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My stomach pitches. I can’t get my legs to move me toward him.
“Your stepbrother is here,” the nurse tells him.
DG’s eyelids lift open. His mouth curves a little as he tries to keep his eyes open to greet me. “Hey.” His voice sounds slow. His eyes drop back shut.
“This stuff…always…hits me” —his eyes peel back open— “so hard.”
I stand beside him, looking down and feeling vaguely panicked.
“It’s okay.” I force myself to lay my hand on his arm. “Feeling okay?” I ask dumbly.
I think he tries to nod, but his head barely moves. “It’s…ll be…fine.”
Then he’s out. His head lolls slightly to the side on its pillow, and the nurse laughs. “I think it hit him. He was trying to stay awake for you.”
“He was?”
She smiles. “Just to say bye.”
I stand there as long as I think I can. Thinking of another room. Another patient. How the needle always seemed to burn.
Miller
“I’m finished?”
“That’s it,” Dr. Kelley tells me with a quick smile. “I’ll let you get dressed.” She puts a finger over her mouth, like she’s asking me to keep a secret. “Skip the wheelchair ride out this time. You can leave as soon as your stepbrother arrives.”
I pull on my clothes one piece at a time, holding onto the rail with one hand as I do. Whatever was in the IV made me so tired. Even now, after almost three hours, I feel sleepy and off-balance.
Also, Ezra isn’t here. When I woke up—apparently I slept through the whole hour in the MRI, as well as a second EEG—they tried to bring him back, but the nurse said he wasn’t in the waiting room. I called him just to let him know what’s what, but he didn’t answer. That was more than an hour ago.
After I’m dressed, I sit in one of the plastic chairs beside the wheeled bed I just got out of and send him another text. ‘Hey I’m done. Can u pick me up? Like in the circle drive/drop off?’
I have this fuzzy memory of him coming back to the pre-procedure room, saying something to me before they whisked me away to the MRI, and the nurse confirmed that when I asked. She said she didn’t know where he went after that, though.
I’m so dead-ass tired, I don’t even want to walk out to the lobby, so I sit for a second waiting for him to text back. But there’s nothing. What the fuck?
I check my phone one more time before I leave the room, and there’s one from Mom. ‘Such good news! Let me know when you boys get home.’
The doctor called Mom on speaker phone when she briefed me, because she was worried I might not remember what was said—but basically, everything looked normal. Right now, the theory for my seizure is that when I got knocked out—when Ezra pushed me off the trestle bridge—it shook something up in my head. I told the doctor I’d knocked myself out; I made her promise not to tell Mom. Apparently if you get knocked out and your brain’s already wonky, that can shake shit up.
So far, there’s no need to start meds again. So that’s the upside.
Downside: still can’t drive. Not for another six months. Which means it’ll be winter before I’m behind the wheel again, and in the meantime? Gotta rely on Ezra to shuttle me around.
I try calling him as I walk toward the lobby. When he doesn’t answer, I leave a message.
“Hey. Been trying to get you for a while. Can you pick me up? Thanks.”
I blow a long breath out and run a hand through my hair. It’s all sticky from the EEG leads.
I spend a minute looking around—at all the families, parents with children. One woman is carrying a little baby car seat thing. That makes me sad. I’ve still got that heavy feeling as I walk outside and stand beside this big bronze sculpture of kids dancing. Before I can lift my hand to shield my eyes from the sun, I see a black Jeep pull into the drive. It stops near me, and the door opens.
I feel woozy climbing in, but I don’t want to let him know it.
“Fancy seeing you here,” I manage.
“Got your burger.”
He taps the dashboard, where a paper sack sits.
My chest loosens up a little. “That’s where you went?”
“Looks like it.” I frown over at him, noticing he’s wearing that peach ball cap again. It’s angled so I can’t see his eyes.
He starts out of the circle drive, and I notice there’s a soda in the cup holder.
“Sunkist,” he tells me. “Your mom said you like.”
“Did you talk to her? We’ve been trying to get you on the phone.”
“Different day.”
So, is he saying my mom told him I like orange soda on a different day? But he didn’t speak with her today while I was at the MRI? Did it take him more than two hours to get this food? Why didn’t he answer his phone?
