Life and Other Complications Page 12

  “My name is Dr. Daniels. You’re in the hospital. We’re taking care of you. Can you tell me your name?” She sounded so calm.

  My voice was shaking. “Alyson.”

  “We’re waiting for a report,” Dr. Daniels told me. “If it’s clear, we can take you off the backboard.”

  “I want my mom,” I whispered.

  “Was she in the car with you?”

  I tried to nod, but my head couldn’t move. The panic swelled up again.

  “It’s okay,” Dr. Daniels said. “Was your mother in the car with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “She’s here,” Dr. Daniels told me. “Another team is taking care of her.”

  “Dr. Daniels,” a voice said from across the room. “The films are clear.”

  Dr. Daniels smiled. “That means we can get you out of this.”

  There were loud sounds of Velcro tearing and then they were helping me off the backboard. I could move enough to see the people in scrubs with plastic over the top. My arm was bloody, and my head was spinning.

  “Can you tell me what hurts?” Dr. Daniels said as she shone a small light in my eyes.

  “My head and my arm.”

  Cold metal touched my leg and I jumped. They were cutting away my tights. I tried to pull my leg away, but hands pinned me to the bed.

  “It’s okay,” Dr. Daniels said. “We want to make sure we find all of your injuries so we can fix them. We’ll get you a hospital gown with balloons.”

  I didn’t want the hospital gown. I wanted my velvet dress and my tights and my mama. I tried to struggle. But a needle pricked my arm. Within a minute the world was growing hazy.

  I was drifting away when I heard a man’s voice say, “Dr. Daniels, you need to see this.”

  Then something pressed into my palm and my thoughts snapped back to the present. They were sewing up my hand.

  Finally, the ER doc said, “Some gauze and a shot of antibiotics and we can get you out of here.”

  “I need to see Luke Harrison,” I told him. “He was in the ambulance with me.”

  “Are you family?”

  Technically, no. But Luke and Caroline are the closest thing I have to family.

  So I said, “Yes.”

  The doc looked skeptical. But he said, “I’ll ask.”

  I didn’t know his name. He had probably told me, but I didn’t remember.

  My mind was hardly in that room. It was wherever Luke was.

  I had known that this was coming. But I still wasn’t ready to lose Luke. There are some things you’re never ready to face. Somethings that are unbearable. But being away from him was worse. So after they left me in the room, I pulled on a second hospital gown and went looking for Luke.

  I found him in a trauma bay, drinking a juice box.

  A woman in scrubs was typing on the computer. She glanced over at me and said, “Can I help you?”

  “She’s with me,” Luke said.

  I walked across the room to him, still not completely convinced that he was there and talking to me. But when I got to the side of the bed and touched his face with my right hand, he was real.

  “Your color is so much better,” I said.

  “Painkillers and steroids will do that,” Luke said. “How’s your hand?”

  “Fine.” I was almost afraid to ask. “Larry?”

  “Didn’t burst,” Luke said.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Completely.”

  “I was so scared,” I whispered.

  Luke wrapped his arms around me and pulled me in close. “Yeah, me too.”

  It was a while before I was willing to let go so I could look at his face. “Then what happened?”

  Luke looked almost amused. “I have an acute otitis media.” He looked at the woman typing. “Did I say that right?”

  “Perfectly,” she said.

  I stared at him. “An ear infection?”

  Luke nodded.

  The doctor spoke up from her rolling stool. “They can be extremely painful in adults and put enough pressure on the inner ear to impact balance.”

  “But in the ambulance, his pulse and blood pressure were so high.”

  “A natural response to pain,” she said. “They’re normal now.”

  I couldn’t quite take this all in, and they weren’t finished.

  “There’s something else,” Luke said. “When they did the CT scan there was no sign of Larry.”

  I frowned. “They couldn’t see it?”

  “They’re not sure it’s still there.”

  I didn’t understand. “What happened to it?”

  “I have no idea,” Luke said.

  “Aneurysms can resolve on their own,” the doctor told us. “It’s just extremely rare for one the size of Luke’s.”

  “It’s gone?” I asked her.

  “We would need more in-depth scans to be certain,” she said. “But his CT was promising.”

  For more than a few seconds, I was overwhelmed. I heard the words and I understood them. But none of it felt real.

  Caroline showed up with clean clothes for me. When we told her what we knew, she looked the way I felt, stunned and relieved and almost afraid to hope.

  “The others are in the parking lot,” she said.

  But Luke shook his head. “We aren’t telling anyone. Not even my parents. Not until we know for sure.”

  “How do we know?” I asked him.

  “We make a trip to Dartmouth.”

  Monday, June 20

  Today, Luke, Caroline and I drove down to the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. The three of us were quiet on the drive, but Caroline couldn’t seem to stop moving. She hates hospitals. But she still insisted on making the trip with us.

  “Whatever happens, we face it together,” she said.

  Luke told his family he was going for a check-up with his neurologist. We didn’t say anything about a change. Luke was adamant about that. And our hope was so fragile.

  Our first stop was the imaging center, where Luke would get a brain MRI.

  “This will take a while,” he said.

  “How long?” Caroline asked him.

  “An hour, maybe more.”

  “You have to be in that tube for an hour?” she said.

  He nodded. “With a mask over my face to hold my head still.”

  “I feel claustrophobic just thinking about it,” I said.

  “You get used to it after a while.”

  But I couldn’t get used to the idea, any more than I could get used to how empty the waiting room felt after Luke went back for his scan.

  Once he was gone, Caroline said, “He’s going to be fine.”

  I nodded, not sure which of us she was trying to convince.

  It felt like days before Luke came back to the waiting room.

  “Now what?” I asked him.

  “Now we have to wait,” he said.

  “How long?” Caroline said.

  “We’ll see Dr. Martin in two hours. Do you want to get some lunch?”

  “Sure,” we both said, because it was something to do. But Caroline and I weren’t hungry, and for the first time since I’ve known him, Luke wasn’t either. The three of us just sat at an outside café pushing food around on our plates.

  I hated the way Luke kept looking at me, as if he was trying to find the right words to say something that needed to be said. Before he could manage it, it was time for us to see Dr. Martin.

  The neurologist was a thin man who reminded me more of a jazz musician than a doctor. He even tipped his chair back with a steady rhythm.

  “I told you that you were one in a hundred million,” Dr. Martin said. “And you certainly lived up to it.”

  “The aneurysm healed?” Luke said.

  “Completely. And there are no other abnormalities. You have a clean bill of health.”

  Luke sat back hard in his chair. “I’m going to live.”

  Dr. Martin smiled at him. “With any luck, to a ripe
old age.”

  This was really happening.

  Luke said goodbye to Dr. Martin and his staff the way most people would say goodbye to old friends. An entire chapter of his life was finished. It was something I couldn’t imagine.

  On the way back to the car, Luke gave Caroline free rein to call the others while he called his parents. Luke spent most of five minutes convincing them that the aneurysm was gone. Then I could hear them celebrating through the phone.

  All the way back to Trinity, Luke couldn’t seem to stop smiling, and my mind couldn’t stop spinning. Luke isn’t terminal anymore. He’s going to live.

  This was so good. But there was still a panic growing inside me. Which didn’t make any sense. I love Luke. Nothing’s changed, except his life expectancy.

  The truth hit me with enough force to throw me back into the seat.

  I love Luke. But I only let myself fall in love with him because he was terminal.

  He was safe, because he was dying.

  But now this relationship could last as long as I live.

  When we got to Luke’s house, his parents came out to meet him. They were crying and wrapping their arms around him. They were so happy. They got their miracle.

  I don’t think the Harrisons would have minded if Caroline and I stayed, but we both sensed that this was a private moment. So, we left Luke to his family.

  Caroline waited until the Harrisons’ front door had closed before she turned to look at me. “It’s unbelievable.”

  I nodded.

  “One trip south and he got his whole life back. His future. Everything. Even sex.”

  My thoughts caught on that last word. “What?”

  “I was waiting to tell you until after we found out for sure about his head. But I’ve been reading. And if Luke takes anti-virals, his chance of infection would be really low.”

  My throat was squeezing shut.

  “You all can have a sex life someday.”

  She sounded so happy. I could barely breathe.

  “Are you okay?” Caroline said.

  “Yeah,” I managed. “I’m just late.” I hugged her. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  Caroline frowned slightly as I let her go. But I smiled, with my best ‘everything is great’ expression, and then walked away. I waited until I was around a corner before I started to run.

  I sprinted down the road toward the Millers’. But I couldn’t outrun my thoughts. And I couldn’t chase them away. They kept crashing into each other.

  I can’t do this. I can’t sleep with Luke.

  The one good thing about the HIV was that no one would ever want to have sex with me, ever. Why did Caroline have to find a damn loophole?

  She’s going to tell him what she found out. She’s going to take the protection of HIV away from me.

  I slowed down to a walk when I got to the Millers’ and managed to look mostly calm as I passed through the downstairs. When I reached my room, I shut the door and leaned against it.

  I had to fight down the panic.

  I had to think.

  I can put sex off until we’re married, but that’s not forever.

  On our wedding night, he would expect it.

  Another wave of fear erupted inside me, and I had to struggle to breathe.

  I survived sex with Rick. I can survive it for Luke.

  To be honest, I probably deserve it.

  After everything I’ve done. After all the lies I’ve told, all the times I betrayed the people I love, I deserve to be hurt, and humiliated and powerless. But knowing that doesn’t make it any less horrifying.

  And what about Luke? If the idea of sex sends me into a panic, what’s going to happen when we get there? I don’t know. I just know it’s going to be bad. And Luke doesn’t deserve that. He deserves someone who can share his whole life, who can be his lover, the mother of his children, all the things I can’t be.

  He deserves so much better than me.

  Luke doesn’t have to settle for the girl with HIV anymore. But he will. Because that’s who he is. He promised he will always love me. And Luke keeps his promises. It’s one of the things I usually love about him. But tonight, I hate it.

  Because it means I have to be the one who ends this.

  Tuesday, June 21

  First thing this morning, while the sky was still gray, I got dressed in running clothes, pulled my hair back into a ponytail, and left the house. I didn’t bother leaving a note for the Millers. I figured they wouldn’t even wake up before I got back. It doesn’t take that long to end a relationship.

  All the way to the Harrisons’, I tried not to think about the fact that this would be the last time I made the trip. Instead, I held onto the delusion that Luke and I would somehow stay friends. Because isn’t that what people always tell themselves? I can rip someone’s heart out and we’ll still like being around each other.

  Maybe if you tried dating and it fizzled out miserably. Maybe if when you kiss your friend, it felt like kissing your cousin. But not when you’ve been in love. Once you’ve fallen in love with someone, there’s no going back to how things were before.

  I got to Luke’s house before I was ready to deal with any of this. But I doubted another hour would make it any easier. So I stood on the sidewalk and called him.

  Luke sounded half asleep when he answered. But he still said, “Good morning, Beautiful.”

  The same tone that used to unravel me sent something hot and sharp twisting through my stomach.

  “I’m outside,” I said.

  “Give me two minutes.”

  So I stood and I fidgeted until Luke opened the front door. He looked like he had just pulled on a shirt. But when he saw me, his smile reached all the way up to his eyes. It’s what Caroline calls his Aly smile, because she says it only shows up when he’s looking at me.

  I pulled in a breath. But before I could say what I had come to say, Luke kissed me. Not a quick peck of hello, but a lips meeting mine with so much passion it took my breath away kind of kiss. When he pulled back, I was dazed, and he was smiling.

  “I was going to come over later, but this is better,” he said.

  His warm fingers wrapped around my cold hand and he was leading me into his house, down the hall to the family room. We sat down on the couch, and the way he was looking at me, I didn’t know how I was going to do this.

  Finally, I managed, “You’re going to live.”

  He smiled at me. “That’s the rumor.”

  “You can have a future.”

  “That’s a good thing. So why do you look like someone died?”

  “You get to grow up and get married and have a family.”

  Luke nodded.

  My words were shaking. “But I can’t.”

  I saw the realization hit him.

  “You can’t have children?”

  I shook my head. “The risk of infecting them is too high.”

  Luke was quiet for so long I half wished he would say something, just so we could move past this horrible silence.

  But when he opened his mouth, I changed my mind. I didn’t want him to say anything. But he did.

  “Aly, I don’t have any idea what I want to do for a living, or where I want to go to school. The one thing I’m sure of is that I want to spend my life with you. So if you can’t have children, we’ll adopt.”

  I stared at him.

  Mama hadn’t been willing to give up Rick for me. But Luke was willing to give up having a biological child, for me?

  “I am not worth that much trouble,” I whispered.

  Luke framed my face with his hands and looked straight into my eyes. I was afraid he was going to see all of me, my shame, my brokenness. But if he did, he misunderstood it. Because he said, “You are worth any amount of trouble.”

  And something inside me came undone. I finally understood what people mean when they say they love someone so much it physically hurts.

  Luke wrapped his arms around me and pulled me in so clos
e that I could feel his heartbeat against my skin.

  I was supposed to be ending this. But instead I was falling in love with him all over again.

  Wednesday, June 22

  I still haven’t broken up with Luke or told my friends about Rick and the trial and the lies. I keep trying to catch my breath and find my balance. But life keeps hurtling forward, not caring that I’m not ready, that I don’t know how to handle any of this.

  Tonight, the Millers’ babysitter cancelled at the last minute. So I offered to stay with the girls. I needed the distraction, and it was something I knew how to do. Mrs. Miller must have been desperate because she agreed to let me watch her children.

  I made them dinner and then did the dishes while they watched a show about superhero princesses. Standing at the sink, with the sound of the TV blaring from the next room, I realized that this was where my mother was while Rick and I were in the living room.

  I pushed that thought away. But my mom and Rick kept showing up. When Hattie called me “Mom”. And when I saw my face above Gabby’s in the bathroom mirror. I rushed the girls through brushing their teeth. Realizing too late that where we were going next would be worse. A little girl’s bedroom.

  Hattie and Gabby’s room is a pale pink instead of yellow. And there are two beds instead of one. But still, it was too familiar. The dollhouse in the corner. The bookcase full of books. Stuffed animals and dolls spilling onto the floor.

  “Aly.”

  I looked over at where Gabby was sitting in her bed.

  “You need to check the closet,” Gabby said. “For monsters.”

  “I can do that.”

  “There aren’t any monsters in the closet,” Hattie said from her bed.

  But she also leaned to the side to watch as I opened the closet door.

  Inside the girls’ closet, I tried not to see the little clothes. But my mother was there like a ghost hanging my clothes in the closet the day we moved into Rick’s house.

  “As long as Rick loves us, everything will be fine.”

  I shut the closet door. “No monsters.”

  “You’re sure?” Gabby said.

  “Positive.”

  I ran my hand over the seam between the door and the frame. “And now I’m sealing the door shut with monster repellent.”

  Gabby watched, interested. Hattie pretended not to care.