I was working through invoices when the hospital called. The ink pad on my desk had dried, and I had been pressing the stamp twice onto every page when Nurse Evelyn told me my mother had suffered a severe stroke. She asked me to come immediately. I had not spoken to Martha in eleven years, since leaving our family home on Oakridge Avenue.
Now I was being asked to return to her side without time to prepare for everything that remained unresolved between us. At St. Jude Hospital, I found her beneath a white blanket, struggling to move. When she recognized me, she reached for my coat with her trembling left hand.
