I Found Our Sister
1830 Words
Brian's POV
I was making my rounds at the hospital and fill in on the floor with all the coma patients. The usual surgeon who took care of this floor was out and I was in the rotation to fill in. As we approached the next room the nurse looked at me and said "this sweet thing I feel so sorry for. She was so brave protecting her little girls from the attackers, but they hurt her really bad. The paramedics said she stayed conscious long enough for them to get the babies in the ambulance with her. We haven't been able to wake her up since. We keep a nurse in the room with her and the babies hoping that the sounds of their cries will bring her out of it somehow. But so far it hasn't worked and soon we will have to turn the babies over to the state since we can't find relatives. Heck we don't even know who this poor girl is I'm sure there is a family somewhere missing her and they don't know she's here." I shook my head I had heard about this woman. She had two infant daughters, and nobody knew her name. If she didn't wake up soon and identify some family members for the babies to go to, they would end up going into foster care. The hospital was trying to keep mom and babies together but with it being unknown who she was and if she would wake up, they couldn't keep them here forever.
I headed into the room expecting the see the regular scene with the addition of a nurse with babies in bassinets sitting close by. My eyes traveled to the bassinets, and I saw two precious little bundles all wrapped in pink with little flower bandanas wrapped around their tiny little heads. It crunched at my heart to see such precious little ones. Priscilla and I had just experienced a miscarriage after preparing for and wanting a baby for years. The baby was going to be a little girl she was far enough along for us to know that. We were going to name our little love Ivy Jane. Ivy for her mother and Jane for my adopted mom. It tore at my heart to look at these precious girls and remember what we had lost and yet somehow, I felt a connection to these little babies. I walked over to the bassinets and gazed into their faces. They reminded me of a baby I saw many years ago. It reminded me of when mom and dad brought home Elizabeth. She was so tiny and cute with perfect little button noses just like these two. I wondered what their mother looked like and what they would look like if Elizabeth was their mom. But it wouldn't be her because she was in New York somewhere the last time she wrote us living the high life.
I turned to administer to the actual patient and stopped dead in my tracks. If I hadn't known better, I would swear I was looking at my mother. But this woman was many years younger, and my mother had been dead for six years now. Could it be? I walked over to the young woman in the bed and whispered "Lizzy?" The nurses all looked at me as if I had lost my mind. Immediately I moved her hair from the back of her neck. If this was my sister, she would have birthmark right behind her left ear. I carefully searched and found what I was looking for. A tiny heart shaped mark on the back of the left ear. My heart leapt a thousand times over. I looked at the nurses and said, "I can't treat this woman." The main nurse looked at me and asked why? I informed her that hospital policy is that nobody can treat a family member and I was able to just now definitively identify this woman as my sister. I went on to tell the nurse that I would be able to verify it was her as soon as I got my adopted brother over here for a DNA test as they were the true siblings. My heart was overjoyed and hurt at the same time. I found our little sister but she's not awake and has been badly hurt. At first the nurse looked confused and then she smiled. "Do you know what this means doctor? It means those sweet little girls over there really do have family around to take them in until their mother gets better." And then as if she had just remembered "oh, but will it be too hard on you and Priscilla?" I shook my head it might be just the thing we need.
I headed to my office and immediately reached for the phone to call my brother Larry. I knew he would answer if I had called him from my cell, but I had used the office phone out of habit so when he didn't answer I wasn't discouraged. I simply hung up and pulled out my cell phone to call him again. This time it rang a few times before my brother answered. "Hey what's up dork breath?" He always called me that it should bother me being in my thirties, but I loved the guy. He was the one out of all of us that took Lizzy having to move to uncles the hardest. "What are you up to right now?" He replied that he wasn't doing anything at the moment and then he queried as to why. I asked him if he could come to the hospital and meet me in my office, I had something serious I needed to tell him. "Uh-oh that doesn't sound so good brother is there something I should know before I get there? Is there something wrong with Priscilla? I know she's been taking the loss of the baby pretty hard. Amber's been worried about her." I told him it wasn't something bad, but I needed him to get here as soon as he possibly could.
Thirty minutes later Larry walked through my office doors with concern etched on his face. "Ok brother I'm here what's the big deal?" I looked up at my brother and motioned for him to take a seat. I took a deep breath because I knew the next words, I was about to say would be shocking for him. "First I'm going to have the lab draw some blood from you. We need to do a DNA test." I said wincing as I said the words knowing they wouldn't be received well. "Why in the hell would you have to do a DNA test you better start talking." Just then the lab technician walked in. "Please trust me as soon as she takes your blood, I'm going to take you to show you why." Reluctantly Larry held out his arm for the blood draw. I could tell he wasn't happy with the idea but was trusting me to fill him in. When the technician was done, I told her that the results needed to be compared to the patient on the fourth floor whose blood she had drawn just twenty minutes ago, and it needed to be done asap. Larry looked at me like I was going crazy. "Ok brother are you ready to tell me what is going on now?" he asked. I stood up from my desk and said, "better yet I'm ready to show you."
I walked him to the room on the fourth floor that had totally turned my life around just not even an hour ago. I could hear one of the babies crying her little heart out and without thinking barged right into the room and went right over to the wrinkled up little red face. Larry followed me and I saw him gazing at the precious little one still sleeping. "She amazing, isn't she?" I asked. He looked up and simply nodded his head at me. Then looked into my arms and saw the one that had been mad as all get out finally calm and looking like a mirror image of the one still in the bassinet. "Do they remind you of anyone?" Larry glanced up at me and said, "They look just like Elizabeth did when she was first born." I smiled at him and said "they do, don't they? Brother, I need you to go over and look at the young woman lying in that bed over there."
Slowly Larry made his way to the bed not really taking his eyes off me and the babies. Once the young woman got into view, I could hear a gasp escape from his mouth. "What the f**k is this?" I heard him ask. He turned around and looked at me and I said "What does it look like to you? Larry, I found our sister. If you don't believe me look behind her left ear."
David’s POV
Brian had called Larry to come to the hospital for something important he wouldn’t tell him what it was just that it was urgent that he got there. He advised that maybe we should all come to the hospital with Larry since it involved us all. We couldn’t figure out what the hell was happening, but we went. When we got to the hospital Brian met us and immediately took us towards a room. He looked at all of us and said “I’m going to have to ask you all to wait out here while Larry, myself and the staff her go into this room. I promise in just a few minutes all your questions will be answered and you will be happy with the news. We all just nodded and waited. After a few minutes we heard Larry’s voice coming from behind that door and then we heard the words we never thought we would hear out of Brian’s mouth. “Larry, I found our sister. If you don’t believe me look behind her left ear.” I had to be hallucinating after all this time Elizabeth had been found and in a hospital bed none the less. What the hell had happened to put her in such a place and why were we called to the hospital so that Larry could make an identification? I had so many unanswered questions and I only hoped they would be answered. The next thing I knew Larry and Brian were walking out of the room they had just entered each of them holding a little pink bundle in their arms. “What the hell did you do steal a couple of babies? I know your women are wanting to have bundles but guys really.” I was just joking but then they both looked at the rest of us and said “meet your nieces. We found Elizabeth and these are her daughters.”
- Writer
