75
Lisa
A man’s voice floats in, distant and echoing. “Looks like she’s coming to.”
I peel open one eye, a slash of light cutting through the haze. “Hello? Where am I?” It hurts to speak. I touch my mouth and
feel a plastic mask.
“Hi, Lisa. How are you? You might be a bit sore from the intubation. You’re just waking up from surgery.” A male nurse with
a goatee, who looks all of nineteen, grins at me.
“Surgery?” I croak, grasping my head. My brain feels like sludge.
“Yes, you got a new kidney!”
My pulse quickens. I push back the cotton blanket and lift up my hospital gown to reveal a long dressing across the right
side of my lower abdomen along with a dreaded catheter bag.
“Hi, Lisa,” an older woman says softly. “I’m Jane, one of the transplant nurses, and this is Evan, a nursing student on placement—it’s
his first day. You rest up, and we’ll be back later.”
Time fades in and out. Staff murmur things I can’t hold on to. I wake to soft lights and hushed voices. Tubes everywhere.
At some point I feel myself being wheeled into another room.
Frank is there, a tall, blurred shape that sharpens just enough for me to see the relief in his eyes.
The next time I surface, nurses Evan and Jane are back at my bedside.
I try to sit but the pain smacks me back down. “I’m sorry—I don’t remember anything. They found a donor?”
Jane leans closer to Evan. “Some patients become very disorientated or forgetful after anesthesia. It can even cause temporary amnesia, usually goes within a day or two.” She places a hand on my shoulder. “Take it easy, love. And yes, they found a donor, remember?”
Evan beams. “You’re so lucky! My brother won’t even share his chips let alone a kidney!”
“Evan!” Jane says through gritted teeth. “Can we have a word outside?”
They leave, and I watch them through the glass wall. Jane says something to him in a sharp whisper that’s almost loud enough
for me to hear, something about “didn’t want her to know.”
Evan claps a hand over his mouth. Then he peeks back inside, face red. “I’m so sorry. I wasn’t supposed to say anything. I’ll
go now and let you rest.”
An alarm sounds from another room, and as they rush off, one of Evan’s words lands with a sickening jolt.
Brother. It presses in, too big to hold. There’s only one way that I could have his kidney.
My vision snaps out of focus as realization settles in. Griff is dead. They probably wanted to wait until I’d recovered to
break the news. Miraculously, I must have been at the top of the list.
Tears surge. I wasn’t with him when he passed. I didn’t get to say goodbye. Not that he would have known. Still, I’d thought
there would be a moment. Some flicker of awareness. A hand squeeze. Something. I knew the time to make amends was over after
his diagnosis. But now, it truly feels gone without a shadow of a doubt. He’s dead. And I’m still here. Because of him.
A knock breaks the silence as Frank arrives with a bunch of gerberas. “Hello, you.” His smile, now as familiar as my own,
brings on more tears. I reach out my hand, and he takes it, sitting on the bed. “How are you holding up? You’ve been in and
out of it all morning, poor thing.”
“Well, they fixed my broken kidney. But I think it broke my heart in the process. I heard about Griff,” I say, my brain still
foggy.
Frank’s jaw drops. “He . . . he told you?”
“Yes.” Evan catches my eye as he walks past, still red in the face. “He told me. I understand why he thought he shouldn’t, but I’m glad he did. I’d hate to be kept in the dark.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize he’d come to!” Frank says slowly, puzzled.
I shrug. It doesn’t seem surprising that Evan came too, given this is a teaching hospital where students shadow nurses.
“That must’ve been a hard call to make,” Frank says, placing the flowers beside the phone. “Did he tell you everything?”
“Well, he told me he donated, and I . . . connected the dots.” The room tilts as I suck in a shaky breath. “I’m sure I’ll
hear the full story later. I—I can’t think straight. My head’s all over the place.”
Frank nods, swallowing. “It must have been a huge shock. It was for me too.” His hand lingers before he presses a Kleenex
into mine. “But I’m so relieved that you know, and that you’re taking the news so well. I was sworn to secrecy.”
My fingers tighten around the tissue until it’s nothing but a damp, crumpled ball. A sob wrenches from my chest. I press my
hands to my face as the truth crashes over me. He’s gone. He’s gone. And I never got to tell him . . .
Frank’s hand is warm on my shoulder, grounding me even as my world splinters. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to sift through
my torrent of emotions. All I know is the aching, gaping hole he left behind.
“You alright, love? Why don’t we ask the nurse for something?”
“Okay, that’d be good.” Hopefully whatever they give me will work on emotional pain too.
Frank ducks out.
“Oh, Ratbag,” I whisper into my oxygen mask. The grief that was so painfully stretched out over time has finally come to a
head.
Frank returns with the nurse just as his phone rings. “Sorry, it’s my aunty calling. She wants to know how it went.” He steps
outside the door to answer.
“Hi there, Lisa,” says Jane. “Frank’s been filling me in on all you’ve been told. You poor love. You must be in shock and
in a bit of pain, are you, honey? I can give you something for that.”
I nod. “I can’t stop thinking about my brother.”
“I’m terribly sorry you found out like this. Evan has been reprimanded—he should have known better. And we’ll have to let Mr. Barlow know too, of course.”
I look out at Frank as she injects something into my drip. “Huh? Oh, he already knows, and he’s not my husband,” I mumble,
a warm wave spreading through my body. The pain in my belly drops away, but it does nothing for the ache in my chest.
“Would you like to see him tomorrow?”
I hesitate. Dead bodies have always freaked me out, yet this might be my only chance to say goodbye. “Please let me see him
now. I don’t want to wait.”
She looks me up and down, brows furrowed. “We’d usually want you to rest another day . . . Given the circumstances, though,
we can take you there this afternoon in a wheelchair if you’re feeling okay.”
I know what this means: the morgue. I block out mental images of gray feet with toe tags and stainless-steel countertops.
Frank is back, his eyes full of sympathy. “Do you want me to come with you?”
“No thank you. I need to do this alone.”
A few hours later, Jane returns and assists me into a chair, my knuckles white as I grip the cold armrests, doubting my decision
to lay eyes upon my dead brother. But I’m already moving.
The nausea that has been niggling all day grows as we reach the lift. The nurse presses a button. I can’t see which one, but
even in my groggy state, I swear we are going up not down. Although my knowledge of this is based on television, I assumed
that morgues were always in the basement.
We stop, and the lift doors open. Machines hum. Monitors beep. The lights hurt my eyes, and I squint to make sense of the
shapes around me. I’m wheeled past rooms with glass walls. If two decades of binge-watching Grey’s Anatomy have taught me anything, it’s that this isn’t the morgue, it’s the ICU. I guess he passed away here and hasn’t been moved yet.
“You ready, love?” the nurse asks.
I murmur something that sounds like yes, while everything in me screams no.
She wheels me into a glass room where he lies, pale and still, a myriad of tubes still stuck into him.
“He may not be particularly talkative,” says Jane.
Particularly talkative!? I know some people have a dark sense of humor, but this is next level!
“I’ll give you two some privacy.”
A beep sounds steadily from the ECG machine to my right. I rub my eyes. There’s a green squiggle making waves. Maybe he had
a massive stroke and was declared brain-dead, and they’re keeping him on life support long enough to find recipients for his
other organs.
I take Griff’s hand. My god, it’s still warm. I squeeze hard, pressing my grief and anger into his skin. “You bloody ratbag!
You stupid, big arse.” Rage and devastation bubble and then boil over. I stopped chasing his affection months ago. But sitting
here now, I still want one last chance. “Why didn’t you love me! Why couldn’t you have done this for Mum! You just let her
die!” I collapse my head onto his hand, my face soaked in tears. “Why do I still love you?”
“I love you too,” I can almost hear him whisper back. “I love you too, Lisa.”
I flinch as fingers comb through my hair. I try to scream, but no sound comes. What the actual!?
Griff’s eyes are open! He is looking at me! Talking to me!
I scramble for the call button, but Griff removes his oxygen mask and raises his hand in a stop sign.
“Lisa.” He’s staring deep into my eyes, directly, lucidly.
I drop the buzzer, my hand trembling.
“Don’t call anyone in yet. We need to talk. They told me you found out. I never expected to see you, but I’m so glad you’re
here.”
I blink hard. I must be on some very strong drugs.
He hasn’t spoken so intently, so logically, since the dementia began.
“Griff . . . ?” I say his name as if it’s something that doesn’t exist. “How . . . how come you’re still alive?
I thought you . . . How did they let you give a kidney? You can’t donate unless you’re dead.”
“They didn’t tell you . . . ?” His gray brows knit in confusion.
“You . . . you can’t consent with the dementia . . .”
“About that.” Terror crosses his reddening face. “I need to tell you something.”
The room blurs at the edges, and I get that strange feeling that I’m not really present, that I’m an observer, watching this
play out on a stage.
“The thing is, Lisa, I . . . I don’t have it.”
“Have what?”
“Dementia—I don’t have dementia.”
The words sit in the air like a feather that is too heavy to float but too light to sink. I rub my forehead, convinced I’m
losing my mind. I glance over at the drip attached to his arm; maybe whatever meds he is on are causing a lucid moment.
“Lisa, did you hear me? I don’t have Alzheimer’s. I never did.” His eyes, though tired, have never been so clear.
Before I can speak, another nurse comes in. “Hello, Mr. Barlow, it’s lovely to see you awake.” She checks the monitor, adjusting
the drip before taking his blood pressure. “How are you feeling?”
He gives no reply.
She looks to me and frowns. “Is everything okay?”
“He’s saying that he doesn’t have dementia. Has his medication made him lucid?”
She narrows her eyes, tapping her iPad. “No, Mr. Barlow doesn’t have dementia. He couldn’t be a living organ donor if he did.”
“No. No. That’s not right. He’s been in a nursing home. He moved there over a year ago. His husband Beau had it first . . .
then he got it . . . he . . . he . . .” Surely Griff couldn’t have . . . My breathing becomes rapid and shallow.
An irritating buzz sounds from the nurse’s beeper. “I’ll be back in a sec,” she says with a wave.
Griff’s gaze remains fixed on me.
“How . . . ?”
He looks at his hands, fumbling with his IV. “I faked it.”
“What the hell do you mean?” Smiles are something you fake, or cat ownership—not a debilitating neurological disease!
“I had to do it. I had to be close to . . .” He shuts his eyes. “I couldn’t bear . . .”
I blink away hot tears. “How could you, Griff?! How dare you do that to me. Do you know how awful it’s been?” My mind flashes
through the past year, of all the visits, of all the things I said to him, of all the nursing care he received. And the rashes
I showed him! Oh god, the rashes!
“I’m sorry. Lisa, please, you have to understand, Beau was everything . . . I . . . I had no one else—”
“No one else? NO ONE? Really, Griff?” My voice is getting louder, my pulse faster. “What about me? Don’t I count?”
“Of course you do, I—”
“I’ve never meant anything to you, have I? You never wanted me. You always pushed me away. First my dad and then me!”
“When Beau was diagnosed—”
“You weren’t the only one grieving him! He was my best friend. I’m sorry I bloody kissed him, but he cared for me more than
you ever did! He would have given his kidney in a heartbeat to his mother.”
Griff’s face turns white.
“Do you think I don’t know about what happened? I found the paperwork!”
His monitor beeps faster. “Lisa, you have to listen, you don’t understand—”
“Why did you lie? How could you be a match and refuse to donate? You left me to pick up the pieces so you could bugger off
and learn to make fancy bloody tarts—”
“Please, I—”
“I was so alone, organizing everything after Mum died and then after Beau died, all while grieving the loss of you, too. Well, you know what the good thing about that is? I’ve already grieved you. You really are DEAD to me, Griff!”
The words visibly wound him.
The nurse sticks her head in the door. “What’s going on in here? I heard yelling.”
“Take me away now!” I plead.
“Your heart rate is very high, Mr. Barlow,” she says, glancing at Griff’s monitor.
“Please! I have to leave now!”
She motions to an orderly, who wheels me to the lift. I don’t even look back.
“Lisa! Lisa! Wait! There’s something you have to . . .”
The elevator door closes.
“Well, that was a first,” says the young male orderly, whose BO is rapidly filling the small space.
“Huh?”
“I mean, recipients don’t usually yell at their donors.”
Frank is waiting for me when we return, his gray eyes brimming with worry. “Ah, there you are!” He studies my face intently.
“How was he?”
“Well, he was bloody alive, I can tell you that! I thought he was DEAD!”
Frank pauses. “What? But I thought you said he told you . . .”
“What?”
“You said he told you, just before. Griff told you he donated. I assumed he called . . . ?” Frank motions to the phone.
My brain rattles, stumbling to put together the pieces. “No! Griff didn’t tell me anything. The nursing student—Evan—HE told me Griff is the donor, so I assumed he had died. I didn’t know about . . . about . . .” I can’t even get the words out.
“That he came clean about the fake dementia so he could be a donor? Oh, darling.” Frank takes a seat and slips his cool fingers into mine. “I’m so sorry. I would never have let you see him without explaining. That must have been a bombshell.”
I place my hand over my tummy and wince.
“Is it hurting?”
“Yes,” I gasp, unable to stop the tears.
I watch through blurry eyes as Frank gets a nurse. A ringing sounds as she asks something about more pain relief, and I agree.
I want to be numb. I need to be the one to forget.