The scoreboard ticked up a point on our side. It was 6–5. But the game wasn’t over yet. We had to hold them. We had to hang on.
The ref blew her whistle.
The other team pressed in with the ball. I pushed forward, raised a hand in the air to block the shot.
“No foul, no foul!” Coach shouted from the bench.
A girl on the other team twisted.
She saw her chance. She swooped. She turned. She shot. And suddenly the ball was heading for our goal.
The players on the bench drew in a collective breath.
Mila launched herself from the water. Spread her arm wide to the right. The ball smacked off her palm, blocking the shot. She wrestled for it. Took possession.
The cheers from the crowd got louder, making the air electric.
Mila passed me the ball. I took control, swimming off in the other direction, toward the other side of the pool, toward the other goal.
The lights of the scoreboard blazed. The shot clock ticked down.
My team spread out in a wide circle in the water. Juliette passed. I passed. Iris passed. Thea passed. Running down the clock as everyone in the stands counted down.
Ten.
And the rest of the team on the bench.
Nine. Eight. Seven.
And my mom.
Six. Five. Four.
And then us.
Three. Two.
One.
The buzzer went off and the water swelled up like the ocean. We were a mass of kicking and screaming and elation in the middle of the pool. Two players on the deck pushed Coach into the water, clothes and all. And then everyone else jumped in. And we were a celebration. Someone from the local newspaper took a photo. Parents snapped pictures from the stands. In the air, the announcement on the loudspeaker said we won.
We won.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
11:38 A.M.
The big hands and the calm voice are still here. “What’s your name?” He speaks strong and clear. Like I can trust him. I can tell him.
“Ru—by,” I manage. It’s weak. Garbled. Like Charlie’s last breath.
“Ruby?” He squeezes my hand. “We’re gonna take care of you, Ruby.”
All the people are here to help.
Charlie isn’t here.
My mom isn’t. I need her. Where is she?
We are going and going. People are talking and talking. They talk to me and I try to answer, but the world is so fuzzy. I just want to sleep. Everyone around me talks to one another. Saying numbers. Naming places.
There’s a rush. Moving. Pushing. Fast.
I squint my eyes open. There are so many people. There are tents. Like the drill at school. One tent is filled with people covered all the way up with white sheets. Even over their faces. I can’t see them. They don’t move.
I can’t move.
What if I’m like them? What if this is what it feels like to be dead?
I try to move so I’ll know I’m not the same. I’m too stiff. Stuck. But then I remember the neck brace. The straps around me. All of it holding me in. Too tight. No space. Like the rubble. I can’t breathe.
I’m still trapped.
I want to scream.
I want to bust through.
“It’s okay,” the man with the big hands and the calm voice says when I shake. My hand is still in his. “We’re taking you to the triage tents, where the doctors can help you. I’m gonna stay with you until we get there, okay, Ruby?”
I try to nod. The brace won’t let me.
We push past empty space. Black asphalt. Ambulance vans and bright red fire trucks. My gaze scrapes across the sides of them. Shiny. Slick.
We go into another tent. It’s not people covered in sheets here. There’s pain. Screams. Howls. I want to cover my ears but I can’t move my arms.
I want to move.
I want to talk.
I want to leave.
Someone shouts above me. A woman. “Respiration’s under thirty. Cap refill is not immediate. Cannot follow simple commands. Possible sepsis. Tagged immediate.”
They’re talking about me.
I’m immediate. I’m a label, not a person.
I want to know what’s happening
I want to know somebody and I want somebody to know me.
I close my eyes. Drifting.
The calm voice is in my ear one more time. An electric jolt. His big hand squeezes mine. “You’ve got this. Stay with us.” I try my hardest to squeeze back. I try with everything I have. I manage something just barely. “That’s my girl.”
The lip of a bottle hits my mouth. Water. I gulp. Sputter.
“Slow,” someone says.
I drink again. Slower.
A shout from outside the tent. “Multiples at Shore and Sunset. We need everyone.”
The big hand lets go of mine. Pushes back.
I try to say Don’t leave. It’s a whisper.
“I have to go,” he says. “This is the part where I let the doctors step in and I go help someone else. Another person like you.”
I want to cry because I don’t want to be alone again.
He swipes his hand across my forehead. “You need someone else now. My job was to get you here.”
And then I’m being lifted up again. One person and another one are doing it. What’s happening? Where am I now? They set me down on a cot so the big hands and the calm voice can take the stretcher. Someone scribbles on something, and I watch as they set it down on top of my chest.
A red tag.
I’m poked. Prodded. A clear mask goes over my nose and mouth. So much fresh, clean air. Not dusty like the rubble. Not singed and burnt like the sky. I can breathe. Something stings inside my arm. I feel it moving up and up through my veins.
The pain fades. I’m fuzzy. My thoughts fizzle.
I’m dandelion fluff.
I’m a floating balloon.
I can’t keep my eyes open. They’re so heavy. I can’t hang on. I’m breaking my promise to the big hands and the calm voice. And my mom. And Charlie.
But I’m too tired to stay.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
12:00 P.M.
Moving again. Out and through the tent. And then I’m slid into the back of an ambulance. Metal against metal. I want to protest.
I just got out, don’t put me back in.
I try to speak. “Where?” My voice garbled. Not clear. Not strong. My head so fuzzy from that stuff in my arm.
“I have one immediate going to University Med.” The man who pushed me here. And then the numbers again. Something over something. Sepsis. More things I don’t understand. “Go, go!”
Chaotic. Quick. They’re in a hurry to save me. I feel it in the shuffle.
Above me is the wail of the siren.
Below me is the push of movement.
I’m going away. Farther and farther.
I’m fading.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
12:30 P.M.
I come to when we move again. Two people pushing me. One at my head. One at my feet. There’s rattling underneath me, the squeal of metal wheels. My heart races too fast with memories. Rubble. Rescue. Big hands. Calm voice. My vision blurs but I don’t miss the shiny building. The big hospital sign. No! I hate hospitals. Hospitals are where people go to die.
I wiggle. Try to move. To break free. But a hand on my shoulder steadies me. Then I’m through the doors. Across the floors.
Pushed. Pushed. Pushed.
Shouts.
Turn. Turn. My body sways from one side to the other, the straps holding me in, keeping me from falling as we turn again. Through hallways. Around corners.
Until we jerk to a sudden stop.
“Here?” someone says.
“Five flights,” the other answers.
I try to focus on which voice is which.
Then my stretcher is compact. The wheels fold underneath me and I’m carried instead of rolled. We’re going up. Stairs. A turn. More sta
irs. My head is heavy with exhaustion and fuzz. But still I see the horror. There are bodies. Bodies. Covered in sheets on the landings. Piled up. One and then another on top of that. Just like I thought. Just like I knew hospitals would be.
And then the rotting-meat smell of decay. Creeping. Crawling up my nostrils. Making me choke.
I squirm, the straps digging into my shoulders and thighs, my heart stuttering with the fear they’ll leave me here. But then the one at my feet heaves the stairwell door open. We all snap back when the heavy door stops short against something on the inside. I grip the sides of my stretcher, fearing I’ll fall off. Get lost in the pile of bodies. Dead and forgotten.
Bang, bang. A fist against the wall by the door.
“Here!” the man at my feet shouts.
Footsteps shuffle. The door creaks open more. They’re forcing me in. The one at my head stays. The one at my feet goes.
“I’ve got her.” A woman now. All-white coat with a clipboard and a pencil. Tracking arrivals.
A snapping sound, and I’m transferred from one cot to another. The wheels on the new cot slip out from underneath me and the woman in the white coat kicks something, a brake, that makes it stop. Frozen. The straps fall loose. I can move again, but I’m too tired to do it. I feel sweaty and sick.
“Name?” she says.
“Ruby.” The syllables scratch against my throat.
“What’s that?” the woman says.
“Ruby.” One of the guys from the ambulance. “She’s in and out. Puncture wound to her left arm. Possible sepsis.”
I open my eyes to him, wanting to see this person who knows so much about me when I know nothing about him. I catch the scruff on his face. The dark circles under his eyes. The tired slope of his shoulders. The stains on his coat. Dirt. Blood.
He’s been doing this for days.
“Last name? Age?” The woman again. Straight, shiny hair. A mole under the corner of her eye. Tiny gold hoops in her ears.
He shakes his head. “Wish I knew.”
I try to say Seventeen, but I slur. Unclear. Only the S sound comes out. A long hiss. I try again because I want to give them something. Answer the questions he can’t. But my whole age stays stuck on my tongue.
I lie there hissing, “Sssssss.”
“We’ve got it from here,” the woman says. Is she talking to me or the man who brought me here? The one with the face scruff and the tired shoulders.
He nods. Turns to go. I tug at the edge of his jacket to stop him. I want to know his name. To thank him.
“Thhhhh—” I manage.
He looks at my face. I focus my eyes on his. Hoping that’s enough for him to understand how grateful I am.
He smiles. Gentle. “I know.”
“Good luck out there,” the woman says to his back as he leaves.
She moves my leg, bending it at the knee. She moves my left arm to rest it across my stomach. I’m clay and she’s molding me. I let her. I don’t resist because I can’t. I can only squint at the lights above me. They aren’t bright and fluorescent. They’re soft. Flickering. Barely there. Like me. Running on fumes.
Someone else bangs through the stairwell door, calling for help. The woman stops moving me to take off with her clipboard and her pencil.
Around me, the hallway echoes with the sounds of labored breathing. Grunts. Groans. Like Charlie.
I want to be somewhere else.
I struggle to lift my head. To see. To know. Where else can I go?
But there’s only an endless sea of people. They surround me. On cots in front of me. And next to me. If there’s space, there’s a person. Every hallway. Every door. Every room. Every square inch has people in it. I reach out. I want to be able to touch them the same way I wanted to touch Charlie. To know we’re all in this together. I couldn’t reach Charlie, but maybe I can reach them. I stretch my fingers to connect. I catch the soft edge of the shirt of someone next to me.
We’re all here. Crammed in side by side. Cot-to-cot.
Hope-to-hope.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
4:03 P.M.
My world whirs. I go out. I go in. Vision blurry. Brain hazy.
I try to move, but it feels like swimming. Like I’m trying to grip the lip of the pool gutter but never getting there, my fingertips slipping down the edge whenever I grab for it.
I struggle to focus. I’m in a new room. A room within a room. I’m covered in gauze and tender bruises and crisp clean sheets. There’s a clear plastic bag with clear liquid inside. It’s hanging from a hook on a portable metal stand next to me. I follow the tube from the bag to my hand.
Am I like my dad? Am I waiting to die?
There aren’t any windows, and the air is blue-gray from dimmed lights. A chair sits in the corner with my dirty sweatshirt on it. Charlie’s journal on top. A reminder of who I am and where I came from and who I know. The life I have outside of here. The life I had before. My eyes scrape across the sliding glass doors of my room and focus on the workstation outside. It sits in the middle and the doors to other hospital rooms make an octagon around it. The workstation reminds me of a spaceship; a futuristic-looking pod full of desks and computers where the doctors and nurses can monitor patients. And in the center of all that is the static of a voice on a radio sounding newsy and informative, relaying only the most important information. The sliding glass doors of other rooms are spread out like an octagon around the workstation. I can see into the one across from mine. There’s a woman in a chair. She wears a yellow shirt as bright as the sun.
She holds the hand of someone in the bed.
Wait.
Charlie?
Did the big hands and the calm voice get him out, too?
My body wakes with hope. A rush of warmth to my insides. I try to sit up. I want to stand. I want to go to him. I want to hear him call me Ruby Tuesday.
But all too quickly the sinking crush of truth comes.
Charlie isn’t here. Charlie is dead. I held his hand. I know.
His words are in a journal on top of my sweatshirt.
I deflate with the pain of it.
Why him and not me?
I want to shout it. I want to know where I am. I want to change positions but this bed is too small. The sheets are too tight. I kick my feet to loosen them.
I roll to the side.
The tube to my arm pinches. Hurts.
I hiss.
Next to me, something beeps. I look up. I’m a summary of jagged lines and numbers on a screen.
A nurse in pale pink scrubs rushes in. Her hair is pulled into a bun that sits slumped on top of her head. I squint. Make out the blurry name tag on her shirt. Cathy.
“You’re awake,” she says, smiling. Gentle. Calm. Reassuring.
“I—”
She checks the monitor. Rights me to my back. Tucks in my sheet. Too tight again. I kick it free as soon as she finishes, all of it so much effort. She takes note. Lets it be. When she reaches up to adjust the plastic bag of clear liquid, I notice a faded black T-shirt hanging out of the bottom of her scratchy scrubs. I want it to be a concert tee. I want to ask her about which band it is and when she saw them. Are they her favorite? Did she sing along to all their songs? The shirt brushes my arm. So soft. Like a baby blanket. It’s a comfort against my raw skin, making me miss my mom and my own bed.
My mom.
I look for her. In this room. In this blue-gray light. I want to reach out and touch her. See her sitting in a chair, waiting for me, like that woman across the pod in the bright yellow shirt. Keeping watch. Radiating like sunlight.
But there is only emptiness.
Where is she?
“Mom.” My voice is raspy. Indecipherable.
“Let’s see if this helps.”
Nurse Cathy untwists the safety seal from a small bottled water in her pocket. She reaches over to fill a blue plastic cup on a nearby table. She sticks a straw in the cup. Helps me sit. Holds the straw to my lips.
I suck
. Swallow. But my throat is swollen. Raw. I wince. Nurse Cathy pulls the cup away.
“Okay?” she asks.
I nod. Push my open face toward the cup. I want more. I smack my lips. A baby bird in the nest. She holds the straw to my mouth. I suck again. It doesn’t hurt as bad to swallow this time. It coats my dry throat. It makes me think I can form words. The water isn’t enough.
“Food?”
“You’re getting there. IV for now. No solids yet.”
When the small cup is drained, I manage another word. “Mom?”
Nurse Cathy squeezes my shoulder. Shakes her head. My eyes pool. Wet. Glassy. And Nurse Cathy goes swirly in my vision.
I need to ask more, but then the next thought comes swooping in.
“Charlie?”
Nurse Cathy’s eyebrows crease in the middle, the barely-there wrinkle transforms into a deep crevice. “Is your name Charlie?”
Does she not know who I am? Does she not know my name is Ruby? I thought the woman in the white coat wrote it down. Nobody here knows anything about me. And if I’m not awake to tell them, they’ll never know. I could end up being just another someone piled in the stairwell landing. Or like Charlie in the laundromat. If someone finds him, how will they know who he is? I need to tell someone where to find him. To name him.
I shake my head. Try again to say what I mean. “Charlie.”
She flicks her gaze to me. “We have John Does. Jane Does. I haven’t met a Charlie, but that doesn’t mean they’re not here.”
That’s not what I mean. I know he isn’t here. He’s in the laundromat. Gone. I want someone to get him. To bring him home.
I sink back into the pillows.
I am a lump. I am a bruise. I am a broken heart. I am alone.
“You need to rest,” Nurse Cathy says, pushing a syringe of clear liquid into the port attached to my hand. I feel the warmth of it go up my arm. A sudden flash of heat like when I peed in the rubble. The warmth stays this time. The pain falls away.
“Where is. . . my. . . mom?” The words stumble out. Wobbly. Halfway there. “Is . . . she. . . at work? Is. . . she. . . here?”
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