until she brought him down.”
The officer looked up.
“Brought him down from where?”
“The maternity floor.”
Karen’s voice became quieter.
“I thought she meant she was going to bring Elena too.”
The officer closed his notebook halfway.
“Did your mother tell you she intended to remove Leo from his mother’s care?”
Karen shook her head.
“No.”
“Did you ever agree to participate in that?”
“No.”
The officer waited.
Karen looked at me through the windshield, though she could not see me on the phone.
Then she said, “I would not have agreed.”
The officer opened the notebook again.
“Why not?”
Karen rubbed the edge of the receipt.
“Because he is a baby, not a family position.”
No one answered her.
The officer asked for the receipt.
Karen handed it across.
“It has the parking time on it.”
He checked the printed time.
“Keep the original?”
“Yes.”
“I will make
a copy.”
Karen looked toward the hospital entrance.
“Is Elena still there?”
“Yes.”
“Is Leo with her?”
“Yes.”
Karen nodded once.
Then she asked, “What happens to my mother now?”
The officer closed the notebook.
“That depends on what the hospital records show and what the other statements establish.”
Karen looked at the receipt in his hand.
“So there will be records?”
“There already are.”
She lowered her eyes.
I could hear the officer turning a page.
“Karen,” he said, “there is one more question.”
She looked up.
“What did Vivian mean when she said Elena would understand?”
Karen did not answer right away.
Then she said, “She thought the papers would make Elena give up Leo.”
The officer’s pen stopped.
I reached for the envelope on my tray table.
The blue folder was beside the visitor record request.
I opened the envelope.
“From now on, I want every decision
written down.”
Daniel’s printed messages were still warm from the printer.
I placed them beneath the other papers, then reached for the parking receipt copy the officer had given me.
The envelope was open in my hand when the hospital phone rang.
The administrator slid the access log across the desk, stopping it beside the envelope I had brought from the recovery suite. The first entry was 1:07 p.m.
Mike leaned forward and tapped the next line with one finger.
“At 1:08, the visitor entered the recovery corridor.”
The administrator turned a page. “The nurse documented the same time.”
Daniel looked from the log to me. “And the room?”
“Recovery 214,” the administrator said. “The room number matches the nursing note.”
I kept the papers square with the edge of the desk.
Mike opened his incident notes. “At 1:25, the visitor was still inside. At 1:
40, staff were asked to secure the room.”
Daniel rubbed his wedding ring with his thumb.
“So there is no question about when she entered,” he said.
“There is a question about what happened after she entered,” the administrator replied. “That is why we are preserving both records.”
Mike turned another page. “At 2:05, I was notified that she would not leave.”
The administrator looked at me. “Do you want us to add anything else to the record?”
“Only what was observed.”
“That is what we are doing.”
Daniel looked down at the log again. “My mother will say the staff misunderstood her.”
Mike closed the folder.
“Then her statement can be included with the rest.”
The plainness of that answer helped more than an argument would have.
I reached for the access log, but the administrator kept one hand on it.
“We will retain the original,” she said. “
