well, sleeping well?” Father Jiminez inquired, obviously just to pass
the time while they waited for the subject of the meeting to arrive, not
meaning to impugn Hatch’s claim to a full recovery and good health.
Lindsey-by nature more nervous than Hatch, and usually more prone to
overreaction than he was-leaned forward on the sofa. Just a touch
sharply, she said, “Hatch is at the top of the recovery curve for people
who’ve been resuscitated. Dr. Nyebern’s ecstatic about him, given him
a clean bill of health, totally clean. It was all in our application.”
Trying to soften Lindsey’s reaction lest the priests and nuns start to
wonder if she was protesting too much, Hatch said, “I’m terrific,
really. I’d recommend a brief death to everyone. It relaxes you, gives
you a calmer perspective on life.”
Everyone laughed politely.
In truth, Hatch was in excellent health. During the four days following
reanimation, he had suffered weakness, dizziness, nausea, lethargy, and
some memory lapses. But his strength, memory, and intellectual
functions returned one hundred percent. He had been back to normal for
almost seven weeks.
Jiminez’s casual reference to sleeping habits had rattled Hatch a
little, which was probably what had also put Lindsey on edge. He had
not been fully honest when he had implied he was sleeping well, but his
strange dreams and the curious emotional effects they had on him were
not serious, hardly worth mentioning, so he did not feel that he had
actually lied to the priest.
They were so close to getting their new life started that he did not
want to say the wrong thing and cause any delays. Though Catholic
adoption services took considerable care in the placement of children,
they were not pointlessly slow and obstructive, as were public agencies,
especially when the would-be adopters were solid members of the
community like Hatch and Lindsey, and when the adoptee was a disabled
child with no option except continued institutionalization.
The future could begin for them this week, as long as they gave the
folks from St. Thomas’s, who were already on their side, no reason to
reconsider.
Hatch was a little surprised by the piquancy of his desire to be a
father again. He felt as if he had been only half-alive, at best,
during the past five years. Now suddenly all the unused energies of
that half-decade flooded into him, overcharging him, making colors more
vibrant and sounds more melodious and feelings more intense, filling him
with a passion to go, do, see, live. And be somebody’s dad again.
“I was wondering if I could ask you something,” Father Duran said to
Hatch, turning away from the Satsuma collection. His wan complexion and
sharp features were enlivened by owlish eyes, full of warmth and
intelligence, enlarged by thick glasses. “It’s a little personal, which
is why I hesitate.”
“Oh, sure, anything,” Hatch said.
The young priest said, “Some people who’ve been clinically dead for
short periods of time, a minute or two, report … well … a certain
similar experience….
“A sense of rushing through a tunnel with an awesome light at the far
end,” Hatch said, “a feeling of great peace, of going home at last?”
“Yes,” Duran said, his pale face brightening. “That’s what I meant
exactly.”
Father Jiminez and the nuns were looking at Hatch with new interest, and
he wished he could tell them what they wanted to hear. He glanced at
Lindsey on the sofa beside him, then around at the assemblage, and said,
“I’m sorry, but I didn’t have the experience so many people have
reported.”
Father Duran’s thin shoulders sagged a little. “Then what did you
experience?”
Hatch shook his head. “Nothing. I wish I had. It would be …
comforting, wouldn’t it? But in that sense, I guess I had a boring
death. I don’t remember anything whatsoever from the time I was knocked
out when the car rolled over until I woke up hours later in a hospital
bed, looking at rain beating on a windowpanee-” He was interrupted by
the arrival of Salvatore Gujilio in whose office they were waiting.
Gujilio, a huge man, heavy and tall, swinging the door wide and entered