Chapter 14
LUCY
{Over fifteen years ago}
Young Lucy.
I’d tossed Hoppy to the floor earlier, angry at the fact I couldn’t go outside. The bunny was still slumped in the corner of the hospital room.
The balloon from my eighth birthday floated lazily; it was sinking lower as the waning helium lost the battle with gravity.
I was resting in bed, body cushioned by a stack of pillows.
The old television mounted to a spindly articulating arm played a gameshow, but the sound was muted.
A forgotten coloring page rested on my hospital table, primary hued crayons fanning out from the picture.
I couldn’t remember if I’d completed the page later, but what I had drawn was precise.
I nearly always kept the color perfectly inside the lines.
I wasn’t a messy kid. I tried to be easy.
I tried to not make things harder on my parents than they already were.
No matter how ill I felt, I’d smile and nod and try to make mom and dad happy.
I don’t remember when I became aware of how sick I was, but by eight years old, it wasn’t something I could ignore anymore.
The steady drip of my IV had been my lullaby for weeks, but it seemed to be growing fainter now. My head felt foggy; I shook it gently. God, I remember this—the first time I wondered if I was about to die, and the first time I thought maybe it would be better for my parents if I did.
I knew something was wrong long before the monitors started their frantic beeping.
My eyelids felt heavy as I forced them open, the game show on the television was just a blur of movement, and there was this faint whimpering sound…
that was my mother, keening like her world was ending. I guess it was.
Through the fog of fading away, I watched nurses rush into my room with faces that tried to hide their worry.
They moved with the practiced dance of people who'd done this too many times before, adjusting dials and checking readings while speaking in the hushed tones adults use when they think children can't understand.
But I understood plenty. Or, the future me watching all of this happen knew with stark clarity that this was the sound of yet another treatment failing.
"It's alright, sweetheart." Dad's voice came from my right side, his hand engulfing mine. He was lying, but I didn't tell him I knew. His eyes kept darting to the monitor screens, counting the numbers that measured whether I'd live or die.
Mom sat on my other side, her fingers gently stroking my hair, so pale and thin it felt like spider silk against the scratchy hospital pillowcase.
Her touch was steady, but her breathing wasn't. I heard the little catch in her throat every time the monitor beeped irregularly.
Though she tried to bite back the sobs, sharp notes slipped from between her clamped lips.
"Should we call the doctor?” she whispered over my head to Dad, as if I couldn't hear her when she was literally touching my ear.
"Already on his way," he answered, squeezing my hand a little tighter. "Let's keep reading, shall we? Where were we, Lucy-Lou?"
I pointed weakly at the worn copy of The Velveteen Rabbit splayed open on the bed beside me. "The part about becoming Real," I said, my voice barely audible above the mechanical symphony of my life support.
Slowly, the room began to clear. The beeping calmed. My mother’s muffled wails quieted. Not dead yet. But tired. So… very… tired.
Dad nodded, lifting the book and finding his place.
His voice took on the gentle cadence he reserved for story time, the one that made me feel like everything might be okay even when we all knew it wasn't. Had it ever been okay?
Maybe when I was very little. A newborn. Perfect and pink and new to living.
"'What is REAL?' asked the Rabbit one day..." Dad read, his finger tracing the lines. I mouthed the words along with him, having memorized them months ago. "'Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?'”
I clutched Hoppy tighter against my chest. My own rabbit wasn't velveteen but a matted mess of once-blue fur, now faded to the color of a rainy sky.
One ear hung by threads, and his embroidered eyes had been re-sewn three times.
He smelled faintly of antiseptic, just like everything else in my life.
Hoppy had been with me through every blood draw, every scan, every experimental treatment.
He'd absorbed my tears when needles hurt too much and caught my whispers when I was too scared to tell my parents what I was really thinking.
The night nurses would find him tucked under my arm each morning, no matter how much I'd thrashed in my sleep.
"'It doesn't happen all at once,' said the Skin Horse," Dad continued, his voice softening. "'You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept.'"
I watched Mom's face over the top of my rabbit's head.
Her smile was fixed in place, but her eyes were leaking at the corners.
She'd cried in the bathroom this morning too. I’d pretended not to notice how red her eyes were when she came back, just like I pretended not to notice when she and Dad whispered in the hallway, their voices urgent and broken.
"Insurance won't cover much more of this—"
"We'll find a way. We have to."
"Gary…” she said my father’s name, then sighed heavily. “The house is already mortgaged to the limit. You can’t get blood from a stone.”
"She's our daughter, Maris. What choice do we have?"
“What kind of life is Thomas living? We’re always taking care of Lucy. Maybe… maybe we aren’t what she needs.”
“Thomas loves his sister.”
“I know that.” Mom’s voice sounded broken.
Neither of them spoke again.
I'd heard variations of this conversation for months.
Each time, Mom looked a little more worn down, like Hoppy after too many trips through the hospital's sanitizing machine.
Dad's voice grew tighter; his shoulders hunched a little more.
They both smiled wider when they came back into the room, as if happiness could be measured by how many teeth they showed.
The head nurse bustled in, checking the IV line and frowning at whatever she saw there. "The doctor will be in shortly," she said, her tone professional but kind. She'd snuck me extra Jell-O cups last week when the dinner tray came with green instead of red. "How are you feeling, Miss Lucy?"
"I'm okay," I lied, because that's what everyone wanted to hear. The truth was my bones ached from the inside out, and breathing felt like sipping air through a coffee stirrer. But saying that made the grown-ups' faces do the crumpling thing, and I hated that more than the pain.
Mom's fingers tightened in my hair before she caught herself and relaxed them. "She's been very brave," she said, as if I wasn't there. Adults did that a lot in hospitals—talked about you while you were right in front of them.
I went back to staring at the window while Dad continued reading.
Beyond the glass, other children were living normal lives—riding bikes, climbing trees, scraping knees in ways that healed with simple band-aids.
My world was measured in cubic centimeters of medication and percentages of oxygen saturation.
The door opened, and Doctor Mitchell entered, carrying her clipboard like a shield. I recognized her expression immediately—the careful neutrality that meant bad news wrapped in medical terms too big for an eight-year-old to understand. But I did understand. I was getting good at reading adults.
"Mr. and Mrs. Graves, could I speak with you for a moment?" She gestured toward the hallway.
"No," I said, my voice stronger than it had been all day. "Tell me too."
The adults exchanged that look they always did—the one that debated whether to protect me from the truth or admit I deserved to hear it. Doctor Mitchell nodded once, pulling up a rolling stool.
"Lucy, the new treatment isn't working the way we hoped." She spoke directly to me, which I appreciated. "Your numbers aren't improving, and some are actually getting worse."
Dad's hand squeezed mine so hard it hurt, but I didn't pull away. Mom made a small sound like she'd been pinched.
"We'll find another trial," Dad whispered, his voice cracking slightly. "There are other hospitals, other treatments. We're not giving up."
"Of course not," Doctor Mitchell said, but her eyes held the tired look of someone who'd seen too many children like me. "There's a new protocol being developed at the Alpha and Omega Institute for Health and Wellness. I've already made some calls."
Mom started asking questions about insurance coverage and travel arrangements. Dad began talking about medical loans and second opinions. Their voices overlapped like they were having two separate conversations that somehow needed to happen at the same time.
I stroked Hoppy's tattered ear and thought about the Skin Horse's words. About becoming Real through being loved. About how most toys that are loved too much eventually fall apart.
"Great—another promise I can't keep," I said, the words slipping out before I could stop them.
The adults all turned to look at me, their conversations halting mid-sentence.
"What did you say, honey?" Mom asked, her forehead creasing.
I looked down at Hoppy, suddenly embarrassed. "You keep promising I'll get better. But I keep breaking that promise. I'm sorry."
Dad made a strangled noise, and for the first time, he couldn't hide his tears. "Lucy-Lou, you haven't broken any promises. Your job is just to be brave, which you are. Every single day."
But I saw the truth in the monitors, in the failing IV, in Doctor Mitchell's careful words. In the way my parents' clothes hung looser on their frames and how the stack of bills by Mom's purse at home grew taller each time I was allowed a brief escape from round-the-clock medical care.
I was breaking apart not just my body, but my entire family.