“That’s very interesting, Monica,” Mom says, cutting her off. “Do me a favor and get the doctor?” It’s an order, but Mom makes it sound kind. She is never not delegating—Sterlingwood’s mayor first, everything else second.
Mo hurriedly does as she is told. Being low-key afraid of my mother means she’ll answer to anything, even the name “Maureen,”which was what Mom called her when Mo first moved to town at the start of high school.
“You have to be more careful,” Mom says, squeezing my hand.
I give her a weak smile, because I know exactly what her tenderness means:I was scared. I’m glad you’re okay. Please don’t ever do this to me again.
Mom and I have a way of communicating without words. In our silences, we say the important things. Promise not to hurt or embarrass each other.
The woman Mo returns with seconds later is in colorful floral scrubs with lavender bottoms and a white shirt with purple flowers.
“Welcome back, Zadie!” the nurse says, all cheer. Under the fluorescent lights of the hospital room, everything feels too bright.
There’s a stinging pain in the back of my neck and an ache going around the crown of my head.
“I think I’m having a migraine,” I tell the nurse, and she nods, scribbles something on a chart, then begins to take my vitals, asking me a bunch of questions.
“What’s happening?” Mom asks. I’ve heard her assistants joke that my mother wants regular progress reports on progress reports.
Before the nurse can answer, a short, ancient-looking man enters with a stethoscope around his neck. “How’s the girl doing?” he says. If I wasn’t feeling so gross, I’d blanch at being calledthe girl, but what it reminds me is that there is alsothe boy.
“Jason!” I say, shooting upright and wincing, all while the nurse is taking my blood pressure. “Is he okay?”
“Well, I don’t know ifokayis the word,” Monique mumbles, eliciting the fastest smack from Amber.
“What do you mean? What does that mean?” I scan the room, desperately searching for information on somebody’s face.
“He’s not awake,” the doctor says, pushing round, owl-like glasses up his nose. He comes forward, tips my chin up, and shines a penlight in my eyes.
“He’s sleeping?” I ask.
“He’s in a coma, honey,” the nurse says, each word gentle, but it feels like a punch.
“A coma?”
Air is pushing against my windpipe, making it hard to breathe.
“We have every hope that he’ll make a full recovery,” she hurries to add, “but he took a harder hit than you. An especially bad one to the head.”
Amber sniffs loudly.
When my dad died last summer, thirteen months ago to be exact, I discovered that the worst kind of pain feels like nothing—blank, flat, dry—until it feels like everything.
But Jason isn’t dead, and this pain is different, a sharp, twisting feeling in my chest.
“Can I see him?” I ask.
Mom pats my hand in my lap. “Maybe just focus on getting better,” she says.
“I want to see him,” I say, ferocious suddenly.
I want to confirm it—that the Jason I know, who is always on the move, always doingsomething, is really hurt enough to be unconscious.
The nurse readjusts my arm cuff and instructs me to lie back down. She tells me she has to restart the measurement.
“Is he going to be okay?” I manage to squeak out.
Both the doctor and nurse seem reluctant to make any promises. “We’re doing everything in our power to get him better,” the nurse says, as the doctor begins inspecting my neck, rambling about whiplash. Mo interrupts to ask him a question, but I hardly hear a word anybody says.
