My Life as an Album (Books 1-4): A small town, southern fiction series

by LJ Evans

  “No,” I whispered out, but I was holding it steady like I was the rest of my body. I was afraid to move even an inch more than I had to.

  “Can you stand?”

  Derek lifted me. I didn’t do any of the work, but when he put his arms around my waist, I couldn’t help the whimper of pain that escaped me.

  “Where does it hurt?” he asked, staring into my eyes as he put me on my own feet. Feet that were fine. My left elbow hurt like the dickens. And my insides…my insides were still hollering bloody murder. God. Mama. What would Mama say? Her sad eyes filled my vision, making it hard to breathe. Hard to talk. Hard to answer Derek.

  “Inside,” I said quietly, my eyes meeting his and swelling with tears that I would not shed in front of these men.

  “Shit,” he said again. Because he understood. He understood my one kidney. He understood that I shouldn’t be doing anything that would damage it. Yet, I had. I’d been on a stupid caving adventure, instead of tucked up safe at home like a possum in its nest.

  “We need to get her to a hospital. What’s the easiest way out of here?”

  “Easiest or quickest?” the guide asked.

  Derek looked at me.

  “Quickest,” I said through teeth clenched against the pain.

  “Then that’s back up the ladder,” the guide said.

  I looked back at the ladder that I’d just fallen from. It wasn’t the longest one I’d done, but in the shape I was in, I doubted my ability to do it. The thought of trying it again was enough to increase the nausea that I was fighting.

  “Do you think you could hold on to me if I carried you on my back?” Derek asked.

  I had to think about it. Would it be better to be jostled around on his back, or attempt it at my own slow pace? I didn’t know, but I couldn’t start up on my own and then halfway, decide for him to carry me. I needed to make the decision now, on the ground.

  “I think it’ll be less painful if I do it on my own,” I said between slow aching breaths.

  “Owen, you go first, I’m gonna go right behind her,” Derek said.

  Owen nodded and went to the ladder, taking my pack with him. That would help. I’d only have me to deal with. Owen started up, I grabbed the ladder, and my elbow burst with pain again. Could I do it one-handed?

  “Look, you take the first step. I’m going to try to share each step with you. That way I can hold you up as best as I can,” Derek said.

  We proceeded up at an excruciatingly slow pace. Me trying to grab with one hand, Derek trying to balance us both against the movements of the rope. Pain worked through me in ways that made my head whirl so that I had to stop, forehead on the cave wall, several times before I could continue.

  I just concentrated on the pain and the steps so that I wouldn’t have to think about how I’d probably screwed everyone’s lives up one more time.

  At the top, Owen reached back to grab my good hand as he and Derek maneuvered me onto the ledge of the cave. I sighed with a momentary sense of relief that we’d made it, but when I sat down, my insides burst into such agony that I shot back up.

  “You can’t sit?” Derek asked, alarm trolling through his voice in a way that made me want to cry again.

  I just shook my head, afraid if I spoke, I wouldn’t be able to hold back the tears and words that were ripping through me.

  The guide, who’d come up behind Derek and me, took charge again. “It’s only ten more minutes. All straight walking. I’ve radioed ahead, and they’re going to have an ATV at the exit for us. It’ll probably hurt like hell on the trail, but it’ll get you to the vehicles as fast as possible.”

  I nodded. I was getting to be an expert at nodding without pain. I just had to do it slowly and stiffly.

  We made our way in silence, Lonnie and Mitch having observed from the top of the ladder. No one really said anything. Derek was the only one who truly understood the magnitude of my fall.

  True to what the guide had promised, the ATV was waiting at the cave entrance with another guy and a first aid kit. “Do we need to call for a helicopter?” the new guy asked.

  “Mia?” Derek asked.

  “No. Just get me to a hospital.”

  Derek and Lonnie tried to shield me from the jolts as the ATV drove over the beat-up terrain until we got to the cavern’s store and parking lot.

  Derek jumped into the back area of the SUV, put a seat down, and then helped lift me in so that I could lie flat because sitting in the ATV had pretty much taken everything out of me. Lonnie drove, Mitch was in the passenger seat, and Owen was in the one seat left standing in the middle. Silence. Like in the caves, but this was anything but peaceful.

  Google Maps directed them to a hospital in San Andreas. It was the longest ride of my life. But Derek was there, teasing me about keeping them on their toes, and trying to lighten my mood as fear and anger washed over me.

  My fear wasn’t for me; it was fear for Mama. Mama needed me more than I needed any blasphemous adventure. While we drove, I had time to hate myself all over. To hate this new Mia who’d selfishly gone on this trip with a stupid boy and risked everything for a few moments of happiness. For an escape I hadn’t deserved. I’d known I hadn’t deserved it.

  And now look what had happened.

  I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t let anything hurt Mama any more, especially nothing that I did. And now there was a good chance that I’d do more than just hurt her. There was a chance that I’d completely devastate her. The remorse hit me again, feeling almost as raw as the pain on my insides. Guilt because I knew if anything happened to me, Mama would never forgive Daddy for telling me to go. Guilt because I should have stayed home.

  I wanted to cry. But I didn’t. I wanted to scream as the SUV hit curves and turns. But I didn’t. Instead, I listened as the man who had taken my heart tried to keep me sane in the midst of my self-condemnation.

  The hospital ER was blessedly empty. When I explained what had happened to the intake nurse, and that I was afraid I’d hurt my one good kidney, she reacted with appropriate speed.

  I was in my own little curtained area before I had a chance to hesitate. The doctor examined me, ordered tests, and had me pee in a cup all while Derek hovered close by. The doctor ordered an x-ray for my elbow, had an ice pack applied to my cheek, and told me he’d be back with results.

  “Tell me,” Derek said quietly, grabbing my hand as I lay on the gurney on my good side, staring at him.

  “What?”

  “How bad can it be?”

  He wasn’t being sarcastic. He wanted to know. What was the worst-case scenario? I wasn’t sure I was willing to tell him that. I was angry. At me. At him. At the world that didn’t play fair.

  “Little Bird,” he demanded.

  “If it’s damaged, they can do surgery,” I said. I didn’t have to say that it was my kidney. He knew.

  “What the fuck were we thinking?” He put his head down on our hands. Self-loathing radiated off of him in waves so big that it could have been its own radio station.

  That softened my heart a little because he was hating himself as much as I was hating myself. My anger toward him melted because it wasn’t his fault. I’d known the possible consequences and ignored it for a good time with a bad boy. This was all on me. Even through the anger and self-battery, I still loved him. All of him. Stormy eyes, and messed up past, and all his beautiful words.

  “Stop,” I croaked out.

  “You should have explained how dangerous this was for you,” he said, kissing my fingers, but not looking up at me.

  I think he was angry too. At me. At himself.

  I didn’t know what to say to him, because it was true. I should have told him. But even more, I shouldn’t have come at all. And if I said that, it would hurt him. And I’d just promised Lonnie that I would try not to.

  “I’m not letting you do this any more, Little Bird,” he said with a command to his voice and furrowed eyeb
rows.

  That hit me in the gut in a new way, even in the midst of the fury and blame. Because the thought of no more undergrounds with Derek, the thought of having no more peace and quiet and unseen beauty with the man I loved guiding me through, that was almost as hard to take as the guilt. It was yet another new and painful way to be torn apart.

  Thankfully, I didn’t have to argue with him or myself, because the doctor came back in.

  “You have blood in your urine,” he said bluntly. My heart dropped, causing a wave of nausea that Derek saw as I felt all the color leave my face.

  “What does that mean?” Derek asked.

  “She’s stable, no other organs damaged that we can tell. I think it’s going to heal fine, if she rests. I want to admit her and watch her carefully over the next twenty-four hours to make sure the bleeding doesn’t worsen, and that her blood pressure stabilizes.”

  “Okay,” Derek nodded.

  “If it doesn’t stabilize, we can do a minimally invasive technique called angiographic embolization. That’s where the surgeon goes through the large blood vessels in the groin to reach the arteries of the kidney and stops any bleeding.” The doctor looked from Derek to me. “But I don’t think you’re going to need that. I think you’re going to be fine after some rest.”

  Relief hit me as hard as the nausea. I was going to be okay. He thought I was going to be okay. It didn’t make me hate myself less, but it at least eased the panic and guilt at the thought of having to tell Mama that I’d damaged my one good kidney.

  The doctor continued, “You also have a small fracture to your elbow. It’s clean, and I think it’ll mend with just a splint. Someone will bring that up and get you into it. You’ll want to have another x-ray done in a few days just to make sure it hasn’t moved. In that case, you might need surgery on that as well.”

  He waited for us to ask questions, and when we didn’t, he continued.

  “I’ve prescribed some meds for pain and blood pressure. We’ll keep an eye out for any stomach swelling or sign of more internal bleeding tonight. They’re going to move you up to a room. I’m on call until ten o’clock tonight, and I’ll come by before I sign out.”

  With a few more dos and don’ts, he was gone.

  Derek found my bag and reached for my phone.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Calling your mom to let her know what happened and that you’re okay.”

  I reached for the phone and groaned as I did so, pain invading me. “Don’t you dare!”

  He looked up, surprised. “What?”

  “I am not going to worry Mama. My God. If she knew....” and I choked on the regret and hatred and sorrow that filled me again.

  “Mia, this isn’t a joke,” Derek said sternly.

  “I know! But if everything is okay by tomorrow, then she doesn’t need to worry. She doesn’t need to frantically look for a flight and almost kill herself to get here,” I said furiously. I wasn’t mad at him, really. I was still livid with myself.

  “She’s your mom,” he said.

  I couldn’t hold it anymore; I started crying. “I can’t do that to her. I can’t,” I said as I let the anxiety, and responsibility, and worry of everything that had happened wash over me in all its entirety.

  Derek wrapped me in his arms and held me tight against his chest, and I let him because, no matter what I said about knowing I shouldn’t have come, I still loved this man who knew me like no one else in the world. And when I felt his own tears hit my arm, I crumbled into sobs, and he gave.

  “Okay,” he said quietly.

  He held me while we both cried tears of guilt, and anger, and pain.

  Returning Home

  ALL OF THE STARS

  “And I know these scars will bleed,

  But both of our hearts believe

  All of these stars will guide us home.”

  -Ed Sheeran

  They moved me to a regular hospital room. There was no one in the bed next to me, so the boys took over that half, fighting for control of the TV remote, and making so much noise that Derek shooed them out to get food. They left and came back with burgers and fries. I wasn’t hungry. I was far from it.

  After several more hours of the guys clowning around, and seeing that it wasn’t doing anything to make me smile, Derek told them to go find a hotel room for the night. I told Derek to go too, but he wouldn’t, and I didn’t have the energy to fight him.

  The pain meds made me feel loopy, like everything was dreamlike. Eventually, I fell asleep. But it wasn’t a good sleep. The beeping of the machines, the quiet voices, and Derek’s echolocation as he focused all his energy on me kept bringing me out of disturbed dreams. The final one was a dream where Mama was having to attend my funeral, but then it was Jake’s funeral, then Cam’s, and finally the baby’s. My heart was pounding so furiously when I woke that I knew I wasn’t going back to sleep anytime soon.

  I glanced toward Derek’s chair. He was asleep. He looked so tired poured into a too small armchair. Even tired, he was gorgeous as always. I loved him. God help me, I did.

  But I also realized that I couldn’t do this. I had to go home. I didn’t have a choice.

  I just didn’t know how I was going to tell him that without hurting him. I didn’t know how to make him see that our real worlds had finally caught up to us.

  He opened his eyes as if he sensed me pulling away from him. His dark eyes stormy in the twilight of the hospital room. “Little Bird?”

  “I’m okay, just a bad dream.”

  He scooted his chair so that he could take my hand in his like he had earlier in the ER. “Have I told you today that I love you?”

  “Hey, moron, you haven’t told me you loved me at all,” I said quietly, as close to teasing as I was going to get at that moment.

  He looked up at me with a small grin. “Sure, I did. I told you in front of several hundred people last night.”

  I reached my index finger to play in his cleft, and he bit it. “No, you sang my favorite song about someone loving someone, but you never said, ‘Mia, I love you.’”

  He grinned more, which broke me in a whole new way because I was going to walk away from him. I’d thought at the beginning of all this that there was a chance that I’d be left more broken than before, and it wasn’t that I wasn’t going to be broken when I left him—God, I was—but it was even worse knowing that I was going to break his heart along with mine.

  He grabbed my fingers and pressed his lips to my palm. If I wasn’t so full of drugs, and tiredness, and worry, that probably would have made me feel things that weren’t appropriate in a hospital room and would have made me doubt my new resolve.

  He looked up at me, and his smile went away so that there was only serious Derek left. “Little Bird, I love you so goddamn much that I don’t know if I’ll ever be the same again.”

  His stormy eyes flashed, and my eyes filled with tears at his beautiful words. Words that I knew I didn’t have a right to have. Words that told me how much I was really going to hurt him. But it was a choice between him and Mama. And I couldn’t choose him. Not now. Maybe never.

  Tears fell again before I could stop them. Because I’d never really been loved by a boy, and now I was going to break us both.

  “I didn’t think that would make you cry,” he said.

  “I’ve never been loved before,” I told him quietly, a half-truth in so many ways. I’d been loved. By my family. And Cam and her family. And Wynn. But I’d never been loved by a boy. Wholly and completely in a way that made the world stop the way Derek made my world stop.

  “That makes me want to bust something. Or someone. Or maybe go back to my serial killer ways,” he said, kissing my palm again.

  My eyes started to droop again, medicine kicking in once more. “Hey, moron,” I said through shut eyes.

  “Yea?”

  “I love you too.”

  Because that was the ful
l truth.

  ♫ ♫ ♫

  The boys showed up as early as visiting hours would let them, and Derek left to shower and change while they entertained me. Which really meant they argued over the free bed and the TV remote again while I supervised like a teacher in a playroom.

  I wanted a shower so bad that I itched everywhere, but the hospital said no. I was still hooked up to IVs and monitors.

  They retook the same tests that we’d done the day before, and a different doctor came in to give me the results just as Derek returned. This doctor was female and very pretty, so the guys were drooling over her. We had to kick them out to get any privacy. So they decided to go check out of the hotel and get lunch.

  Once they were gone, she turned to me with a smile. She’d been entertained by our shenanigans. If I wasn’t in regret mode, I probably would have been too.

  “Your levels look good. The blood is all but gone from your urine. This was probably just a good scare, but I think we should keep you another twenty-four hours just to make sure,” she said.

  She checked a few more things, asked if we had more questions, and when we shook our heads, she left.

  More of my anxiety started to wash away, along with the dread of having to tell Mama what happened. Even with the relief, it didn’t change my mind. I had to go home. Derek needed to finish his tour, and we would have to let reality hit us.

  “You need to go. You have to be in Oregon,” I told him.

  “We can fly out of Sacramento tomorrow morning and be there well in time to get the venue set up. I’m not leaving you.”

  “Derek—”

  “Don’t argue with me, Little Bird. It’s already done.”

  I was going to argue, and he knew it, but we were stopped by my phone ringing.

  It was Mama, and my heart fell. I hoped Derek hadn’t texted her in the middle of the night. I looked at him, ready to scold.

  “Mama!” I said, trying not to sound groggy.

  “Mia?”

  “Yes.”

  “You sound funny,” she said. I bonked my good hand against my forehead because mamas could always tell.