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Bethie, was suddenly eclipsed. Your mother would be That woman who was gang-raped in the boathouse at Rocky Point Park and you would be That girl, Teena Maguire’s daughter .

Off-Duty
    D ROMOOR DROPPED BY S T . M ARY ’ S . Inquired at the front desk how a patient named Maguire was doing, in intensive care.
    The heavily made-up receptionist frowned into a computer. Type-type-typing rapidly. Frowned importantly saying such information was confidential unless he was a family member, and was he?
    Dromoor considered showing the woman his badge. Saying he’d been the officer to first see Martine Maguire. He’d been the one to see what had been done to her. And so he had a right to know if she would live.
    The receptionist was staring at Dromoor, waiting. He’d been so still, his thoughts had plunged inward.
    â€œSir? Are you a family member? Or . . .”
    Dromoor shook his head no. Turned and walked away. Fuck it he couldn’t get involved, he had promised himself. Married and a father and his wife already anxious about him and he wasn’t the type, not the type to get involved.

The Vigil
    A T S T . M ARY ’ S . V ISITING hours from 8:30 A.M . until 11:00 P.M . now that your mother is out of intensive care and in a private room on the fourth floor.
    Grandma is paying extra for the private room, which Momma’s insurance won’t pay for. Grandma and you, you practically live at St. Mary’s now. God only let my daughter live. God help us in our hour of need. God have mercy on us. Let my daughter live. I will never ask anything of You again .
    At first it was not known whether Teena Maguire would ever recover what is circumspectly called “consciousness.” After two days at St. Mary’s you were released but your mother remained on a life support system in the intensive care unit, her condition was “critical.” In a coma, for her skull had been “concussed.” There had been “pinpoint hemorrhaging” in her brain. She was not able to breathe on her own. She was fed intravenously. A catheter drained toxins from her body in a continual thin stream. Speaking to your grandmother, the neurologist was awkward, evasive. It was like a bad joke hearing this professional in his hospital whites utter such words as We can only hope for the best .
    You saw hope rising into the sky. A flimsy kite torn by the winds off Lake Ontario. You laughed, you were so scared.
    Then, on the morning of the sixth day of the vigil, your mother began to open her eyes. She began to wake, intermittently. All that day and into the next. You could feel Momma forcing herself up out of sleep like a swimmer breaking the surface of a heavy viscous water like molten lead. You could feel her effort, the tremulous strength of her will. Her bruised eyelids fluttered. Her wounded mouth quivered. “Momma!” you whispered. You were holding one of her icy hands, Grandma was holding the other. “Teena! We’re here, honey. Bethie and me. Both of us. We won’t leave you. We love you.”
    Eventually your mother woke from her sleep. At first she was childlike, trusting. What had happened to her was vague as an explosion or a car crash or a building collapsing on her head. Her shaved head swathed in white gauze and her chalky-pale skin had a look of something newborn you wished only to protect.
    Childhood was over and yet: as long as your mother could not remember what had happened to her you could behave in the old way of before .
    Casey came, after several days. Gaunt and poorly shaved and strangely shy, swallowing hard. On the street it was known what had happened to Teena Maguire, in the newspapers ithad been more delicately expressed. To Casey’s face no one would wish to say That Maguire woman, she had it coming .
    Casey’s visits with Teena Maguire were brief and very awkward. In his shaky hands he brought flowers hastily purchased in the hospital gift shop.