into my comatose 17-year-old daughter’s hospital room at exactly 3 p.m., held her hand for an hour, and left—while I, her own mother, had no idea who he was or why he was there.
I’m Sarah, 42, American. My daughter Hannah is 17.
Six months ago, a drunk driver ran a red light and hit her driver’s side.
She was coming home from her part-time job at the bookstore.
Five minutes from our house.
Now she’s in room 223, in a coma, hooked up to more machines than I knew existed.
I basically live there.
I sleep in the recliner. I eat out of vending machines.
I know which nurse gives the good blankets. (It’s Jenna.)
Time in the hospital isn’t normal. It’s just a clock on the wall and the sound of beeping.
And every day at exactly 3:00 p.m., the same thing happens.
The door opens.
A huge man walks in.
Gray beard.
Leather vest. Boots. Tattoos.
He nods at me, small and respectful, like he’s afraid to take up space.
Then he smiles at my unconscious kid.
“Hey, Hannah,” he says.
“It’s Mike.”
Nurse Jenna always lights up when she sees him.
“Hey, Mike,” she says. “You want coffee?”
“Sure, thanks,” he says.
Like this is totally normal.
He sits next to Hannah, takes her hand in both of his, and stays for one hour.
Sometimes he reads from a fantasy book.
Sometimes he just talks in a low voice.
“Today sucked, kiddo,” I heard once. “But I didn’t drink.
So there’s that.”
At 4:00 on the dot, he puts her hand back on the blanket, stands up, nods at me, and leaves.
Every. Single. Day.
For months.
At first, I let it slide.
When your kid is in a coma, you don’t turn down anything that looks like kindness.
But after a while, I couldn’t stand it.
He wasn’t family.
He wasn’t any of Hannah’s friends’ parents.
Maddie and Emma had no idea who “Mike” was. Her dad, Jason, didn’t know him.
Yet the nurses talked to him like he belonged there.
One day I asked Jenna, “Who is that guy?”
She hesitated.
That didn’t answer anything.
I let it go for a bit, but it kept building.
I’m the one signing forms and sleeping in a chair.
Some stranger is holding my kid’s hand like it’s his job.
So one afternoon, after his usual 4:00 exit, I got up and followed him into the hallway.
“Excuse me,” I said. “Mike?”
He turned.
Up close, he was even bigger.
Broad shoulders. Scarred knuckles. Tired eyes.
