Small Steps

by Peg Kehret

  The first Sunday, I could hardly wait for twelve o’clock. I combed my hair twice and gobbled my lunch. “My parents are coming today,” I told the nurse as I handed her my lunch tray.

  “You hope,” said Alice.

  “They’ll be here,” I said. “It’s Sunday.”

  “It’s sleeting,” Alice pointed out. “The roads will be terrible.”

  From my bed, I peered anxiously out the window at the icy rain. Alice was right; the roads were probably slick. But surely, I thought, Mother and Dad would call if they were not coming, so I wouldn’t worry about them.

  “They’ll be here,” I repeated, trying to convince myself as well as Alice.

  Promptly at noon, Mother and Dad swept in the door, their arms full of bags and packages.

  “What a nice, bright room,” Mother said. “And you have roommates your own age. How wonderful!”

  The introductions were made, and then I opened the packages. There were extra pajamas, more books, and a box of stationery with the envelopes already stamped.

  “Potato chips!” I shouted.

  “The hospital never serves potato chips,” said Renée.

  Dad pried open the can, and I began to munch. Mother passed the can to the other girls.

  Even more welcome than potato chips was news from home. The Usems had a new car; Mrs. Meany had opened an antiques shop; Steve Gentle was taking piano lessons. I listened eagerly—and so did Dorothy, Renée, Shirley, and Alice.

  Midway through the afternoon, it began to irritate me that I wasn’t able to talk alone with my parents. If Dad said something funny, everyone laughed. Why did my roommates have to listen to every word? Didn’t they know it wasn’t polite to eavesdrop on other people’s conversation?

  The moment I asked myself the question, I knew the answer. I was the only one who had visitors. I had assumed that all of the girls would have company on Sunday—except for Alice, of course.

  Apparently, Mother had the same thought because she turned to the other girls and asked, “Are any of you expecting visitors?”

  “It’s too far for my family to come,” Shirley said. “They’ve only been here twice.” Twice! In seven months!

  “My parents try to come once a month,” Dorothy said, “but it depends on whether they can get someone to do chores for them.”

  “What about you?” Mother asked Renée. “Will you be having visitors today?”

  Renée shook her head. “I live more than two hundred miles away,” she said. “My parents would like to come every week, but it isn’t possible.” Then, as if to prove that her family did not neglect her, she added, “They write to me, though. I get a lot of mail.”

  Last, Mother turned to Alice. Don’t ask, I thought, but of course Mother did.

  “I don’t get company,” Alice said.

  “Not ever?” Dad said.

  “One of my brothers came once, but when he saw how ugly I am, he never came back.”

  “You aren’t ugly,” Dad said. “You’re pretty.”

  “Ha!” said Alice.

  “We’ll visit all of you next Sunday,” Mother said. “And we’ll bring treats for everyone.”

  “What would you like?” Dad asked. “Renée? What should we bring for you?”

  After some thought, Renée asked for a comic book. “Little Lulu,” she said, “or Archie and Veronica.”

  “Shirley?” Mother said. “What can we bring for you?”

  Shirley replied instantly. “A bag of marshmallows.”

  “Plain old marshmallows?” Dad asked.

  “I love marshmallows,” Shirley said. “The big, puffy kind.”

  Dorothy could not decide.

  “I know what she really wants,” Renée said. “A tall, dark, and handsome young man.”

  While the rest of us laughed, Dorothy pulled the covers over her head. When we quit laughing, she said, “Do you think I could have some licorice?”

  Alice refused to ask for a special treat.

  “There must be something you’d like us to bring you,” Dad said. “Something you can’t get here at the Sheltering Arms.”

  Alice shook her head. At first I thought she was being ornery; then I realized Alice had been at the Sheltering Arms for so long she didn’t remember things like comic books and marshmallows. Licorice and potato chips were beyond her realm of experience. She didn’t know what to ask for because she did not know what she was missing.

  A window of understanding opened in my mind, and the breeze of compassion blew in. From that moment on, I was glad to share my visiting family with my roommates.

  “If you don’t know what you want,” Mother told Alice, “we’ll surprise you.”

  The next Sunday, the other girls were as excited about visiting day as I was. Alice combed her hair, though she quit when she saw me watching her.

  Once again, Mother and Dad came in right at twelve o’clock. They hugged and kissed me and greeted all the other girls.

  “Did you remember our treats?” Renée asked.

  “Of course,” Mother said. She handed Renée a Little Lulu comic book. Dad opened Shirley’s bag of marshmallows and put one in her mouth.

  “Yum,” Shirley said. “That’s the first marshmallow I’ve had for seven months.”

  “Here is your gift, Alice,” Mother said as she gave Alice a pink lipstick.

  “Why are you being so nice to me?” Alice asked.

  “We like you,” Mother said.

  Alice didn’t say thank you, but she put the lipstick carefully away in her drawer.

  “Dorothy’s next,” Renée said. “Where’s her tall, dark, and handsome young man?”

  Dad went to the doorway and motioned to someone in the hall.

  In walked my brother, Art. Art was eighteen and six feet, two inches tall, with thick, dark hair. He was once voted Campus Dreamboat by a sorority group.

  After Art hugged me, he said, “I didn’t come to visit you. I came to see Dorothy. Which one is Dorothy?”

  Dorothy blushed red as a wagon while the rest of us squealed our delight.

  “This is for you,” Art said, and he gave Dorothy a bag of licorice.

  Every Sunday after that, all of us chattered happily as we waited for my parents to arrive. Each Sunday at four, I hated to see them leave. The afternoons together were such fun, and it would be a whole week until I saw them again.

  But when I started to feel sorry for myself, I looked across the room at Alice. I only had to wait one week before my parents returned. Hers were never coming.

  10: Happy Thirteenth Birthday

  On the first Sunday in November, Dad said, “Next week, we’re going to have a birthday party.” He turned to me. “Or did you forget what day is coming?”

  Every year since I was old enough to know the date, I had counted the days until it was time for presents and a party. This year, I had completely forgotten. Without school events to keep track of, and Mother’s “Daily Reminder Calendar” next to the telephone, my days and weeks ran together like cream in coffee.

  “By this time next week,” Mother said, “we’ll have another teenager in the family.”

  “A grown-up, mature young woman,” said Dad.

  “Ha!” said Alice.

  A teenager. I was going to be thirteen years old. I wondered what awaited me in the year to come. A wheelchair of my own? Braces on my legs? Walking sticks? Or

  perhaps during my thirteenth year I would learn to walk. Perhaps I would go home.

  Home. What a powerful word. It caused pictures to flash through my mind like slides fast-forwarding on a screen.

  Home was a three-story yellow house with a large kitchen where we ate most of our meals, a dining room for special occasions, and a living room that contained, among other things, the piano where I practiced my lessons.

  My bedroom was upstairs, and in my mind, I entered it gladly. I saw my bed, my four-drawer dresser, the rug on the floor, e
ven my messy closet, which Mother always nagged me to clean out so I wouldn’t attract spiders.

  I loved every inch of that house, but home was more than walls and furniture. It was Grandpa sitting beside me at dinner and B.J. at my feet, hoping for a handout. It was Mother singing in the kitchen and the smell of freshly laundered sheets that had dried in the sun.

  Home was Dad arriving at six o’clock, bringing me a piece of bubble gum; home was macaroni and cheese for supper; home was feeling safe and cherished.

  “Are we really going to have a party?” Dorothy asked.

  “Right here in this room,” Dad said, “and it’s going to be a wing-dinger.”

  “I’ve never been to a birthday party,” Alice said.

  “We’ll fix that,” said Mother.

  It was easier to have them leave at four o’clock, knowing there was a birthday party to look forward to.

  The next Sunday, the nurses helped us into wheelchairs for the party—all except Shirley, who couldn’t sit up that long. I thought twelve o’clock would never come.

  Mother and Dad brought balloons and party hats. Art came, and his presence excited all of us even more. Dad took movies of the festivities. Dorothy blushed and looked away from the camera while Renée mugged shamelessly. Shirley self-consciously waved whenever the camera was pointed at her, and Alice put her hands over her face and refused to be photographed.

  Mother opened a large box, revealing a chocolate birthday cake with thirteen candles. The nurses were invited to share the cake, so there was quite a group crowded into the room to sing “Happy Birthday.” As I blew out the candles, I had only one wish: I want to walk again.

  After we ate cake, I opened my presents. Dorothy and Renée had made a bead bracelet for me in their occupational therapy class. Alice had made a card, which surprised me, because on the morning of the party, she pretended to have forgotten all about my birthday. Shirley was not well enough to make anything, but her name had been added to Alice’s card.

  We hated to have the afternoon end, but as usual, my parents gave us something to look forward to.

  “Next week,” Dad said, “you can see yourselves in the movie.”

  “Not me,” said Alice. “I’m not in it.”

  “Yes, you are,” said Dad. “I got some shots of you when you didn’t know it.”

  Alice grumbled about that, but when Sunday rolled around again, she was eager to see the film.

  There was much bustling about as my parents set up the projector and screen and hung bedspreads over the windows to darken the room. Dorothy and Renée were in their wheelchairs and so was I, but Shirley’s bed had to be pushed across the room next to Alice’s so that everyone could see.

  Dorothy had never seen herself in a movie, and she shouted with excitement each time she appeared on screen. Alice kept saying, “There we are! That’s us!”

  When the movie ended, we begged Dad to rewind it and play it again, which he did.

  In bed that night, the other girls talked about how much fun it was to see themselves in a movie. Listening to their chatter, I remembered dozens of other home movies—of me playing with B.J., riding my bike, and climbing a tree. There was footage of me modeling a new coat and riding my friend’s pony.

  As I compared those other, happy times to my hospital birthday party, I felt homesick. It had been a wonderful party, and I was grateful for it, but it wasn’t as good as being well.

  Will it ever happen? I wondered. Will I ever ride a bike again?

  My worries were eased by Miss Ballard’s optimistic outlook. She praised my progress every day, saying things like, “If you keep this up, you’ll be walking soon.” After she had worked with me for a week, Miss Ballard asked if I would like to try a hot bath instead of the hot packs.

  “Anything would be better than hot packs,” I said.The next morning two of the nurses, Willie and Terry, helped me into a large bathtub that was partly filled with hot water. Then Willie turned the hot water on again. “We’ll let it run until the water is as hot as you can take it,” she said.

  The water got hotter and hotter, but because it happened gradually, I didn’t mind. When the tub was full, I soaked until the water cooled down, emerging with lobster-red skin and fingers and toes as wrinkled as raisins.

  I dressed and had my physical therapy session. “Do you want to have a bath each day instead of hot packs?” Miss Ballard asked.

  I grinned. “No more hot packs? Ever?”

  “No more hot packs.” She made a note on my chart.

  I loved the hot baths. They relaxed and soothed my muscles even more than the hot packs had, without the initial burning sensation. Also, my arms and legs felt weightless in the water; I could move them in ways that I could not otherwise.

  A daily trip to the occupational therapy room was added to my schedule. O.T. consisted of crafts and projects designed to strengthen damaged muscles.

  On my way to the O.T. room, I went through a ward for younger children. Several were playing with dolls. The dolls all lay on their backs while the children moved the dolls’ arms and legs around. One little girl told her doll, “This will hurt, but it will help you get well.” I wondered if there were doll-size hot packs.

  When I reached O.T., I saw other patients painting, weaving scarves, and making belts. I was eager to start my own craft project.

  The occupational therapist, whose name was Jeanette, took the footrest off my wheelchair. “We’ll need your shoes and socks off, too,” she said, and quickly removed them. I could not imagine what craft project required me to have bare feet.

  Jeanette dumped a bag of marbles in a pile next to my right foot. “Pick them up with your toes,” she said, “one at a time, and move them over to your other foot.”I stared at her. “Why?”

  “It’s good exercise for your feet and ankles.”

  I curled my right toes around a green marble, moved my foot to the left, and released the marble.

  “Very good!” Jeanette said.

  “This,” I muttered, “is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done.”

  “It won’t take long,” Jeanette said. “There are only seventy-five marbles.”

  “I’ll die of boredom,” I complained, but Jeanette had already gone on to show some lucky patient how to make a belt.

  When half the marbles had been moved, I told Jeanette, “My leg is tired. I can’t do any more.”

  “Use your other foot,” she replied. “Move the marbles back where they were to start with.”

  Later in the week, I made a coin purse in O.T. In the hospital, I had no use for a coin purse, but it was better than picking up marbles with my toes.

  11: Dancing the Hula, Popping a Wheelie

  Just before Thanksgiving, Miss Ballard an-nounced, “Tomorrow you’re going to stand by yourself.”

  I knew my physical therapy sessions were helping me. My arms and legs were stronger. My back was stronger, too; I could now sit up for several hours at a time. Still, I worried all evening. I remembered trying to stand alone at University Hospital.

  The next morning, Miss Ballard helped me sit with my feet over the side of the bed. She put one arm around my waist and said, “Slide off until your feet hit the floor. Then lock your knees.”

  “Isn’t someone going to help us?” I asked. “What if I fall?”

  “I won’t let you fall,” she said. I didn’t see how she could stop me if I collapsed, since I was bigger than she was. Probably, we would both go down.

  Alice, whose bed was closest to mine, stared at me but said nothing. I wondered if she hoped I would fall. It had to be hard for her to watch new patients arrive, get better, and leave while she always remained behind with her condition unchanged.

  A soft voice from across the room said, “Good luck.” Dorothy, who might never stand alone, crossed her fingers.

  My fear vanished. I slid forward and put my feet on the floor. With Miss Ballard’s hand firmly on my waist, I
locked my knees, and stood.

  When Miss Ballard let go, I remained standing. I stood straight and steady, with no support, for a full minute, beaming at Dorothy the whole time.

  “That’s fine,” said Miss Ballard.

  “Good show,” said Dorothy.

  “From now on,” said Miss Ballard, as she helped me sit on the bed, “you’ll stand for awhile every day. Soon you’ll be able to get in and out of the wheelchair by yourself.”

  Each day I stood alone a little longer, and my confidence grew like Jack’s beanstalk. Unfortunately, it grew a bit faster than my strength and soon got me into trouble.

  One evening, we were all in our beds, talking about trips we wanted to take. I said I would like to go to Hawaii and learn to do the hula.

  “What’s the hula?” Alice asked.

  I explained that it’s a traditional Hawaiian dance where the dancers wear grass skirts and sway their hips in time to the music.

  “I never heard of any hula,” Alice said. “Are you making this up?”

  “I’ll show you,” I said. I flung back the blankets, swung my legs over the side of the bed, and stood up.

  I put both hands off to one side and tried to sway my hips back and forth. Instantly, I crashed to the floor, landing in a heap by the side of my bed. I was strong enough to stand alone briefly, but I was clearly not ready to dance the hula.

  When the other girls saw me go down, they panicked.

  “Nurse!” screamed Shirley.

  “Peg fell!” shouted Dorothy.

  Alice punched her call button over and over, which made a red light and a buzzer go on at the nurses’ station.

  “Help! Help!” everyone yelled together.

  Willie was close by, and she broke all speed records dashing to our room. When she saw me lying on the floor, she knelt beside me. “Are you hurt?” she asked. “Why were you out of bed?”

  I looked up at her. “I was doing the hula,” I said.

  “The hula?”

  “Alice didn’t know what the hula is,” explained Renée.

  “So Peg was going to show her,” Dorothy added.