David stopped for a second in front of his house, absorbed
in the scene.
His house was originally a two-story house, with a hearth at
the living room, and thus with a chimney at the roof. The
house was back from the nineteenth century, and had a roof
made of red bricks, and grand, arched windows at the front.

Now all that remained of once the orange-colored walls of
the side facing the street was black, burning, forbidding
walls. The bricks that made the roof were falling apart,
endangering any one who passes too close. The second floor
looked as if it is going to crash in a matter of minutes.
Rescue teams and ambulances filled with medics streamed to
the area. Firemen in their gleaming red vehicles started
confronting the fire. People shouted, checking if anyone was
in the house. The whole environment was of a catastrophe.
None of it had succeeded in entering David's thoughts; there
was only one - his mother, Jane.
And then, he saw some of the firemen who rushed into his
house earlier come out with her, carrying her between them,
trying to protect her from the heat with their bodies. He
rushed to them, wanting to get a better look on his mother.
The firemen brought her into an ambulance waiting nearby,
and medics started taking care of her as soon as she was put
in.
"Watch it, kid. This is no place for you." Said one of them,
shooing him from the ambulance.
"Wait!" David had to see her. He cared for her too much to
be able to see her go. "I am her son!"
"Are you sure you want to see her?" The medic seemed
worried.
David didn't hesitate. "Yes."
"Well, then, get in."
The medic entered the back of the ambulance, then turned
back and beckoned to him. David entered the back of the
ambulance, and another medic closed the doors behind him.
Then he said to the driver to get going.
The ambulance started moving, sounding its siren, and gained
more speed with each passing moment.
David looked at the space around him. There were three
medics tending Jane. He hoped it was nothing serious, but
knew it was a false hope. She looked extremely pale, and
each breath she took looked a tremendous effort to her. The
medics seemed stressed, moving all the time, trying to ease
her breath, using many strange devices. David didn't
recognize the tools around him, wishing he had taken a quick
course on CPR or something, so he could help Mother. She was
unconscious, but David still tried to talk to her.  
Some time and again, he looked at Mother and began thinking
about a grave possibility. But, not wanting to give it power
by thinking it, and not wanting to think about what it could
mean, each time David averted his thoughts to her beautiful
face while she was asleep. That was what she was doing.
Asleep.
After what seemed hours, the ambulance arrived to the
nearest hospital. Immediately, the medics got Mother on a
stretcher, and hurried into the hospital, while David by her
side all the time, trying to see her, how she is. Other
medics soon joined them in some waiting room, and entered
the room near. When David tried to enter too, a man stopped
him.
"You cannot enter now."
"But I am her son! I want to see her! She might need me!"
David almost shouted. They couldn't deny him entrance! He
needed to be by her side. He couldn't know what would happen
in the next moments.
"I am sorry," the man answered. "During surgery, non must
enter. Not even, and especially, children."
"Please!" David begged the man, but the man ignored him,
turning to go back inside.
David stopped him.
"Could you at least tell me how is she?"
"We do not know yet for sure, but her condition is not good.
She breathed a lot of smoke, and probably a burning beam had
fallen on her, for there are burning scars all over her
body. Now you can either wait here or go somewhere else, for
it could take a lot of time. But don't worry, son, if it's
possible, we'll save her."
With that, the man closed the door. David was left outside.
He was afraid, for himself and for Jane. She was in a bad
state. He hoped it was not fatal. It couldn't be. It mustn't
be.
Not wanting to think about it, David looked around the
waiting room. There were other people, all looking broken,
sad. He didn't like being here, but he had nowhere else to
go. His house was burnt, destroyed, and besides, he won't
leave this place right now for all the riches in the world.
He won't leave Mother again.
Hours passed. All the time, David heard rustling inside the
surgery room where Jane was being tended. Sometimes, a nurse
would rush out from the room, and after several minutes
would be back with someone or some tool at her hand.
Sometimes, it was a doctor, perhaps brought to voice another
opinion, or perhaps to lend a hand. The doctors who entered
sometimes left after a few minutes, but some had remained in
there, stayed inside. David was sure that it couldn't be
good, for it meant that the injury Mother suffered was worse
than anticipated.
At seven he felt the nagging of hunger. He hadn't eaten
since before school, for the should-be lunch at noon was
lost, perhaps in the remnants of the burnt microwave. But he
ignored the hunger. He won't leave Jane again. Over the
following minutes and hours, it became more and more
demanding.
Two hours later, a nurse who exited the room saw him. She
was one of the first in the crew was trying to save Jane's
life, so she knew since when he'd been there. She saw also
the restrained hunger in the way he sat. It was that strong
already.
"Do you want to go with me to the cafeteria?" She asked.
"I'm pretty hungry and wouldn't mind company."
David simply looked at the room where his mother was being
treated, and then looked back at the nurse.
"It won't be long," she continued, sensing his reluctance,
"and the cafeteria is just a few rooms and around the
corner."
David still tried to ignore his stomach's loud pleading, and
oppose the proposal, although his defenses were starting to
weaken.
"Do you think your mother would want you to starve yourself
or to exhaust yourself just outside where she is? Just
because she is there and you are here doesn't mean that you
have to punish yourself. She wouldn't want that. It is not
your fault."
David still sat there, not responding. The nurse sighed, and
left to the cafeteria. He continued to sit there after she
disappeared at the end of the corridor. He couldn't stop
thinking about the scene of his house, on fire. What could
have happened? Has a candle lit the table? Has gas leaked
and burnt the house? Or perhaps it wasn't an accident...
David didn't want to continue that line of thought. He
ordered his mind to relax, and then noticed the increased
rumbling of his stomach. Remembering the nurse's words, he
decided that truly it would be better for him to be strong,
and healthy, for his mother. He won't disappoint her again.
He stood up, having decided, and asked for directions to the
cafeteria. Passing a few corridors, he saw similar relatives
of wounded and sick person's treatment rooms.
When he arrived to the cafeteria, he saw it was only half
full, being now after nine thirty. He spotted the nurse who
invited him, for she was beckoning to him. He took a plate
and started putting in it two salami sandwiches, some
vegetables, a lot of corn, a steak, and a huge piece of
cake. He was hungry! Then he walked to sit by the nurse.
"I see you've changed your mind," she said.
"Came to my senses," David answered. "I've realized that I
have to be strong for my mother, especially now, when she
most needs me."
"Good. Now eat."
They ate in silence. David arrived only a few minutes after
her, but she ate faster than him. At last, she finished her
plate, and stood to leave, but then she changed her mind and
turned to look at him. Her tone was grave, and David thought
he discerned sadness in it.
"Eat everything. You may need all the strength you can
get."
With that, David slowly looked up at her. There was sadness,
and pity, in her eyes.
"What do you mean?"
She didn't answer. Instead, she turned, walked to return her
plate, and left the cafeteria.
David didn't want to think at the possible implications of
that remark. In his, and more importantly, his mother's
condition, he saw at every phrase or action the worst
possibilities. Not that he wanted to. He was afraid for his
mother, for her health, and, although it seemed selfish, for
his life whether the worst would happen. He had no other
relatives. Oh, his mother always talked about this cousin
and that aunt, but oh how bad they couldn't visit, and he
ended up meeting no relative through all of his life.
Usually being alone, he learned to entertain himself, to
like the privacy, to think about his day and his
assignments. And when Zen's family moved to the region,
David met with him a lot, and a few new friends he met at
7th grade.
Perhaps it was just his imagination. He heard all the time
about people who saw emotions in other people's eyes.
Personally, he never succeeded in doing that. It was surely
his imagination. So he continued to eat, but the food
suddenly lost all flavor. He barely managed to constrain
himself and not run after the nurse and demand explanation,
or approval about his supposedly observation.
Finally, his plate was clean, and David stood up. He turned
to the exit, forcing himself to walk slowly, not to start a
dead run toward the door. After he left the cafeteria, he
walked back toward the bench by the room where his mother
was treated. He felt every inch of the way, playing on his
already worn nerves from his dread.
When he arrived to the bench with his school bag, and saw
that no doctor or nurse ran into or from the room, he
relaxed a bit. After an hour with no apparent emergency
requiring more doctors, he relaxed even more, and against
his weakening will, started drifting into another realm of
sleep. Right then, a weary nurse came out of the room, threw
David a look, then shook her head and started walking,
though it resembled more running. David bolted upright at
that, but before he could say anything, the nurse rounded a
corner and disappeared. David started having a bad feeling
about this.
A few minutes later, the nurse came back, now walking faster
if possible, closely followed by another nurse and a doctor.
The three of them entered the room, with not so much as a
glance in David's direction now.
Then followed a period of silence, some fifteen minutes, in
which David felt no longer drowsy at all. After that,
though, things started to worsen very quickly.
Another nurse was sent from his mother's ward, this time to
an opposite direction, and David could swear she must run
for her speed. When she returned, it was with an important
looking doctor, all the while talking to him in hushed, dire
tones. When the doctor spotted David, he asked something the
nurse, and obviously not contended by her response, he told
her something in return. By then they were by the door to
his mother's ward, and the doctor said one final thing to
the nurse, and entered. The nurse stood there for a moment,
looking at David, thinking, and then seemingly coming to a
decision, started walking towards him. Suddenly, he
shivered.
"Hello," she said when she approached him. "You must be
Jane's son, David."
David nodded. When he arrived to the hospital earlier, a
woman asked him his name and then his mother's and he told
her also that he was her son. Then that woman marched off.
"I want you to listen carefully now," the nurse continued.
"I am Lynda, one of the nurses who currently take care of
your mother. She is seriously burned from the fire at your
house, and suffers also from a broken leg and a few broken
ribs, caused probably from a crash of one of the wooden
beams supporting your house. She is grievously wounded, and
in fact, is considered a miracle for staying alive thus far.
I do not want to describe her more fatal injuries to spare
you that, but believe me that we shall do all we can to try
to bring her back to you. She is a strong woman, your
mother."
David couldn't comprehend most of what the nurse said, but
he did understand the part about his mother suffering
greatly. He sat there, unblinking, unmoving, trying to
understand it all. The nurse, after a few minutes of
standing there, decided to head back to his mother's ward,
saying farewell as she left. David didn't hear her.
The next few hours he passed in part sleeping, part sitting,
looking at the room right in front of him. Whether in dream
or reality, he thought only of his mother, trying to lend
her strength through sheer will, wishing her to be well.
Sometimes a nurse or a doctor would enter the ward;
sometimes they would leave it. He didn't care anymore. He
felt that if he would concentrate enough, if he would be
persistent enough in his wish, then it would become true.
His only wish was for his mother to get better, to be with
him again. By that time he understood all too well the brief
talk he had with Nurse Lynda, and from the little he knew
about injuries, the broken ribs would not be very helpful
considering her burns and lack of strength as is.
About four a.m. by the clock on the wall to his left, a
group of nurses and doctors went out of the room, pushing
alongside a mobile bed with a patient on it covered in a
white blanket. David jumped to his feet and rushed to the
side of the bed, sure beyond doubt that it was his mother,
wanting and not wanting to look at her, torn between worry
for his mother and the fear that would come at the sight of
her wounds.
They crossed probably twice the size of the hospital in
their journey, by David's estimation. All the time, he
walked alongside his mother's bed, bleeding his resolve,
feeling so much fear, yet gradually he became more and more
indifferent, emotionally dead. Later, he would understand
that he was protecting himself, steeling himself for the
upcoming events.
The small, grim group arrived finally to its destination,
when they stopped before a door to a vacant surgery room.
David went to sit on a nearby bench. At least, that was the
original plan. As soon as he sat down on the bench, all of
the day's, and half night's, pressures and events caught up
to him, and before he knew it he was lying down on the
bench, sleeping, before the doctor could reach to open the
door.

David was in a nightmare that he couldn't wake from, for it
was reality. He tried constantly to wake himself from it,
hoping with all of his heart to wake from it and discover it
as only a normal nightmare, but to no avail.
That morning, he woke up with a dull sense of dread,
possibly from a forgotten dream. Then, the world had gone
mad. He saw that the ward where his mother was treated was
vacant, all the doctors and nurses not visible, except for
one who sat across him, on a chair. When she saw that he was
awake, she rose and walked to him. When she got close, he
recognized her as the one who ate with him the night before
in the cafeteria. Then she said the words that would change
his life forever:
"David, I'm really sorry to tell you this, but your mother
has passed away during the night . . ."
Somewhere in the back of his torn mind, David noted that she
continued to speak after that, for he saw her mouth working,
and heard her voice in the background, but it was drowned
beneath the roar of anguish in his mind. His world was
crumbling around him. The world had gone mad.
For hours he wandered aimlessly through the hallways of the
hospital, seeing nothing, yet slowly he calmed down, and
decided to see his mother one last time. A nurse took him to
see her, or more accurately, what remained of his mother. He
was sure that he will lose control and break down, but he
didn't. He didn't feel anything. Well, as long as he kept
his gaze on her face.
David said one last silent goodbye to his mother, Jane, and
then turned and left the room, but not before committing to
memory every last detail of her face, her calm expression
after the death, and her clothes (she had been clothed by
the medical staff). He thanked the nurse once out with a
voice devoid of emotion, or thick, he didn't notice. He then
left the hospital itself, and started walking slowly towards
home, now his alone - an orphaned son.