Where All Things Will Grow

by N. K. Smith

  “Bunny, what’s...?”

  Suddenly not only did my hunger not matter, but neither did my fatigue. I sat up and drank the half a glass of water on my bedside table in two gulps. I needed more. Forcing myself up again, I pushed past whatever was in front of me and stumbled down the stairs.

  “... not right... hospital now.”

  Someone was talking to me, but I couldn’t make out the words. In the kitchen, I drank directly from the faucet, sucking the water into my mouth and gulping it down. When I was done with that, I moved to the refrigerator, mumbling, “Mom said I had to go.”

  Everything was bright. It was too bright. “Just close the curtains and I’ll be okay.” I wasn’t sure if I said it or just thought it, but I couldn’t hear whoever was with me respond and the light stayed the same. I heard murmurs of something happening beyond my fuzzy bubble of light, but couldn’t tell what it was.

  I shoved random food into my mouth, anxious to get something solid into my gurgling stomach. Something grabbed me and, although I was so fatigued, I contemplated sinking into the hold. I shrugged it off and moved away. Not even shutting the refrigerator, I left the kitchen in a daze. The sun was too bright, so brilliant. The murmurs were becoming too loud, nearly deafening.

  They silenced in the wake of a loud thud and the pain that reverberated throughout my body.

  Then my world went dark.

  Summer was drawing to a quick end. David and Rebecca were off to California to get set up in their new apartment. Trent had finally made the decision to go to the University of Maryland. While he would still be close, he wouldn’t be as close as Jane wanted him, but she seemed to take it well enough. There was no blood and barely any tears.

  When I asked her how she was doing, Jane shook her head. She looked sad and I wondered if it had anything to do with not having the one person she loved most in the world near her.

  “You’ll b-be o-o-okay wwwwwithout T-T-Trent?”

  She smiled, obviously delighted that I asked. Sometime during my hospital stay, I realized how I’d completely ignored Jane and her concerns. I’d been a bad friend and since she was technically my sister, I’d been a horrible brother. All I’d done was care for her physical wounds, but I did nothing for the wounds that remained unseen.

  “I’ll be okay,” she answered, voice quiet. “If he finds someone else, then it wasn’t meant to be.”

  I was confused. That was actually a pretty sound statement coming from Jane. She’d never been able to see straight when it came to him, but I suppose I hadn’t either when I was with Sophie.

  She saw my expression and rolled her eyes. “Oh, I’ll still freak out, but I understand that I can’t always...” She paused, gave a little sigh, and tugged on the bar through her labret. “People leave and I can’t control that.”

  I’d gotten the senior reading list and was going through the books. I knew I would read them again when the teacher actually assigned them, but I needed the distraction.

  There were too many hours to keep myself occupied.

  I played music at least four hours every day. For two of those hours, I played the works of others, and then composed during the remaining two. An entire drawer in my desk was now filled with finished pieces. Maybe one day I would record them, if only to have something of myself on one of my bookshelves.

  My room was back to what it once was. My art books had been replaced along with everything else I’d destroyed. I worried about putting the picture of Sophie’s Lonely Ear back up on the wall, but she was a part of who I was now, even if she wasn’t with me. So after hours of debate and a few stray tears, it was where it was supposed to be.

  Every day the green rock Sophie loved was in my pocket, and every night I returned it to its place in front of The Silmarillion.

  Since visiting Chicago, I felt more comfortable here; not just in my room, but in Stephen’s house altogether. He worked very hard to ensure I was cared for and every time I looked around, I never saw anything that gave me painful reminders of my past. Stephen had never raised his hand to me and had never pressured me to be anything other than who I was.

  No one had ever hurt me here, and I acknowledged the difference between the dark house in Chicago and this house with light flooding through every window.

  I still had nightmares and I still woke with teeth impressions on my hands, but I didn’t bite them while I was awake.

  It was a start.

  When I felt upset, I played music. When I was really upset, I wrote letters. Some of them I shredded, and others I kept. I had a stack to Sophie in the drawer beside my bed.

  I felt like I’d come much further in regard to my health and wellness, but I still hadn’t seen her. I wanted to and when I asked about how she was, Robin smiled and said she was fine, but then one day Stephen rushed to the hospital. Robin stayed with us.

  We both knew something was wrong. Jane tugged on one of the hoops through her earlobe and then twirled the new bar above her eyebrow. Since she turned eighteen, there was nothing stopping her from loading herself up with metal and ink. I didn’t think Stephen minded, especially since there had been no more cutting. While I thought she looked sort of weird with all of the tattoos and piercings, if it made her feel better and I never had to clean a jagged cut in her flesh again, it was okay by me.

  Robin was very serious and the way she flitted around the house with no real purpose made me anxious. Finally, she entered the living room and regarded us. She took a deep breath, folded her hands in her lap and then locked eyes with me.

  “Sophie—”

  I sat up instantly.

  “She’s in the hospital. In a coma.”

  My mouth snapped closed as my mind tried to wrap around her words. I heard Jane gasp and then felt her grasp my hands.

  “SSSS-SSSSS-SSSS...”

  “She slept all day and then...”

  “W-w-w-w-what?”

  I didn’t understand. She wasn’t in the hospital, and she certainly wasn’t in a coma.

  I was having issues dealing with the obviously false things Robin was saying.

  “I d-d-d-d-don’t b-b-b-b-b-b—”

  “I’m not sure what happened. Perhaps a hypoglycemic episode that advanced into diabetic ketoacidosis resulting in her coma.”

  There was a long pause and then Jane said, “We don’t understand any of that.”

  “Her blood sugar dropped and then surged. It was elevated significantly and she was severely dehydrated.”

  I closed my eyes and thought of music notes on paper. I followed the lines down the page until I’d calmed my heart rate.

  Sophie was in the hospital. Hadn’t she been taking care of her diabetes? Hadn’t Robin said she was doing fine?

  People came out of comas all the time.

  “B-b-b-but ssssshe’ll be all right?”

  Robin gave me a weak smile. “It’s really too soon to tell. Her body has been through a lot and it’s fighting very hard right now.”

  I didn’t have a problem with hospitals, but knowing that I was about to enter Sophie’s room made me sick to my stomach. I could have held Jane’s hand, but on the off chance Sophie had already awakened, I wanted both my hands free.

  I should’ve never broken up with her.

  I felt shocked when I stepped through the door. Her father was half-asleep in the chair next to the huge hospital bed which dwarfed her body. She looked incredibly thin and pale, as if she hadn’t eaten since I’d last seen her. She had a tube delivering oxygen to her nose, two IVs in her arm, and electrodes taped onto each of her temples, plus wires disappearing down the neck of her gown.

  Machines beeped next to her.

  She looked awful.

  I wanted to run from the sight of her.

  I didn’t run. I moved closer to her, ignoring everyone els
e. Her father moved and I took his seat. I’d never visited anyone besides Jane in the hospital before and I never knew anyone in a coma. It was odd to see her chest move up and down but know that her brain wasn’t functioning as it should be.

  I wondered if it was dark where she was or if she was surrounded by light.

  I hoped for light. She hated the dark.

  Maybe I should’ve said something, just to let her know that I was here, but I couldn’t do much more than look at her.

  It wasn’t like in the movies when the person just looked like they were sleeping.

  Sophie looked dead.

  Robin touched my shoulder and drew my attention to her. “Will you be okay?”

  I nodded and Stephen began to speak. “We can’t be positive until she wakes up, but the tests indicate a stroke.”

  Jane spoke before he could continue. “A stroke?”

  I asked, “W-w-w-wwwwwhen wwwwwill she w-w-w-wake up?”

  Stephen looked at me and sighed before answering my sister. “The elevated sugar forced her body to work too hard. Plaque buildup and blood clots are the usual suspects. With diabetics, their bodies can’t build new pathways for the blood as a healthy person would, so in short, she didn’t get enough blood to her brain.”

  Then he turned to me, his face calm, almost unreadable. I supposed he was in doctor mode. “We don’t know if she will wake up. This is where science cannot predict what will happen.” He turned back to Mr. Young. “We don’t know the extent, if any, of brain damage she may have suffered.”

  I turned back to Sophie, needing to see her in order to keep any semblance of calm. I felt Jane’s small hands run through my hair.

  It helped.

  Everything about this situation should have had me freaking out, but I wasn’t.

  Even though I didn’t know what to do, and wanted to run away, I stayed because I needed to be close to Sophie.

  I didn’t want her to die.

  My body was incredibly tense.

  “You didn’t cause this. This is not your fault.” I was startled by Robin’s voice. I turned to her. Somehow she’d managed to rest her hand on my arm without my feeling it. I also became aware of Jane’s continued soothing strokes of her fingers through my hair.

  “W-w-w-what?”

  How could she really say that? I’d left her. I could’ve helped her. This wouldn’t have happened if I’d stayed with her.

  I shook my head. I couldn’t start thinking like that. I’d made a lot of progress this summer, and I couldn’t let negative self-talk defeat everything I’d fought for.

  “I kn-know.”

  I wondered how long they’d let me stay. I wondered when they would chase me out. Knowing that, at best, I had limited time in her room, and at worst, she had limited time on this earth, I reached out and carefully pulled her hand to the edge of the bed. I leaned forward, putting my elbows on my knees and grasped her smallest finger.

  I thought back to the first time we’d linked fingers. It calmed me and I smiled. Slowly, I brought each finger into my hand one at a time, until her entire delicate hand was within mine.

  The others left the room and came back, left again, and returned, but I was unaware of anything but the girl in the bed. I still loved her.

  There were certain universal truths I knew to be indisputable in this world, most of them unexplainable or based on faith:

  God existed in some form and the God I Am was present in every living being. There was meaning in everything; one just had to look for it. You get what you give, and the Buddhist notion of karma was a principal element in this universe.

  But the deepest truth I could recognize within me was that I loved Sophia Young.

  I loved everything about her. This tiny little person lying in this great big bed owned my heart and if I truly had one, my soul, too.

  I’d been at the hospital every day for six days straight. I was there almost as much as Sophie’s father. They wouldn’t let me stay in the room all the time, so I would go to the cafeteria or gift shops. Even when visiting hours were over, I found it difficult to leave.

  I bought her new flowers every day. Today I brought her a dish garden since she preferred plants to cut flowers.

  When we were alone, I whispered to her. I didn’t know if she heard, but by whispering, I cut my stuttering by at least half. There was no way of knowing if she actually heard what I was saying, and if she understood. Stephen would tell me that it was possible she had severe brain damage and she may never function again.

  I drew comfort from holding her hand or linking our fingers together.

  I told her about my entire summer.

  Right before I was going to say goodnight to her on the sixth night, the littlest finger of her left hand twitched. I stared at her hand, but nothing more happened and I thought I’d imagined it. I reluctantly let go and was leaning down to kiss her forehead like every night, when I noticed her swallow.

  And then her eyelids fluttered.

  Then she sat up straight and I panicked because she began trying to tear off all of the tubes and wires.

  My heart pounded and my mind raced, but I was able to push the nurse button quickly. As bad as I felt, there was still some rational thought in me. It was heartbreakingly clear to see that she wasn’t moving the right side of her body at all, while the other half was in full motion.

  Sophie’s father came running in right after the nurse. He must’ve seen her rush in.

  For a moment, he looked happy and relieved to see that she wasn’t just lying there looking like death, but then he realized half of her body wasn’t working and his face fell. There was too much to pay attention to, so I stopped trying. I felt sick and I really wanted to bite my hand, but I kept them both very tightly curled at my sides.

  It was Stephen’s day off, so other doctors came to help, followed by more nurses.

  Mr. Young and I were pushed to the back of the room, which was just as well. I didn’t want to see what they were doing. I had to have faith that all those people were competent and wouldn’t hurt her.

  All I could see was Sophie’s right foot and it only moved when one of the hospital staff repositioned her body.

  Mr. Young’s gaze was fixed on the bed as he shifted next to me. One hand was tugging at the whiskers on this chin while the other was pulling at his hair. He was usually a very calm and stoic man, but he was incredibly agitated and I wanted to help him in some way. It was horrible to be here watching as Sophie went through this, but I could only imagine what it must be like to be a father watching his daughter go through this.

  “D-d-d-d-ddddd...”

  He turned and his eyes bore into me as I grew even more anxious. Despite the difference in color, Sophie definitely had his intense eyes.

  “I-I-I-I’ll c-c-c-c-call SSSS-SSStephen.”

  It seemed to take a second for his brain to process what I said, but then he nodded and said, “Yes. Yes, please.”

  I pushed through the sludge of panic and called home, but there was no answer, so I called his cell phone and when he said hello all I could say was, “Sophie.”

  “I know. They already paged me. I’m on my way now.”

  Mr. Young and I were told to go to the waiting room. I looked around. The big TV and chairs were meant to put people at ease, but it wasn’t working for either of us. I watched his knee bounce up and down, up and down, up and down.

  Sophie did that, too, when she was anxious.

  I tried to keep all of my thoughts positive, but I couldn’t keep my hand from moving to my mouth. I didn’t break the skin, but just scraped and nibbled a little at the knuckle on my index finger.

  At some point, he said, “She’ll be fine,” under his breath, but I didn’t think he was talking to me. Actually, I didn’t think he’d knew he had said
it out loud.

  After what had to be hours, Stephen came in with a tall woman with long black hair and olive skin. Sophie’s father stood up, but I couldn’t. Stephen looked at me and I became acutely aware that I was nibbling on my finger, so I pulled my hand away and sat on it.

  He smiled, obviously pleased.

  I liked it when he was proud of me, even though it made me sort of uncomfortable.

  “This is Dr. Radzinsky. She’s the staff neurologist. You’ll be seeing a lot of her.”

  She held out her hand to Mr. Young and he shook it. She wasted no time. “Sophie’s suffered a stroke. From the test we’ve run, I would classify it as moderate to major, and she’s suffered some brain damage.”

  Mr. Young sucked in a deep breath and took a step back. He looked how I felt. He turned to Stephen.

  “Tom, the CT scan we did when she first arrived is great at showing hemorrhagic strokes, but it will only detect ischemic strokes several hours after the event.”

  “W-w-w-w-w-what’s the d-d-d-d-d...”

  Stephen looked at me, and I felt calmer, like there was someone on my side ready to help me if the anxiety blossomed. “A hemorrhagic stroke is caused by bleeding in the brain, while an ischemic is a blockage of blood flow.” He turned back to Sophie’s father. “Basically she had a blood clot which prevented oxygenated blood from reaching her brain. In the absence of oxygen, some of her cells died.”

  “Which means brain damage,” Dr. Radzinsky added. “She’s asleep now, but...”

  “W-w-what?” I said loudly. “Y-y-you lll-l-let her g-g-go b-back to sssssleep?” I moved toward the door, but was stopped by Mr. Young.

  “There’s a difference between being in a coma and sleeping,” he said to me, reminding me that he, too, was a health care professional.