by Amy Reed
Two days into life outside the hospital and, so far, I’m not impressed. I watch the same mind-numbing daytime TV I watched in the hospital. I take naps. Mom asks me five million times per hour, “How are you feeling?” and five million times I answer, “Fine.” I answer, “No, thank you,” to her “Do you need anything?” Helicopters could take lessons from her in hovering.
I’m avoiding texts. All those I love you, babes from Will. All those So happy you’re back!s and Can’t wait to see you!s and When are you coming to school?s from everyone else. All those exclamation points.
This is really exciting stuff. This is what it feels like to be a miracle.
I change the channel on the TV again. I look for something new. Something louder.
After a few episodes of yet another reality show about rednecks, the physical therapist—a large, butch woman named Sandy—arrives with pages and pages of physical therapy instructions. Mom’s beside herself, offering the poor woman beverages, snacks, my unborn child, anything, like Sandy is doing us a huge favor by coming over, like she’s the most generous person in the world, like it means something more than just her doing her job.
She and Mom help me upright so I can practice using the crutches. It’s weird being suddenly vertical after a month of sitting and lying down. The muscles in my legs wake up from their deep sleep. They are groggy. They want to go back to bed. My leg doesn’t feel like it’s mine. It’s someone else’s, someone weaker, someone who stole my strong leg and replaced it with this pathetic, shriveled, unused thing.
Mom watches as I take a couple of practice laps around the living room. I don’t think her butt is even touching the chair, she’s so tense and springy. Her hands are in front of her mouth, palms together like she’s praying. I don’t think she’s breathing. As if holding her breath could keep me upright. As if exhaling could blow me over.
My leg cramps. I lose my balance and Sandy catches me under my armpits. Mom springs up and hovers closer. I can feel her propellers buzzing.
“Honey, are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” Sandy helps me to the couch. Why am I out of breath? I hobbled maybe twenty feet total.
“You have to take it easy,” Sandy says. “Start out small and gradually work up to longer distances. It’s all in the instructions here.” She taps the pile of printouts. “Now why don’t we try out some of these exercises?”
She shows me how to point my toes and flex my feet. She shows me how to stretch my quads and hamstrings. This is remedial stuff. This is stuff for old people. The infirm.
I can’t even touch my toes. A year ago, I could do splits. On both sides and the middle. In the air.
“Good job!” Mom cheers at nothing.
Sandy leaves us with my rehab instructions and my therapy schedule. Mom’s eyes glisten with possibility while mine cloud over with exhaustion. My phone dings with another text, but I ignore it. Time for another nap.
if.
Dear Stella,
I have to go into the hospital in a few days to see Dr. Jacobs. I’m only getting blood tests, but for some reason he feels it necessary to talk to me. If he wants to see me so bad, I don’t understand why he can’t just take the elevator down a few floors and walk across the street to the outpatient building where they do blood tests just fine. It’s like he wants to torture me, making me go back to the inpatient building, back to the cancer floor, back to that place with all the memories. It’s just a thirty-minute appointment, but still. I’m trying not to think about it.
I’m doing laps around the house like a caged beast. I hobble in circles until I’m so exhausted I can barely make it back to the couch. Sandy said to take it easy, and I’m sure she means well, but she doesn’t know what the hell she’s talking about. I doubt she’s ever been trapped in her house like a prisoner. She certainly hasn’t ever had my mother as a prison guard, constantly offering beverages.
My armpits are chafed and red from the crutches. Physical therapy and all my circles around the house have made me sweaty. Even with the removable soft brace that replaced my cast, I still haven’t managed to take a proper shower in weeks. I’m sure you’d have something crude to say about the way I smell. I know I’m disgusting, and I know I should do something about it, but somehow it seems easier to stay in pajamas all day since all I do is sleep and watch TV anyway.
Sometimes I want to shake everyone until the smiles fall off their faces, those smiles that try to say everything’s okay now, the hard part’s over, Evie’s alive and everything is back to normal. No one wants to talk about how incredibly un-normal it actually is, how no one knows how to talk to me now that I’m home, now that I’m not Cancer Girl anymore.
If I’m not Cancer Girl, who am I exactly? Crutches Girl? Gimpy-Leg Girl? Should-Have-Died-but-for-Some-Reason-Didn’t Girl? Going-to-Get-Better-Soon-but-Right-Now-Is-Still-Pretty-Useless Girl? Caged-Lion-in-a-Too-Small-Cage-at-a-Second-Rate-Zoo Girl? Everyone is so damn polite all the time. My family, my best friend, my boyfriend, these people who are supposed to know me better than everyone—they can’t do much better than small talk and pats on the back. They stare at me with their weepy eyes and sigh. Even Will seems scared to touch me; the only affection I get is quick, dry pecks on the cheek. It’s like he’s afraid of breaking me. I miss the way he used to touch me. I miss feeling wanted, really wanted, not just cared for, not just doted on. Everyone thinks I’m still so fragile. Don’t they realize I survived? Don’t they realize how tough that makes me?
No one knows what to do with me now that I’m alive. There’s no protocol for how to treat someone who comes back from the dead. There are so many books about grief and loss, about saying good-bye to the people you love. But there is no book about taking back that good-bye.
Maybe things will get better when I go back to school in few days. Maybe something will happen besides this monotony of waiting. Maybe people will remember who I really am. Maybe I will too.
Love,
Evie
fifteen.
MOM HAD TO RUN TO THE STORE, SO I’M HOME ALONE. IT hits me that I haven’t really been alone in a month. I’ve either been in the hospital with a nurse checking on me every hour, or here with Mom’s constant attention.
Now this is it, my chance to escape. Just for a few minutes, then I’ll get back in my cage like a good pet.
I turn off the TV. The house is quiet. Mom will be back from the store soon. Will is coming over after baseball practice. I have half an hour of freedom.
I pull on a sweatshirt and tie an old running shoe on my good foot. I pull a clean pair of sweatpants over my leg brace. I look at Stella’s hat sitting on my desk and think about putting it on, but I ultimately decide it would be cruel to subject it to being seen with this outfit.
The doorknob is solid and cold in my hand. It feels illicit. I have been reduced to this: the most exciting thing that’s happened to me in days is opening the door to leave my house.
I hobble out onto the sidewalk. The air is cool and breezy with early spring. This quiet residential street I used to so easily walk down is suddenly an obstacle course of cracked sidewalk, tree roots, and cars parked in driveways. A sensible voice inside my head tells me this isn’t a good idea. I’ve only been upright for a few days. I’ve only practiced with these crutches in my very flat house with walls and furniture all around to grab on to whenever I get tired. I’ve always had someone to catch me.
But there’s another voice, the wild beast voice. The one that’s so sick of being caged. It says, What the hell? It says, Maybe a little danger is exactly what you need.
It says, What would Stella do?
Stella would strut down this sidewalk like she owned it.
I try on her confidence. I imagine what it feels like to be a rock star, to be strong and fierce and fearless. I look at all the hazards in front of me and tell myself I’m not afraid of falling.
So I walk. It feels good to be moving. It feels good to be going somewhere besides in a circle. My leg is
already stronger. My muscles are already coming back. I barely even slow where a tree root breaks through the concrete. I slide past a traffic cone with perfect grace.
I turn the corner onto a major street and the wall of sound and exhaust from a passing bus throws me a little off-balance. But my arms have gotten strong and I manage to right myself with my crutches. A cyclist narrowly avoids me on the sidewalk and I yell, “Ride in the street, you fucking asshole!” Stella would be proud.
I walk and I walk. Most people ignore me, but a few people look with confusion and concern. It’s not very often you see a girl in sweatpants with patchy cancer hair hobbling down a busy street on crutches. But whatever. Let them look. This is the best I’ve felt in weeks. I feel like I could walk forever. I could keep going and going and never come back.
I manage to go five full blocks before I start feeling weak. I turn around and see the expanse of sidewalk I’ll have to travel before turning onto my street. It’s farther than I remember. Isn’t it supposed to be the other way around? Isn’t the way back always supposed to feel shorter?
I make it one block before I realize I should have turned around a lot sooner. I lean against a tree for support. I white-knuckle the crutches. Sweat is pouring down my face and my leg is wobbly. I didn’t bring my phone with me. Something could happen. Something could happen and no one would know.
I’m standing in the middle of the sidewalk four blocks from my house and I feel farther away from home than I’ve ever felt. I can’t go back and I can’t get away. I’m stuck here, in this limbo place where you’re only supposed to pass through. And I can’t move. I’m exhausted. My leg folds and I manage to slide down the tree onto the ground. My braced leg slides out from under me. I’m sitting in a puddle of who knows how many dogs’ pee. My hand is in something wet and squishy.
I cry because I can’t move. I cry because I’m trapped. I cry because my body is a cage, with a door that opens and closes whether I want it to or not. I’m alone inside, while everyone I love is on the outside, pointing, watching, feeding me things through the bars, waiting for me to do tricks. And even though the door opens, I know I can never get out. There’s a moat around me I cannot cross.
I wanted to be fearless like Stella, but I’m terrified. And she’s still gone.
“Hey, girl,” says a tall man with long dreadlocks and a Caribbean accent. “Whatchu doin down dere?”
“Nothing,” I say.
A woman stops. Her dog sniffs at me. “Are you okay, honey?”
“Why she cryin’?” the man says to the woman.
“I don’t know. Honey, why are you crying?”
I shake my head. I don’t look up. I don’t want to see them staring at me down here in my cage.
A guy on a skateboard stops. A girl on a bike stops.
“Do you need us to call someone for you?”
“Do you need help up?”
“Do you want to use my phone?”
They’re all looking, waiting for me to tell them how to help me. But I don’t know. I have no idea what I need from anyone.
“Evie!” calls a familiar voice down the street. My heart jumps. “Evie!”
“Is that you?” the woman says. “Are you Evie?”
“Evie!” Will’s voice calls from blocks away. My savior. My knight.
“Over here!” the man yells in his direction.
“Evie?” says the woman, crouching down in front of me. She holds her hand out, like I’m some dog she’s testing to see if it’s friendly. “Do you know that boy? Are you safe?” I look up and the concern in her eyes is real. Everyone’s concern is real. Their concern is always so real.
I nod. I wipe my face with the back of my hand. Whatever wet, squishy thing it was in smears on my face, and it makes me start crying all over again.
Will runs up, his skin still shiny with sweat from practice. “Evie, what happened?” But I can’t speak through my tears.
“I think she fell down or something,” says the kid on the skateboard.
“Are you hurt?” He crouches down and I reach my arms up, like a toddler who wants to be held. “Oh, Evie,” he says, letting me throw my arms around his neck. He somehow picks me up, cradled in his arms, as if I am the three-year-old version of myself, and I am both grateful for his strength and disgusted with myself for feeling so helpless, for needing him to rescue me.
“Did you fall?” he says.
I shake my head no. “I just got tired,” I say into his chest. “I just had to sit down.”
“I got to your house and your mom was freaking out. She was getting ready to call the cops. Why did you leave the house? Why did you go so far? Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
“I wanted to go for a walk.”
“You can’t do that, Evie. You can’t just go. Not now. Not anymore.” There is an edge to his voice, but it is not anger. It is fear. That is my prison. It is everybody else’s fear.
“I’m sorry,” I say, and then I’m crying so hard I can’t say anything else.
Will carries me the entire way back home. I couldn’t get out of his arms if I wanted to. I hide my face in his neck and breathe in the musky warmth of his post-practice sweat. I remember when this smell used to turn me on, when one whiff of it would make me dizzy with desire. It is the smell of his strength. But now that means something entirely different than it used to. Now I don’t know how it makes me feel.
I want him to stay, I want him to never let me go, but eventually Will has to leave to have dinner with his own family. Even though I can do it myself, I let Mom help give me a sponge bath. She cries as she wipes the dirt and whatever else is on my face. She says, “I was so scared when I got home and you weren’t here. I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you.”
But you do know, Mom. You’ve known for a long time. It’s my living you don’t know what to do with.
I tell her I’m tired and don’t want dinner. She helps me into my pajamas and tucks me into bed before Dad even gets home.
“Does it hurt?” she says, stroking my hand. I tell her yes and she gives me two Norcos. But it is not my leg that needs them.
As soon as she leaves, I take Stella’s magic box out of my sock drawer where I’ve been hiding it. I pull out the two pills I’ve been saving for an emergency, the ones I hid in my cheek after Mom gave them to me yesterday.
This is it. This is the emergency. This is the pain I need to not feel.
sixteen.
HALFWAY THROUGH LISTENING TO STELLA’S CD, I REALIZED I was no longer solid. My body had turned into steam. It turned into the opposite of pain.
And then sleep.
Then my mom shouting, “Evie, wake up!” in the middle of my head. “Evie, we’re going to be late for your appointment with Dr. Jacobs.” Her shrill voice, scraping my skull.
And now back to zero pills. Now an anxious emptiness I don’t know how to fill. I remember the school assembly about prescription drug abuse. I am fully aware that’s what I’m doing. But after everything I’ve been through, I’m really not that worried about taking a few extra Norcos once in a while. It’s amazing the kinds of things people worry about, all their stupid ways to be careful and avoid getting hurt. Wear your seat belt! Look both ways when crossing the street! Don’t abuse prescription painkillers! But I had cancer. Cancer. Survival is hard work, and sometimes survivors need a little help dealing with all the surviving they’re doing. Some have support groups and counseling; Caleb has church and faith and Jesus; and I have my pills.
I also have a box full of weed sitting in my sock drawer, waiting for me to figure out what to do with it.
On my way to the hospital, my anxiety grows with every block we drive closer. The air is getting denser, like we’re entering some other dimension with different gravity that wants to crush the breath out of my lungs. Mom is listening to NPR, and they’re talking about a civil war somewhere in Africa, about starving orphans, refugees, mass graves. How can she listen to this all day long? How can it
be background noise on her way to the grocery store or post office? How can she hum to the tune of murdered babies and genocide and the international community not wanting to get involved?
Things have been happening all over the world and I know nothing about them, and I don’t want to. Turn the radio off. Put cotton in my ears. I don’t want to hear it. All these things so much worse than what has happened to me. I know I should be grateful I am alive. I should be grateful for my mom and her car and the stupid hospital and doctors and their great medical training. I should care about the orphans. I should care about something, anything. But I don’t. I can’t. It’s caring that’s the problem in the first place. It’s caring that gets hearts broken.
As soon as we enter the hospital lobby, I can’t breathe. All those parents’ faces. All those kids. All those supposed-to-be-cheerful decorations.
Mom is ridiculous, strutting in and greeting the security guard like they’re old pals. “Hi, Al! It’s been a while.” She’s desperate to find someone she recognizes. She wants to gloat. She wants everyone to know her kid isn’t dying anymore. She’s showing me off.
“After we see Dr. Jacobs, we can go see Caleb and some of your friends,” she says. “Would you like that?” She is talking too loud. Her voice bangs around in my head and makes my brain hurt.
I shake my head because it’s impossible to speak when you’re not breathing.
She doesn’t understand. She thinks the hospital is just a building, just a place. She doesn’t understand how dangerous it is. It takes people and doesn’t give them back.
I fight the pounding in my chest on our way up the elevator. How can she not feel it? How can she act like this place didn’t almost take me, too?
Breathe.
I close my eyes and conjure Stella. I hear her voice. I feel her hand, cool on the back of my neck. We’re in the chemo dungeon, sitting side by side on those horrible beds with tubes pumping poison into our chests. And when I have to lean over the side to puke in the bucket, she is somehow next to me, even though she is as strapped in as I am. I always got sicker than her. She was always the one helping me.