by Maisy Morgan
“He’s one amazing kid,” Preston said, grinning.
They sat down for a bit, talking about the game and how well Tripp had done. “He’s got another game coming up soon,” Mary told Lilly. “You’ll be able to come to it if you like.”
“Definitely,” Lilly said giddily. “It was really exciting; I had so much fun watching him play. He’s so good!”
Mary’s phone suddenly buzzed. She saw Tripp’s name appear across the screen. She frowned, checking the time and wondering for a moment if he had missed the bus, but she knew his last class of the day was only just getting started. “Hold on a second, you two; Tripp is calling me,” she said.
“Isn’t he still in school?” Preston questioned, and Mary nodded as she answered.
“Tripp? Everything all right?” Mary asked, but she had hardly gotten the words out of her mouth before Tripp interrupted her in a panic.
“Grandma! It’s Hannah! Come pick me up…please…now!” Tripp yelped.
“Tripp, slow down—what’s going on?” Mary questioned—Preston and Lilly both standing up in concern craning their necks and trying their hand to hear what Tripp was saying on the other line.
“Hannah, she had some sort… I don’t know… a seizure or stroke… I don’t know! They’re taking her to the hospital now… they can’t get a hold of her mom. Please, come get me! I need to go with her. They won’t let me go with her. Please, come get me now so we can be there for her!”
Mary waved to Preston. “Come on,” she said, hurrying out of the trailer, Lilly and Preston on her heels. “Tripp, listen to me, you stay with Mrs. Smitz. Preston and I are coming right now; do you hear me?”
“Yes, yes, I hear you,” he said, his voice shaking. “Please, hurry. I’ve got to be there for her…”
“We’re on the way now,” Mary said as the three of them darted across the studio.
Chapter Nineteen
Mary poured a cup of coffee, her hands a bit shaky. She added cream and sugar and left the little hospitality stand, heading down the hall and into the small waiting room. The room was full of people she knew. The Morrises had arrived at the high school around the same time she had; Draco too had called them panicking. His mom had been in line at the elementary school when she had received the call, and she headed straight there to get him after picking up his sister. Draco was seated with his sister in his lap, her head rested on his chest, half asleep after the commotion of the afternoon.
Mary sat down by Tripp. He was busying himself with math homework—something to distract himself. He looked very frustrated by a particular problem he had come across, and he clearly didn’t have the energy needed for concentration right now. He flipped his notebook closed and shoved it into his backpack with a frustrated grunt. Preston reached over and took Mary’s hand, as it was shaking. She passed him the coffee, silently asking him to set it on the end table beside where he sat. Everyone was so anxious that you could feel it in the room without a word of explanation.
Cindy had arrived after all of them; she had been working at the antique shop, and for some reason, the school hadn’t thought to call there. Mary called her in route on their way to the hospital. She had busted in about thirty minutes ago and had been ushered back to her daughter in a great state of distress.
Matthew and Lilly were there as well. Lilly was pacing; this was the first she had learned that Tripp’s friend had health concerns outside of just the wheelchair, so it had come as a grave shock to her. Matthew had abandoned filming immediately, citing a family emergency to the director. “What’s taking them so long?” Tripp asked bitterly. “Shouldn’t they be able to tell us something by now?”
At the entrance to the emergency room, a man in a suit came hurrying in with some files under his arm. He spoke with someone at the check-in counter, and Mary overheard him say Hannah’s name. He disappeared in the back with the emergency room nurses. “Who was that?” Preston asked.
“I’m not sure,” Mary said.
Another several minutes went by. Mary could see Tripp fidgeting in his seat. Draco was as well, but he had settled down significantly ever since his sister had crawled into his lap. He was hugging her like an overgrown teddy bear. It seemed the only time those two could get along was during a crisis or when one of them was asleep. At last, Cindy appeared before them in the waiting room, her eyes bloodshot and looking as pale as a ghost. Mary stood up and hurried to her, walking with Cindy to everyone else, their arms hooked together as Mary’s way of showing her some support. “The physician we’ve been seeing up in Atlanta came down,” she said, wiping her eyes. “I can’t believe he did that… I called him as soon as I got off the phone with Mary at the shop…”
“He came all the way from Atlanta?” Matthew asked.
“Came straight here so he’d be here when Hannah woke up,” Cindy said. “She’s sleeping right now. They’ve stopped the seizures.”
Tripp wrung his wrists. “Is she going to be okay?” he asked, looking down at his feet when he asked it, almost too afraid to listen for the answer.
“She’s going to be fine,” Cindy said. “For right now. Dr. Bonder, the doctor we’ve been seeing, brought her MRI scans.”
Mary frowned. She put one of her hands on Cindy’s shoulders. “What did he find?” she asked.
“Nothing good,” Cindy said. “Said the cancer is only in her hip—apart from a small tumor in her brain.”
“A tumor!” Tripp said, and Lilly went and sat down beside him. She reached over and grabbed his hand, and Tripp let her do so willingly.
“It’s small,” Cindy said. “It’s what caused the seizure. He wants to… wants to talk about scheduling surgery.”
“You’re talking about brain surgery,” Roy Morris said. “They want to cut her open?”
“Yes,” Cindy said. “We’re going to get a second opinion, but Dr. Bonder feels we need to make this decision fairly quickly. He wants to do it as soon as possible. Told me that she’s bound to keep having seizures if we don’t. He doesn’t think chemotherapy is going to help based on its size.”
“So he’s just skipping straight to cutting her head open?” Roy questioned.
“Roy, that’s enough,” Anna warned along with giving him the eye.
“Has Hannah been at all responsive?” Preston asked.
“Not yet,” Cindy said. “They sedated her. She should be waking up soon, I think. We’re going to be here probably overnight while they monitor her. They’re checking her out now to make sure there aren’t any injuries from her fall.” Cindy’s eyes went towards Tripp and Draco. “Mary told me you two were there for her. Thank you so much, boys. You… you don’t know what that means to me.”
Tripp slowly stood up, letting go of his mom’s hand. He came over to Cindy and hugged her, and she hugged him back. He pulled away uncomfortably. “I’m sorry,” Tripp said pitifully, with sadness in his eyes.
“Sorry? For what?” Cindy questioned.
“I should have noticed something was wrong quicker than I did,” Tripp said. “She could have gotten really hurt falling out of her chair like that. I was stupid not to notice something was wrong before I did.”
“Mrs. Smitz said you caught her head,” Mary assured him. “This could have been a lot worse, Tripp.”
“Yes, sweetheart,” Cindy said in agreement. “You did all you could, and I’m so glad you were there. If you weren’t, I don’t know what would have happened.” She leaned forward and gave Tripp a kiss on the cheek. “I’m going to head into the back… they… they said we can bring two people back at a time until she’s moved out of the ER.”
“I’ll go back with your first?” Preston offered, and Cindy nodded and thanked him.
The two of them left together. Tripp sat back down in his seat, and Lilly took his hand again, which he seemed to appreciate. The thought of that little girl having to have brain surgery made Mary sick to her stomach. She was already having to consider chemotherapy—now this? They hadn’t even started add
ressing the problem with her kidneys. Mary stayed in touch with Cindy and Preston through text messages for the next hour. Not much changed until Cindy texted that the doctor was clarifying what his plan would be: scheduling brain surgery at the surgery center in Atlanta followed by multiple rounds of chemotherapy. Her kidneys were not a high concern just yet; she would likely be on dialysis until they rendered her healthy enough for a transplant, and that wouldn’t come until she was no longer doing chemotherapy. It seemed it would be one big operation or treatment right after the other.
“I don’t want to leave until I see her,” Tripp told Mary when she suggested her taking him home. She promised she wouldn’t make him leave until he was ready.
Preston and Anna switched places, and Anna joined Cindy for a while. Eventually, Anna arrived back to tell them that Hannah was still asleep but was being moved to an overnight room on the second floor. They relocated to another waiting room with Cindy, where they waited for Hannah to be moved. It grew dark, and it was a while before Cindy was escorted back to Hannah again.
Chapter Twenty
Ever since Cindy had said brain tumor, there had been a rather permanent feeling of dread within Tripp’s chest. His ears had started ringing, and he felt like he was in a daze. “Tripp, we’re going upstairs,” Draco said suddenly, shaking him back into reality for just a moment.
His grandmother looked at him with a worried expression, but he pulled himself up. They had been waiting around for a while now after Cindy had told them that Hannah would be moving to a more permanent room for her to stay overnight. He followed his grandmother and the others to an elevator, feeling almost dizzy.
He simply followed the crowd of loved ones. Eventually, he found himself seated again in another waiting room. There was so much waiting around. It made him sick. It grew later and later, and soon Draco’s sister was starting to get painfully antsy. Draco’s parents eventually decided they needed to take her home, but Draco pleaded to stay.
“He can stay the night with us,” Mary said. “But we plan on staying here until we get to see her.”
“I imagine Tripp won’t be going to school in the morning,” Mrs. Morris said.
“Probably not, so if Draco’s staying with us, he’ll probably be playing hooky with Tripp,” his grandmother said.
The Morrises thought about this for a moment. His father eventually nodded. “I think we can make an exception for tomorrow.”
Draco seemed glad that he would get to stay, and he kissed his little sister’s forehead and told her not to give their parents a hard time about going to bed when they got home. His parents left with much hesitancy and a grand amount of reassurance from Tripp’s grandmother. The night continued to drag on, and much to Tripp’s surprise, his mother and Matthew also remained at the hospital. It was dark out, and Tripp had long lost track of time. His phone had died hours ago. He drifted in and out of sleep while sitting in the uncomfortable chair in the waiting room.
Just when he felt as though he had been sleeping well for a bit, his grandmother tapped his cheek. “I’m going on a dinner run,” she whispered. “Cindy is in the back speaking with the doctor. Anything you want in particular?”
“Anything that’s actually open,” Tripp said with a yawn.
His grandmother smiled at him for a moment. “Your mom and Matthew are here,” she said.
Tripp sat upright in his chair and rubbed his eyes. He glanced over to see Draco passed out in a corner. Matthew was sitting with his body slouched down in his chair, his mother right beside him with her head rested on his shoulder. “Okay,” Tripp said and yawned again.
His grandmother kissed his forehead, and she left the waiting room. “You holding up all right, sweetheart?” his mother asked once his grandmother had left.
“I guess,” he said.
Lilly turned to Matthew, tapping his leg. “I think you should go,” she told him. “You have early filming tomorrow, and you don’t want to get yourself in trouble with the director. You already left set early today. He can’t keep making exceptions for you.”
Matthew didn’t look pleased with this. “I don’t think I should go,” he said, glancing Tripp’s way.
“No, you really should,” Tripp said.
“I can get a cab home,” his mother said. “Matthew, you don’t want to put your job in jeopardy. You’re just now starting to really break into acting.”
Matthew sighed. He didn’t look pleased with himself, but he eventually decided that he would go. He kissed Lilly goodbye, gave Tripp a reassuring nod, and left. Lilly came and moved closer to Tripp, taking the empty chair beside him. “I hope your grandmother gets back soon. I haven’t had hardly a thing to eat today.”
“I kind of picked at my lunch earlier,” Tripp said. “I wasn’t really hungry. I guess I’ve been worrying about Hannah all day.”
“You two are really close, aren’t you?” his mother asked.
“She was my first friend I made after we moved to Georgia,” Tripp said. “She’s cool. We hang out all the time. I guess you could say she’s my best friend.” Tripp glanced in Draco’s direction. He was curled up and drooling on himself in the chair in the corner still. “Well, one of my best friends.”
“You three have something really special,” she said. “That’s good. It’s good to have a group of friends like that you can count on. A few close friends can make all the difference in your life. Good friends who will look out for your well-being. Believe me, I know what it’s like to have a group of friends who don’t really care about you.”
“Is that how you got into drugs?” Tripp asked and then bit his tongue. He wasn’t sure if this was really a conversation he wanted to have with his mother, and he felt like he had just brought up the most sensitive topic for her he could have. But the words were already out in the open, and he couldn’t take them back, so he decided to wait and listen closely to her answer.
She looked terribly uncomfortable. But she answered him. “Yes, actually,” she said. “But I can’t really blame my old friends, can I? I am the one who made those stupid decisions. But maybe if I had not fallen into that sort of crowd, things would have been very different for me. The first time I tried drugs, it was because of peer pressure. A friend told me it was a good way to relax. That I’d feel better. It was a big lie that my friend also believed. She didn’t care about me. She cared about her drugs first and foremost. Wanted to feed her addictions, and a part of that was having someone to validate her addictions. That’s what I was for her.”
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Tripp said.
“Tripp, I’m the one who is sorry,” she said. “I don’t blame anyone else other than myself for the way I acted.”
“I know you’re trying,” Tripp told her. “Mom, I’m glad you’re here right now.”
She smiled. “I’m glad I can be here for you.” She held out her hand, and he took it and smiled at her.
Just then, Cindy emerged from the back entrance. She looked very tired. She looked around the waiting room in a bit of a daze before coming over to them. “Where’s your mom?” she asked.
“She went to get everyone something to eat,” Tripp said.
“I just got some news,” Cindy said, tapping her fingers at her side for a moment like she wasn’t sure if she should tell him or not.
“How is she?” Tripp asked, and he jumped right up. “Is she awake?”
“She’s awake,” Cindy said and took a deep breath. “We’re going up to Atlanta first thing in the morning for her surgery.”
Tripp’s eyes widened. “Wait? Seriously? Earlier tonight you were still wondering whether or not she was going to have surgery at all. What changed?”
“They say she’ll likely keep having seizures if they don’t remove the tumor,” Cindy said. “It’s pressing up against her brain. We’ve already gotten the second opinion we were hoping for, and it only came with even more urgency. So… She’s having emergency surgery first thing tomorrow.”
Tripp immediatel
y wished his grandmother hadn’t left. His lip quivered for a moment, and he felt his mom touch his shoulder. “She’s awake, you said?” his mother asked.
Cindy hesitated for a moment. “Yes, she’s up.”
“How is she doing?” his mother asked.
“Better than expected. I think she’s in a bit of denial about what’s going on because she sent me out here to see if Tripp has her backpack—she wants to work on homework,” Cindy said.
Tripp nodded. “Yeah, I got it. I can… I can bring it back there to her?” he asked.
“She’s settled in now,” Cindy said. “We can all start moving back if you want.”
“Draco is sleeping,” Lilly said.
“Mom, why don’t you stay out here with him and wait on Grandma to get back with dinner so she knows where we’re all at?” Tripp suggested. “I’ll go ahead and bring Hannah her homework.”
This seemed agreeable to everyone. Tripp followed Cindy to the back; he had both his backpack and Hannah’s with him as he went. They went down a long hallway and eventually entered into a small room. When he saw Hannah, he wished he had stayed in the waiting room. He wished Cindy had given him some sort of warning. They had shaved her head.
Hannah’s face went pink. “Tripp,” she said, and she forced on a brave smile.
He felt incredibly uncomfortable. So much so that he thought about making up some excuse about having to go to the bathroom, but he decided against it. “How are you feeling?” Tripp asked, his throat a bit dry.
“Stupid tired,” she responded.
Cindy, clearly not thinking about how Tripp would feel being left alone in the room with her, abruptly left them—saying she’d wait for Mary to return so that she could show everyone where Hannah’s room was. Now, Tripp found himself completely alone in the room with Hannah. He just stood there, staring at her, and he knew he was making her uncomfortable. “What?” she barked and then crossed her arms. She had an IV in one arm, she had oxygen tubes in her nose, and there were monitors hooked up to her—checking her heart rate and a bunch of other things Tripp didn’t understand.