My husband worked at the hospital where I nearly died, and in four weeks he never once came into my room. The morning it happened, after forty-four years together, I’d told him I was sick of his face. Some nights his keys jingled right past my door. The night before they sent me home, I saw him through the glass with Neely, the young nurse who kept telling me he was a sweetheart.
Conrad had worked maintenance at the county hospital in Sidney for thirty years. He fixed boilers and elevators, and the ice machine on the third floor that nobody else seemed able to fix. He was sixty-eight and would not retire.
For forty-four years, before an early shift, he had set my coffee cup upside down on a folded paper towel. It was a small thing. I didn’t need roses. That cup was enough to tell me he had thought of me before leaving.
Then two men in maintenance quit, and Conrad started taking every extra shift they offered him. Supper sat on the stove five nights a week.
“Two more years, Darlis,” he kept saying. “Then we’ll buy the camper.”
I’d done the books at the feed mill for thirty-eight years. I knew what “two more years” meant when he was already taking every shift he could get. It meant the camper stayed a way to postpone the conversation.
One morning in September, he was at the sink in his gray work shirt, filling his green thermos.
I told him I was sick of looking at his face across a supper table he was never at.
He screwed the lid on slowly.
“Did you hear me?” I asked.
“I heard you.”
He didn’t argue. He picked up his lunch and went to work. At the time, I took his silence for stubbornness. I didn’t stop to consider that I had said exactly what I meant, at least on the surface.
At noon, I was rinsing the breakfast skillet when my left arm went heavy. The kitchen floor came up at me. The ambulance took me to the only hospital in town, Conrad’s hospital.
They put two stents in my heart that afternoon. I don’t remember much of the first few days: machines beeping, people saying my name loudly, an alarm going off in the dark. I remember a face at the glass of my door, there and gone, and a woman telling someone, “Sir, step back.”
I assumed I had dreamed it.
Then an infection set in, and the doctor told me I would be staying a while. They moved me to the heart floor, room 412, across from the nurses’ station. The whiteboard said, “Your nurse tonight: Neely.”
Neely was maybe twenty-nine, with a long blond braid and a laugh you could hear down the hall. On my first night there, she fluffed my pillow and said, “Mrs. Overstreet, your husband is a sweetheart.”
I looked at her. “Where is he?”
“Working, hon.”
“He works in this building.”
“I know,” she said. “He’s working.”
She said it gently, as if that settled things. It didn’t settle anything for me.
Conrad didn’t come the next day, or the day after. Our son, Noel, came each evening after work with a sub from Kroger and the crossword. I’d ask where his dad was, and he’d look down at the puzzle.
“He switched to nights, Mom. They’re short-handed.”
“He works in this building. He can’t ride the elevator up three floors?”
Noel held the crossword between us. “You’d have to ask Dad.”
“I’m asking you.”
“And I’m telling you what I know.”
He didn’t sound angry, exactly. He sounded careful. I kept looking at him until he finally glanced up.
“Mom, I don’t know why he hasn’t come in.”
That answer bothered me more than a defense would have. I had spent forty-four years with Conrad, and now I was hearing about his schedule from our son.
At the end of the first week, I called Conrad from the phone by my bed.
“Why won’t you come see me?”
For a few seconds, the line was quiet enough that I thought it had gone dead.
“You said you didn’t want to see my face,” he said.
“I was angry.”
“I heard you.”
“Conrad, I’m in the hospital.”
“I know.”
“Then why aren’t you here?”
“There’s a pump leaking in the basement.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
He didn’t answer. Then he said he had to go and hung up.
I held the phone against my ear a moment longer. I could have called back. I didn’t.
Forty-four years, and he had taken me at my word.
Some nights I called home anyway, just to hear our answering machine.
“You’ve reached Conrad and Darlis,” it said in my voice, recorded in 1996. I would listen to the message and hang up.
Late at night, I sometimes heard keys jingling past my door. A big ring, the same sound Conrad’s made when he walked. By the time I sat up and looked, the hall was empty.
Somebody brought pizza to the night shift every night. I could smell it around midnight, and I couldn’t have a bite. When Neely brought my pills, she would say, “He’s a good man, Mrs. Overstreet.”
I started to think she knew something I didn’t.
One night, I heard her at the station laughing with another nurse.
“Black, two sugars,” she said.
I sat up so quickly I regretted it. That was exactly how Conrad took his coffee. I told myself it didn’t prove anything. Still, I could hear the sound of her laugh long after the nurses lowered their voices.
In the third week, I asked Noel to pull up our bank account on his phone.
“Can you check the savings?” I said. “I want to see the withdrawals.”
“Why?”
“Just look, Noel.”
He opened the account and turned the screen toward me. I had kept our books since 1982. I knew how to read a list of transactions, and I knew what I was seeing.
Forty dollars in cash had come out of our savings every night. Nineteen nights in a row.
I stared at the screen. “That’s not a mistake.”
“No.”
“Your father took it?”
“It looks like it.”
“What has he been doing with forty dollars every night?”
Noel lowered the phone. “I don’t know.”
I didn’t believe him. Or maybe I believed that he didn’t know the details but had guessed enough to avoid saying anything. I had no way to tell.
I held the paper where I’d written down the withdrawals so tightly that the corner tore in my hand. Then I asked Noel to bring Conrad’s green thermos from home.
“Dad’s got it at work,” he said too fast.
I looked at him. “How would you know?”
“I saw it there.”
“When?”
He pressed his lips together. “Mom, please.”
“Please what?”
“Don’t turn this into something in the middle of the hospital.”
“I didn’t turn it into anything. I asked for his thermos.”
He looked at the floor. “I’ll talk to him.”
“No. I’ve talked to him.”
I called my cousin. Her son-in-law handled divorces over in Troy, and I asked her to find out what half of a paid-off house and a hospital pension came to. I didn’t tell Noel. I didn’t tell a soul. I was ashamed of how quickly my mind had gone there, but I wanted to know what leaving would mean before I admitted how frightened I was of staying.
The next evening, I told Noel I was going down to the nurses’ station to ask Neely what was going on.
He sat at the end of my bed and put his face in his hands.
“Mom, please don’t make a scene at Dad’s work.”
“The whole town will hear it by noon?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You said the whole town would hear it.”
“I’m trying to keep this from getting worse.”
“Worse for whom?”
He rubbed his forehead. “For all of us. Just wait until you can talk to Dad.”
“I’ve been waiting.”
He didn’t have an answer. I could see him trying to find one, and I felt sorry for him. I was still angry.
That night, I lay awake thinking maybe I had done this to myself. Maybe a woman who told her husband she was sick of his face had no right to expect him to show up at her bedside. I was scared to know what he had been doing. I was more scared not to know.
The night before they sent me home, I woke at a quarter to two. Hall light came through the little window in my door. Behind the nurses’ station, in a plastic chair near the screens, sat a man in a gray work shirt with his back partly turned.
I knew his bald spot in a coal mine.
Neely came around the counter carrying two coffees. She handed him one and put her hand on his shoulder. He laughed, softly. I had not heard Conrad laugh all summer.
I didn’t ring for anyone. I sat up and swung my feet over the side. The bed alarm started squealing. By the time I reached the doorway, leaning on my IV pole, the chair was empty.
His coffee was still on the counter. Under the chair, his green thermos lay on its side, the initials he had scratched into the lid with a nail in 1998 facing up.
Neely turned and saw me standing there in my gown and bare feet. She picked up the thermos and held it out. Her eyes filled.
“Mrs. Overstreet,” she said, “your husband has been here every night.”
I gripped the IV pole. “Doing what?”
“Bringing the night shift pizza. Sitting over there when he can. He said you didn’t want to see his face, so he wouldn’t come into your room.”
I looked at the coffee on the counter. “And you?”
“I bring him coffee when I’m on break. That’s all.”
The words came out more sharply than I meant them to. “You put your hand on his shoulder.”
“I did. He was upset.”
“Upset about what?”
She glanced toward the hallway, then back at me. “About you. He didn’t want me to tell you. He thought you’d be angry if he came in.”
Behind her, a nurse at the station had stopped what she was doing. I could feel my own face getting hot, but I made myself ask the question I had spent days trying not to ask.
“The forty dollars?”
“He buys the pizza,” Neely said. “He brings it for the people working overnight. He said you couldn’t eat any, and he didn’t want the staff looking after you to go hungry.”
I had thought the cash was proof of something secret. It was the cost of pizza.
“Why didn’t he just come to my room?” I asked.
Neely’s mouth tightened. “You’d have to ask him.”
I took the thermos from her. The green finish was scratched in the same places I remembered. I had asked for it because I thought the way he answered Noel might give him away. It had done that, but not in the way I expected.
“Where is he now?”
“He went back to work.”
I couldn’t tell whether the hospital felt larger or if I was simply tired. “Can you tell him I’m awake?”
Neely hesitated. “He’ll come if you want him to.”
“I want him to explain it to me. I don’t want you speaking for him.”
“I understand.”
She didn’t look offended. She looked worn out, and I felt mean for making her stand there with my suspicion after she had been trying to help me.
“Neely,” I said, “did he ever tell you we were having trouble?”
“He said you were angry with him. He didn’t tell me anything else.”
I nodded, once. I couldn’t fix what I had said to her in that moment, so I kept it simple.
“Thank you for telling me.”
She went to find him. I sat back down on the edge of the bed with the thermos beside me. My legs were weak, and the alarm had brought a nurse in to make sure I was all right. They got me settled again before Conrad came in.
He stood just inside the door, still in his gray work shirt. His eyes went first to my feet, then to the thermos.
“You’re supposed to call for help before you get up,” he said.
“I did. The bed called for help.”
His mouth moved as if he might smile, but he didn’t. “I heard the alarm.”
“You were right across the hall.”
“I know.”
“Then why did you leave?”
“I didn’t know if you wanted me there.”
“You were sitting outside my room.”
“Not outside your room. At the station.”
“That’s a fine distinction.”
He looked down at the thermos. “I didn’t want to make things worse.”
“By staying away?”
“You said you were sick of my face.”
“I said it because I was sick of you taking every shift and leaving me to eat supper alone.”
“I thought you meant it.”
“I meant I was angry. I didn’t mean I wanted you gone while I was in here.”
He rubbed a thumb over the side of the thermos. “I didn’t know how to come in after that.”
“You could have asked.”
“I should have.”
His answer was plain and quiet. It did not erase the weeks I had watched the door and waited for him, but it was the first thing he had said that felt like it belonged to both of us.
I lifted the torn paper with the withdrawals written on it. “I thought this meant you were spending our money on something you didn’t want me to know about.”
“I was buying pizza.”
“Every night?”
“Most nights. The staff were here with you. I wanted to do something.”
“You could have brought me a coffee.”
“You couldn’t have coffee then.”
“I know that.”
He looked at me, then away. “I thought maybe you’d hear them talking about the pizza and know I was around.”
“I heard them. I didn’t know it was you.”
“I should have told you.”
“Yes.”
The answer sat between us. I had expected a better reason from him, maybe one that made the whole month seem like a misunderstanding we could laugh about later. There wasn’t one. He had been hurt, and then he had made his hurt into a rule neither of us knew how to break.
Neely and Noel came in a few minutes later. Noel had come up when he heard the bed alarm. He stopped when he saw his father beside me.
“Mom, are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Sit down.”
He looked at Conrad. “You told me you were working.”
“I was working.”
“You didn’t tell me you’d been here every night.”
“I didn’t think it was my story to tell.”
Noel’s eyebrows lifted. “You were sitting at the station outside her room.”
“I wasn’t in her room.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“I know that now.”
Noel looked at me. “I thought he’d come in.”
“You knew he was at the hospital?”
“I knew he was on nights. I saw him once at the station, but I thought he was doing his rounds.”
“Did you know about the pizza?”
He shook his head. “No.”
I put the paper on the blanket where Noel could see it. “Forty dollars out of savings every night. I thought I knew what it meant.”
Conrad looked at the list. “I should have told you.”
“Yes,” I said. “You should have.”
Noel read it, then looked up at his father. “You could have gone in for five minutes.”
“I could have.”
“Mom was asking where you were.”
“I know.”
Noel started to say something else, then stopped. He had spent weeks standing between us, trying to keep a disagreement from becoming a public scene. I could see how tired he was of it.
“Don’t make him answer me,” I said. “He’s here now.”
Noel pulled a chair over. “I’m not making him do anything. I just don’t understand why you both let it go on like this.”
“Neither do I,” I said.
Conrad didn’t defend himself. He sat in the chair, close enough that I could reach him if I chose to, but he didn’t take my hand. I was grateful he didn’t assume the conversation was finished just because he had finally come into the room.
Neely stayed near the door. I looked at her.
“I’m sorry I made you part of this.”
“You were trying to understand what was going on,” she said.
“I was also wrong about you.”
She gave me a small nod. “I’m glad he came in.”
The nurse asked if I needed anything. I said no. My throat was dry, but I didn’t want another interruption. Noel leaned forward, elbows on his knees.
“Dad, why didn’t you tell me you were sitting there?”
Conrad took a breath. “I didn’t want him carrying messages between us.”
“You already had him carrying messages.”
Conrad looked at me. I didn’t rescue him from that. Noel was right.
“I thought if I came in, she’d tell me to leave,” Conrad said.
“I might have,” I replied. “But you didn’t give me the chance.”
He nodded. “I know.”
“You can’t decide what I mean every time I say something in anger and then leave me alone with it.”
“I understand.”
“I’m not asking you to agree with everything I say. I’m asking you to ask me what I mean.”
He looked at the paper again. “I should have asked you that morning.”
“You should have.”
There were no new accusations to make. There was only the old one, about the work and the empty place at supper, and the fact that I had thrown a cruel sentence at him instead of saying I was lonely. Both things were true. Neither made the other disappear.
“I was wrong to say I was sick of your face,” I said.
Conrad’s eyes stayed on mine. “I was wrong to stay away.”
“I didn’t want you to go.”
“I know that now.”
Noel sat quietly. He had brought the crossword with him, but he didn’t open it. We had all spent weeks being careful around the sentence I’d said at the sink. It had sounded final to Conrad and foolish to me, and neither of us had tried to find out whether the other meant it.
Conrad glanced at the thermos. “I can take that home.”
“Leave it.”
“You asked Noel to bring it.”
“I wanted to see what you’d do when he asked.”
He gave a tired, almost embarrassed laugh. “That was a test?”
“I didn’t know what else to do.”
“You could have asked me.”
“I did ask you. You said there was a pump leaking.”
“There was.”
“That still wasn’t an answer.”
“No,” he said. “It wasn’t.”
A nurse came in to check on me, and the conversation paused. Conrad stepped aside while she checked the line and asked how I felt. I said I was tired. She reminded me not to get up alone. When she left, Noel stood.
“I’ll let you two talk.”
“Stay,” I said.
He sat down again. I didn’t want him to feel he had to pick one of us or leave us to perform being fine. He had been bringing me food and a crossword every evening. He had shown up, even when he didn’t know what to say.
Conrad rested his hands on his knees. “They’re sending you home tomorrow?”
“That’s what they said.”
“I’ll be here.”
“Will you come into the room?”
“Yes.”
It was the simplest thing he could have promised, and the only one I needed from him just then.
When I was discharged, he walked beside me out of the hospital. Noel carried my things. We didn’t discuss the house or the camper in the hallway. I wasn’t ready to pretend that one conversation had solved the way we had been living.
At home, I told Conrad I wanted to talk about the extra shifts before he agreed to another one.
“I can’t promise they won’t ask,” he said.
“I’m not asking what they’ll ask. I’m asking what you’ll say.”
He rubbed his face. “I’ll stop taking every shift they offer. I can tell them I need some nights at home.”
“Don’t say it just because I’m home from the hospital.”
“I’m saying it because I should have stopped before you had to ask.”
I looked at him for a moment. “And the camper?”
“Still want it.”
“Two more years?”
“I don’t know. I shouldn’t have kept saying that like it answered you.”
It didn’t make the forty-four years vanish. It didn’t make the weeks in room 412 less lonely. But I could hear that he understood the real question now. I didn’t need him to solve the camper that night. I needed him to stop using it as a substitute for time with me.
“I don’t want to ask your son where you are,” I said.
“You shouldn’t have had to.”
“I don’t want to guess what you’re thinking, either.”
“I’ll try to say it.”
“That’s all I can ask tonight.”
For a while, we sat at the table without talking. I had spent weeks deciding what the cash withdrawals meant and imagining the worst explanation for the coffee and the hand on his shoulder. I had been wrong about Neely. I had been right that Conrad was keeping away. The reason mattered, but it didn’t make the hurt imaginary.
Before he went to bed, he asked if I wanted him to stay in the room.
“Yes,” I said. “I do.”
He stayed.
