Chapter 3 - The Mortician’s Confession
The waiting room at St. Jude Memorial Hospital was cold, sterile, and blindingly bright.
Rachel paced back and forth across the linoleum floor, tearing a paper cup into tiny shreds.
It had been three agonizing hours since Thomas was rushed through the swinging doors of the emergency room.
The doctors had essentially banished the family to the waiting area, refusing to answer any questions.
Suddenly, the heavy glass doors of the waiting room slid open with a loud swoosh.
A short, balding man in a rumpled suit sprinted into the room, sweating profusely.
It was Mr. Henderson, the director of the funeral home where the viewing had taken place.
He looked completely terrified, clutching a manila folder tightly against his chest.
"Mrs. Clarke, I need to speak with you immediately," Henderson gasped, trying to catch his breath.
Rachel stopped pacing and glared at the man, her eyes red and swollen from crying.
"What is going on? How could you put a living man in a coffin?" she demanded fiercely.
Henderson swallowed hard, looking around to make sure no one else was listening to their conversation.
"There was an error, a massive, catastrophic error," the mortician whispered, trembling visibly.
He opened the folder and pulled out a stack of messy, handwritten intake logs.
"When the morgue transferred your husband's body to my facility, our embalmer was out sick."
Rachel felt a wave of nausea wash over her at the mention of the embalming process.
"We placed him in the refrigeration unit overnight, intending to prepare him the following morning."
Henderson wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead with a dirty handkerchief.
"But a junior assistant bypassed the chemical preparation and went straight to cosmetic dressing."
He looked at Rachel with wide, fearful eyes, realizing the gravity of his confession.
"If we had embalmed him, Mrs. Clarke, the chemicals would have killed him instantly."
Lorraine, who had been listening quietly from a plastic chair, stood up abruptly.
"But the hospital declared him dead on Tuesday morning after his massive heart attack," she pointed out.
"How could he survive two full days in a freezing morgue drawer with no oxygen?"
Henderson shook his head slowly, looking absolutely utterly bewildered by the impossible science of it all.
"I have been in this morbid business for forty years, and I have no earthly explanation."
Just as he finished his sentence, the heavy wooden double doors of the intensive care unit swung wide open.
A senior doctor in green scrubs walked out, pulling his surgical mask down around his neck.
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He looked directly at Rachel, his expression completely unreadable and grim.
"Mrs. Clarke, your husband is awake."
