by Jay McLean
Nurse Ruby nods once. “Hopefully she will be. I hope you don’t mind but I spoke to her grandmother. I told her you were out here waiting,” she says, but the look on her face isn’t one that’s delivered with good news. “She says that Becca doesn’t—I mean isn’t ready for visitors just yet.”
“Wait. You said doesn’t,” I say, a sob filtering out of me. I rub my hand against my chest, trying to somehow soothe the massive ache; the pain of my heart breaking. “She doesn’t want to see me?”
“That’s not what she said,” Rob says, his hand on my back.
Nurse Ruby glances at him quickly before returning to me and I can see it in her eyes; that’s exactly what she meant and she knows it’s more important for me to know the truth than it is to protect my feelings.
“I’ve convinced Becca’s grandmother to come out and at least speak to you, Josh. I think you deserve that much.”
I hold my breath and nod.
“I have to go now.” She stands up and walks out of nurse’s station and stands right in front of me. “Good luck with everything, okay?”
And then I hug her. I don’t really know why but I feel like I need to and she needs to know that right now, I needed her or at least someone like her on my side. “Thank you so much. For everything.”
An entire hour passes. We sit in silence. All four of us. Not a single word spoken. Then Chazarae walks out from the ER doors and we stand, in unison, slow but steady.
She looks like death.
I feel like death.
There’s no smile on her face—not even a pitiful one. There’s nothing. And it’s exactly what I deserve. She stops in front of me, her hands at her sides as she eyes each of us individually. When she finally settles on me, she clears her throat. “It’s not that she doesn’t want to see you. It’s that she can’t. So go home, Joshua.”
My stomach plummets. “I’m not going anywhere.”
She inhales sharply, her eyes narrowed. Then she takes a step forward, lowering her voice to whisper. “When Becca moved in, I asked you for one thing; to leave her alone. Why couldn’t you have just left her alone?”
I try to swallow the lump in my throat, but it’s too fucking big, so instead I speak through it. “Can you just tell me what happened? Please.”
“Go home, Josh.”
I refuse to go home.
Not until I see her.
Kim takes over watching Tommy for Chloe. Chloe goes home to her parents’ house where they’d spent New Year’s Eve. I guess that’s how they were able to get to my house so quickly last night. Hunter doesn’t leave. Robby doesn’t leave. Day turns to night. Robby calls my mom. I have no idea why. She shows up with food. They eat the food. I don’t. “Let’s go for a walk,” Robby says. And I agree. Because it’s better than sitting in the waiting room, watching people come and go. Some give up on waiting. Some get to see the people they care about. I don’t do either. I’m an outsider—sitting still—watching the world move on around me.
But I can’t move on without her.
He takes me outside where the air is cool but it doesn’t help me to breathe any easier. We walk just outside the perimeter of the hospital, my phone gripped tightly in my hand in case Hunter calls with any news from Chazarae. I know he won’t call. I know she won’t come.
We sit down on a bench just outside a different entrance. More sitting. I could’ve done this inside. He doesn’t speak. What is there left to say?
“I fucked up,” I tell him.
“We all fuck up sometimes,” he says.
“I hate New Year’s Day,” someone else says, and I look up to see two nurses, both male, standing a few feet away. They’re smoking. One’s super tall. The other’s super short.
The short one says, “Me too. There are so many fuckers in here that take things too far and think they’re invincible.”
“Right?” the tall one agrees. “I had one come in this morning. Here we go again, I thought. But it wasn’t. The girl tried to kill herself.”
My entire body tenses. Next to me, Robby sits forward.
We listen.
“Ugh,” the short nurse says. “Those are the worst. It’s like… I don’t know about you, Danny, but I took this job to save lives of those who actually want to live. Don’t waste my time with this shit. You want to kill yourself? Die, already.”
“Right?” Danny says again, taking a puff of his smoke and crossing an arm over his chest. “It’s fucking sad. Like this girl, she’s young, hot as hell. Her eyes are fucking ridiculous. How hard could life be that you’d want to do that, you know?”
I stand up, my blood boiling and my fists balled.
Robby stands up next to me. “Be careful, Josh,” he warns.
The short nurse says, “That’s fucked. What do you think happened?”
Danny scoffs, blowing smoke out at the same time. “Same old shit. Some fucking guy doesn’t love her and she thinks the world’s over.”
Three steps.
That’s all it takes for me to get to them. I push the short one out of the way and within seconds, my fist is on Danny’s stomach. Blow after blow until he’s on the floor. From the corner of my eye—I see Robby holding back Danny’s friend. I open my mouth to speak, but no words could ever convey how I feel, so instead I communicate with my fist, twice more, before I stand.
Danny scuffles, but I’m ready, waiting for his exchange. “Call the cops,” he tells the other nurse, his eyes on mine. He won’t fight back though. He’s a pussy. And a fucking asshole.
I step back and start walking away—the adrenaline, the anger, the understanding, all of it pulsing through my veins.
“You call the cops,” Robby says, his voice loud but even. “I’ll share with the medical board every single thing I just heard.” I stop in my tracks and turn back around because Robby’s fighting my fight and he doesn’t need to. “What do you think would happen to your license if they hear what I’ve recorded?” He holds up his phone. “Maybe next time you can watch your fucking mouths and keep your fucked up shitty opinions to yourselves.”
Danny silently brushes down his clothes and heads back into the hospital.
Robby comes up beside me and we walk together, side by side, step by step. “Did you really record it?”
“Nah.” After no response from me, he says, “I’m sorry, Josh.”
Neither of us mention what they said and whom it was about. But at least I know why she’s here. Only now I wish I didn’t.
28
-Joshua-
Hunter sleeps on the floor of the waiting room. So does Robby. Eventually, so do I.
“Joshua?” I hear, and for a moment I think I’m a kid again and it’s my mother’s voice trying to wake me for school. For a second I’m annoyed—but then reality hits. Fuck, I wish I was that kid. I’d take all the Monday mornings in the history of the world if it took me away from this reality.
I sit up and thank Nurse Ruby when she hands me the coffee. “I figured you could use it,” she says, the same pitiful smile from yesterday.
“Do you know anything more?” I ask, not sharing the fact that I do.
She shakes her head, her lips pressed tight. “My shift just started. But I checked in on her first thing before I even knew you were here.” She glances at Rob and Hunter still asleep in the corner of the room we’ve deemed as ours. “She’s beautiful, Josh,” she says, her gaze dropping.
She checked in on her… saw her file. She probably thinks the same of me as those asshole nurses from last night—she just doesn’t have the guts to tell me to my face.
“I know,” I whisper, a lump forming in my throat. “She’s… my everything.”
Nurse Ruby clears her throat. “She’s still not ready to see anyone, Josh. Why don’t you go—”
“Not you too,” I cut in. “You can’t make me leave, right? I mean there’s no law that states I can’t be here.”
“No,” she says, looking right in my eyes. “You can stay.”
She starts to leave but I grab her arm. “I know she doesn’t want to see me. I know she hates me. I know that seeing me will most likely make it worse. I know that you know that, too. But I can’t not see her. I just… I need to talk to her and I need to touch her and I need to know that she’s okay. And I need to tell her that I love her, that she’s everything to me and that…” I choke on sob. “That I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”
Nurse Ruby takes me in her arms, holding me, all while I cry unashamed.
“I love her,” I mumble. “And I don’t want to exist without her.”
She pulls back, her tear soaked eyes on mine again. With her hands on my shoulders, she nods once, and then she’s gone.
She doesn’t speak to me for the rest of the day.
Rob and Hunter barely speak to me.
I wonder if they’ve worked it out—that I’m the reason she’s here. I wonder if they hate me as much as I hate me.
At some point, Chazarae walks out. She sees me but she doesn’t acknowledge me. An hour later she returns, showered and changed, Bible in her hand. Like the fucking Bible can rewind time and erase the past. It can’t do shit. And even with that in mind, I find myself pacing the floors, praying to a God who knows I don’t believe in him.
Kim calls. She says Tommy’s been asking for me. He wants to talk to me, so I let him. He talks about anything and everything and I listen to his voice, hear the joy in his words, and I try—I try so damn hard—to hide the sadness in mine.
I go back to breathing without really existing, all while the world moves on around me.
Seconds turn to minutes, minutes turn to hours.
And I wait.
- Becca -
“I understand,” the nurse says to Grams. Her voice is soft and warm, unlike the male nurse I had yesterday. She’s not my nurse though—I know this because she came in this morning, skimmed over my chart and just looked at me—right into my eyes. She smiled sadly and then left.
She comes in often but never checks my chart.
The other nurses check the chart every single time they come in. I wonder what they’re looking for—a note that proclaims I’m no longer crazy and they can go back to taking care of people who need it?
“Just think about it,” the nurse says, her hand on Grams’ arm.
Grams nods and waits for the nurse to leave before coming to me.
She sets her Bible next to my arm and slowly takes my hand. Her fingers skim the bandages around my thumb and I look away because the heartache in her eyes is too much to handle.
“I’ve been lost,” she says, and I can already tell she’s crying. “I don’t know what the right thing to do is here and I want to do the right thing, sweetheart. I want to protect you but I don’t know if that’s the best for you. I’ve been praying and looking to God for the answers but I’m torn. Matthew 6:7 says: Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy,” she sniffs once, and I finally look at her. She inhales deeply. “It’s not me who needs to offer forgiveness. It’s you. It is you he has wronged. Not I. And it’s wrong for me to make that choice for you.”
My eyes narrow.
Her tears fall faster.
Next to me, the heart monitor beeps—the space between each sound shorter than the last.
“Josh is here,” she says, and I fight to breathe. “He hasn’t left. Not once.” She lowers her gaze. “Becca, I told him you couldn’t see him.”
“Why?” I mouth.
“Because I didn’t want him near you. I couldn’t forgive him for the way he’d treated you. For bringing you back to this place, back to the darkness of your past.” She looks up now. “Do you want to see him, Becca?”
★★★
Grams waits until there’s only ten minutes left of visiting hours before getting him. I know if I see him any earlier, he’ll want to stay.
I’ll want him to stay.
And he can’t.
I don’t move when he walks in, his hands in his pockets and his head lowered. He doesn’t look at me either. He simply sits down on the chair next to my bed, the same one Grams has been in since I was moved into this room.
His hands raise and pause an inch over my arm. His eyes lock on the bandages around my thumb and circle around my hand down to my wrist. He doesn’t touch me. I don’t want him to touch me. Then he pulls back, his hands on his lap. He looks up, first at the wall opposite me, and slowly, at me.
And I feel like I’ve died.
Like the breaths I’d been taking are no longer possible and everything inside me has stopped.
Just stopped.
But I know it’s not true because I can still see him. I can see the lifelessness in his eyes, the darkness that surrounds them—the heaving motion of his chest and quivering of his lips. I see him. But it’s not him.
And neither am I.
He clears his throat, his eyes on mine.
“You look beautiful,” he whispers, and my eyes drift shut, releasing the tears. His hands jerk forward, wanting to wipe them away, but I beat him to it.
“I looked into school in St. Louis,” he says, “For Tommy. There are some good elementary schools around Washington University. Robby says he’ll write me a really good reference. I can get a job there. I’ve saved up enough that we can move there. All three of us. We can get a two-bedroom apartment or something. Or, I mean, even if you want to live on campus or whatever, we’ll just stay close.” He sniffs once and wipes his noise. “We can go now if you want. When you get out or whenever. Whatever you want, baby. I don’t…” He breaks off on a sob and I do nothing but watch him, tears flowing fast and free. “I don’t want to live in a world that you’re not part of. I don’t know how to live without you. And I’m sorry, Becca.” He reaches out now, his hands on my arm. I don’t flinch from his touch. I don’t move at all. But I don’t love it like I used to. “I’m so fucking sorry. And I love you so much. You have to know that—that I’m so in love with you. Becca, please say something. Please?”
“Get Grams,” I mouth.
At first he’s confused. Then he stands up and gets Grams from just outside the door.
She walks in, her eyes wide in panic.
I point to my throat, and then to Josh sitting in the chair.
Josh’s eyes move from me to Grams when she says his name. “Becca can’t talk anymore,” she says, her tone flat—but the anger behind it unmistakable.
“What?” Josh whispers, looking back at me.
Grams answers, “She had to get her stomach pumped. The tube they stuck down her throat damaged her vocal cords even more. She can’t speak.”
Josh swallows loudly, his eyes on mine, and his jaw tense.
Grams leaves.
Josh doesn’t.
He just sits there.
I look at him.
He looks at me.
And I can feel the clock ticking.
Each second bringing us closer to the edge of never.
“I’m going to fix this,” he says. “I’m going to make it right.”
He can’t.
Grams comes back in. “Visiting hours are over,” she says.
Josh nods and stands slowly. “I’ll be back first thing tomorrow, okay?”
I nod.
He leans down, his eyes closing as he drops his mouth to mine.
I let him.
But I don’t kiss him back.
Then he leaves.
And he takes my heart with him.
After Grams walks in and takes a seat, I reach over and grab a pen and paper from the tray by my bed. I write a note and hand it to her.
Her eyes move from side to side before lifting and locking with mine.
“Okay?” I mouth.
She nods. “Okay.”
29
-Joshua-
“What do you mean it’s sold?” I ask the guy at the counter behind the only pawnshop in town.
“It sold real fast.”
“Can you tell me who bought it?”
<
br /> He scoffs. Right in my damn face. “I can’t give out that information.”
With a sigh, I almost give up. Almost. “Can you at least tell me what exactly she sold you? Model numbers? Something?”
He sighs too. Not from lack of hope like mine, but from frustration. “Sure man, whatever.” He goes to his computer, taps a few buttons, and prints off a list.
I look over it as I walk a couple blocks to the camera store. I don’t bother asking questions—I have no time. I hand the guy working on the displays the piece of paper. “Whatever’s on this list—I need it.”
“These are old, dude, we don’t carry—”
“So give me the updated versions. And all the lenses too. And whatever accessories you think I’ll need.”
His eyes widen.
I look at my watch. Fifteen minutes before visiting hours start. “Can we make it quick?”
He jumps in his spot. “Sure!”
A six grand dent on my credit card and worth every penny.
I hope it makes her smile.
I need to see her smile.
I walk past Nurse Ruby while carrying multiple bags. She smiles and nods and I pause just outside Becca’s room, waiting for my heart to settle. I check for my phone in my pocket so I can show her the apartments I’d been looking at. She may not want to live with us and that’s okay. At least we’ll be together. That’s all I want.
I step into her room and my heart drops to my stomach.
The bed is made.
The room is empty.
All but for a single note sitting on her pillow.
Josh,
I am broken.
I am sick.
You were my Band-Aid.
I need a cure.
★★★
Chazarae answers the door. She must expect what comes next because she opens her arms and lets me collapse into them—the force of my cries the loudest sound I’ve heard in days.
“It’s okay,” she soothes. “It’s for the best.”
“I don’t know what happened.” My hands grip the back of her dress, her frail body taking the wrath of my emotions. “I didn’t mean any of it.”