Life Expectancy

she told us that Dr. Cornell-qualified for general surgery with a specialty in gastrointestinal work-was an excellent surgeon. She said the team with him was "awesome."
        I didn't need this soft-spoken sales pitch. To stay sane, I had already convinced myself that Dr. Cornell was a genius with hands as sensitive as those of the greatest concert pianist, a nonpareil.
        According to the nurse, although Lorrie remained in critical condition, the surgery was going well. But it would be a long night. Dr.
        Cornell's best estimate was that he would not be finished until sometime between midnight and one o'clock.
        She had taken two bullets. They had done much damage.
        Just then I didn't want more details. Couldn't bear them.
        The nurse left.
        With just me and Dad in it, the small I.C.U lounge seemed as big as an airplane hangar.
        "She'll be fine," he told me. "Good as new."
        I couldn't remain seated. Had to move, burn off nervous energy.
        This was Sunday, December 22, not one of the five dates on the back of the circus pass. At midnight, the third day on Grandpa Josef's list would begin.
        What could happen after midnight that would be worse than what had happened this evening?
        I pretended not to know the answer. I pressed from my mind the dangerous question itself.
        Although I had gotten up to pace, I found myself at one of the two windows. I didn't know how long I'd been standing there.
        I tried to focus on the view beyond the glass, but there didn't seem to be one. Just blackness. A bottomless void.
        I was holding tightly to the window frame. Vertigo had overcome me. I felt I would fall through the window, into a dark whirlpool.
        Behind me, Dad said, "Jimmy?"
        When I didn't answer, he put a hand on my shoulder.
        "Son," he said.
        I turned to him. Then I did what I had not done since I was a little child: I wept in my father's arms.
        Near midnight, my mother arrived with a large tin of homemade cookies: lemon snaps, madeleines, Scotch shortbread, and Chinese sesame bars.
        Weena followed close behind her in a yellow snowsuit. She carried two big thermoses of our favorite Colombian blend.
        The hospital provided snacks and coffee from vending machines. Even in a crisis, however, we were not a family that ate from vending machines.
        Annie, Lucy, and Andy had been moved to my parents' house. They were in the care and under the protection of a phalanx of trusted neighbors.
        Mom had also brought a change of clothes for me. My shoes, pants, and shirt were stiff with dried blood.
        "Honey, clean up in the men's room down the hall," she said. "You'll feel better."
        Leaving the lounge long enough to wash up and change seemed to be breaking the vigil, an abandonment of Lorrie. I didn't want to go.
        Before leaving home, Mom had found her favorite snapshot of Lorrie and had inserted it into a small frame. She sat now with it in on her lap, studying it as if it were a talisman that would ensure her daughter-in-law's full recovery.
        My father sat beside my mother, took her hand, held it fast. He murmured something to her. She nodded. She stroked the photo with one finger, as if smoothing Lorrie's hair.
        Gently, Weena took the cameo pendant from my hand, clasped it in both of hers, warming it between her palms, and whispered, "Go, Jimmy. Make yourself presentable for Lorrie."
        I decided that the vigil would not-could not-be broken with these three remaining in attendance.
        In the men's room, I hesitated to wash my hands, for fear that I would be washing Lorrie away with her blood.
        We don't fear our own deaths as much as the deaths of those we love. On the cusp of such a loss, we go a little crazy with denial.
        When I returned to the I.C.U lounge, the four of us drank coffee and ate cookies with such solemnity that we might have been taking Communion.
        At 12:30, the surgical nurse returned to inform us that Dr. Cornell would need more time than originally projected. He now expected to speak with us at about 1:30.
        Lorrie had already been in surgery over four hours. The cookies and coffee soured in my stomach. Still wearing his greens and cap, the surgeon arrived with our internist, Mello Melodeon, at 1:33. Dr.
        Cornell was in his forties, looked younger, yet