by Avery Sawyer
I mumbled “thank you” to the nurse who’d pushed my wheelchair out the front double doors. I slowly got in the car.
“I promise I’ll stop doing that. You’ll remember everything in your own time, sweetie.” Mom kissed my forehead and handed me dark sunglasses to wear: the black, blocky, old lady kind. She started the car. “You ready?”
“I guess.” I looked straight ahead, trying not to cry. “I don’t feel good.”
“I’ll go slowly. It’ll be so nice to be able to sleep in your own bed. You’ll see.” She gave me a quick squeeze and pulled out of the hospital parking lot like the whole car was filled with uncartoned eggs.
I rolled the window down and let my arm rest on the car door. I was glad to have the ugly sunglasses: even with them on, the sun was too bright. A calm breeze skimmed across my golden arm hairs. I smiled a little, surprising myself. A flood of joy hit me, pushing away the despair of a moment ago. I made it. I’m alive. I began to giggle like a crazy person, which was probably what I was.
What was wrong with me?
My mom slowed the car down, concerned, and pulled over when she saw tears streaming down my face and dripping off my chin. I gulped for air, choking, snorting, trying not to move my head too much as I laughed. The snort set Mom off. She began to giggle too and grabbed my hand.
We both wiped our eyes and looked at each other, giggling again. She reached for the radio knob to turn up the quiet song I hadn’t even noticed. Paul McCartney’s voice filled the car. Mom began to sing and I didn’t say anything, even though the music was almost louder than I could bear and it was embarrassing, somehow, listening to her singing along with the radio even though there was no one else in the car.
The scenery slowly changed as we headed east. I read every single street sign I could see, as tourist shops met concrete with weeds shooting up from the cracks.
Every few hundred yards, there were billboards for All U Can Eat Seafood or Discount Theme Park Tickets. Chain restaurants and brightly painted hotels turned into beaten-up places with FOR RENT signs in the windows. It wasn’t pretty. There were homeless people, rednecks driving rusted-out trucks with confederate flag bumper stickers, tourists in rental cars getting lost and trying to pull U-turns, and strip malls with half the windows empty.
I glanced at Mom a few times. She has all these books about the history of Florida and what things were like when everything was first planned and built down here. I think she sees our town not as it is but as it was, when it was new and shiny and magical, and full of orange groves and newly planted palm trees and hotels built to look futuristic and amazing. When the news says something about yet another drug dealer getting shot on Orange Blossom Trail, or my school having abysmal test scores, or realtors cautioning people not to buy a condo in Crime Hills, she turns it off. She likes to talk about the year we had an annual pass to the Magic Kingdom, about the day I rode It’s a Small World fourteen times in a row and everything was perfect.
After about fifteen minutes crawling behind a pearl-colored Escalade, my mom steered the car into the driveway of our apartment building. It had eight doorbells, but I knew that only two other units had people in them. Snowbirds—old people from Minnesota—would come after Christmas and fill up two more. A terra cotta pot sat near the entrance. There were no flowers in it, but a scraggly palm tree grew in a square of dirt nearby.
The inside of our apartment was dark because the vertical blinds were drawn, to keep the heat out. I looked at the dirty dishes in the sink and the pile of waitressing aprons, and the college books with titles like Anthology of English Literature and Statistics stacked up on the kitchen table. My mom set the flowers that had been in my hospital room next to them. I felt uneasy again, even though I was glad to be out of the bright sunlight. Is this really it?
“I’m so glad you’re home, honey.” Mom pulled me close for a hug.
“It’s okay,” I said, pulling away. I’d reached my limit; I wanted silence. “I’m fine.”
She nodded and scurried around me, straightening up. “I got your favorite cinnamon rolls.” She opened the refrigerator and showed me a small plate of the thick, frosted dough from the diner on Emory Avenue. “I thought you’d be happy to have one after hospital food.”
“I ate hospital food?” I had no memory of hospital food.
“Um, yes. Well, a little. You didn’t like it. You’ve never liked bland food.” Mom looked disturbed, but shook it off. “Oh, Robin. You don’t…never mind.”
She cut one in half—they were pretty big—and we shared it, standing up in front of the sink like we were breaking the rules. It tasted extremely sweet to me, and not in a good way. I’d have to check one of those brain injury books later to see if whacked out taste buds were a symptom of brain damage. Was anything not a symptom?
“Thank you,” I said, hoping she didn’t notice I’d only eaten two bites. I remembered people liked the words thank you. I sounded too formal, like I was a guest.
“Any time,” She reached out to touch my face, as if she were making sure it was really there. I could tell she wanted to squeeze me for a couple of hours, but I edged away from the sink. Nausea rose up in my entire body and I worried I’d immediately reject the two bites.
“I think I’ll go to my room,” I said in an unsteady voice. Maybe in my bedroom, surrounded by my things, I’d feel better, less like I wanted to shatter into a thousand tiny, vomit-y pieces. “Where is it?” I whispered.
She didn’t hear me, but I found it. Our place was small. “I left it exactly the way it was,” Mom called. “And I didn’t touch your computer. I fed Zelda, though.” She wiped her hands on a towel hanging from the fridge handle. Zelda was my goldfish. She’d been alive for a record five months.
“Thanks. Mom?” I hesitated. “Um, does Dad know what happened?” I knew my voice was too loud, but I couldn’t help it.
“I don’t know where he is,” she said slowly and deliberately, like she didn’t want to be contradicted. “I haven’t heard from him in a long time. I’m sorry, sweetie. I tried his cell phone, but it said the number had been disconnected.”
I nodded and opened the door. My room was totally different than the rest of the apartment. It wasn’t dark, for one thing. The windows didn’t have regular blinds; they were covered in pretty, sheer silver panels. I saw my three floor lamps, but all I wanted at the moment were black-out curtains. The space was very clean, sterile even. There was a wooden dresser, a plain desk, and a twin bed made up with a dove gray comforter, corners tucked in. A huge pile of throw pillows covered almost the whole thing. I saw a spray bottle sitting on the window sill with a roll of paper towel next to it. The walls were mostly plain, except for two prints and a poster: Starry Night, Chagall’s Lovers in Moonlight, and Ryan Gosling in movie ad I’d taken from an out-of-business Blockbuster. On the desk—exactly in the middle—sat a closed white Macbook. Everything was perfect, and for the first time in two days, I felt calm. Yes. This is my place.
I had this theory that if you could see someone’s room, you could see their mind. Like, if they had a messy room, they probably had a disorganized brain. I’d always wanted to see the bedrooms of the boys I had crushes on, so I could understand them better. The thought made the corners of my mouth turn down. My room was neater than a military barracks but my brain was like a half-digested fruit salad. So much for that theory.
I sprinkled some food into Z’s bowl and leaned down to put my face as close to hers as possible. “I fell,” I whispered.
“I’ll leave you alone to rest, honey. Let me know if you need anything.” Mom turned my ceiling fan on low and retreated with one of Dr. K’s brain injury books.
I opened the closet. Jeans and a few pairs of leggings were hung neatly on white plastic hangers. A collection of hoodies and t-shirts were stacked in piles on the floor. The room began to spin. I put my hand on the desk chair to steady myself and pulled the comforter and pillows off of the bed. I was slightly out of breath, dizzy. My sun-wa
rmed skin was clammy. I put the comforter and pillows into the closet, pulled the sliding door mostly closed behind me, and fell asleep there, nestled among the dark piles of my clean clothes. I didn’t care if it was day or night. Time didn’t matter anymore.
CHAPTER 10
MAKE A LIST AND CHECK IT TWICE
A knock at my bedroom door startled me. I looked up from my computer.
Earlier, when I’d woken up from my nap and tried to take a shower, I couldn’t remember what to do once I got in there. I just stood under the water, staring at all the bottles, confused. It seriously freaked me out. I stood there until the hot water ran out, not knowing what to do. While I dried off, crying, I remembered what the doctor had said about writing notes to myself—carrying around instructions. But what the hell was I supposed to do, Google “tips for showering?”
That’s actually kind of what I did. I typed a list from what I found. It was one of the weirdest things I’ve ever done, and I’m a person who once ate an entire container of lemon frosting on a dare. Or did I see that on TV?
1) Get hair wet.
2) Rub shampoo in.
3) Rinse hair.
4) Put conditioner in.
5) Wait.
6) Rinse conditioner out.
7) Wash face.
8) Soap of rest of body with body wash and mesh sponge thing.
9) Rinse.
I didn’t want to tell Mom what had happened. I knew she’d insist on helping me and I would have to demand that she leave me alone, and try not to notice when she looked all sad. It was just easier to avoid her as much as possible like I always did.
I needed to find a way to laminate my shower list so that it wouldn’t get soggy in the bathroom steam. “Come in,” I said, pushing my desk chair back.
The door swung open slowly and Reno Weisman walked into my room. I smiled. I was happy to see him even though we hadn’t hung out in forever. He was tall, one year older than me, and had light brown hair that hung to his chin. His hazel eyes stared out at me from behind black-rimmed glasses. He’d always been super skinny, but I could see that he wasn’t any more. His shoulders were broad.
“Jesus, Robin.” Reno raked his hair back from his face. “Your mom called yesterday and told me what happened.” He pulled a chair out from the corner and sat down on it backward, just like he used to ages ago when we played Warcraft after school. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and looked at me.
“Yeah, it was kind of bad,” I nodded. It pleased me that he was shaken up. He got this crease between his eyebrows when he was really freaked out. I wanted to reach out and smooth it down for him.
“She said it might help if I came over, but I can leave if you want. If you’d rather sleep or be alone or whatever, I’ll just go.” Reno talked fast when he was nervous. I only caught the end part of what he’d said.
“Yeah, um, please stay,” I blinked. It was really decent of him to show up to visit me. I didn’t deserve it. I wondered if I would have gone to him if he’d been the one who’d gotten hurt. I doubted it, which made me feel itchy. “Thanks for coming,” I added in a whisper. I licked my lips and shut my computer. “I know it’s been awhile since we, um…”
He nodded. Reno was one of those people who didn’t make a big deal out of anything. It was either a relief or kind of annoying, depending on your mood. “Does your head hurt now? Did they drill a hole in your skull?”
“Yeah, but I’m on drugs. If I say something ridic, it’s the pills.” I turned so he could see the fresh bandage on the back of my head. “I can’t remember what happened the night we fell.”
“At all?”
“At all. But if you bust out the Memento references, I will punch you in the neck.” Reno was a huge Christopher Nolan fan and I really didn’t want to hear about it. “My memory’s not gone. It’s just that night that’s missing. I don’t know. There are, like, gaps, and all this weird visual stuff is happening to me. I fell.”
He pushed up his glasses and nodded. “I know you fell, Rob.” His eyes were very wide, as if he’d only just grasped how serious my injury was. “I’ve read about this. You’re like a football player who took an illegal tackle and got sent back into the game too soon, and pretty soon he’s telling you it’s 2006 and throwing up on your shoes.”
“I guess. I have been super nauseous.” I paused, trying to figure out what I wanted to ask. “Listen, do you know why we went to Fun Towne that night? Was Emily…do you know…” I felt my eyes tear up; I looked down quickly and wiped them with my fingers. I didn’t want to cry again. “There’s this thing I know I have to remember, something important, but I just can’t.” Did that make sense? Am I using the right words? I’d felt pretty good when they released me from the hospital, but now I was getting confused again.
“I have no clue, Robin. The last time we talked was, like, summer. Have you checked your e-mail? Phone? Facebook?” There was nothing interesting in my e-mail except for one message from Josie Palomino, this girl I’d never particularly liked even though we were technically friends. All it said was “Why aren’t you answering your phone? Call me. J.” I didn’t know where my phone was; I’d have to ask my mom if the paramedics had found it.
“My phone’s gone. I’m supposed to sleep all the time, and that’s all I want to do, but Emily’s in a coma and I’m losing it. I threw a box of Kleenex at my mom yesterday.” I noticed my foot was tapping like crazy. I stopped. Does everyone who hits their head feel like kicking holes in the drywall, or am I just special?
“Okay, okay. Wow. I’ll, uh…I’ll do some Googling around about triggering memories. I’ll figure something out.” Reno pulled out his phone and started thumbing it. “I don’t really see how you can help her if she’s in a coma, though.”
Tears spilled out of my eyes and Reno looked up. He seemed to shrink a little behind his glasses when he saw my face. “Sorry. Uh, I should probably go…or do you want me to…? Do you, um, need anything else?”
“I’ll be fine. I’m just going to get some sleep, I think. I fell.” I gestured toward the closet and he nodded. He stood up and moved backward out the door.
“I’ll text you later, Rob. It’s going to be okay. Don’t…it’s going to be okay. I know you fell.” He shut my door behind him as gently as humanly possible.
It’s going to be okay. That’s what everyone says when they really have no idea how it’s going to be.
CHAPTER 11
WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRENEMIES
Mom said no one had given her my cell phone the night of the accident, but that we could get a new one in the morning. In the meantime I’d have to use hers. I took a couple of deep breaths and punched in Josie’s number. It took me three tries.
“Hello?” The voice sounded pissed off, like my call had interrupted something. I pictured Josie in her grandma’s mobile home. I’d only been there a few times, when Emily and I first started hanging out. She lived in a park where only people over fifty-five were supposed to live, but I guess they’d made an exception for Josie and her older brother. She’d never said where her parents were.
“Hi, um, Josie?” My voice was barely above a whisper; I had no idea what to expect. I had practiced ahead of time, before I dialed, but I still felt unsure if I was saying the right thing.
“Who else would it be?”
“Um, I don’t know. This is Robin.” I traced the edge of the logo on my computer with my finger and concentrated.
“Oh my God. Are you out of the hospital?”
“Yes.” I bit my bottom lip tentatively. Maybe Josie wasn’t so bad. Maybe she actually cared.
“What the hell happened? When does Emily get out?”
“I...I don’t know. She won’t wake up and they wouldn’t let me visit her,” I said, frowning. “Do you know what happened?”
“What? I wasn’t there.” She sounded angry.
“It’s just…I’m really…I’m trying to figure out what happened and my head’s a mess,” I
said. “I guess I have a traumatic brain injury.”
“That’s weak, Saunders. Weak. You’d think you’d take better care of your best friend.” Josie wasn’t the type of girl who had a best friend. She had people who liked to drink vodka and smoke pot and didn’t know how to get it without her. But she was right. I was weak. “What are you going to do?”
“About what? I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, Josie. I feel the worst I’ve ever felt. I fell.” My head was pounding. It seemed like if I wasn’t asleep or trying not to puke or cry, I was letting a small army use the backs of my eyeballs for target practice.
“Everyone knows you fucking fell. I have to go.” She hung up.
I stared at the phone, fighting the urge to throw it.
She had said one thing that made sense to me, even though it made me feel a billion times worse that I already did: You’d think you’d take better care of your best friend.
You’d think.
CHAPTER 12
SCHOOL ME
“I think it’s too soon.” Mom crossed her arms. I noticed she looked old, even though we basically dressed alike in jeans and t-shirts. I think she maybe even owned a pair of leggings. She liked Forever 21 and H&M too. When I was a kid, I thought it was awesome. Now I thought she should find her own kind of clothes, because seeing her in the disposable crap I wore was depressing.
Anyway. She looked old. I supposed that was my fault.
“It’s not too soon. I have to go back.” It had only been a little longer than two weeks since the accident, but I had to help Emily. I thought that maybe if I went back to school, I might be able to figure out what was nagging at me. My new cognitive therapist, Katie Jo, said it was probably okay. I was able to unscramble words of up to six letters and read two pages at a time and answer questions about what I’d read. She warned me that school would be exhausting, that I would have to concentrate much harder than I ever had before (palm trees concentrate harder than I had before). She said she’d help me make sense of everything if I took good notes and brought my text books to our sessions.
