Sleepwalker (Nightwatcher #2)(56)

Sitting at his wife’s hospital bedside, Rocky stares at her face, watching for movement.

On Saturday, when Ange’s sister Carm was sitting with her, she noticed Ange’s eyelids twitching. She went for the nurse, who, much to Carm’s frustration, wasn’t sufficiently awed by the news that one of her patients had shown signs of an impending miracle.

Well, of course not. The staff is jaded, accustomed to dismissing the claims of hovering families ever on the lookout for the slightest movement, often seeing only what they want to see.

But when Carm convinced the nurse to come into the room to look for herself, Ange moved her fingers.

The nurse began to give her instructions: “Squeeze my hand,” “Bend your thumb” . . .

Ange squeezed. Ange bent. Ange really was in there somewhere, listening.

Anything is possible.

Carm had tried to reach Rocky, but the snowstorm was interfering with his cell phone signal. By the time he got the message and rushed up to the trauma unit, Ange had retreated to the still, discouraging place again. Rocky stayed with her all that night, and all the next day, and has been here as much as he can since then—but there’s been nothing. Not on his watch, anyway.

The staff played down the episode Carm had witnessed, presumably to avoid giving anyone false hope.

As far as Rocky’s concerned, there’s no such thing. Hope is hope. As long as Ange is alive, there’s a chance she’ll come back to him.

Ironically, she stirred again last night, while the night nurse was in the room and Rocky was home trying to catch a few hours’ sleep. Again, Ange was able to follow simple commands.

Dr. Abrams admitted that it was a good sign; that she really might be starting to come out of it.

“Should I tell my sons to come home?” Rocky was scarcely able to contain his excitement. “One lives in Texas, and the other two are on the West Coast.”

“It’s not as if she’s going to sit up any minute now and start talking, Mr. Manzillo,” Dr. Abrams told him gently. “The process—if that is, indeed, where we’re headed—is likely to take days, weeks, even. In the best-case scenario, there would be a very long road ahead. I wouldn’t disrupt your sons’ lives just yet.”

That was probably sound advice, though Rocky didn’t necessarily welcome it, or the cautionary tone.

In the past forty-eight hours, he’s gone from imagining Ange’s funeral to imagining her homecoming, and he’s not willing to take a step backward.

Still, the painstaking waiting game is hard enough for Rocky, both emotionally and logistically. Ange wouldn’t want him to inflict it on their sons, who have families and jobs and lives of their own that need tending.

The boys check in daily, all three of them, leaving messages on his cell phone, which is, of course, turned off most of the time, per hospital regulations. When he returned their calls last night, he told them that the doctors were more optimistic every day, but didn’t give them the details.

A nurse bustles into the room, pushing a cart. “How are you tonight, Mr. Manzillo?”

“I’m fine, Judy.”

“That’s good.”

They have the same inane exchange every evening, and Rocky suspects it’s repeated in rooms up and down the corridor.

None of the family members in the trauma unit are fine. But the nurses do their best to make things—well, if not pleasant, at least they try to diminish the unpleasantness of the situation wherever they can.

“I need to suction her, Mr. Manzillo,” Judy tells him. “Do you want to step out for a little bit?”

He’s on his feet before she finishes talking. As a homicide cop, he’s never been all that squeamish, but when it involves a medical procedure being performed on his wife . . .

“I’ll be back, sweetheart.” He presses a kiss to Ange’s pale, wrinkled forehead and leaves the room.

Walking down the hall, he passes rooms identical to hers, where families of other comatose patients keep the familiar, joyless vigil. Rocky knows that, according to statistics, the majority of their loved ones will never wake up. But in his heart, he truly believes that his wife is going to.

She has to, because I can’t live without her. It’s that simple.

He rides the elevator to the ground floor and stops in the chapel to light a candle—a daily ritual, both here and at his home parish, Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

After a quick prayer he continues on, passing the cafeteria. Ordinarily, his stomach turns at the cooking smells evocative of steam tables bearing overcooked meat, limp cabbage, mushy grains. But right now, he finds his mouth watering.

Checking his watch, he notes that it’s past midnight. When was the last time he ate something? Lunch? Breakfast? Last night?

You can’t go around skipping meals, Rocco, Ange’s voice scolds him as she has so many times in the past. You get low blood sugar, and it makes you cranky.

Okay. Maybe he’ll come back and grab a sandwich before he goes upstairs again. But right now, he needs to call his sons. It’s getting late, even on the West Coast.

He steps out the nearest exit.

The night air is cold, and there are still piles of snow. He wishes he’d thought to grab his coat. Ange would have reminded him to.

He’s spent a lot of time in hospitals over the years, courtesy of his job with the homicide squad—questioning witnesses, interviewing families of victims. Until recently, the area just beyond the exits would be crowded with hospital employees—including nurses and doctors in scrubs—gathered here under the awning on a smoke break.