~ * * ~
My head hurt and the voices were louder…angrier. I wanted to tell them to go away and let me sleep, but I was so exhausted it was too much of an effort.
“…were you thinking?”
Nick? What is he doing here?
“She seemed fine,” Mom said helplessly.
“She seemed fine,” he repeated contemptuously. “How could you not notice?” I could hear the anger in his voice and I cringed realizing that he was talking about me. “She must have lost ten pounds since I last saw her. I would have been able to tell something was wrong over the phone…”
“She’s the one who chose to stop answering your phone calls,” Mom pointed out defensively. “I had nothing to do with that.”
“Maybe not, but you practically ordered me to stay away and I let you,” Nick said in self-disgust. “I should have driven up here immediately and confronted her, found out what was bothering her.”
“As you’re so fond of pointing out, she’s 18, an adult; she can pick and choose who she wants to talk to.”
“Make up your mind already! Either she’s an adult who can choose for herself, in which case I don’t have to wait for graduation to tell her, or she’s still a child who needs protection.”
I’d never heard Nick so infuriated.
What have I done?
“Nick,” I could hear the alarm in Mom’s voice. “You promised you’d wait.”
“I agreed to wait until graduation to tell her,” Nick reminded her coldly. “I didn’t agree to stay away until then.”
“Okay,” Mom’s voice wasn’t much more than a tired whisper, “I won’t try to keep you away any longer.”
“Go home and rest, Allison,” he commanded. “I’ll stay the night.”
“No, I can’t leave her.”
“She’ll be fine,” Nick assured her in a kinder tone, “The doctor said there was no damage done, that they caught it in time. I’ll call you if she needs you.”
There was silence. All I could hear was their breathing and the sounds of monitoring machines. A memory flashed into my mind, a memory of similar sounds…and Dad…
The memory was so painful that I gasped and opened my eyes.
“CeeCee…?”
Nick grasped my hand, looking worriedly down at me. Mom appeared next to the bed slightly behind Nick, and level with my knees.
“Nick,” I whispered…it was the best I could do. I hadn’t noticed how dry my mouth was before. “Water,” I managed to croak.
I sounded horrible.
“I have some ice here the doctor said we could give you,” Nick reached over and picked a small piece of ice out of the cup and put it in my mouth. “He wants you to start out with small amounts and build up slowly.”
The ice felt good.
“More…?” I croaked out again.
Nick smiled and continued to put ice in my mouth. He stood on my right side, still holding my hand in his, and using his left to reach for the ice. I tried to smile back, but failed miserably.
I finally shook my head, indicating that I was done.
“Better…?” he asked.
I just nodded rather than using my frog voice.
Mom hadn’t said anything the whole time. I hated to think I had caused her as much pain as I had just experienced when my thoughts had flown back in time to Dad’s final stay in the hospital. The sounds, the smells, everything had come together in that split second to remind me of the last time I had seen Dad alive. It had been so vivid, so excruciatingly real.
“Mom…?”
I decided that my whisper was better than my croak. Nick released my hand, reluctantly, and moved out of the way for Mom to come closer.
“Go rest.”
Tears instantly sprang to her eyes.
“CeeCee…” she began.
“Please, Mom.”
I had never been chatty but I would be extremely glad when I could put more than two words together again without sounding terrible and being exhausted.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered taking my hand and squeezing.
She was blaming herself for my stupid mistakes. I couldn’t allow that.
“My fault” and I was back to the croaking.
“I should have…”
“My fault!” I croaked loudly.
I’d been the one who had given up…the one who’d found it too difficult to swallow food around the constant lump in my throat and decided it wasn’t worth the effort, who’d felt too queasy to even attempt eating more often than not, who frequently forgot to drink enough water. I had even continued to run out of habit, although I was too weak to do much more than walk a lot of the time. I had been guilty of neglecting myself, no one else, just me.
Mom had begun crying in earnest, the tears pouring out of her eyes. She bent down to hug me and somehow I found the strength to return it.
“I love you,” Mom whispered in my ear.
“Ditto,” I whispered back, all I could manage.
I didn’t realize it would cause Mom to cry even harder. I should have, but I didn’t. It was too similar to what she had heard Dad say to me for years.
When will I learn? Will I ever stop causing Mom so much pain? She doesn’t need anymore. I have to stop!
“Go rest,” I sounded a little better, “I’m fine.”
I tried to be reassuring, but it was hard without the cooperation of my vocal cords.
“Okay,” Mom straightened up and dabbed at her eyes with a tissue Nick handed her from my hospital table. “I’ll be back in the morning. You can come home tomorrow.”
She attempted a smile for me. Since mine felt more like a travesty than a smile, I just nodded. I was fighting to keep my eyes open, but…