Betrayed

knew she was still in there, sleeping maybe, but nonetheless alive and vital. Even when presented with proof of her reduced brain activity, he never wavered because he simply couldn't accept the test results. He believed that Ellen, held down by the invisible force of coma, but still feeling and thinking down deep inside, was trying to fight her way back to him. He just knew it. She was his Sleeping Beauty. If only a kiss was all it took to awaken her.

One morning the doctor requested a meeting with Sullivan. He left work and rushed to the hospital, hoping to hear that Ellen had awakened, shown some signs of life, or about a new treatment option or medication. Instead, the doctor had asked him to consider allowing Ellen to die. He suggested removing the feeding tube and withholding fluids.

“My god!” Sullivan had railed. “You can’t be serious. That’s unthinkable! You want to starve her to death?” Unbidden, a memory of an argument in the lawyer’s office sprang into his mind, but he pushed it aside.

“Now, now,” the doctor had soothed. “She wouldn’t starve; technically she would dehydrate. This is not a painful way to go.” His bedside manner was the worst Sully had ever encountered.

“How the hell would you know?” Sullivan had challenged. “You haven’t experienced it. Yet you want to deny a helpless woman the water and food she needs to survive? What kind of ghoul are you?”

“I resent that.” The doctor had pulled himself up to his full height. “What I’m suggesting is standard practice in many of these cases. Ellen wouldn’t want to live this way. You need to accept that. We would give her morphine and she would feel no pain. She would just slide into death easily. It’s cruel to keep her alive in this condition.”

“You have no idea what Ellen would want. Besides, she’s going to recover,” Sullivan said, pacing the small conference room.

“Actually, I do know what Ellen wanted,” the doctor said, his voice cold. “Her family doctor and I recently conferred regarding this case, and Dr. Alfron produced an advanced directive signed by Ellen herself. Somehow this document slipped through the cracks in the beginning.” The doctor sighed. “Contrary to what you may believe, Ellen made her wishes very clear. Unfortunately we didn’t have this document when she was admitted to the hospital. Now we must do the right thing and honor her request.”

Sullivan felt a sinking sensation in his gut. Ellen had gone ahead, then, he thought. Without telling me. His heart pounded in his throat at the news, but he fought the good fight anyway.

 “We don’t have to do any such thing. I don’t know what kind of sadist you are, but I don’t want you touching my wife again. I don’t trust you anymore. You’re fired!”

He started to storm from the room but whirled around. “In fact, I don’t trust the staff here either. I’m not immune to their little digs and jabs. I don’t think they have Ellen’s best interests at heart. And after what you just said, I know you certainly don’t. I’ll drag your ass to court, if I have to.”

“That’s fine with me,” the doctor said dispassionately. “But you must know that the courts will probably side against you since your wife had papers legally drawn up with her wishes.” He paused. “I was hoping you’d be reasonable, but apparently you lack the strength yet to let her go. Frankly, we can’t keep her here, occupying a bed that could be used for someone else. And, I’m not going to authorize any more therapy for her. It’s a waste of time and resources because she is never going to recover. I suggest you find a long-term care facility that is willing to take her. Oh, and a good lawyer.”

The doctor had turned to leave when Sullivan called him back in a soft voice. “Wait!” he said. “You don’t deserve the title of Doctor. You’re only thinking about the bed you can fill with another victim, another sucker.”

“You’re entitled to your opinion,” the doctor answered, his lips tight. “You’re overly emotional now. But, someday you’ll see that I’m just trying to do the right thing for my patient.”

“By killing her.”

“By allowing her to die with dignity.”

“Get out of here,” Sullivan whispered, anger and sorrow battling each other as the doctor left the room.

Sullivan called in to work and took the rest of the day off. He scrambled to find a facility that would take Ellen. He called the insurance company. He called Ellen’s family doctor and railed against her for her part in this. There was an unexplainable bad feeling inside him, a sick urgency. It slithered up his back, crept over his neck, and stood his hairs on end. He must get Ellen out of that hospital today!

The Loving Arms Facility agreed to take Ellen, but they could not admit her until the following afternoon. They, too, asked about an advanced directive. Sullivan lied to them. He didn’t know if he could pull it off, but he was damn sure going to try. Once he got her settled in the new facility he would hire an attorney to file some kind of action to protect her until the whole mess could be sorted out in a court of law. Resentment that any other person, a doctor, a lawyer, or even a judge, had a legal right to decide life or death for his wife, settled over Lance.

He rushed back to the hospital to advise them Ellen would be moved the next day. His information was met with cold civility. Gone was the warmth and sympathy in which he had previously basked. Word traveled fast, he guessed, courtesy of the offended doctor and staff.

Sullivan went up to Ellen’s room and took her hand in his. Guilt crawled around inside him, guilt over his decision to blatantly disregard her wishes. But she had made her decision thinking nothing would happen to her while she was still young, he rationalized. She wouldn’t feel the same had she known she would be stricken so soon. His way was the right way.

He stroked her hand gently, pulling her slender fingers straight as he massaged them. Speaking softly, he explained that she was being moved to a new facility. As usual, he told her about little things that had happened, leaving out the unpleasantness with the doctor.

“I love you, Ellen,” he said tenderly as he watched her eyes move slightly behind their lids. Kissing her on the forehead, he left to sign the paperwork for The Loving Arms.

The next morning, Ellen was gone. The phone call he had dreaded for so long finally came, even as he was feeling hopeful about the future.

“She expired during the night,” the doctor told him when he had rushed to the hospital.

“Expired? Of what?” he had yelled. “She was fine when I left her.”

“Mr. Proctor, your wife hasn’t been fine for a long time,” the doctor said patiently. “While I, and the staff, sympathize with your loss, you have to know her passing is no surprise. We’ve tried repeatedly to warn you of this ultimate outcome. But, you wouldn’t accept the truth. Of course, I have ordered an autopsy.”

Of course it wouldn’t be a surprise to someone who engineered the event, Sullivan thought suspiciously. As the tears rolled down his cheeks, he tore at himself with unspoken questions. How did it go down? A nurse with a hypodermic full of air? An orderly with a pillow over the face? An accidental overdose of one medication or another? Sullivan would never know and it didn’t matter anyway at this point. She was gone and nothing would bring her back.

Alone, after the funeral, numbness settled over him. All the tears had been cried; it seemed he had been crying for such a long time. Something inside him now shut down. He rejected all expressions of sympathy, all offers of companionship, even those from his two closest friends. Work and home, that was his life. Soon, people began giving him the space he was looking for and left him alone.

As he finished this part of his tale, he became aware of Brook’s hand on his.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

Looking into her bruised face, he saw heartfelt sympathy. Something inside him melted, something that had been cold and hard for a very long time.

“It’s horrible, what happened to you. Heartbreaking.” She lightly patted the back of his hand. Then, she became self-conscious. Moving her hand away from his, she took a sip from her mug before continuing. “So, Ellen had different views on death than you did.' Her warm response encouraged him to continue.

Lance nodded. He found himself in the memory of a disagreement he and Ellen had had. It was one of the worst arguments in the history of their marriage. It started in their lawyer’s office, continued on the sidewalk and in the car, and lingered after they had returned home. Sullivan had scheduled the appointment with the attorney to have wills drawn up, since they had reached the decision to start a family.

“Now that we have the wills drafted,” the attorney said, “we should discuss advanced directives. Living wills, powers of attorney, things along that line.”

“What exactly is a living will?” Ellen asked. The attorney explained that living wills are documents that express end-of-life preferences, decisions about accepting or rejecting procedures that will prolong life in the event of a serious illness or accident. Ellen shocked Sully by agreeing with the concept.