Bash
“I’ll drop y’all off here, okay?”
Sandro nods absentmindedly at first, and then pauses, turning to look at me with his hand still on the car door. “You’re coming in, right?”
“Um, nah…I’ll just hang out here, maybe find somewhere to park, or just head back to campus. I can pick you back up if y’all need—”
“What? No. Come in with us.”
“I don’t want to intrude…I know it’s a pretty emotional situation.”
He shakes his head. “You saved her life, man. She might want to see you.”
“I was just in the right place at the right time.”
“Then be in the right place a little longer,” he tells me, already closing his door back. “Go park. We’ll all go in together.”
I don’t argue, just drive off without saying anything else, because let’s face it, everything in me needs to see her, needs to know if she’s okay, needs to know I made it in time this time.
All I’ve heard from the backseat the whole ride has been soft, muffled crying. I hate that these girls are going through the feelings I know all too well—realizing that someone you love didn’t wanna be here anymore. It breaks something inside of you.
Sandro helps his sister out once we’re parked, holding onto her as we walk in.
The fluorescent lights and the smell of antiseptic make my head hurt instantly.
It’s a feeling I hate. Attached to memories I hate even more, ones of me not only forced to stay in a hospital all night when I already knew my sister was gone…
but being back only a month later, watching my mom lying in the same hospital she just had to say goodbye to her daughter in, just to end up in it, too…
from a heart attack. I remember her nurse looking at us and telling us it was a common thing, something they call ‘broken heart syndrome’.
Something that can happen after the loss of a loved one.
I shake off the memories, not wanting the onslaught of feelings causing me any more anxiety right now.
I can’t lose it in front of these strangers.
We’re sitting in the family waiting room for what feels like forever.
No one talks, no one even looks at each other.
It’s like they’re all trying so hard to hold themselves together, and if they say any of it out loud, if they admit what’s going on right now…
it’ll make it all real, and that’ll make them all break.
I keep trying to figure out why I’m feeling like this right now.
Is it just the muscle memory? Is it just feelings brought up from my own past, my own grief, my own fear, like I’m reliving it all again?
Or is it something else, too? Are these just resurfacing feelings from my own trauma…
or are they new feelings and fears for someone I barely know…
someone I feel connected to in a way I really don’t want to.
A doctor in green scrubs appears with a clipboard and a calm voice that sounds perfectly practiced. “Family of Lydia House?”
Simone and Lani are both on their feet instantly. Simone is the first to speak. “That’s us. Is she okay?” The desperation in her voice makes me sick.
“Are you family?”
I see Simone stiffen a little, offended. “Yes,” she tells him flatly. “The rest of her family is…dead. And her foster parents are back in North Carolina. We’re all she’s got.”
My heart actually drops hearing those words. Hating that they were said, that they were real. Her family is dead?
The doctor’s head drops a little, and then he just nods.
“She’s stable for now,” he tells them. “We’ve reversed some of the effects of the OD and placed her on oxygen.
We’re monitoring her breathing and heart closely.
Labs did show some stress. We don’t really know how long she was down.
She experienced what we call hypoxia, where her breathing never stopped completely, but oxygen was still insufficiently getting to the brain.
The long-term effects of that happening are still hard to determine quite yet.
She’s sedated for now and will likely be unresponsive for a while.
Right now, it’s going to be hour by hour as we watch her progress.
You got her here just in time, though. Any longer and we wouldn’t have been able to do what we’ve done for her. She was lucky to have you there.”
Simone looks over her shoulder at me with this broken but appreciative expression. I just nod, not really wanting to accept credit for it. She turns back to the doctor. “She’ll wake up, though, right?”
“It’s too soon to say, but I think she has good odds,” he tells her gently. “There’s nothing for us to do right now but wait. You all should get some rest while you can and try not to stress too much. We’re doing everything possible to give her the best outcome here.”
Lani nods. There’s tears sliding down her face, and she doesn’t even bother to wipe them.
Just stares straight ahead, listening to the doctor.
He asks them if they have any questions for him before he turns and heads back past the restricted area.
Sandro walks up and slips an arm around both of them, and they both fold in toward him, crying.
A nurse eventually comes out and leads them back two at a time to see her.
After Simone and Lani come back out, Sandro goes to get up.
Lani asks if he wants her to go back with him, but he turns to me instead, motioning for me to go with him.
I hesitate. Really wanting to avoid seeing her like that, honestly, the more I sat and thought about it.
And also feeling like I don’t have the right to her in that state, either.
Would she even want some stranger in her room?
I try to tell him that it’s okay, that I don’t have to…
but he insists. So eventually I stop arguing, feeling pulled to go.
Simone stops me on my way back, hugging me. I freeze, not knowing what to do at first, arms up like a stunned idiot. I slowly wrap my arms around her, feeling her cries on my chest.
“Thank you,” she whispers. “Thank you for saving her.”
It’s all too much to take in in this moment. I hate a savior complex. Don’t like it. Don’t want it. Don’t need it.
“I…I was just at the right place at the right time,” I tell her. The same thing I keep telling myself and everyone else. It was just a coincidence…chance.
“You should be thanking God,” I tell her, “not me.”
She just looks up at me and nods before letting go.
Machines blink all across the room. There’s color in her cheeks that wasn’t there out on the sidewalk. I hate how peaceful she looks. Scares me still.
I need you to fight, okay. I get it. You didn’t want to. But you’ve got to now.
I walk over closer to her, where Sandro is already standing with his hand on her hair in this caring, brotherly way.
“Think she’ll make it through this?” He asks…and I…I don’t really know what to say.
I clear my throat. “Yeah…yeah, I think so…but I think the real question is what comes after she does.”
He looks back at me, confused. “What do you mean?”
I hate the pained expression I know is written all over my face, but I can’t help it. I’m trying to hold it all in. I am. “She’s hurting…like really hurting. I knew it the first time I ever saw her.”
“At the party?”
I shake my head. “Nah. I’d seen her around campus before that.
Once was just a quick walk by; she caught my eye for some reason…
and then another time she came into the library before midterms and ended up passing out on top of her books.
I walked over to her and checked on her, and it was very obvious she was high or coming down from a high, but I could see the pain she was in, like on the inside, you know? ”
“How did you know?”
I shrug, not wanting it to be some whole thing. “I don’t know…I guess…I’ve just been there.”
Sandro nods in understanding and doesn’t say anything else for a moment. “She’s lucky…that you were there. Thank you, man.”
He shifts next to me and puts a hand on my shoulder.
I can’t speak, so I just nod. I can’t stop the overwhelming feeling that hits me.
The floor shifts as I look down, so I put my palm on the foot of the bed to steady the tilt.
It feels like I can’t get a full breath in, and the walls start to feel too close, like the oxygen in the air is running out.
“I’m—” I start, then swallow. “I’m going to head to the store. Can I get y’all anything? I…I might head back to campus. I know it’ll be a long night and all. I can pick y’all back up if you need, though. I’ll make sure I’m available.” I start walking towards the door, needing some space.
Sandro looks concerned, but doesn’t push. “Um, yeah…I think we’re good, but I can get your number and let you know when and if anything changes?”
“Yeah…”
He hands me his phone, and I put my number in it, texting myself so I have his number too, just in case.
“I’ll walk out with you. I’m sure the girls want to come back in, and I need to grab some coffee.”
* * *
The liquor store lot is almost empty, five minutes ‘til close. My hands grip the wheel, like that might keep me from going in.
The door is right there. I could walk in, pull something small off the shelf, and be done thinking for the rest of the night. Nobody would know. I could call it taking the edge off. I could call it anything I want.
I stare and watch as each person enters alone and exits with someone to keep them company for the night. Jealous. Tempted to do the same. Bring a friend home in the form of a switch, one that would easily turn off the emotions that are making me feel sick to my stomach right now.
I thought this desire was gone. I thought it was fully taken away for a while after I stopped, like I didn’t even crave the burn before the quiet anymore. Yet it keeps sneaking up recently.
I try to mentally walk myself through it all, why I’m feeling this way.
It’s gotta be my sister…right? But I think it’s more than that, obviously.
It’s her. It’s not just the memories she pulls me back to.
It’s just…her. The pull to her, the sympathy towards her—that I doubt a girl like her even wants—it’s the feelings I get around her.
I know they aren’t simple; I know they aren’t normal feelings for a stranger; I know I don’t want them… and I know why I don’t want them.
I said before that my heart was softening to be able to care about more people again, open myself up, allow people in, not be so afraid of what that meant, the possible hurt. But someone like her? As bad as it sounds…she’s trouble. She’s a big warning sign, plain as day—
IF YOU CARE ABOUT ME, IT WILL COST YOU. YOU WILL GET HURT.
Not a possibility, a promise.
The real question is, why am I starting to care about someone I don’t even know? Is it the savior complex? Is it me treating her like the girl I wasn’t able to save before, and now I somehow can? Do I think she’s some do-over?
No. She’s not that.
I do see my own struggles in her, though. I see my sister’s pain, too. I see…I see her, and I just see the pain, I guess. I want to know what caused it. Is it the family she lost? Is it more than that? How much has she been through to end up here?
I see more than the pain, too. I don’t think the pain is what actually draws me to her.
I think it’s what’s under that. It’s something at her core that still shines through the darkest parts.
It radiates off her like it’s calling me in.
That voice telling you to look deeper. If you can just look deeper, you’ll see the treasure hiding.
My fear with caring is obviously experiencing the same hurt that I felt with losing my sister, with almost losing my mom, too.
With Lydia…she wants to go. She doesn’t want to be here.
She doesn’t think there’s anything worth being here for.
Caring about someone like that is the biggest setup for pain.
I’m slowly starting to learn…that some people are worth that risk, worth that pain. Some people might be worth the bruises they give you by accident. Worth the prayers that sound more like pleas.
My phone buzzes in the seat beside me.
Sandro: They’re moving her to step-down. No changes. Gonna be a long night and probably couple of days. Simone insists on staying here, but I’m gonna take my sister back to my place with me. Are you around anywhere still?
Bash: Thanks for the update. Yeah, I’m actually not far. I’ll swing back now
Sandro: Thanks, man
I stare back at the store as a guy pulls down the cage over the door, closing for the night. I throw my head back against the headrest—relieved…and scared.