“Sorry about your car.”
“It’s collateral damage,” Ro said. “You’re not going to come to graduation, are you.”
“Nope. Looks like my parents will have to wait for Haley.”
“What about your speech?”
“You can talk in my place. People would much rather look at you than at me.”
“They want to see you.”
“They want to see a freak.”
“More like a hero.”
“You’re way more of a hero than I am.”
“So from one hero to another . . .” She wiped away tears. “Come to graduation. If you won’t do that, at least come to grad night. Allow yourself one teeny bit of high school. It won’t change anything. But just maybe it’ll make you feel a little better to be, like . . . normal.”
“‘Normal’ is not on my vocab list. Besides, I can barely move, let alone party.”
“We’ll rent a wheelchair.”
Ben kissed her softly on the lips. “Have fun, honey. Really. You deserve it.”
Her cheeks were wet. “It’s so ironic. I’ve always been such an attention hog. Now that everyone’s gonna be focused on me, I don’t know if I’ll be able to handle it.”
“You have to handle it,” Ben told her. “Someone has to be the socially adroit one.” They both saw the cab coming down the street. “You’d better have fun, Dorothy. That’s an order. I’ll want to hear every detail about graduation and grad night, okay?”
“Okay.”
“I mean it. Who got stoned, who got arrested, who got drunk and puked on himself, and most important, who banged whom.”
“Well . . . that just about sums up high school.” She dried her eyes. They kissed again and then she slipped into the cab, disappearing from sight.
Slowly and painfully, he made his way inside to the waiting room.
Everything he had done—all that research and running around and all the promises and hours and toil and sweat and even getting knifed—he had told himself that he was doing it for Ellen. But truthfully, he’d been doing it for himself. If he ever wanted to look in the mirror without flinching, he couldn’t let that bastard win. And now that Barnes was caught, and Ben had won, he was floundering, more than a little lost. Superfluous to everyone except maybe Lilly. And Ben needed her way, way more than she had ever needed him.
He had fallen asleep in a chair and woke up with a start around two hours later. It was a little before eight in the morning and he stank. Feeling like shit, he went into the men’s room and washed his face and arms and scrubbed his hair with liquid hand soap. The water was pinkish as it flowed down the drain. He stuck his head under the hand dryer and shook out his hair like a wet dog. Then he bought coffee and muffins for the Tafoyas.
Since he wasn’t allowed into the ICU, he left the goodies at the nurses’ station. The nurse on duty said she’d tell George that he dropped by and that he was still here. Ben was convinced that George would never get the message, but an hour later he showed up. “Go home.”
“I’ve got an appointment. They’re gonna change my bandages. What’s going on?”
“She’s still heavily sedated. But . . .” A deep exhale. “She’s improving. Her blood pressure is coming up.” He paused. “We’re trying to keep it real—no false hopes—but I’m . . . I’m optimistic.” George shook his head. “You’re not going to leave until you see her.”
“I’m a mule, George. You should know that by now.”
“Okay, Ben, this is the deal. If I let you see her, will you leave?”
“After they change my bandages, yes.”
“And you’ll go home to River Remez.”
“Actually, I’m going to stay with my grandparents. It’s closer and I’ve been living there anyway. They’re just waiting for me to call so they can pick me up.”
“Great. Stay there. Recuperate. Take care of yourself and let us take care of Lilly. That’s the deal.”
“I promise I’ll leave and rest up for a while. But I know myself. I’m gonna come back. I think my grandparents got me a tablet for a graduation present. I’ll bring it with me. It’ll keep me busy for hours.”
“You don’t need to be here, Ben. You need to take care of yourself.” Ben didn’t answer and George dry-washed his face. “I’m talking to a wall.”
“Yes, you are.”
“There can’t be more than two people in the ICU. June won’t leave. That’s a given. I suppose I could use a few minutes to take a piss and just organize my scrambled brain. I want to check in with work and get that out of the way. I’ll see if June will allow you to visit.”
“Is she mad at me?”
“No.” George was taken aback. “Why on earth would she be mad at you?”
“I left them alone in the house, George. I shouldn’t have gone to graduation rehearsal—”
George cut him off. “No one’s mad. You’re family. Don’t be stupid. Wait here while I ask June if it’s okay.”
As soon as he left, Ben closed his eyes, but the images were too awful and too bloody. Instead he stared at nothing. George returned around a half hour later. “June says okay, but just for a few minutes.” A pause. “Ben, she’s doing better but she looks bad. You’ve got to steel yourself, for June’s sake. Keep it up-tempo.”
“Got it.”
George had taken ten steps before Ben managed to stand up. He turned around and saw Ben struggling. “Sorry.” He came back. “Lean on me.”
“I’m okay. I just move slowly.”
Together they crept over to the ICU. Ben was in a lot of pain but it felt right. He wasn’t supposed to be okay while Lilly was not okay. The nurse had him gown up and cover his feet and head. The ICU room was glassed in. Ben could see a body on the bed with tubes running in and out all over the place. Machines were beeping and chiming. The beat of his heart only added to the rhythm. He went inside.
June was sitting next to Lilly, her delicate fingers wrapped around her daughter’s limp hand. She had looked up when Ben came in, but then her eyes went back at Lilly’s face. She was a small woman to begin with, but the psychic pain had somehow made her diminutive. There was an empty chair—George’s seat—and Ben took it.
Lilly had tubes in her nose and mouth and an oxygen mask over her face. Her neck was completely wrapped in white bandages and gauze. Her left hand was on a board attached to the bed railing and there were needles in her arm and wrist and a couple of IVs dripping clear liquid. Her complexion was gray, as if all the life force had been sucked out of her.
Keep it positive, Vicksburg. But keep it real.
He had wanted to tell her that everything would be all right, that she would be fine and things would go back to the way they were. He had wanted to tell her how beautiful she looked, healthy and rosy and full of spit and fire. He had wanted to tell her all of that. But it wasn’t true, and deep inside Lilly would know it wasn’t true. She always had a great bullshit detector.
“Can I talk to her?” he whispered to June.
She turned, her eyes reaching deep within his soul. “A few minutes.”
He ran a finger across Lilly’s ashen cheek. “Hi, hon. It’s Ben.”
For just a moment she opened her eyes, but then the lids fluttered and closed. Her heart rate quickened. Then it slowed until the intervals between each beat lengthened. The monitor read a sluggish forty-five beats per minute, but she was sedated.
Keep it positive, keep it real.
Again he touched her cheek. “We got him, honey.” Her heart rate sped up a bit. More than hearing him, he knew she understood. “We got him and he’s behind bars. He’s never, ever gonna get out and he’s never, ever, ever gonna hurt anyone else again. It’s over and done with. He’s toast. Your job is to just get well.”
Ben paused to keep the emotion out of his voice.
“You just get well and heal up so that I can give you and Haley a hard time like I always do. We’re all here for you, Lilly—anything you need and anything you want. I
’m here as long as you want. I’m not going anywhere. Right now, I’ve got nothing but time. So when you wake up and you’re better, if you want to hang out and annoy me, I’m here, okay?”
No response. But her blood pressure was stable, her breathing was stable, and so was her heart rate. So that was as good a response as anything.
“I know your dad wants to come back and be with you here in this room. And since there can only be two people with you, I gotta leave the ICU. But I’ll be close. I’m gonna stay with my grandparents so I can come back and forth easily. So . . . so . . . I guess I’ll talk to you in a little bit. Because your dad wants to be here and we can’t have more than two people in the room . . . I think I already said that.
“Take care, hon. Get well . . . get well real soon. I’ll be waiting.” Ben looked at June. “Thanks.”
She leaned over and kissed his cheek. Then she continued her vigil.
George was just outside the ICU. He helped Ben walk back to the waiting room, offering him coffee and a croissant once the kid was seated.
“Thanks. I actually am a little hungry.” Ben nibbled the croissant.
“Call your grandparents.”
“I’ll go to the house as soon as I get my bandages changed.”
“When’s that?”
Ben looked at his watch and took out the vial of antibiotics. He swallowed a pill dry. “At ten. In an hour.” He took a sip of the coffee. It felt warm and soothing. “I’ll leave when that’s done. Thank you for letting me see her.” Another sip of coffee. “You know, she opened her eyes for a second.”
“She did?”
“Just for a second. But she did react to my voice. Her heart rate went up. She heard me, George. And I really, really think she understood what I was saying.”
“You kept it positive?”
“I kept it positive.”
George dry-washed his face again. “I’ve got something in my car that I’ve been carrying around for months.”
“What?”
“Just wait here.”
“Sure. Where else would I go?”
George was back about five minutes later, carrying a manila envelope. “This is Lilly’s graduation present to you. And today is officially your graduation, whether you’re there or not.” He handed Ben the package.
“What is it?”
“Just open it.”
The flap had been taped shut. Ben ripped it off and pulled out a stack of paper. The first thing he saw was a letter from the California Institute of Technology congratulating him on his acceptance. He hadn’t applied to Caltech. He hadn’t applied anywhere except St. John’s and UNM. Looking at George, he said, “Excuse me?”
“It was Lilly’s idea. She wanted to make it happen. So a few of us got together and did what needed to be done.”
“A few of you being . . .”
“Lilly, me, your parents, of course, Tom Gomez, your teachers who felt you were selling yourself short. Even your principal was in on it.”
“You forged an application to a major university.”
“We didn’t forge anything.” George was irritated. “You got the grades, you got the scores, you got the National Merit Scholarship. Your teachers in high school and at UNM wrote the recommendations. They certainly weren’t forged. I have no idea what your boss at Circuitchip wrote, but I assume it was okay ’cause you got in.”
A pause.
“Lilly wrote your essays. Did a damn good job. They sounded just like you . . . actually, smarter than you. And she didn’t mention Ellen, even though everyone said she should. She figured you wouldn’t have liked that.”
“I wouldn’t have liked it.”
“The only thing that was forged was your signature—courtesy of your dad. Big effing deal.”
Ben regarded the letter. “This is ridiculous. I’m not going anywhere . . . especially not now. She needs me.”
“Lilly has two parents, Ben. She doesn’t need a third.” George weighed his words. “You know you’re a little like me, kid. And maybe that’s why Lilly always had a thing for you.” He paused. “Benjamin, it’s time for you to stop being a grown-up and start acting your age.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Ben repeated. “I can’t leave her alone.”
“You’re not leaving her alone, you’re going away to college. Thousands of kids just like you do it every year. Stop being a baby.”
Ben was furious. “Me? A baby?”
“Ben, you’re fine as long as you’re facing death in the eye. It’s life that gives you problems.”
Ben was too angry to talk, then a few moments passed and a cooler head prevailed. Ben said, “George, I can’t leave her now. It’ll break her heart.” Silence. “She loves me.”
“I know she does. I’ve seen enough of her doodling: ‘Ben,’ ‘Benny,’ ‘Benjamin’ written across the insides of her notebooks . . . all the hearts with your and her initials in them. The true question is, do you love her?”
“Of course I love her.”
“I mean, do you really love her?”
“George, she’s not even fifteen yet.”
“Well, she won’t be fifteen forever.” When the kid didn’t answer, George said, “Ben, if you love her, you’ll go to Caltech. She wants you to go.”
Dumbfounded, Ben stammered out, “That was then. This is now.”
George stared at the kid with wet eyes. “If you want to do something for her—something very, very important for her—blaze the fucking trail. She chose Caltech for you because she wants to go to Caltech. She wants to go to L.A. She always wanted to learn how to surf.”
George looked upward.
“After what happened, I should never let her go. Never, ever, ever. All I want to do is hold her hand and tell her I love her. And June . . . pssh . . . she’s superprotective to begin with. If it’s up to us, we’d keep her under lock and key forever. What good will that do? We’ll cripple her.
“But if she has a guardian angel out there, someone who can take care of her if she needs it down the road, maybe . . . just maybe . . . June will relent and let my beautiful daughter spread her beautiful wings. That monster took a lot from her, but he didn’t take her brain. He didn’t take her soul. If you want to help her, get yourself educated and help my daughter to do the same.”
Ben was still looking at the letter. “I can’t believe my dad forged my signature.”
“Stop making a federal case out of it.”
“This is going to cost a fortune.”
“Your parents would mortgage the house if they had to. Fortunately, they don’t have to. There should be another letter inside.” George grabbed the envelope from Ben. “Here we go. Work-study. Eighty percent reduction in tuition, room, and board. You’ll need to go by the third week in August, Ben. There’s orientation and entrance exams to determine your level in math and physics. We’ve already sent in your acceptance letter. It’s a done deal. If you pull out now, you’ll expose us all to being charged with fraud.”
“I’ll just say I changed my mind.”
“If you do that, it’s like spitting in Lilly’s face.” George was snorting. “You think about it.” He stood up. “You think about what the people who love you did for you. And when you’re done thinking about it, you get on that fucking plane and make us all proud.”
With that, he left.
Ben had never wanted to go away for college. New situations were torture. He was out of his element at parties and social gatherings. He wasn’t a talker or a good team player. He was a loner who lived in his head. He liked numbers more than words and was happiest when he was by himself with a pencil and piece of paper, working on abstract concepts that had nothing to do with real life.
Then he thought for a moment.
He suspected he had just described a lot of the student body at Caltech.
A class full of Vicksburgs. Now, that was a scary thought.
It was Lilly’s graduation present to him. Under the current circumstances, he ha
d no choice but to accept.
Lilly, Lilly, Lilly.
Why couldn’t she be like most girls her age? Why didn’t she just hang up posters of rock stars, chase boys, shop for makeup, and call it a day? Why did she have to be so much like him?
Chapter 18
Ben kept a diary, so he would remember.
Day One
Ninety-six hours after being viciously attacked, Lilly celebrated her fifteenth birthday by being moved from the ICU to a room in the special-care ward. Her vitals were stable, but she still had a fever and she still needed oxygen and a glucose drip. She hadn’t eaten because she couldn’t swallow, let alone talk. Disoriented, confused, and loopy from the medicine, she needed time to even realize she was in a hospital. She became agitated. She had to be sedated a number of times. She moved in and out of consciousness, her eyes scanning her environment, soaking in whatever she could.
There were so many tests; in and out and in and out. That in itself would tire out a normal person, let alone someone as compromised as Lilly. June yelled each time they took her away. She yelled when they brought her back. Ben had to keep on reminding himself that despite everything, Lilly was making progress. She had some moments of lucidity. And she recognized people. When he talked to her, he was positive that she knew who he was.
Day Two
The nurses liked to keep the number of visitors in her room to two. June was a fixture. George, Haley, and Ben took shifts. Lilly began to have longer periods of consciousness and became aware of her surroundings. At one point, when Ben was visiting her, she was coherent enough to understand that she had neck surgery and couldn’t talk. She lifted her hand and pantomimed writing in the air.
Ben hunted in his backpack and took out a notebook of lined paper and a pencil.
She wrote: ???????
June became paralyzed, but recovered quickly. She told Lilly that she had been in an accident. That her throat had been injured, so she needed to rest her voice and try to recover.
Her eyes narrowed, and Ben knew that look. She didn’t fully believe her mother, but she didn’t argue. She lay silently until she fell asleep. She seemed a bit more peaceful when she slept. That is, until they woke her up to change her dressing.
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