On purpose.

“The heart wants what the heart wants,” she said, right before dying. Her eyes remained open, gently crossed, as if she finally got a 3-D poster to activate.

Marcia felt her mother’s weak grip unclench and go lifeless. Marcia just sat there. This whole facade peeling away like the proverbial sweet green icing flowing down, someone left the cake out in the rain. Her eyes focused on the window, and the parking lot with so many SUVs, so many.

Meanwhile, the heart monitor flat-lined and beeped, followed by severe honking. A team of nurses overtook the room like pillagers. It was a well-orchestrated swirl of chaos, tubes flying all over the place, metal clanking as the wheels of the bed were released and people screaming, “Stat, yadda yadda yadda, stat!” All this cacophony and so much more, as they wheeled the lifeless woman out of the room.

Marcia remained in the chair beside where a bed once was, eyes transfixed out the window. Apparently, the hospital staff had seen this sort of trauma thing before, because they left her alone, allowing her to just sit there. Thirty minutes passed, and a solitary tear rolled down her cheek. She looked around. The curtains billowed, swaying slowly, from the ceiling vents exhaling a stream of cool air. The garbage strewn near the bucket was much more offensive than it should have been. Reality was finally returning, as Marcia covered her bawling face with her big dry hands.

With her best inside voice, she annunciated clearly, “I’m very surprised my mother had a heart that wanted something.”

#JamesBrown’sHeartWantedPCP