He breathed out. “I know you do. That’s what worries me.” Then he said, “Don’t go over there to that truck mad. Whatever he did, go over there when you’re not mad.”
I told him I would not go over at all. I hung up and stood in the cold for another minute looking at the back of my brother’s head through his window, and then I went back in.
At 1:20, Dr. Ellison came out in his scrubs and found me. He sat down in the chair next to mine, which I have learned is how you know the news is not the worst kind.
“It went well,” he said. “We drained a good amount. No new bleeding. He’s going up to the neuro intensive care unit. He’ll be sleepy and confused today. Tomorrow should tell us more.”
I thanked him. My voice did not work right. He patted my knee once like an old man would, which was a strange thing from someone so young, and it undid me more than anything else that day.
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When he left I took out my phone and texted Bert. “He’s out. Went well. No new bleeding. Going to intensive care.”
He read it. Three dots came up and went away. Came up and went away. Finally: “Ok. Thank you.”
That was all.
They let me sit with Dad in intensive care. Dad slept most of the afternoon with a bandage wrapped around his head and wires on his chest, snoring a little, which I took as a good sign.
At four o’clock I called Marty Pruitt to ask if he could feed for us in the morning.
“Fed this morning already,” Marty said. “Saw Irv’s truck still sitting at the gate last night and figured nobody else was going to. I’ll feed tomorrow too. Don’t you think about those cows.”
“Marty, you don’t have to.”
“I know I don’t. You tell your daddy his bull got out on the road and I put him back. He’ll be mad enough to wake up.” He laughed, and then he did not, and he said, “You tell him we’re praying for him at the church.”
The night nurse in intensive care came on at seven, a tall, quiet woman named Ruthie. She brought me a pillow and a blanket and a sleeve of crackers from the nurses’ station without saying a word about it.
“Your brother’s still out in the lot,” she said around nine, checking Dad’s eyes with her little light. “One of the security boys mentioned it. Said he’s been in that truck since breakfast.”
“I know,” I said.
She looked at me a long moment. “That’s a long time to sit in a truck.”
“It is.”
Around midnight I could not breathe in that room any longer. I went down the elevator and out the doors and stood in the visitor lot under the lights in the cold, with my breath smoking, and looked for his truck.
It was still there. The cab light was on. He had a paper sack on the dash from the gas station across the road. He was sitting with his head back against the headrest, and I could not tell if he was asleep.
I stood there a long while. Otis had told me not to go over there mad. I checked myself, the way you check a tire for pressure, and I was still mad. So I did not go.