Bright Eyes

As I sat watching tv with my husband, Dave, and two boys, who were almost grown men but will always be boys to me, I looked out of the window and was greeted by a red sky. I took the remote control from my husband’s knee and paused ‘tipping point’ right at the precipice of the double counter, looking suspiciously unstable, awaiting the last counter of the third round to be released, determining who was going into the final. I got grunts from the other three and apologised as I got up off my seat and proceeded to close the blinds. I made a comment as to how the nights were stretching and received another chorus of moans, the three of them pointing towards the tv. I wanted to stretch out their suspense and made a joke that I was about to start dinner. My eldest son, Adam protested by lunging for the remote control still in my hand. I quickly pulled it away and wagged my free index finger at him. I returned to my seat and pressed play. The player who was to release the final counter in that round ultimately failed to get any counters over the tipping point, leaving the double counter in the machine for the finalist. As I fast forwarded through the advertisements as much as I could, I thought to myself how lucky I was to have a family that weren’t ashamed to sit together watching such a program. I replaced the remote control on my husband’s knee as the show started again grinning from ear to ear.

As the final contestant got the first question right and received three counters to put into the machine I looked over at my husband and noticed that one half of his face didn’t match the other. The boys cheered as the double made it into the win zone along with seven other counters giving the finalist seven hundred pounds, but my focus was on my husband.

‘Are you feeling ok honey?’ I asked him alarmed. He looked at me, one eye drooping towards the floor, the other looking petrified. I knew from years before when my father was alive, God rest his soul, the signs of a stroke. I silenced the boys as they cheered from the other couch and suddenly seeing if the finalist on tipping point won or not was the last thing on my mind. I asked Adam, to give me his phone as mine was in the kitchen charging. He responded with an attitude, as any seventeen-year-old would. I demanded the phone off of him with such brutality that he tentatively handed it over, both boys now looking at me as I sat on the edge of my seat staring into their father’s drooping left eye, his right ensconced with fear.

‘Is everything ok mom?’ Adam asked as I grabbed the phone from his outstretched hand and frantically dialled 112. It was one of the only numbers that you didn’t need the phone to be unlocked for. I roughly silenced Ben Shephard as he asked the second question of the round, throwing the remote into the corner of the room. Both boys surrounded me concerned as I demanded an ambulance from the operator on the phone. I completely lost my cool as I wiped the drool from the side of my petrified husband’s mouth by screaming down the phone at the operator to send an ambulance immediately. It was Adam who took the phone from me and kept his cool as he gave all the information as to where we lived.

My husband was trying to say something but I couldn’t for the life of me make out what it was. My youngest, Brian, who was in transition year and had just completed a first aid course, stepped in as I was hysterical. I jumped off my seat and gave him the reins. I stood, my hands on my head and feared that what happened to my father was going to be mirrored by my husband.

I started catastrophising. I couldn’t lose my husband, not when he was only forty-six years old, we had so much more living to do! Adam retreated towards the kitchen as I was wailing in panic mode, my life with Dave flashing before my eyes. I saw his bright eyes light up for the first time when he handed me that single rose on our first blind date and remembered how he made his finger bleed from on of the thorns on the stem of the flower. I saw his bright eyes as he was handed Adam for the first time closely followed by Brian. I looked at his eyes now and there was no doubt in my mind that he was having a stroke.

Adam popped his head into the living room and announced that the ambulance was ten minutes out. Brian left his father’s side and sat me down on the couch. I was starting to see white spots everywhere and my hearing was muffled.

The next thing I remember was opening my eyes to the pale pasty face of my eldest, dampening my brow with a wet tea towel. For a second, I forgot where I was and what was happening. I asked Adam what happened and he told me that I fainted. I slowly sat up with my back to the couch and heard the moans of my petrified husband, proudly watching how my two boys were handling the stress of the situation. Just as I regained my composure, Dave vomited. I leapt off the laminate floor but the boys were on it. The wet tea towel Adam had patted my brow with was now on his father’s as he speedily ran into the kitchen for more, the operator on the phone constantly asking for more information.  

I roughly pushed my sweetheart, Brian, away and reached out and pulled the love of my life towards me. I held his face close to mine and heard a wail come from his mouth like I’d never heard before. I looked him in his one open eye and tried to convince both of us that everything was going to be ok.

Adam announced that the ambulance was seconds away and I heard Brian open the front door as the sound of the siren got louder. I closed my eyes and kissed my beloved on the forehead trying to reassure him. He let out another wail and I shuddered at the sound.

Brian screamed ‘they’re here!’ from the front door so loudly that the sound reverberated throughout the house. I couldn’t even speak as the paramedics entered the room and asked me what was happening. It was Adam who jumped in, closely followed by Brian and as I looked from afar, I couldn’t believe how brave my two babies were being.

The paramedics hurriedly worked on Dave and, due to covid, were explaining that I couldn’t go with him. The memories of my father flashed before my eyes as I watched them put my Dave, my true love, into the back of the ambulance on a stretcher, an oxygen mask on his face and wires coming off of his bare chest. I couldn’t help but feel useless.

A crowd of concerned neighbours had gathered around me. Racheal, who lived across the road, offered to escort me to the hospital and that her husband Steve would stay with the boys. I was eternally grateful. The paramedics however tried to explain that I wouldn’t be allowed in but I couldn’t leave my beloved in there alone and scared without being close by. Racheal knew by me that I was in shock and with the aid of Adam, grabbed my shoes, phone, bag and coat as I watched them close the doors of the ambulance. I fell to my knees and screamed. I wondered if that was the last time, I was ever going to see my husband, the father of my children, the love of my life.

I wasn’t long sitting on the cold, blue plastic chairs in the waiting room before I was approached by a doctor with a familiar face. He introduced himself as Francis from down the road. I was shocked to see him. His older sister, Barbara, used to watch the boys every date night me and Dave ever went on. I looked at him dead in the eyes, mine overflowing with tears, and saw sorrow. I knew what was coming next but had to hear it out loud to be able to believe it. He wanted me to join him in a quiet room just off the A&E corridor but I refused. I demanded he tell me there and then. I watched his lips move and clutched his blue scrubs as he uttered the words I was dreading, ‘I’m sorry, we did everything we could but Dave had a massive stroke and died on his way to hospital.’

I felt weak and could hear myself scream the word ‘NO!’ The security guard asked Francis if he needed any help. He took him up on the offer and they held me up, one on each side, and escorted me into an intimate quiet room. I was hysterical. Francis then expressed his concern for the boys. My stomach dropped like I had swallowed a massive weight. How could I do it? How could I tell my sweet, sweet boys that their daddy died, and watching tipping point no less!

My whole world changed that day. Sorrow filled the days that followed and even though Francis had prescribed me some sedatives, I was reluctant to open the little brown bottle, I didn’t want my head to be fuzzy throughout the whole funeral process. I wanted to be present and be able to be there for Adam and Brian.

It became tradition from that day on for the boys and myself to watch one episode of tipping point a day together as a new, smaller family. It brought us closer. As the double counter teetered on the edge once more, a red sky shining through the open blinds, I looked up at the picture on the mantle of the four of us together, smiling, Dave’s eyes bright, just the way I wanted to remember them.