Carissa's Law

by Misty Boyd

  “But I really can’t swim!” she yelled, sounding more concerned than before.

  “I’ve got you. I won’t let go. I won’t let anything happen to you, unless a shark comes!” He laughed back at her.

  “ISAAC!” she yelled.

  “I’ve got you, see?” he reassured her, squeezing her tighter into him. “You’re okay. I won’t let anything happen. Just hold onto me.” They stayed in the water for a long time. Carissa realized she felt free to move more in the water than she ever had anywhere else. It was nice to be able to move like that. It was also nice to be held by Isaac while she did.

  “I love you,” she told him. “And I’m sorry I made fun of your snowman. Sort of.”

  “You know, I don’t have to bring you back to shore,” he joked with her.

  “You would never leave me here.”

  He grinned down at her. “Do you feel lucky?”

  “No, I feel loved.”

  “You are loved,” and he kissed her gently, then brought her back to land.

  It was getting late, so the two of them decided it was time to end the night and head back home. Isaac carried Carissa back to the car and turned the heater on so she wouldn’t be cold in her wet clothes.

  “I didn’t bring towels. I wasn’t really planning to go in the water,” Isaac said.

  “It’s okay. I don’t melt in water. It dries eventually,” Carissa responded.

  They took the long drive off the island and back to Carissa’s house, and Isaac walked her up to the door.

  “Goodnight. I had fun tonight,” Carissa told him.

  “I’m glad,” he responded, kissing her goodnight.

  Carissa went into the house and headed straight to her bathroom to shower and get her pajamas on, trying to avoid any weird eyes from her parents. Her clothes had only half-dried from the ocean, and she still smelled like salt water. In the shower, she remembered the feeling of weightlessness and freedom the ocean had brought. She also remembered Isaac’s arms around her, and how protected she felt. It was incredible.

  Chapter 40

  Connie Peterson got to the office early Monday morning and began checking emails. Along with the regular concerns of the support group, she had four emails in response to the one she had sent regarding Carissa. All of them wanted to hear more about what Carissa was hoping to accomplish and how they could help. Two group leaders sent back their own personal stories that matched the story of Carissa’s parents, along with confirming that there were several more similar stories in their local chapters.

  It was starting to look like this was a bigger problem than Connie thought, and these stories were only coming from parents who had chosen to give their children life despite the terrible prognosis. How many moms and dads had actually gone through with the abortions based on such information? She would probably never know.

  She decided to email Annabelle and Carissa to let them know what was going on. They’d be excited to hear of the support. First, though, Connie needed fuel. She stepped over to the coffee pot and put some on to brew. She made it strong this morning. She would need a lot of energy to get this ball rolling. When it was done, she poured herself a cup, black, and sat down to write the first email.

  Dear Carissa and Annabelle,

  You’ll be excited to hear that I’ve received several responses back from the email I sent regarding the law we’ve been talking about. This problem seems to be widespread in our community, and I suspect we’ll never know how far it truly reaches. Many parents probably take the information given to them as truthful and choose to abort, and we may never know how many fall into that category. Everyone who has responded so far, though, seems interested in getting the ball rolling in this area, and I expect to hear from more this week. Carissa, for eighteen years old, you sure are a mature young lady. I suspect you’ll take this far. Annabelle, maybe you could give us some insight into how we get this to Austin? I look forward to hearing back from you both, and can’t wait to be behind you in this endeavor.

  – Connie Peterson

  She sent the email off and got to work responding to the rest that had come in over the weekend. It took her most of the day to respond to everyone who was interested in helping Carissa with her idea. There would be no shortage of boots, or wheels, on the ground for this.

  Chapter 41

  Carissa woke up early Monday morning. She got out of bed and cracked open her laptop to check her email. In it was an email from Connie Peterson, the leader of the spina bifida support group that Carissa hoped would get behind her on the law she wanted passed. She took a deep breath and clicked it open.

  She couldn’t believe what she read. Connie already had full support from four different chapters of the support group, and she expected more support to come. Carissa clicked to close Connie’s email and realized she had several more from addresses she didn’t recognize.

  She opened them one by one and, in each, found a story of either a parent of a child with spina bifida or an adult with spina bifida who heard her story at a support group meeting and wanted to get behind her. All of their stories matched hers. It was unbelievable. There must have been thirty separate stories of families all given the wrong prognosis, and it was only Monday. Most of the chapters of the support group hadn’t even met yet.

  Carissa tried to respond to each email with thanks, but there were just too many to get to right away. She shut down her laptop, deciding she would come back later to reply to the rest. She needed some breakfast, and she needed to tell her mom everything that was happening.

  “Hey, you!” Sarah called out as Carissa rolled into the kitchen.

  “Hey!” Carissa replied, grabbing the coffee pot and pouring herself a cup.

  “How was your date the other night?” Sarah asked. “You were out kinda late. Haven’t seen much of you since then.”

  “It was great! We had Italian and went to the beach. We left my chair in the car and he carried me.”

  “Nice!” Sarah exclaimed. “Want breakfast? Just pancakes this morning.”

  “Just pancakes? Wow, you know that’s my favorite breakfast,” Carissa said.

  “Comin’ up.” Sarah went to the stove and heated up a skillet, then poured pancake batter into the pan.

  “It was so nice,” Carissa told her. “But, Mom, guess what else? Guess!”

  “I don’t know!” Sarah flipped the pancakes over, then carried butter and syrup to the table. “Don’t have a clue. What else?”

  “So, you know I’ve been working with Annabelle Jenkins on this thing about getting doctors to tell the truth about babies with spina bifida, right?”

  “Right.” Sarah walked back over to the stove, lifted the pancakes onto a plate, and brought them over and set the plate in front of Carissa.

  “Thanks, Mom,” Carissa said, smiling up at her mom. “Well, I heard back from Connie Peterson, the lady over that statewide spina bifida support group. Just over the weekend, four of the chapters of the group decided to get behind us on getting a law passed. And it’s only Monday!” Carissa took a breath and forked a bite of pancake into her mouth. “Umm,” she commented on her breakfast, then continued. “Most of the groups haven’t even met yet, so this is huge! And, Mom, families are emailing me personally to say they’ve had the same experience, and they’re behind me and want to help.”

  “That IS huge!” Sarah replied. “So what’s the next step? What do we do to make this happen?”

  “We wait,” Carissa sighed. “Annabelle Jenkins is supposed to give us our next steps. All we can do right now is wait and pray.”

  “Well, then, that’s what we’ll do,” Sarah said firmly. “We’ll wait and pray. Your dad is going to be so excited! You should tell him as soon as he gets home.”

  “I will,” Carissa said, wondering how her mom might think she wouldn’t tell her dad what was going on as soon as he walked in the door.

  As promised, Carissa told the exciting news as soon as he got home from work. Sarah had cooked a pot r
oast and had everything waiting for dinner. As soon as the blessing was said, Carissa filled him in on the progress of her new project, her excitement contagious.

  “That’s great, honey!” Jim said when she finished telling him everything that had happened. “Let me know when I can help. I’m totally behind you on this.”

  She smiled. He always was behind her, in her corner, ready to help. “Just pray for now, Dad. I’m kind of just waiting for everything to get set in place.”

  “Good enough for me,” he told her. “Your mom and I will be sure to pray.”

  “Thanks, Dad!”

  They finished dinner and Carissa helped clear the table, then went to her room to call Isaac. Before she could tell him the big news, he chimed in with news of his own.

  “Hey!” he exclaimed. “I’ve been waiting to hear from you. I have big stuff!”

  “Me, too, but you go first,” she replied.

  “Okay. If you’re sure…” he hesitated.

  “I’m sure; go ahead, I want to hear your news. Mine can wait.”

  “Okay, so you know how I’ve been working at the library part-time…” he started.

  “Yeah.” She remembered the first time she’d seen him there, so long ago. They’d been through a lot since then.

  “Well, I’ve been kind of fishing around here and there, looking for something more in the medical field, and I landed something! I start in the medical center on Wednesday. It’s daytime, only paper pushing for now, but they say as I complete school, I might be able to move up. And they’ll even allow me to come in a little bit late for the rest of this semester so I can finish up these classes.”

  He took a breath. “Of course,” he continued, “I’ll have to switch to night school after this semester, but I can do that. And we can still have weekends! It’s not much pay starting out, but it’s enough to maybe get myself a small apartment if I can get my mom’s nursing situation buckled in. I’m sure I can. Her nurse now is great, and I could find something close by, in case I needed to get over here.”

  “Wow, that’s amazing! I’m so happy for you,” Carissa exclaimed. This was awesome.

  “So what was your news?” he asked.

  “Well, I mean, after all that, I’m not sure my news even qualifies as news. I’m so proud of you!”

  “I think your news is still news. Anything that you’re excited about, I’m excited about. Spill it!” he ordered, and she could hear him grinning.

  She told him, and he acted like she had said she had a full-time job and was moving into her own place, too. Her news wasn’t nearly as big, but you wouldn’t have known it from his reaction.

  “You get so excited over everything I do,” she told him.

  “Love does that. You excite me,” he laughed. “I can’t help it. I love you!”

  The tone of his voice made her smile. “I do have that effect on you.”

  “Yes, you do,” he agreed.

  They hung up, and Carissa did her nighttime routine and crawled into bed. She would check her email again tomorrow and respond to the ones she hadn’t gotten to. Today had been a big day, and she was exhausted. It was time for sleep.

  * * *

  It had been a week since Connie first emailed about the support group chapters being all in. Since then, Carissa had been swamped with email after email of families sharing their diagnosis and prognosis stories, all of them the same. Doctors filled parents’ heads with falsehood after falsehood, tragic prediction after tragic prediction, all pointing to very bleak outcomes for babies with spina bifida.

  Carissa was worn down and fired up by the stories, all at the same time. She desperately wanted to make a difference for the next generation of babies like her. It just shouldn’t be this way. Parents should be given factual information on which to base these decisions. This was life or death. Their decisions should at least be based in truth.

  All Carissa could do for now, though, was continue to wait. Annabelle had yet to return the email asking how to move forward with plans to make a law. Carissa certainly didn’t know where to start. Her high school government teacher had been the varsity football coach, and grades were often based on how much football trivia you knew, rather than whether you knew how to get a law passed. Carissa had been doomed on both sides of that equation. She had been lucky to get out of that class alive. She had passed, though, and that was just as scary as the fact that they let the football coach teach government.

  Isaac had started his new job, so she was seeing less of him. He spent his mornings in class, his afternoons at the hospital, and most evenings looking for an apartment near enough to his mom that he could pop in as needed.

  She had plenty to do, though, with all the emails piling in from the families within the support group, but it was still hard to see him only on weekends. It would be worth it, though, when he had his own place. She was sure that would give him a sense of accomplishment.

  The semester was almost over, too, so she figured she might as well get used to not seeing him as much. He’d be going non-stop with the job becoming full time and night classes starting. And, with her starting school again, weekends would really be all they had. They were really getting somewhere in life, though, and she was proud of that.

  Someday, it would all be worth the sacrifice of a little time.

  Chapter 42

  Annabelle had been out of work for a week due to her daughter being hospitalized. It always shocked her how fast a kidney infection came on in a kid with spina bifida. One day, everything was fine. The next day, fever, pain, vomiting, and urine you could smell down the street.

  Annabelle was so versed in these infections that she could identify the bacteria by the smell before the urinalysis came back from the lab. It had been e. coli, again, and this time her daughter had come down hard. She’d ended up in the hospital on IV antibiotics and fluids. The vomiting and fever didn’t stop for four days.

  Annabelle was still exhausted from Isabella’s long illness, but she had to get back to work to pay the medical bills that were sure to come in soon. Even with insurance, these hospital stays were expensive for a single mother. She felt terrible, but she had left her still-recovering daughter in the care of a babysitter so she could come back to work today.

  There were piles of paperwork and tons of emails. Annabelle trudged through it all until she thought her eyeballs might pop out of her head, and then she ran into the email that perked her right back up. Connie had gotten back to her about the law she and Carissa had spoken about, and it was great news. They had a lot of support from within the community, and all they needed was for Annabelle to tell them how to get started.

  Well, she could certainly do that. She began to type.

  Connie and Carissa,

  I am sorry to be so late in returning this email. I was away from work with a sick daughter. Those kidney infections can be such a beast. But enough about me.

  Here’s what you need to get started. First, you need to find a sponsor in the Legislature. Usually this is your own district representative. There are lawyers there in his office whose only job is to help people like you do things like this. Call the sponsor and tell him about the law you want passed. He’ll have a lawyer put it into proper legal language and send you the draft. Make sure that what the lawyer wrote sounds the same as what you want to accomplish. If it does, the lawyer will then present the bill to the House of Representatives.

  The Speaker of the House will then hand the bill off to a committee that will decide whether the bill should be brought to the floor for a vote. This is where you start praying. We could get stalled here because, even if the committee decides to bring the bill forward, the Speaker can decide to throw it out, and we’ll have to wait two years to bring it forward again. We don’t want to wait another two years. These babies have waited long enough to be heard. We want this done this session. They meet again in January, and it’s November now, so we need to get started.

  Carissa, this is your baby, so you take
off with it! Let me know if you need help.

  – Annabelle Jenkins

  Annabelle sent out the email and called Jane, the babysitter, to check on Isabella.

  “Hello?” Jane answered quickly, after only two rings.

  “Hey, Jane. How’s my girl doing?” Annabelle asked, hoping the news was good.

  “She seems okay,” Jane replied. “She ate some cereal a little bit ago, and she’s lying down playing with her toy horses now. Everything looks good here.”

  Relieved, Annabelle loosened up and slumped into her chair. “Great! Thank you so much for watching her. You know you’re the only one I trust when she’s sick.”

  “I know. I’ve got her. I’ll call if we need you.”

  “Thanks. Tell her I love her and I’ll be home soon. Bye.” Annabelle hung up the phone and was able to get some work done, knowing that Isabella was in good hands.

  Chapter 43

  Carissa woke up sometime in the middle of the night with nausea and excruciating pain in her head, and she knew. She’d felt this before and she knew what was coming.

  Her shunt was malfunctioning. The tube in her brain that kept the spinal fluid from pooling up and swelling in her brain was clogged. Without help, the fluid would become too much and cause brain damage. She could feel it happening, but the pain was so intense she couldn’t get out of bed or even call out for her parents. She reached for her phone on the bedside table, but only managed to knock it onto the floor, and then the darkness came. She felt it swallowing her, but she couldn’t fight it off.

  “Mom…” she managed to choke out, but she knew it wasn’t loud enough for anyone to hear, and then darkness overtook her.

  * * *

  Jim shook Sarah awake. It was Saturday, and he’d agreed to take her on a breakfast date to IHOP, just the two of them. It was Sarah’s favorite place to eat. Carissa could make her own breakfast. They were due some kid-free time.

  “Honey, wake up!” he called. “I hear waffles calling your name. And you don’t even have to cook them!”