A Socket, a Plug
Asteady woosh filled the sanitized room, again and again.
Each time ending with a sigh, almost as if Isabel herself heaved it.
But she didn’t, never would breathe in the sharp tang of disinfection.
Would never feel the sun on her face again, or go out with her friends.
Laughing freely had not been a given to her in this life.
Her heartbeat beeped on the machine, the steady rhythm still worked like clockwork, keeping her blood flowing, but it was her brain that had irreparably gone off to shadowed corners.
“So, that’s it?”
Lucien lifted his chin. The clogs that had been nervously shifting over the linoleum flooring behind him stilled.
“There is nothing more we can do, sir, she was doing very well given the circumstances. We had never anticipated brain damage to occur, much less at this level. And certainly not after this amount of time.”
“So what do you call this, then?” He jerked his chin to Isabel. “Should I call it a gross ignorance? Or chalk it up to one big, massive mistake?”
The young girl was as pale as the sheets that covered her up to her shoulders. Blue veins stuck out of the deathly pallor that clung to her skin.
She looks like she’s dead already.
Lucien stepped forward and felt for the pulse that was beating along with the whirring machines. Still warm to the touch.
The doctor behind him piped up. “An unfortunate event, t-to which we have n-no—” The man hung his head.
“No explanation.” He shivered like a man in front of the butcher’s block, keeping his eyes averted from Lucien’s.
The hospital might as well be in front of said block, waiting to have its head chopped off.
“An unfortunate event.” Lucien tasted the words on his tongue. He did his best to push down the anger that was impatiently waiting to erupt, to fling his sharp words into the room, and watch the white-coated docter cower beneath it. It would make no use.
What’s done is done. And Isabel for all her signs of life, was gone. And yet, it wouldn’t make what he had to do next any easier.
“What are the options?” Lucien asked the man behind him while he drew up a chair, keeping a tight eye on Isabel as he let the legs scratch loudly over the floor. The man behind him flinched, Isabel, did not. Not even a flutter of her dark brown eyelashes.
“We can keep her intubated.”
Ah yes, intubated.
The hollow plastic tube that was currently held in its place by tape, running from one cheek to the other ashen cheek. Pulling slightly on Isabel’s colorless lips, jammed right in between them, the only thing keeping her from sure death.
“Isabel.”
“What?” The doctor asked, perplexed.
“Her name is Isabel.”
Is, was. He lifted his head to the Dr standing off to his side, taking in his slack-jawed expression. Why did he even bother, medical staff weren’t notorious for their empathy toward people’s losses.
Neither are you. He shook his head clear of the little voice inside him piping up, way too high pitched for his liking. And too right on, for that matter. But at the very least he knew the names of his victims.
“The other options?” Lucien held a hand to his temple, forcing back the growing and pulsating headache behind it.
Kate was safe where he left her in his house amidst the mountains, but he wanted, no needed, this to be over with.
So he could return, and find solutions for all the other problems he had left to fix.
“The only other option left is… allowing Isabel to pass on. Withdrawal of life support.” The Dr clarified.
To stop the fight. Let her go.
He looked at Isabel once more, looking for any sign of movement, recognition, any proof of actual life left within her. But her eyes were pressed shut, her fingers hadn’t twitched once, not even when he squeezed her hand upon entering.
“The decision is yours, sir, she has no family to make it for her.”
Leaving me with the final choice. Not easy, considering she might as well be Kate’s twin.
He had dug into the records, had asked Emilio to search with him, lest he made the wrong decision.
But as similar as Kate and Isabel looked, there was no reason to believe they were tied by blood, only by coincidence.
Kate brought up in a foster family, Isabel who had been raised among her parents. Two entirely different pasts, merging into the sanctuary. Lucien had been convinced they were relatives at one point, but that just wasn’t true.
“There is no chance, none of recovery?”
“Not full recovery.”
Lucien’s head whipped up, if there was even a slight chance at—
“She might wake up someday, but there will be no recollection, she won’t recognize anyone, won’t be able to talk, eat or drink. Won’t be able to move on her own.”
Not a life worth living.
He could only hope the hospital was right this time around, else what he would do next would be… unforgivable. Lucien took in the mechanical sigh, saw her heartbeat pipe up on the screen, the tape securing her lips together.
And knew what he had to do.
“How would letting her… pass work?”
“It can be done at any moment, you just need to sign this form and Isabel.” The man actually looked at the girl who had nearly survived. “Can go home.”
Home.
Lucien’s head swiveled to the Dr, taking in the small, brass cross hanging between the lapels of his jacket. It would make one’s work easier, believing that one day they all went home, whether to heaven or hell.
Occasionally in the past he’d gotten jealous, when the pastor had come to inform his younger self that his mother was finally at peace.
When all Lucien had wanted to do was sock him in the face for his unknowing words, his mother had never known peace in life, what would death change?
But even in moments like these, belief like that could be envied.
“Get me the form.”
The man nodded, walking backwards away from Lucien and the girl before turning into the hallway, the sound of his clogs fading into the distance.
Lucien dropped himself in the chair with a heavy sigh, eyes locked tight to the heartbeat that would soon be silenced. He turned to face the reason for his being here, slowly reaching out to brush the stray hairs out of Isabel’s face, knuckles sliding past her cheeks.
“They say we find peace on the other side, if any of it is true. I hope you find it my girl, you deserve every bit of it.”
What was left of his heart clenched together.
“Kate will know what happened… soon. When she’s ready for it. I hope you can forgive me, knowing it will save her. And, I hope she will be able to as well. In some distant part of the future.”
Slapping clogs announced the Dr’s return, Lucien scooted backward against the chair. Taking the offered clipboard into his hand, his eyes scoured the white form.
I have been informed of the patient’s condition, prognosis, and the expected outcome of discontinuing such treatment.
What a fancy way of rephrasing death.
He read the next part. I hereby authorize the withdrawal of life-sustaining measures.
A pen clicked, the Dr held it out to him. Lucien put it against the paper, it scratched over the white form, signing Isabel’s passing.
And just like that I legally killed someone. With the swipe of a pen.
“I’m sorry for your loss, mister Evans.”
“I would like to be left alone.” Lucien’s eyes didn’t leave Isabel’s silent form, he’d wait for a sign until the very last second. The Dr bobbed his head in confirmation. Leaving killer and victim alone. He stayed by her side for hours, holding her hand, squeezing every so often.
Stayed that way long after the beeping into the room had faded into silence.