But the monitor was beeping again.
Image
The nurse was standing beside me.
And for the first time in a very long time, I understood exactly what I was doing.
“I do,” I whispered.
The door closed behind them.
The room did not become peaceful all at once.
Pain still moved through me.
The lights were still too bright.
My body was still broken in places I could not fully understand.
But the air changed.
The first nurse adjusted the blanket around my shoulder.
“I’m going to document what happened,” she said. “And I’m going to make sure your visitor restrictions are updated.”
Document.
Restrictions.
Updated.
They were ordinary words in a hospital.
To me, they sounded like locks sliding into place.
For years, my family had lived in the soft gray space where nothing was written down.
Tessa could say she was joking.
My mother could say she did not see it.
