Colorblind

by Siera Maley

  Chloe’s mother and father were alone in the lobby, clutching each other. I saw her father’s hands before I could look away, and knew instinctively that this was the moment I’d see over and over again, every night when I closed my eyes. His hands were stained with dried blood.

  My stomach started working again and I stumbled to the nearest garbage can to wretch for the second time. Dad was there, at my back, and then Chloe’s parents were looking at us, their cheeks stained with tears even worse than my own were.

  “There’s no news yet,” was all her dad could muster up the energy to say. I was glad he seemed unable to spare us any more detail. I couldn’t know any more about what had happened. I didn’t want details. Ever.

  We waited there for what felt like hours for good news I knew wouldn’t come. I thought of all the things I hadn’t done right. I wished I’d given her everything she’d wanted from the very beginning. I’d conquer every fear I had now just to see her smile.

  A nurse came to take Chloe’s parents away to a different waiting room sometime later. I learned that Chloe was in surgery, then, and wished I hadn’t.

  Robbie found us not long after that. He didn’t know what to say any more than my dad did. He sat beside me in one of the chairs, ran a hand through his hair, and then placed his face in his hands. Maybe later on I’d just appreciate that he’d been there, but I didn’t then. Dad paced back and forth not far from us.

  There were people in and out as we waited, but I didn’t look at any of them. I pulled my knees up to my chest, eventually, and pressed my face against them, closing my eyes and swallowing back more nausea. I thought I’d be more angry at myself than I was, but it wasn’t me I was angry at. I was just angry that things were the way they were, and I didn’t know how to focus that. How could I be angry at a force? How could I let that out?

  I squeezed my eyes shut tighter and mumbled to Robbie, “Everything’s pointless. Everything.”

  He turned his head to face me, and then shook it. “No.”

  I pulled back to stare at him, stony-faced. “This wasn’t worth it.”

  “It just feels that way now,” he told me. He was quiet, but I sensed it was because he was worried he was upsetting me. And he was.

  I swallowed hard, all too aware the tears were going to come again. “My girlfriend is in another room dying-” I stopped, choking on the word, and then stood. I needed to get out.

  “Harper?” Dad called out from across the room when he noticed me heading for the door. “Harper-!”

  “I need some air,” I managed to say, and when I glanced back and saw him starting after me and Robbie getting to his feet, I turned away and sprinted.

  I was faster than Robbie, I knew, and Dad was too far away to catch me before I got to his car. I clambered in and shut the door behind me, then locked the doors and started the car up with the keys he’d left in the ignition. Robbie reached me before Dad and yanked at the door handle, then banged on the window.

  “Harper!” His voice was muffled. “Harper, don’t do this.”

  I didn’t even look at him; just shifted the gear into drive and then pealed out of the parking lot, tires squealing. Behind me, I saw Robbie rush for his car. My phone rang and I ignored it.

  I wasn’t sure where I was going at first. I just knew that I didn’t want to be around when the bad news came. I couldn’t take another second in a waiting room when I already knew what I was waiting to hear. Why bother? Why bother with anything if this was always going to be the result? Every life ended with a group of hysterical people in a waiting room. Hell, life itself could be measured in how many times we’d stood in a hospital room and waited for bad news. I didn’t know the number on my forehead – the one that told me how long in years I’d be around – but I had a second number that could tell me how long I’d been around. Long enough to outlive two loved ones. Long enough.

  In the end, we’d all just wind up being reduced to a number one way or another, and no amount of emotional attachment could change that. Even a person like Chloe was only going to live on as a memory. The memories would fade, and we’d age, and soon there would be no one left who knew her. My mother had been fading for years now, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. All I wanted was some semblance of power. Just some sign that I had some control. That was all I’d ever wanted.

  I wound up at the place my parents had used to go to be alone when they’d been younger. Where Chloe and I’d had our first kiss.

  I left the water alone and stopped by the cliff, then sat down on the grass just a few feet from the edge. I wondered about my own number. I wondered if it was 20, or 30, or 40. It wasn’t seventeen; that was the only thing I was certain of. The only thing Robbie’d ever confirmed for me. Fate had determined I wasn’t going to die tonight.

  I stood up and looked over at the cliff’s edge again, but before I could even consider moving, I heard footsteps and panting as Robbie approached behind me.

  “Harper, don’t,” he warned, watching me turn to face him. “Don’t be stupid.”

  “How did you know I was here?” I asked him.

  “Sped like hell to keep up with you,” he breathed out, taking a step toward me. Instinctively, I stepped backward, and he immediately stopped. “Harper.”

  “I don’t want to die,” I clarified, glancing over my shoulder. The drop was steep, with rocks at the bottom. There was no way I’d survive it. “But my number isn’t seventeen. All I wanted was to know that I could beat the numbers. Maybe this is how I do it.”

  “That’s not how it works, Harper, and you know it,” he said. “It might look impossible to survive, but you aren’t meant to die tonight, so you won’t. No matter what you do.”

  “That’s not true!” I shook my head. “What if I were to get a gun-”

  “Then you won’t be able to get one. That’s not how it works,” he repeated. “You’re not going anywhere, and as much as it might hurt right now, this isn’t the solution.”

  “How can you say that? After what happened to your sister, how can you say that? They didn’t deserve to die.” I pressed my lips together and wiped at my eyes, trying to stop myself from crying again. “If we can’t beat this, then what’s the point?”

  “Maybe there is no point. I don’t know. But we go on anyway because we have to. There are people who love and care about you. There are experiences you’re going to have that you’re going to be glad you were around for. And yes, there are going to be things that’ll tear you up on the inside and make you wish you’d never been born. That’s a part of life. But it’s not ever going to be enough to risk your life trying to prove a point. Look at yourself! You’re a step away from using yourself to test fate when there’s a girl at a hospital who needs you right now. What if she wakes up and she’s got another few days? What if she’s up right now and she’s got an hour left? And you’re out here doing this.”

  I opened my mouth to suck in a breath, feeling my vision go blurry as tears welled up in my eyes again. This time I couldn’t stop them from falling. “I don’t know how to live with this,” I told him. “Not this, too. I thought I was stronger but I’m not.”

  “You have me. You have your dad. Maybe that can be enough. I know we’ll do everything we can to make it enough. Chloe wouldn’t-”

  “Don’t use her,” I interrupted. “I don’t want you to use her.”

  “Then…” He hesitated, and then took another step toward me. “Then let us be enough. Your number won’t be coming up for a while, Harper. I know we can be enough. Maybe this is as low as you get, and if you can get through this, then you can get through anything. This is a bad start, but give life a chance to prove it’s worth it.”

  “You’re too cynical to believe any of that,” I shot back. “I know you are.”

  “Well, maybe I’m starting to. You saw a girl like Chloe and wondered how she could wind up with the life she got. You hoped you were wrong and that somehow she could beat her number. Now give me a chance to hop
e that this isn’t it for you.”

  “Look at how Chloe turned out,” I pointed out. I closed my eyes and tried to keep my voice even. “Look at where she is tonight.”

  “She might not be gone yet,” he said. “Come back to the hospital. Come see this through.” He stepped closer and offered his hand to me, and I blinked out a few more tears as I stared. I knew, ultimately, that I couldn’t ever step backwards. Not after my mom, and not even after this.

  “Okay,” I said, and took his hand.

  “I’ll drive,” he replied, and pulled me into him.

  * * *

  Dad gripped me so tightly when we returned to the hospital that it hurt. “Thank you,” I heard him say to Robbie while my face was buried in his chest.

  We waited, then. I didn’t leave the room again. I didn’t speak. I closed my eyes and remembered Chloe: every moment of her I could think of. The day we’d met, the afternoons in my room, the trips to get ice cream and play laser tag. I seared it all into my memory. I made sure I’d never let her slip away.

  Dad’s phone rang several hours later, when my own phone said it was just past four in the morning.

  “Thank you,” he said as he ended the call, and then he walked to me and Robbie and told us, “That was Kent. The surgeon told them that she’s better than when she came in but it still doesn’t look good. They’re still not sure how she’ll do overnight. Kent and Hayley are going to stay but-”

  “I want to stay,” I demanded immediately. Dad looked like he wanted to protest, but I cut him off. “You would’ve stayed with Mom.”

  He fell silent at that. He had no argument for it.

  “I’ll go pick up some food and some pillows and blankets,” Robbie offered.

  “I won’t eat,” I told him, but Dad nodded at him nonetheless.

  “Thank you, Robbie.”

  Robbie left, and Dad took a seat next to me, letting out a deep sigh. After a moment, he opened his mouth to speak.

  “You know, when your Mom…” He paused and closed his eyes, letting out a slow exhale. Then he shook his head. “It still hurts to think about, but, um… Eventually you start remembering the good times rather than the one really bad time. And it aches, kind of like a fading bruise, but it doesn’t have that sharp sting anymore. If Chloe-”

  “I don’t think I can do this right now, Dad,” I murmured. “I can’t.”

  “Okay,” was all he said. He rested his hand on my back and it felt heavy and uncomfortable, but I didn’t complain.

  “Why do you think bad things happen to good people?” I asked him abruptly.

  He took a moment to respond. “I don’t know,” he said at last. “As cruel as it is, I think it might just be bad luck.”

  “And you’re okay with that? You can go through life every day having accepted that?”

  He pat my back once with his hand. “I think I have to be okay with it. And I think that everyone struggles with it. Some people make themselves okay with it by believing that there’s a God with a plan, and that good people die because there’s something better waiting on the other side. For those of us who don’t believe that… We just have to learn to be okay.”

  * * *

  Robbie brought pillows and blankets back, but I didn’t fall asleep for a while. None of us did. I paced back and forth instead, restless, and Dad stayed up to watch me, I knew, even if he didn’t say it. I knew he was worried I’d leave again, but I didn’t plan on it. I was going to see this through to the end, whenever it came.

  I curled up in a chair in the corner of the room eventually and closed my eyes. I didn’t believe in a God, I knew, because God was meant to be the epitome of everything good, and I couldn’t believe anything completely good was holding the giant magnifying glass given the life I’d had. But I didn’t believe anything wholly bad was responsible either. Robbie was probably right. It probably was just fate. But God and the Devil supposedly came with ears, so maybe fate did, too.

  “Maybe you’re not listening. Maybe you can’t listen. But if you can, and you are… you can take whatever you want,” I mouthed, my eyes still closed. “Take ten of my years. Take all of them. Just give her more time. She deserves more time. She wants it more than anyone. Give her just a little more time.”

  * * *

  Chloe’s parents came to our waiting room around noon the next day. I’d drifted in and out of sleep for a few hours up until then, but as soon as I saw them, I was alert.

  Their eyes were red and puffy and their faces were no less tear-streaked than they had been when I’d seen them the night before. But Hayley approached me, offered me a weak smile, and asked, “Would you like to see her?”

  I opened and closed my mouth, stunned. “How-?”

  “She’s in and out of consciousness, but she’s stable.”

  “What?” I shook my head, not daring to believe it. Was this another drowning? Was she meant to survive this? Was Hayley mistaken; was something going to go wrong?

  “We’ll wait for her here,” Dad cut in, nodding thankfully to Hayley. I got to my feet and followed her. Kent stayed behind.

  We wound through hallways and past nurses and beeping machines, and then into the ICU. Hayley led me to the last bed on the right, where a curtain shielded it from view, and then paused and took a deep breath. Then she pulled the curtain aside and let me go in alone.

  Chloe was battered and bruised and hooked up to more machines than I thought possible for a single person. I started crying on the spot as I moved to her side, and her eyes fluttered open to look at me. The top of her head was wrapped in bandages; covering everything above her eyes.

  She opened her mouth, and, stunned, I realized that she could speak. “Oh, no, don’t cry, Harper,” she murmured. Her hand stretched out toward me and I took it, careful not to squeeze too tightly. “Don’t cry.”

  I shook my head wordlessly, speechless, and for a minute or so, we didn’t speak. I just watched her, tears streaming down my cheeks as her hand squeezed mine.

  “Baxter has got to stop slipping his collar and running out in front of cars during his bathroom breaks,” she said at last. It was too soon for me to laugh. “He’s in big trouble when I get home.”

  “Did they say you’re going to be okay?” I asked her.

  She cleared her throat, and then winced. Breathing seemed to be a little difficult for her, and she had a mask over her mouth. She was using her free hand to remove it over and over again when she spoke. “I heard them tell Mom and Dad that I died for a few seconds during surgery. Kid who hit me had a hood ornament that caught me in the lung. Lots of blood in lungs and one collapsed. Then lots of surgery and stitches. Not good. But if I can survive all that, I think I’ll be okay.” She hesitated, and then joked, “Told you I wasn’t going anywhere.”

  I studied her for a moment, my throat closing up. I didn’t dare to be hopeful even as I asked, “Are you allowed to mess with your bandage?”

  She let out a slow breath. “I hope so. It’s itchy. It’d be great if you could adjust it a bit, actually.”

  I glanced toward the door to double check that Hayley wasn’t coming in, then reached for Chloe’s bandage and gently tugged up the left side until her forehead was exposed. The number rested there, clear as day, as though it had been there all along.

  84.

  Epilogue

  Chloe’s stay in the hospital was not short. I was back in school before they felt comfortable releasing her. But she did get released, eventually.

  In addition to the collapsed lung, she’d had a mild concussion, and she’d broken her leg in too many places to count. Once she was out of the hospital, she had to start physical therapy for that. I immediately began helping as often as I could, between my classes and my new job serving ice cream at the movie theater.

  Deborah moved in with me and Dad just a few months after that. I wondered sometimes if she questioned the day I somehow knew I needed to be with Chloe, or if her placing her hand on her stomach had been some kind
of indication that she’d felt that same feeling before, too. I knew she couldn’t see the numbers, but maybe sensing that something terrible was going to happen to a loved one wasn’t something totally exclusive to people like Robbie and me.

  Robbie and I continued hanging out at least twice a week. When I wasn’t with Chloe, working, or in school, I was usually with him. Ever since I’d stepped away from that cliff, Robbie was more determined than ever to avoid giving me any more details about my number. I supposed I wouldn’t know what it was until it was time for me to go. I was surprisingly okay with that.

  Seeing Chloe’s number change didn’t make me gain faith in some sort of benevolent omniscient being, but it did change what it was like to be with her. The dark cloud over our relationship vanished. We spent our days enjoying the present, and happily, idly pondering the future. I didn’t worry so much about her anymore. Maybe I got a little less cynical. Maybe I smiled a little wider and a little bit more often, and maybe the sky looked a little bluer; the grass a little more green.

  I had no way of knowing what or who decided how we lived, or how long we lived, or what the consequences of our actions and decisions were. I would almost certainly never know. When I died, I wouldn’t know what chain of events had led directly to my death, and I wouldn’t know what I would’ve been able to do to change it, or even if it ever could’ve been changed. Bad things were inevitable. Death was inevitable. But maybe the reverse was true: that good things were equally inevitable. And maybe sometimes inevitability liked to take a back seat to second chances.

  Though I knew it couldn’t last forever, I decided it was about time I let myself be happy. I was alive. Chloe was alive. Robbie was alive, and my father was alive and dating a woman who was well on her way to becoming his fiancée. And although it’d taken me a while to warm up to Deborah, I knew now that if Mom had been able to meet her, she’d have approved.

  And for the time being, at least… all of that was good enough for me.