Kiss and Cry

by Ramona Lipson

  Coach Hicks witnessed everything before yelling at us to come over, “Ryan, Dalia!” Ryan released his hold of me and we both skated over to him. His face was reddened with anger and his voice stern, “If the two of you have issues, you settle them OFF the ice. If I see either of you raise a hand against the other, you can find yourselves a new coach. Are we clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” we said in unison.

  “Get off the ice and don’t come back until you can act professionally,” he seethed.

  We got off the ice and went to our separate change rooms. Ryan was finished before me because I saw him waiting at the front doors. I walked passed him wordlessly. He followed me out, “I’ll drive you to school.”

  “I’ve got my dad’s car here.”

  “Get in my car,” he ordered. I followed him to his car. Upset I reached for the handle and my headache went from something mild to this profound throbbing. My body turned hot and a huge wave of nausea hit me. I felt me legs give.

  Ryan

  I was on the other side of the car, there was no way I could have gotten to her in time. She collapsed, I let her fall.

  Damn it! I let her fall!

  Panic mode set in I ran over to the other side of my car to find her fragile body laying on the ground with a small pool of blood collecting around her head. “Wake-up,” I said to her as I began shaking her but her eyes didn’t open. I moved her upper body so I could cradled her in my arms, blood was starting to go everywhere. My car door was still open on her side and I reached into my pocket grabbing my phone, I dialled 911.

  When the ambulance came the first attendant looked at me and said to his partner, “He moved her.”

  Why did I move her? They always say never to move the victim unless they are in danger. They taught me that. I did it anyway. I just didn’t want her to be lying on that cold hard ground. I told her I would never let her get hurt and thats exactly what I did. She was hurt.

  The first attendant was reaching in the back of the ambulance for the stretcher and the second one looked at me, “Can you tell us what happened?” He was lifting her off me while he waited for me to speak and scramble out from underneath her. They were going to place her on their stretcher. I didn’t want to let go of her. I had to let go of her. It was the hardest thing I ever did, but I forced myself to let go of her.

  I was afraid that when I opened my mouth to talk to the paramedics my voice would crack or worse I would act upset but I managed to put words together,“I don’t know, we were getting in the car and when I looked over, she wasn’t there. Her head must have hit something sharp on my car door, she’s bleeding.” They grabbed white cling wrap from their truck and the first attendant held her head steady while the other one wrapped it in efforts to stop or slow the bleeding down before bracing her head in case she had any neck injury.

  The first attendant began doing her vital signs. He felt for her pulse and then started taking her blood pressure. The other one recorded everything on a pad he kept in his pocket, “BP 74/44, Heart rate 50, respirations 10, 02 Sat 88. We’ll start an infusion of normal saline now and put her on 100% when she’s in the truck.” The second attendant wrapped a blue band around her arm and then inserted an intravenous catheter into her arm. The second attendant primed the line attaching a bag of normal saline to her. Then they transferred her onto the stretcher covering her and buckling her in, “Can I come with you?” I pleaded.

  The attendant looked at me, “Sure you can, or you can follow us to Toronto General.” They slid her into the back of the truck and one of the attendants jumped in with her and placed an oxygen mask over her face.

  Pull yourself together, she’s in good hands now, I told myself. “Ok, I’ll follow.” They put her into the ambulance. I closed the car door on her side and then got into my car.

  I tried dialling her house to tell her parents what happened but there was no answer so I left a message. I called my mother and gave her a quick rendition of what happened so she could try to get in touch with Dalia’s mom while I stayed with her at the hospital. I forced myself to drive calmly even though I just wanted to floor it the entire way.

  When I got there, they had already taken her in to an examining room. They were in the midst of transferring her onto a stretcher when I caught a glimpse of her eyes opening, “She’s awake!” I exclaimed.

  They finished the transfer and a nurse attached a portable blood pressure machine to her arm to take her vitals again. The ambulance were reporting the events that took place in the field to the nurse as she made her notes. I looked at the machine attached to Dalia and her pulse had increased to 80 and her blood pressure was now 82/50. “My head,” she complained.

  A doctor casually strolled in wearing the name badge, ‘Dr. Tate’. He was an older gentleman who appeared friendly and calm, “What do we have here?”

  The nurse looked at the attendants, “Thanks, you guys can go now.” She dismissed them and they nodded leaving the curtained examining room. “We have a 16 year old girl who was getting into a car when she collapsed losing consciousness. She has some sort of bleed going on in the back of her head but I haven’t had a chance to look at it yet.”

  “Order a c.t. of the head to rule out a bleed, complete blood count, electrolytes, and,” he paused looking up at me, “is there a chance she might be pregnant?” I nodded, “And a human chorionic gonadotropin level.” He gave me a look before explaining, “That’s a pregnancy test boy.”

  The nurse continued, “Initial vitals were: BP 74/44, Heart rate 50, respirations 10, 02 Sat 88. The attendants stabilized her head and put her on 100% non-rebreather, started a bolus of normal saline and now her vitals are: blood pressure 82/50, heart rate 80, 02 saturation 100% on a 100% non-rebreather with a respiration rate of 12. She came too when we transferred her onto the stretcher.”

  “Let’s take a look at her head,” he instructed the nurse. Dalia’s eyes opened again as the doctor started examining her. “Hi sweetheart, do you know where you are?”

  “In the hospital,” she seemed unsure.

  “Do you remember what happened?” he asked.

  “I was getting into a car.” She was trying to remember more of what happened but it didn’t seem to come to her.

  “Yes, that’s right and you had a bit of a fall. Can you tell me what day it is?”

  “Thursday.”

  “Month?” he asked.

  “November.”

  “The last thing you ate?”

  “A banana.”

  The doctor continued,“Memory is intact. Place her on telemetry to rule out any kind of dysrhythmia.” The nurse held her head up as he unwrapped the bandage and looked at it, “She’ll need stitches. Shave around the site. Have the suture kit and 1% lidocaine ready, I’ll be back in a few minutes!” The nurse went to go collect the supplies as Dalia laid there silently. When she came back, the nurse began to shave around the area that was bleeding. Tears began rolling down her cheeks at the sound of the loud razor cutting off her hair.

  Dalia

  The nurse threw a few handfuls of long strands of my hair into the garbage. Ryan sat silently by my side watching the entire time, his thumb swiping away my tears.

  The nurse than proceeded to draw blood which she sent to the lab and started removing my dress. Ryan quickly got up to leave and the nurse gave him a curious look and then shrugged. She must have assumed he had seen me before, and didn’t know why he was leaving the room. When the heart monitor was placed on my chest, she called out, “You can come back now.”

  Ryan and the doctor came back into the room and the doctor started aspirating with a syringe the lidocaine from the vile with a needle. He explained everything before he started, “I’m going to freeze you locally with this injection which will sting, but then it shouldn’t hurt when I start suturing. It looks like you’re going to need about seven stitches. They’ll be dissolvable so you won’t have to get them removed.”

  I closed my eyes and took the painful needle into
my opened wound stoically. The doctor and nurse started talking about a movie they had both watched called The Ledge while they worked on closing me. I glanced up at Ryan, “Does mom know?”

  He shook his head, “I tried calling but there was no answer so I left a message, I have my mother working on that.”

  Another lady in scrubs came into the room, “They called her down for c.t. now.”

  The doctor looked up, “I need a few more minutes.”

  “Okay,” she said, “I’ll tell them.”

  “Has someone inserted a 20 gage i.v. into her? They’re going to want to use contrast.”

  “Yes,” my nurse answered.

  True to the doctor’s word, he finished a few minutes later and then raised the railing of my stretcher. The nurse and Ryan started rolling me to my c.t. scan. Ryan was asked to wait outside while the c.t. technician and the nurse transferred me from their stretcher to the c.t. machine. I laid still for several minutes while the test was being performed and then they transferred me back onto my stretcher. The nurse rolled me out into the hallway and then we went back to my curtained examining room.

  The nurse locked the stretcher in place and left me alone with Ryan. “Are you okay?” he asked. I nodded yes. “Do you want me to call anyone?” I nodded no. I just didn’t have it in me to speak to him. “I just came up with a nickname for you now,” Ryan said lightly.

  I looked at him waiting to hear it.

  “Patch!” he teased.

  “It’s better than your nickname,” I said a little spitefully.

  “I have a nickname?”

  “Tara, and Sierra came up with it.”

  He raked his fingers through his wisps, “What is it?”

  “I’m not telling you,” I taunted.

  “Tell me!”

  “No!”

  “Tell me,” he persisted softly.

  “Alpha Orgasm!” I giggled.

  His nose crinkled up and his eyes widened a little, “Why?”

  “Tara thinks your bossy but cute,” I explained knowing full well she was going to kill me when she found out I told him.

  His hand covered mine and we stayed companionably silent until the doctor returned,“Kids, You’ll be happy to know that you’re not pregnant. We did find that your electrolytes are out of balance and we’d like to correct them overnight and monitor your heart. I am admitting you for observation. If you’re okay, you’ll be able to go home tomorrow.”

  They wheeled me into a room on a medical floor. I continued to have a drip going into my arm and the telemetry pack from the Emergency Department was replaced with a different heart monitor that could monitor me on the new floor.

  Admitted

  Ryan sat on a chair close to my bed.

  I gazed at his hand which was still covering mine making me feel safe and secure, “I owe you an apology,” I admitted.

  His tender gaze locked onto mine, “There’s no need.”

  “There’s every need,” I argued.

  “I’m so sorry for losing it at the arena this morning and slapping you.”

  “Don’t be,” he said quietly, “just get better.”

  Our eyes didn’t budge from one another.

  Tons of chemistry and electricity pulsing through my body, in the air.

  Oh my, I was starting to like him.

  The serious look in his eyes alone was pivotal in our relationship, immediately I knew it was mutual. Everything was LESS coherent and yet way more real.

  We didn’t need words, these new feelings had a life of their own.

  Parents

  I was sitting up in bed having my dinner and Ryan was eating a sandwich from Tim’s next to me, when Mrs. Kennedy came knocking on the door, “Oh dear, what happened?”

  “She fainted and cut her head open mom, Doctor Tate said she was dehydrated.”

  “Let me see,” she said.

  I moved my head for her to look at it and she gasped, “Oh My God!”

  “So are they keeping her?”

  “Just overnight. Did you get a hold of her parents?”

  “Ya, They’re coming.”

  Mom and dad knocked on the door only minutes later.

  “Come in,” I called.

  They peeked their heads into the door and saw that there were no more chairs in my room. Mom and dad said, “We’re going to get more chairs.”

  They disappeared back into the hallway assumedly looking for more chairs. They came back with two, “We stole them,” dad said mischievously! Leave it to him!

  Mrs Kennedy informed mom, “She’s fine, they’re just keeping her in for observation. She fainted and cut her head open on Ryan’s car. Take a look! The doctor who saw her said she was dehydrated.”

  Mom looked at my head, “Oh.My.God!”

  Dad got up and looked too but he didn’t have that same grossed out, horrified look that the moms had. “How do you feel Honey?” Dad asked.

  He gave me a kiss on the forehead before sitting back down on his stolen chair.

  “Better thanks.”

  Mrs. Kennedy looked at Ryan, “Do you want to tell me what happened on the ice this morning? Coach Hicks called, he told me you guys were fighting and she slapped you in the face.”

  “That about covers it,” Ryan said evasively. “It won’t happen again.”

  “I should hope not,” she said indignantly. “Mr. Hicks told me that if he see’s one more outburst like that on the ice, you guys can find another coach.”

  Mom looked shocked, “This is the first I heard of this! What were you two doing fighting on the ice?”

  “It was stupid,” Ryan sloughed it off. “I deserved the slap.”

  “No, you didn’t,” I told Ryan.

  “That’s my girl,” dad said proudly, “feisty!”

  The hospital announced the end of visiting hours, everyone stood with the exception of Ryan. Mrs. Kennedy glanced at him, “I’ll see you at home?”

  Ryan ran his fingers through his hair, “No, I want to stay with Dalia, make sure she’s all right. The nurses said I could.”

  Mrs. Kennedy looked at my mother for approval, “That’s fine with me,” she reassured. They kissed me on the forehead just as they were about to leave when I stopped mom, “Can you tell Tara and Sierra what happened.”

  “Sure Honey, Give your phone to me and I’ll do it when I get home.”

  The room got quiet after they all left and we were tired. I squished over to one side of my bed making room for Ryan. I opened the covers for him to join me.

  “I was so scared for you, Patch” he confessed, as I rested my head in his arm.

  “Its over now, Alpha,” I reassured. We savoured our quiet time together, drifting off to sleep our breathing became synchronous.

  Valentines Preparations

  Once Coach Hicks heard all our sordid details through the arena’s grapevine of gossip, he was ruthless towards our training, never allowing for any personal issues to make it onto the ice again.

  Ryan and I discussed our schedules in the car on more than one occasion and we theorized that there was a conspiracy against us orchestrated by none other than: Coach Hicks, our parents and teachers of course. Together they ensured that if we weren’t sweating it out on the ice then or our faces were buried deep in books. They thought they had us under their thumbs, and they did, except for tomorrow night!

  It was four months after my discharge from hospital and four months of doing nothing but what was expected from us by everyone else. I was bound and determined to have a little bit of fun on the side, no matter what the cost. My co-conspirators were none other than Tara and Sierra, Ryan was merely an accessory to the crime.

  He knew how badly I wanted to go to the Valentine’s Day Dance and didn’t even bother asking me to be his date, he assumed we were just going to keep up our charade as a couple but I was going to show him! I wasn’t a force to be reckoned with or taken for granted!

  The morning before the dance, dad was playing on his iPad Can
dy Crush Saga, I introduced him to the game a few weeks back and he became severely addicted to it ever since. So he had the black round candy ball and he was deciding which direction he wanted to move it in when I swept in for the kill, “Dad can I go to a Valentine’s Day Dance tomorrow night at the school? Ryan is going.”

  “I’ll have to ask your mother, when is it again?”

  “Tomorrow night,” I repeated patiently.

  “I’ll text her,” he said.

  I knew she was at work, that was why I chose now to ask him. He was more vulnerable, an easier target, the one with the biggest soft spot for me. So he pulled his phone out from his front pants pocket and started typing out a text to mom. She said yes immediately which surprised me. “You can go, but NO boys!” he told me. I jumped up and squealed with excitement.

  “Okay, I need money daddy!” I reminded him.

  “For what?”

  “A new dress and hair of course!” He reached in his wallet and pulled out a hundred dollar bill, I reached over him and took the rest making him essentially cash broke. When the money was secured in my greedily little hands, I booked us our appointments for tomorrow with three different stylists.

  I texted Ryan first:

  Dalia: Alpha O?

  Ryan: Patch?

  Dalia: I got the ok 4 the dance. I’m going shopping 2day, & 2morrow so I won’t B skating.

  Ryan: Great, we need the break. C U there :-)

  Dalia: TTYL

  Ryan: TTYL

  Then I texted Sierra and Tara in a group text:

  Dalia: I booked the hair appts did U guys get the $ U need 4 the makeovers?

  Tara: Yup, we’re good 2 go. Meet @ the mall 4 6?

  Dalia: Will B there, same meeting spot?

  Sierra: Of Course!

  Dalia: TTYL

  Sierra: TTYL

  Tara: TTYL

  We went to ALL the dress stores in the mall before I found THE dress for me. It was an x-rated little number that left nothing at all to the imagination. I already planned to put a frock overtop and remove it when we got to the dance so my parents wouldn’t see what I was really wearing. I would just tell them I spent all the money on my hair.