Chapter 2 - Breath Counting
The knock never came again. I kept my head on the edge of Grandma Rose's bed and waited for it, my cheek pressed into the light blanket where it smelled like detergent and her hand lotion. Dad stood in the doorway breathing hard through his nose. Mom turned toward him but didn't drop her hands from her face right away, like she couldn't decide what he was supposed to see.
Nobody said good morning. That was the first wrong thing I could count.
I was watching Rose. Her chest wasn't moving the way it did when she napped on the couch with the TV on. It was too still. I told myself to watch closer. I counted the way Mrs. Alvarez taught us to count rests in music class. One, two, three. Nothing. One, two, three. Then there was the smallest lift under the satin of her pajamas, right near the burgundy trim at the collar. So faint I thought I'd imagined it.
I slid my hand a little farther across the bedding until my fingers found hers. Her hand was cold. Not cool like she'd just washed them. Cold all the way through to the knuckles. I squeezed once and waited for her to squeeze back the way she always did when we watched movies. She didn't.
"Mom," I whispered. My voice sounded too loud in that bright room. The sheer curtains moved a little in front of the glass doors and sunlight hit the dark wood floor in a long stripe. "She's cold."
Mom blinked fast and finally lowered her hands. Her gold necklaces caught the light when she stepped forward. She didn't look at Dad. She sat down slow on the other side of Rose's bed, across from me, and the mattress dipped. She stared at Rose's face for a second like she had to convince herself to touch her.
"Rose? Mama?" Mom said, quiet. She put two fingers against the side of Rose's neck. Her own hand was shaking. She held her breath while she felt for a pulse, and I held mine too without meaning to. The armchair in the corner, the dark wooden door behind Dad, all of it just stayed there, waiting.
I watched Mom's eyes. They moved a little, like she was listening with her fingers. Then her shoulders dropped a fraction.
"There," she breathed. "There's — it's slow. It's there."
I let out air I didn't know I'd been keeping in. "She breathed," I said. "I saw it. Just now. Right here." I touched the blanket over Rose's ribs.
Dad stepped closer. His shoes sounded heavy on the wood. He stopped at the foot of the bed and stared, his mouth half open the way I'd seen him in the doorway. His dark blue shirt was wrinkled at the shoulder like he'd pulled it on fast.
"How long has she been like this?" he asked Mom.
Mom didn't answer right away. She smoothed the blanket with her palm, then smoothed it again, straightening a wrinkle that wasn't really there.
"Elena," Dad said. "When did you find her?"
"This morning. When Lily —" Mom glanced at me and stopped. "She was like this when we came in."
Dad pulled his phone out of his pocket. "I'm calling 911."
Mom's hand froze on the blanket. "Wait — Mark, wait a second."
He looked up. "Wait for what?"
"Just — let me check her again. She might just be — she takes that sleep medicine. You know how deep she sleeps. If we call and it's nothing, they'll —" Her voice got thin. She looked down at Rose again, then at me. "Lily's right here."
"We can't sit here," Dad said. His voice cracked on the last word and he cleared his throat. "She's unresponsive, she's cold. I'm not waiting."
He was already swiping the screen. I watched his thumb shake. He put the phone to his ear and stepped back half a step, like he needed room to think.
"Nine-one-one? I need help. My mother-in-law — she's in bed, she's not waking up. She's breathing but it's barely — yeah. Upstairs bedroom." He gave our address fast. He kept his eyes on Rose the whole time. "No, she hasn't fallen. She's just — still."
Mom reached over and tucked the blanket tighter around Rose's shoulders. Her fingers lingered on the satin trim. She wasn't looking at Dad, but she was listening to every word.
May you like
Dad nodded at whatever the woman said. "Okay. Okay, slow pulse, faint breathing. Yeah, we're keeping her still." He looked at Mom and then at me. "They said don't move her. Don't try to sit her up. Just keep her warm and stay on the line until they get here."
I nodded, even though he wasn't talking to me. I put my hand back over Rose's cold fingers, careful not to jostle her, and started counting her breaths again. One, two, three. Lift. I held on to that little lift like it was something I could keep safe until the sirens came.
