Out of bed

   Nurse Alex called about 8 p.m., which is never good. 
   The nursing staff calls in the mornings to let me know about every new ding she’s sustained, every new tear in her onion-skin arms or hands, every new hot spot on her rigidly arched foot or the canvas-covered bones that used to be her very cute rear end. 
   My father said he followed that butt all around the Naval War Library until she agreed to go out on a date.
   The staff lets me know about her misadventures, faithfully, but in the mornings.
   Tonight, Alex said, she rolled out of bed somehow and landed on the floor. No skin tears and no blood. But any fall is a bad thing. Those bird bones shatter if you squeeze too hard.
   He didn’t witness it. An aide called him after finding her on the floor.
   “She was just lying on the floor grinning at me,” he said.
   With a goose egg on her head.

   I wonder if the air mattress malfunctioned. That happened once last year. It overinflated, ejecting her from bed. They took away the mattress for a while. But they brought back a new one because she’s so immobile she breaks down with terrifying alacrity without the self-adjusting support. The new mattress inflates but also has a scooped center, so it’s a bit like a nest.
   She’s rigidly immobile, never even rolls over on her own; and they took off the safety railing months ago, to make it easier to lift her in and out of bed, which happens six times a day, every day.

   Fortunately, Sunny slept through whatever happened and she didn’t have to witness it. She broods on bad events and sometimes becomes so upset it brings on a seizure.