Saving Elijah

the bedroom doorway.
    I couldn't handle this now. I just couldn't. "Wrong number."
    "Oh. Is Elijah all right?"
    "He's the same, Kate. I'm going back now. I'll see you tonight when you come."
    "I was thinking of not coming tonight. Is that okay?"
    She hadn't last night or the night before, either. Didn't she care? Of course she cared, she loved her little brother like crazy.
    "Whatever you want, Kate. Come. Or don't come. Just tell Grandma and Grandpa."
    "Which one?"
    "Take your pick. Say goodbye to Alex for me, will you?"
    I kissed her goodbye, hugged her, scooped up my dirty clothes, laid them on top of the washing machine, and left.

    *    *    *

    "Imagine it, Dinah." The ghost leaned forward from the backseat as I pulled out of my driveway. "You think it's going to get any easier? I don't think so. Imagine your life when your son is a vegetable. It goes on and on, the grief forever.
    "Your practice is finished, your column over, your friends avert their eyes when they see you, they even cross the street. You're up every hour or so during the nights, thinking of your son lying there with his eyes that way. You get out of bed every morning at six. The last thing Sam says to you before he leaves for work is, 'When will it end, Dinah?' He thinks it's up to you. You give the children breakfast. No conversation—there never is."
    "You are lying. All of this is a lie." My protests sounded weaker, even to me.
    "Lying, am I? Why don't you drive up to Laurel and see it for yourself? Do it right now. Elijah's not going anywhere. Take Interstate 95 north instead of south."
    I did as he said and went north. The ghost told me where to go.
    "You do this drive daily for years and years. You have to follow the directions over and over before you can follow them without looking. Eventually, you will know every curve, tree, sign on the route. You play the same tape in the car during the ride, over and over. The voice on the tape is high and clear and the singer asks who will warm her soul. This music is undemanding, melodious, very beautiful actually. Not as beautiful as my own music, of course. Becky gave you the tape, and it's the only music you're capable of listening to. You play it when Sam drives there with you on the weekends.
    "You have a lot of time to think in the car, and when the music can't stop the thoughts, you do sums to keep from thinking. You count hours. It's nearly a two-hour ride each way. You have been in the car a total of 4,337 hours, six minutes, forty-three seconds.
    "You never look at the other children as you come into the main ward. They have their own mothers, even though you have never seen them. This is the twelve hundredth time you've been here, you tell Jane, the doctor. You visit. You stay for four hours each day. You go home and your other children are there."
    "Alex and Kate!" I said. "They have names."
    "You barely remember their names, you barely know they're alive. That's what they think. Alex never speaks a word, he loathes you, he goes off with his low-life friends to do drugs, anything he can get his hands on. Kate goes off to college in two years, relieved to go, but Alex will never go to college. Sam stays with you, tries to make up for you with the kids, pretends this is life. He finds what he can in affairs."
    "Affairs?"
    "Honey, you are whistling 'Dixie' if you think a man is going to put up with this for years." He whistled to emphasize the point.
    "Sam will."
    "Well, now, let's just wait and see." His laugh bounced around the car.
    I looked in the rearview mirror, but I saw only the reflection of the road disappearing behind me. I looked away.
    "Why are you so cruel?"
    I could feel him move closer to me, murmur into my ear. "When you are getting ready for bed every night, Sam asks, 'How was he today?' He no longer speaks your son's name, this husband of yours. You detest the sight of him. The feeling is mutual."
    I knew this hating had already begun.
    "Every night, you look at the clock. It is 11:10 p.m. You will be lying beside Sam for five hours, fifty minutes ... three hundred fifty minutes... twenty-one thousand seconds. This is the way your mind has to work. If you don't count numbers, you'll get your thoughts stuck in a circle again, start praying for miracles again. The circles drive you mad."

    *    *    *

    We had arrived. I'd expected a kind of asylum: old brick, gothic spires, a huge foreboding place set high on a hill with small narrow windows. As I pulled to a