Proof of Heaven

all upbeat. The truth was that I was at significant risk of dying, very soon.
Even if I didn’t die, the bacteria attacking my brain had probably already
devoured enough of my cortex to compromise any higher-brain activity.
The longer I stayed in coma, the more likely it became that I would spend
the rest of my life in a chronic vegetative state.
Fortunately, not only the staff of Lynchburg General but other people,
too, were already gathering to help. Michael Sullivan, our neighbor and
the rector in our Episcopal church, arrived at the ER about an hour after
Holley. Just as Holley had run out the door to follow the ambulance, her
cell phone had buzzed. It was her longtime friend Sylvia White. Sylvia
always had an uncanny way of reaching out precisely when important
things were happening. Holley was convinced she was psychic. (I had
opted for the safer and more sensible explanation that she was just a very
good guesser.) Holley briefed Sylvia on what was happening, and
between them they made calls to my immediate family: my younger
sister, Betsy, who lived nearby, my sister Phyllis, at forty-eight the
youngest of us, who was living in Boston, and Jean, the oldest.
That Monday morning Jean was driving south through Virginia from
her home in Delaware. Fortuitously, she was on her way to help our
mother, who lived in Winston-Salem. Jean’s cell phone rang. It was her
husband, David.
“Have you gone through Richmond yet?” he asked.
“No,” Jean said. “I’m just north of it on I-95.”
“Get onto route 60 West, then route 24 down to Lynchburg. Holley just
called. Eben’s in the emergency room there. He had a seizure this
morning and isn’t responding.”
“Oh, my God! Do they have any idea why?”
“They’re not sure, but it might be meningitis.”
Jean made the turn just in time and followed the undulating two-lane
blacktop of 60 West through low, scudding clouds, toward Route 24 and
Lynchburg.
It was Phyllis who, at three o’clock that first afternoon of the
emergency, called Eben IV at his apartment at the University of
Delaware. Eben was outside on his porch doing some science homework