Keturah said, "Okay, I'll pass that on to—"
I didn't see Glynis move. I was looking at Everett. What I felt was a hand going past my shoulder, fast, and the weight of the phone leaving my knee. By the time I turned my head, she was on her feet and three steps back, holding it against her chest with both hands, the way you'd hold a bird that might get away.
"No," she said. "No. You don't get to do that. Not to him."
"Glynis, give me the phone."
"You've been filming him for a year." Her voice was high and fast and shaking. "Don't think I don't know. Standing on your little ladder. Filming him while he works. Filming him when he gets confused. You're going to give that to the fire department, and then it goes to the news, and then it's on the internet, my husband falling apart on the internet, and everybody in this neighborhood laughing at him, and you get to be right. That's what you want. You want to be right."
I had to choose. I could get up and go after her or I could stay where I was with my hand on Everett's back, counting his breaths. I stayed. I'm not saying it was noble. It's just that I've stood beside enough beds to know which thing in front of you is going to matter in an hour.
"Glynis," I said, "I need to talk to the dispatcher. Give it back."
She wasn't listening. She was swiping at the screen with her thumb, and the phone was unlocked, because it had been in my hand a minute earlier and I'd set it on my knee, and I saw her face go tight with concentration the way people's faces do when they're looking for an app on a phone that isn't theirs. Photos. She found it. I watched her tap, and tap again, and press, and I watched her lips move, reading. Delete video. Delete. I watched her thumb come down.
"There," she said. She was crying, or almost. "There. It's gone. Now you can tell them whatever you want."
That was when the phone spoke.
"Ma'am."