Where I'm Calling From

shook hands with the doctor again. The doctor patted Howard’s shoulder and went out.
    “I suppose one of us should go home and check on things,” Howard said. “Slug needs to be fed, for one thing.”
    “Call one of the neighbors,” Ann said. “Call the Morgans. Anyone will feed a dog if you ask them to.”
    “All right,” Howard said. After a while, he said, “Honey, why don’t you do it? Why don’t you go home and check on things, and then come back? It’ll do you good. I’ll be right here with him. Seriously,” he said. “We need to keep up our strength on this. We’ll want to be here for a while even after he wakes up.”
    “Why don’t you go?” she said. “Feed Slug. Feed yourself.”
    “I already went,” he said. “I was gone for exactly an hour and fifteen minutes. You go home for an hour and freshen up. Then come back.”
    She tried to think about it, but she was too tired. She closed her eyes and tried to think about it again.
    After a time, she said, “Maybe I will go home for a few minutes. Maybe if I’m not just sitting right here watching him every second, he’ll wake up and be all right. You know? Maybe he’ll wake up if I’m not here. I’ll go home and take a bath and put on clean clothes. I’ll feed Slug. Then I’ll come back.”
    “I’ll be right here,” he said. “You go on home, honey. I’ll keep an eye on things here.” His eyes were bloodshot and small, as if he’d been drinking for a long time. His clothes were rumpled. His beard had come out again. She touched his face, and then she took her hand back. She understood he wanted to be by himself for a while, not have to talk or share his worry for a time. She picked her purse up from the nightstand, and he helped her into her coat.
    “I won’t be gone long,” she said.
    “Just sit and rest for a little while when you get home,” he said. “Eat something. Take a bath. After you get out of the bath, just sit for a while and rest. It’ll do you a world of good, you’ll see. Then come back,”
    he said. “Let’s try not to worry. You heard what Dr Francis said.”
    She stood in her coat for a minute trying to recall the doctor’s exact words, looking for any nuances, any hint of something behind his words other than what he had said. She tried to remember if his expression had changed any when he bent over to examine the child. She remembered the way his features had composed themselves as he rolled back the child’s eyelids and then listened to his breathing.
    She went to the door, where she turned and looked back. She looked at the child, and then she looked at the father. Howard nodded. She stepped out of the room and pulled the door closed behind her.
    She went past the nurses’ station and down to the end of the corridor, looking for the elevator. At the end of the corridor, she turned to her right and entered a little waiting room where a Negro family sat in wicker chairs. There was a middle-aged man in a khaki shirt and pants, a baseball cap pushed back on his head. A large woman wearing a housedress and slippers was slumped in one of the chairs. A teenaged girl in jeans, hair done in dozens of little braids, lay stretched out in one of the chairs smoking a cigarette, her legs crossed at the ankles. The family swung their eyes to Ann as she entered the room.
    The little table was littered with hamburger wrappers and Styrofoam cups.
    “Franklin,” the large woman said as she roused herself. “Is it about Franklin?” Her eyes widened. “Tell me now, lady,” the woman said. “Is it about Franklin?” She was trying to rise from her chair, but the man had closed his hand over her arm.
    “Here, here,” he said. “Evelyn.”
    “I’m sorry,” Ann said. “I’m looking for the elevator. My son is in the hospital, and now I can’t find the elevator.”
    “Elevator is down that way, turn left,” the man said as he aimed a finger.
    The girl drew on her cigarette and stared at Ann. Her eyes were narrowed to slits, and her broad lips parted slowly as she let the smoke escape. The Negro woman let her head fall on her shoulder and looked away from Ann, no longer interested.
    “My son was hit by a car,” Ann said to the man. She seemed to need to explain herself. “He has a concussion and a little skull fracture, but he’s going to be all right. He’s in shock now, but it might be some kind of coma, too. That’s what really worries us, the coma part. I’m going out for a little