April 2006
The day after the shooting at the taquería, Isaiah went to the hospital, Marcus’s voice resounding in his head. He asked to see the boy that was on TV but the nurse told him he couldn’t visit because he was a minor and not a blood relative. She wouldn’t tell him anything, not even the boy’s name. If he wanted to speak to Dr. Lopez he’d have to call her office and make an appointment.
Isaiah went to the cafeteria and stationed himself near the cash registers. Hundreds of people streamed past carrying their trays. Around two o’clock, when the flow had slowed to a trickle, he saw a Latina woman in green scrubs and running shoes. Her name tag said AMELIA LOPEZ MD. She was bony but fit. Long arms and sharp elbows, deep tan, hair in a tight bun. Marathons, Isaiah thought. He waited until she was eating a Yoplait and then sat down in front of her. “That boy,” he said, “the one with brain trauma. I’m the one that got him shot. I’m the one that got his parents killed.”
Isaiah told the doctor his story beginning to end, leaving out nothing.
“I don’t know what to say,” Dr. Lopez said.
“It’s my fault,” Isaiah said. “It’s all my fault.” He was crying now, his head bowed, tears falling into his lap.
“I think you’re being hard on yourself. You didn’t know that would happen.”
“I have to make it right.”
“How?”
“My brother Marcus was my only family and he was taken away from me. I want to be the family I took away from the boy.”
She looked at him. “I think you have a good heart, Isaiah. I really mean that and I think your intentions are admirable, but I can’t give you permission to see him. Only the family can do that.”
“What should I do?”
“If it were me? I’d pray for forgiveness.”
Weeks went by. Flaco’s only visitor was a caseworker from a state program for the medically indigent. Flaco had fallen into a deep depression, groaning something that sounded like mommy over and over again. Dr. Lopez prescribed an antidepressant but it didn’t help.
She was relieved when the boy’s uncle showed up. He was antsy in his maroon shirt, maroon tie, and pleated gray slacks, his hair slicked back over his ears. He asked about the taquería and if the Ruizes owned the building and if they had life insurance and was there a case to be made against the city. Flaco? Oh yeah, how’s he doing? The uncle left without seeing him.
The grandparents visited. They lived in a retirement village in Colton, one of the staff brought them in. The grandfather had milky eyes and could hardly see. The grandmother walked with a walker and could hardly hear. Dr. Lopez asked if there were any other family members who could help out. No, there was only their son, who sold annuities and wasn’t reliable. There were other relatives in Mexico but they had their own problems.
Dr. Lopez had seen this before. A kid alone and bereft, longing for his parents and sinking into despair. It was a psychological problem but there were medical consequences too. Increase in blood pressure, stress, cortisol levels. She hated to see the little boy suffer, a little boy not unlike her own. She remembered Isaiah. His earnest sincerity. His need to be the family he’d taken away from Flaco.
Isaiah met Dr. Lopez in her office. “I’m going to put you on the visitors’ list,” she said. “But if you cause a disturbance or upset Flaco in any way you’re out.” She showed him Flaco’s MRI, pointing with her pen at the spot where the nine-millimeter bullet smashed into his skull and ripped through the left side of his brain, annihilating millions of brain cells before exiting near his left eye.
“The trauma caused his brain to swell,” she said. “It could have killed him. I had to cut a hole through his skull to release the pressure.”
“Cut a hole through his skull?” Isaiah said. “How?”
“The scalp is peeled back, a bur hole is drilled through the bone, and a section is cut out with an electric saw. It’s not pretty. Then we put him on a ventilator and medically induced a coma.”
Isaiah had never been seriously ill or injured and had never been in a hospital before. Getting an A in biology didn’t prepare you for this. “Wait. You put him in a coma?”
“Reduces blood flow, lets the brain rest. Then his breathing tube was replaced with a tracheotomy tube. You’ll see it sticking out of his throat.”
“How does he eat?” Isaiah said, horrified. Did they actually cut a hole in his neck?
“Nasal feeding tube. Then there was another surgery to remove the bone fragments from his fractured left eye socket and there’s more surgery to come. We’ve got to repair the damage to his cranium and replace the skull section with a ceramic plate.”
It took a moment for Isaiah to take all that in. “But he’s doing okay?”
“I’d say he’s doing as well as can be expected,” Dr. Lopez said.
“How long before he gets back to normal?”
“He won’t,” she said. “His right side is paralyzed, he’ll be in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. His cognitive functions are impaired. He’ll have to learn how to speak again, read and write, move his arms, use his hands. And the names of things. He’ll have to relearn those too. Chair. House. Car. The psychological damage remains to be seen.” She tapped her pen on the MRI. “All that from one damn bullet.”
Isaiah stood at Flaco’s bedside. The boy was small and pale as wax paper. Bruises around his eyes, Frankenstein stitches on his shaved head, tubes coming out of everywhere, monitors flashing numbers. “Hey, Flaco,” he said. “My name is Isaiah. I’m gonna hang around if you don’t mind.” Flaco was sedated and didn’t react. Isaiah sat down and read about brain injuries on his laptop. He stayed for two hours, said he’d be back the next day, and left.
He came every day and did the same thing. Said hey Flaco and sat down with his laptop. He resisted the urge to say I know how you feel or I’ve been there myself. Nobody knew what it was like to lose Marcus and nobody knew what Flaco was feeling now except in words that had no meaning. Scared, abandoned, angry, confused. For now, it was enough to be there, not making it better but not making it worse.
Dr. Lopez looked in on them from time to time. She saw Isaiah reading aloud from Harry Potter and Flaco listening to music on Isaiah’s earbuds and Isaiah juggling tennis balls and doing magic tricks. She left without saying anything.
Isaiah rented a one-room apartment near the hospital. The tan shag carpet had holes in it and there was a sewage smell in the bathroom. He visited Flaco twice a day. When he wasn’t there he went to the library and looked for books to read aloud and learned how to juggle and do magic tricks. Flaco enjoyed them.
Isaiah got his meals at the hospital cafeteria or got plastic-wrapped sandwiches from Vons and ate them on the curb like a bum. He still had a lot of time on his hands. He took lessons in Krav Maga because the gym was near the hospital. Krav Maga was a martial arts system developed by the Israeli military. The guiding principle: Defend and attack in the same move. He got pretty good but had no interest in belts or tournaments.
Flaco started rehab. Motor therapy, cognitive therapy, aphasia therapy, speech therapy. Slowly, he made progress.
Marcus’s voice was never far away. He sounded so real and close it was like he was there, with Isaiah in the hospital room, sitting on the curb while he ate his sandwiches; standing over him while he was trying to fall asleep.
If you think reading Harry Potter to that boy gets you off the hook, you are sadly mistaken. Flaco is only the start of it. The war caused death and destruction and made innocent people worry for their lives and their children’s lives and made them feel ashamed of where they lived. You were supposed to raise people up, ease their suffering, bring them justice, do some good out there-Oh, I’m sorry, are you crying again? Well, I hope it’s not for yourself because I don’t feel sorry for you and neither should you. What? What was that? You can’t pay back everybody for everything that’s happened? Is that your excuse? You can’t pay back everybody so you’re gonna pay back nobody?