Eleven Things I Promised

by Catherine Clark

  I didn’t understand what she was driving at. “Did she get worse overnight?” I asked.

  I knew that could happen, but I assumed it only did so with older people. That had happened with my grandmother. She went from the flu to pneumonia to worse in what seemed like twenty-four hours before she passed away.

  “I just—I want you to be aware that she’s no longer in shock. Which means she knows more about what’s going on, and she’s a little bit worse than she was yesterday.”

  “Oh, I . . . sure. Okay.” I’d dealt with Stella’s extreme moods before. I could handle it.

  Mrs. Grant must be overreacting, I thought. The whole family was a bit squeamish, to be honest. All except Stella.

  “Why don’t you and I go in together?” she suggested.

  “Actually, if it’s okay, I’ll go in by myself.”

  “Oh, well. Are you sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure. I’ll, um, come get you if I need you,” I said.

  “I’ll be right over there.” She pointed to a hideous teal couch. Hospitals are full of bright, cheery colors, but as far as I’m concerned they should always be gray, to match the mood. Unless it’s the baby center.

  I walked into Stella’s room, glad to be on my own so Stella and I could really talk. Her mom meant well, but she had a tendency to hover. We didn’t always speak our minds when she was around. When we did, she’d often say, “Girls . . .” in this annoyed tone.

  Stella was in bed, under the covers, the top part of it at a slight incline. She was reading on her tablet with her back turned to the door, and when she looked over her shoulder at me, she looked so much better that I was relieved. Sure, her face was a little puffy—but she wasn’t as pale. Her straight dark-brown hair somehow wasn’t straight anymore, as if they’d given her a bad haircut and left weird curls framing her face in the front. She didn’t do curls. I did.

  I set down the iced latte on her bedside table and pulled out a couple of doughnuts. “Glazed or maple?”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Okay, maybe later,” I said, resisting the urge to have one myself. I set the bag on a chair and tried to give her a hug, but she didn’t budge. I patted her shoulder. She stared at me as if I were a stranger. “So what are you reading?”

  “Just some dumb celebrity gossip,” she said. “Nothing important.”

  “Let me see,” I said, reaching for her tablet. “Who is it? What did Amanda Bynes do now? Or wait. Justin Bieber—please tell me he’s dating a Jenner?”

  “No!” she said, shoving the tablet under the covers. That was weird, because we always looked at pathetic celebrity sites together, but whatever. She was feeling sensitive.

  I opened the bag I’d brought and pulled out her oldest, still-living-with-some-fur stuffed animal, Cheeto, an orange tiger that had been hugged so much it hardly had any fur left. Stella kept Cheeto hidden on a top shelf in her closet, and I was pretty sure I was the only one who knew she still had him. Cheeto had seen us through a lot of agonizing moments when we were little. Flu shots. A wiggly tooth that had to be yanked out. The part in the first Harry Potter movie when Voldemort is drinking the blood of the unicorn.

  “I don’t need Cheeto,” she said as soon as she saw him.

  “Maybe not, but Cheeto needs you.” I tossed the beloved, ragged tiger onto her bed.

  She didn’t pick him up. She didn’t fix his torn ear so that it stood up right, the way she always did. She didn’t even touch him.

  “Come on, cheer up. I know this is terrible and horrible, but you’ll get better quickly,” I said.

  “No. I won’t,” she said.

  “I know it feels like that now.” I started to push the bed rail down so that I could sit beside her. “But—”

  “Don’t,” she said.

  “I’m just going to sit down,” I said.

  She pulled herself up and wrestled with my arms a bit, trying to push me away. The sheets slipped, and that was when I realized it. Her legs weren’t the same lengths. The leg closest to me, her left leg, was short. Below the knee, it was gone. Maybe the knee was even gone.

  I quit wrestling, let go of the bedrails, and stood up, taking a step back, unable and unwilling to understand what was going on.

  “Yesterday I was glad just to be alive. I didn’t even know what happened, not really. This morning . . . I had surgery. It’s real.” Stella pulled the sheets and blanket more tightly around her.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Stells . . .”

  “You can’t tell anyone about this,” she said. “Not anyone.”

  “What are you saying? You can’t keep it a secret,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “You just can’t! Your family is going to have to explain it when you miss school and—”

  “It’s going to be a secret. So do you think you could just not tell everyone for a while? God.” She angrily threw Cheeto across the room, where he bounced off the window and landed on top of the window ledge, perched as if he were enjoying the parking lot view.

  I walked over and stood beside the stuffed animal, pretending to gaze out the window with him, blinking away hot tears.

  “Do you want to know what I was looking at?” Stella said bitterly. “I was Googling how long it takes to get a new leg. Okay? I was reading about how my life is going to suck for the next six months. No, wait. For the rest of my life.”

  “No, it won’t,” I said, turning back to her. “We’re going to make it work.”

  She didn’t say anything in response. She was staring at the TV on the wall opposite her. It was an old Simpsons episode.

  “How about the Cure Ride? How are we going to make that work?” she said. “Should I ride in the support van?”

  “No, I’ll do the ride for both of us,” I said. “I’ll get serious about it and raise money, and I can—”

  “Why would you do that?” she said. “You hate cycling. That’s why you weren’t there.”

  She didn’t say it, but my mind leaped to what she was thinking: It could have been you. Maybe it should have been you. You don’t even care about it, and I do.

  “I’m sorry,” I said again, turning to face her, the tears now falling onto my shirt.

  “And don’t cry,” she said. “God, Franny. You’re fine. You’re awesome. Just—”

  “Stop it!” I said. “I’m crying because I hate that this happened to you, not for me!”

  “Yeah, well.” Stella stared at the TV. “Life sucks, and then you die.”

  I went closer, but she refused to make eye contact. I stood there like a dolt for a few minutes, waiting for her to talk to me, to look at me. But she wouldn’t.

  “Stells. Please,” I said. “Don’t—don’t give up.”

  “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

  “I don’t have to—”

  “I want to be alone. Don’t you get it?” she snapped. “Just leave already.”

  Tears flooded my eyes, and I ran out into the hallway. Nurse LaDonna was walking past and grabbed me by the elbow. “You okay? You don’t look like yourself,” LaDonna commented, scrutinizing me. “You feeling all right?” She took my arm and guided me to a straight-back vinyl chair at the nurses’ station. “Humor me and sit here for a minute. I’m going to get you something.”

  She went somewhere and I sat there, taking deep breaths, while my heart seemed to beat out of control.

  “Have a cup of herbal tea.” LaDonna held a tall stainless travel mug out to me. “Take it with you. You can keep the travel mug when you’re done.”

  I eyed the tall mug. It was dark green, with white loopy lettering that spelled out Mercy in a way that made it look like Merry. “Was this a Christmas thing?” I asked.

  “What do you mean?” said LaDonna. “Now take a drink, get your bearings. This will help you.” She turned to respond to a call from a patient’s room. “I’ll be right there,” she said into the intercom, and then she marched off down the hall.

  I took a s
mall sip of the hot tea. I didn’t even like tea that much, but it was weak and sugary and comforting. I studied the mug again, wondering if these were the mugs that got rejected. One time when I was on dance team we ordered these jackets that were supposed to say Shooting Sparks, but instead they said Shooing Spanks. We got replacements, but still, it was sad that nobody could use them. We were going to give them to Goodwill, but then we didn’t want people walking around with the wrong message.

  I got up and wandered out of the hospital, sipping the tea. I was too busy thinking about Stella to notice Mason coming through the revolving door until I stepped into the doorway before he had a chance to get out. Burning-hot tea splashed out the hole on top of the travel mug and landed on his shirt as we awkwardly rotated through the door to the sidewalk outside.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I—this mug. It’s new.”

  “Or defective,” said Mason as he brushed the drops off his arm onto his jeans.

  “So. You were going in?” I asked.

  “Yeah. I was here earlier, so I’m just coming back. Went to get some homework.”

  We stood outside the revolving doors. It was April, the time when the ground starts coming back to life, when mud turns into grass. The air smelled different, and birds were chirping. We both followed the sound and watched four sparrows chasing one another up to a slant in the roof, and the birds slipped underneath.

  “That’s why they call it Sparrowsdale, I guess,” he said.

  “Mason, I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Don’t be sorry. She’s going to be okay. It sucks, that’s all, but she’ll be all right,” Mason said.

  “I know. I know,” I said, sounding like a chirping bird myself. “I’m going to do the ride anyway.”

  “I can help you get ready. If that’s okay,” Mason said. “It’ll take my mind off . . . you know.”

  “No. I don’t think it will,” I said. We shared this look of recognition. Above us, the sparrows pecked and fought with one another, competing for space.

  “Stupid birds,” he said. “They could go anywhere.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Cameron ran after me and grabbed my arms when I stumbled on a rock, keeping me from falling. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay,” he said, but I couldn’t stop shivering. My teeth were nearly chattering. It was the dumb bikini and my related sunburn. My skin was burning up and freezing cold at the same time.

  “Come on, let’s go talk to the group. I’m worried about you.” Cameron guided me back to the finish area and we found a picnic table under the big food tent to sit down. The rest of our team quickly came over and gathered around me. “Autumn, grab her a Gatorade,” Cameron said.

  “And Alex—can you get some ice from the medical tent?” said Margo.

  “It’s— I need clothes. That’s all,” I said.

  “That’s not all,” said Oxendale. “What’s going on with your wrist?”

  “I twisted it. But really, I just—I need some clothes,” I said. “I’m freezing.”

  Within minutes Elsa had returned with a long-sleeved shirt and a fleece jacket for me; my wrist was resting on an ice pack; and I was sipping Gatorade fruit punch while Autumn sat across the table from me, looking concerned. Separate from Alex, for once. “They just started setting out dinner. What do you want? Take anything.” Elsa set a plate of food in front of me.

  Oxendale put one of his bike jerseys on my lap. “Sorry, it’s all I’ve got, Franny.”

  “Please don’t call me Franny,” I said. I’d been wanting to tell him since Sunday, but for some reason I hadn’t had the nerve until now. “Nobody calls me that except Stella and her family.”

  “Oh? Oh. Right,” said Oxendale. “Sorry. You should have mentioned it.”

  “No, it’s okay. I’m not trying to be a jerk. Really. Thanks for the bike-jersey blanket.”

  Max gave me a careful hug, his strong arms, his warm body making me feel safe. “Blondie, you don’t look like yourself.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us?” asked Margo. “No, wait. That’s a stupid question. It wasn’t up to you, was it? Stella decided.”

  I nodded. “She thought—I don’t know. She just wanted more time to deal with it.” I remembered her face, her panicked but cold face, that day at the hospital. How angry she’d been and how much I’d cried. “I wanted to do something. anything. So I thought it might make her feel better if I did the ride without her. But she hates the idea, deep down. I think she even hates me for knowing what happened to her,” I explained.

  Nobody said anything. Cameron was rubbing his calf, over and over, like he’d injured it earlier in the day. I wrapped my arms tightly around myself, still trying to warm up.

  “I knew she was having a hard time, but I thought it was just, you know, her emotions,” Cameron said.

  “I thought she had facial injuries,” Margo said.

  “She did. She . . . does,” I said.

  “But this is so much more tragic,” Autumn insisted. “I mean, scars heal. That’s superficial. But losing a leg—”

  “That’s going to heal, too,” I said fiercely.

  “Right. I know. I know! That was stupid, what I said. Sorry,” she apologized.

  “No, it’s not your fault. It’s mine. I shouldn’t have said anything.” I wasn’t okay with what I’d just done. I had promised to keep Stella’s real situation a secret, and I’d kept it for weeks. Why was I breaking the promise now, with only three days left? “I promised Stella,” I said. “She didn’t want anyone to know, so I—I told her that I’d keep it a secret even though it was going to be impossible to pull it off. I was pulling it off, though.”

  “Kind of,” said Margo. “But I had a feeling something else was going on besides a broken leg.”

  I turned to glare at her. She always had to compete. She always wanted to win. “Are you glad now? Because you were right?” I asked her.

  “No,” she said firmly, shaking her head. “I’m not glad. Do you really think that badly of me?”

  I didn’t say anything. Sometimes, yes.

  “I wish I was wrong. I’ve been wishing I was wrong ever since I first started worrying about it.” She was looking at me, her eyes shining intensely as if she were about to cry.

  Suddenly I remembered her mother’s illness. I had to stop being so insensitive. I wasn’t the only one going through something bad—and it wasn’t even me, it was Stella. I was just trying to support her. “I . . . no, I know you wouldn’t want that,” I admitted. “I’m sorry, Margo.”

  “It’s okay. You’re weak right now,” she said.

  There she went again with her helpful comments. Even in trying to be nice and compassionate, she just couldn’t commit to it. She had to slip in a dig of some sort.

  “But she’s so . . . so good,” said Autumn. “It’s not fair.”

  “It’s not fair no matter how good she is,” said Max. “I mean, a random accident like that . . .”

  “That must have been hard. Did you talk about it with anyone?” Elsa asked. “Sorry. My mom’s a grief counselor. It’s the first thing she always asks.”

  “Not really,” I said. “It helped being around other people who knew, even if we didn’t talk about it. Like Mason. He’s really the only one, except my mom. I couldn’t talk about it too much with her, though, because she was freaking out about whether the same thing would happen to me. I thought she’d keep me from doing the trip, but I convinced her it’d be safe. And it felt safe. Until today when I was on my own.”

  “So, now we know. For better or worse,” Margo said. “You can talk to us.”

  “You know, people do really well with artificial limbs,” Alex said. “The advances they’ve made lately—the computers and mechanics—it’s incredible. How about that guy who won gold medals in the Paralympics on artificial legs? Blade Runner?”

  “And then he allegedly killed his girlfriend,” Oxendale reminded us.

  “Oh. Right. Well,” Alex said, “I can’t believe you br
ought that up.” He frowned at Oxendale. “You have horrible taste sometimes, you know that?”

  “I have an aunt who’s in a wheelchair—she was in a motorcycle accident,” Max said. “I know, big surprise, right? A family member who rides a Harley. Anyway, now she uses one of those hand-powered bikes? She’s done marathons. This woman . . . she wasn’t even someone who did sports before.”

  “That’ll be Stella. For sure,” said Oxendale.

  “What if Stella doesn’t want that?” I asked.

  “Oh, she will. Please, it’s Stella,” said Margo.

  I glared at her.

  “Look, we may not be best friends, but we’ve competed with each other a lot over the years. Remember, I was on soccer, too—we did traveling team together for two years when I left dance. Plus this trip last year. And I’m not trying to make light of it or say it’s all going to be peachy. You know that. You know I—well, I have experience with this kind of crap.”

  “Why, what happened to you?” asked Autumn.

  “My mom. She’s not well,” said Margo.

  “Is everyone going to spill something major tonight? If so, I’m going to have to get more marshmallows. Maybe a pack of cigarettes,” joked Cameron.

  “You smoke?” Max asked.

  “I can’t get over it,” Autumn said. “Her whole life is flipped upside down because of one stupid accident and one stupid driver.”

  “She’s lucky,” Alex said. “She could have been killed, right? Any accident bad enough to lose a leg could have—”

  “Can we not talk about it anymore?” I said.

  “Sure, sure. Let’s move on,” Elsa said.

  “So now we understand more of why you’re doing this even after Stella dropped out. I mean, to be honest, it never made much sense to me,” said Autumn, as she absentmindedly filed a stick to make it a good marshmallow roaster. “You weren’t the type to put yourself out there. But now it all clicks.”

  The back of my neck prickled at her offhand comment. I wasn’t the type of person who would put herself out there. Wherever “there” was. A place where outgoing super couples ruled the hallways and decided whether they’d talk to you based on some unpredictable formula? A place where you performed onstage until a better athlete and dancer told you that your look wasn’t as uniform as the coach wanted it to be? That place?