On the arm of Dads recliner, his phone started to ring, and Tina told me dont you dare, because the detective was calling about my grandmothers hospital paperwork, and the power of attorney Tina forged three days before Grandma died was about to surface.
For years Tina made herself at home in our house and my father turned up the TV. This time the truth came from the attending physician, because Dr. Nakamura noticed a name on my grandmothers file that did not belong there.
My grandmother died at Denver Health in February, and three days before she died, Tina signed my grandmothers paperwork as her power of attorney, a document my grandmother never signed, because my grandmother could not stand Tina and told the nurses she never signed anything.
The copy of the hospital record in my bag proved it. Dr. Nakamura, the attending on my rotation, showed me Tinas name where it never should have been, and the nurses notes that my grandmother denied signing. I took it to a lawyer, who took it to the police.
Tina snapped the stethoscope my grandmother had engraved with my name and told me to listen to that. She did not know a detective was already calling my father. She said dont you dare, and then his phone rang.
Dad finally looked away from the game when I said it was about Grandma. I didnt do anything, Tina, I told her. You did.
I drove to a friends, and Monday morning I sat my PANCE, the PA boards, on no sleep, and I passed, because Tina could snap a stethoscope but not my grandmothers faith in me.
I am a physician assistant now. The forged power of attorney is with the police, on paper, where youll never be a real doctor does not help Tina, and my grandmothers estate is being handled the way she actually wanted.
My father, when he understood what Tina did to his own mother in her last days, went quiet in a way I had never seen. He asked her to leave. She has.
Your grandmother told the nurses she never signed anything, Dr. Nakamura told me. She did not. And Tina stopped talking before Dads phone finished ringing, because my grandmother, even from her hospital bed, made sure the truth was on the record.