Off the Page

by Jodi Picoult

  My heart is pounding so hard I can barely hear the woman’s response. “Okay, listen, I’m going to put you on hold for one second. I’m going to get an ambulance on its way to you, and then I’m going to come back and stay on the line with you until they get there.”

  I kneel down, afraid to touch Jessamyn, equally afraid to leave her alone. I wish Delilah were here; she would know what to do. I wish Edgar were here.

  I wish it were anyone but just me.

  “Sir, are you still there?” the woman says. “The ambulance is on its way. What’s your name?”

  “Oliver,” I answer, realizing too late that in my panic, I’ve given the wrong answer. “Edgar.”

  “Oliver Edgar, do you hear any sirens yet?”

  As if she has willed them, there is a wailing outside the door, and a firm, pounding knock. “They’re here.”

  “Go answer the door,” the woman tells me. “They’ll take care of your mom.”

  But isn’t that my job? Isn’t that what I promised Edgar I’d do?

  Within seconds, two uniformed men have Jessamyn lifted onto a rolling bed and wheeled it into the back of a tremendous van. “Can you follow us to the hospital in your car?” one of them asks.

  “I—I don’t know how to drive,” I stammer.

  “You can ride up front,” he says, and he hops into the rear with Jessamyn.

  There are flashing red lights as the van zooms and whines down back roads to a building I’ve never seen before: ST. BRIGID MEMORIAL HOSPITAL.

  The men rush Jessamyn, still strapped to the bed, into the building. I run behind them, but as they are about to go through a set of double doors, a woman dressed in blue pajamas pulls me aside. “Are you her son?”

  “Yes.” I try to see through the glass as Jessamyn grows farther and farther away.

  “You can’t go in there,” she tells me. “The doctors will help your mom. I’m going to bring you to the waiting room, and someone will come get you as soon as we know more about her condition.” She looks at me kindly. “Is there anyone you’d like me to call?”

  “Yes,” I say, without hesitation. “Delilah McPhee.”

  She holds on to me so tightly, our fingers twined together, that I can almost believe we’re one person joined at the hands. “I’ve never felt like this before,” I whisper. “Really, truly scared.”

  Delilah looks up at me. “She’s going to be okay, Oliver.”

  “But you can’t be sure,” I point out. “I thought never knowing what’s going to happen next was a good thing, but I guess that’s not always true.” I lean my head back against the wall and close my eyes. “I’m useless.”

  “Oliver—”

  “I mean it. I didn’t know what to do when I found her. I don’t know anything about doctors or hospitals. If she hadn’t woken up, what would have happened?”

  “You would have called me.”

  I look at her. “You can’t be there to clean up my messes every time,” I say. “Let’s be honest, Delilah, I’m not Edgar. It’s not going to be long before everyone finds that out.”

  The woman in pajamas—no, rather, they’re scrubs, or so Delilah informed me—comes back to the waiting room. “Your mom’s asking for you,” she says, smiling.

  Delilah squeezes my arm. “I told you so. I’ll be right here.”

  I follow the nurse down the bleached white hallway and enter a room on the right, hesitantly drawing back a pink curtain to reveal Jessamyn, looking small and pale, propped up against pillows. There is a bandage at her temple.

  “Mom,” I say, and she holds out her arms.

  I fall into them with relief. This is not my mother, but in this moment, she feels like it. “What happened?” I ask, my voice muffled against the spotted nightgown she is wearing.

  “I’m fine, Edgar. I fainted, that’s all, and I happened to hit my head on the way down.”

  “You fainted?” I say, seizing on the most important words of the sentence. “Why? Are you ill?”

  “I was so busy today I completely forgot to eat,” Jessamyn says, dismissing my concern. “Honestly, it was silly and stupid of me. I’m fine.”

  “So we can go home now?” I ask. After this day—with the message from the book, and Frump’s arrival, and Jessamyn’s injury—all I want is normal back.

  “Well, they have to keep me overnight,” she admits. “It’s protocol.”

  “I’ll stay with you,” I say. “I’ll skip school tomorrow.”

  “You’re not getting out of class that easily.” Jessamyn smiles. “It’s going to be incredibly boring. Doctors running tests and me watching endless Spanish soap operas. Although . . . how will you get home?”

  “Delilah’s in the waiting room,” I say. “She can drive me.”

  Her face relaxes as she sinks back against the pillows. “Do you think her mother would let you stay at her house tonight? I’d feel better knowing I don’t have to worry about you being alone.”

  “I guess.”

  Her eyes drift shut. “Good,” she sighs. “I love you, Edgar.”

  I lean down to kiss her cheek, but she is already asleep. “I’m sorry I’m not who you needed me to be,” I whisper, and I slip out of the room.

  I stand beside Delilah awkwardly as her mother hands me a stack of towels. “Thanks, Mrs. McPhee,” I say.

  “It’s not a problem, Edgar. You’re welcome to stay as long as you need.” She pauses. “And if there’s anything I can do for your mother, just let me know.”

  I nod, but I can’t imagine how Mrs. McPhee, who works all day long, would have any time to run errands.

  She’s set me up in the guest bedroom, which is three doors down from Delilah’s. I must admit, knowing that she’s going to be so close to me will make it terribly hard to sleep.

  “Good night,” Mrs. McPhee says, and as she starts to leave, Frump dashes between her legs and hops up on the narrow bed. “Humphrey!” she scolds. “Down!”

  “Oh, it’s all right,” I answer. “I wouldn’t mind some company tonight.”

  “Better the dog than my daughter,” Mrs. McPhee murmurs.

  “Mom!” Delilah cries.

  “Say good night, Delilah,” her mother replies. She waits with her arms crossed, and it’s perfectly clear that she’s going nowhere without Delilah. I must admit, I’m a bit offended. But then again, she doesn’t realize her daughter’s boyfriend is a prince who would never compromise his true love’s reputation.

  Delilah leans up and pecks my cheek. “Sleep tight,” she says, and she follows her mother out of the guest room.

  I strip down to my boxers and crawl beneath the covers. Frump sits up and cocks his head, and I scratch between his ears. “Some pair we are,” I sigh. “Lost in translation. Maybe instead of thinking of all the good that could come from escaping that fairy tale, we should have spent a bit of time considering the aftereffects. You can’t talk, and I can barely get through the day without messing something up.” My mind flashes back to an image of Jessamyn lying on the floor. “She was so still,” I whisper. “And there was so much blood. It’s different here. It’s a world of permanence. Consequences stick. You can’t just turn a page and have the sword wound heal. For heaven’s sake, Rapscullio falls nine stories in the climax and walks away without a scratch as soon as the book is closed. Here, cuts bleed and bodies break and there are no second chances.”

  Frump opens his mouth as if he is about to respond, but all that emerges is a whimper.

  “I promised Edgar I’d take care of Jessamyn for him. Clearly I’m doing a rotten job. Yet once I tell Edgar what happened to her, surely he’ll want to switch back. And that would break Delilah’s heart.”

  Frump puts his paw on my arm. For a moment, we just look at each other, and it doesn’t really matter that he can’t speak, because I know exactly what he would say if he could. Oliver, he’d tell me, tomorrow’s bound to be better.

  I flop back onto the pillows, crossing my arms behind my head. Frump curls into a don
ut against my side and harrumphs into the covers.

  I imagined a perfect life. I thought that escaping the book meant every dream I’d ever had would come true. But dreams, it seems, have costs. For every person you make happy, there’s another one you disappoint. Sometimes I wonder—if Queen Maureen or Captain Crabbe were to see me in school, with my new clothes and my friends, would they even recognize me? Would I want them to?

  Outside, the moon is a silver sliver. Every night, the shadow eats a slice of it, until it’s nothing but this hollow rind. I feel the same way; with each day, I lose a little more of myself.

  Frump snores in his sleep, his legs twitching, as if he’s chasing Seraphima. Carefully I draw back the covers and slip out of bed, padding down the hall until I am standing in the dark outside Delilah’s bedroom door.

  I turn the knob as silently as possible and slip inside.

  She is lying on her back, her dark hair fanned across the sheets, like a mermaid’s underwater. Her skin reflects the moonlight, and the covers are tangled at her feet. She’s wearing a T-shirt that seems to have swallowed her whole.

  When you see the sunrise every morning, you get used to it. You forget to gasp at the mixing of the colors, at the way the sun’s rays spill over the mountains and light the ocean on fire.

  Being with Delilah every day, I’ve forgotten how absolutely stunning she is.

  Delilah’s eyes open slowly and she jumps, nearly levitating on the bed. “Holy crap, Oliver,” she says. “You scared the hell out of me!”

  I take a step backward. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I just— Why are you staring at me like that?”

  “You’re not wearing any clothes. . . .”

  I glance down, mortified to realize I forgot to dress before leaving my room. “I’m so sorry. I’ll go—”

  “No!” Delilah says, swallowing. “This is good. Very good.”

  I hide my smile and sit down on the bed. “I couldn’t sleep.”

  Delilah scoots, making room for me to lie down beside her. I curl onto my side, facing her, so we are inches apart.

  “Sometimes when people have insomnia, they count sheep,” she tells me.

  I frown. “Who keeps a herd in the house?”

  “No, it’s a metaphor. The point is to just count something. When I was little, my mom had me count my blessings.”

  I think about that for a moment. Then I roll over, pinning Delilah to the mattress. I can feel her heartbeat speed. I wind my fingers through hers and whisper in her ear. “Number one,” I say, “your hands.” Then I drop a kiss on each eyelid. “Number two,” I say, “your beautiful eyes.” I slide my hands down her arms and slip them beneath the hem of her oversized shirt, spreading my palms across the small of her back. “Number three . . . your soft skin.”

  I nibble my way from her collarbone to her jaw, and she sighs. “Number four,” I say, “the sound of your voice.”

  I trace her lower lip with my thumb. “Number five . . . your mouth.”

  And then I kiss her.

  Delilah’s lips move under mine, as if we are speaking the same secret. I break away only when there’s no more breath to share, and bury my face in the curve of her neck. “I love you so much.”

  Her hands play over my shoulders. “When you say that to me . . . I feel like I’m flying.”

  With a groan I roll onto my side, curling my body around hers. I slip my arm beneath her waist and pull her tight against me, her back to my front. “I’ll never let you fall,” I promise.

  Two days after Jessamyn’s return from the hospital, we celebrate with a meal she calls “takeout” that is a collection of delicious foods from a foreign land. Although she doesn’t seem to have much of an appetite, I can’t stop eating. “I have never tasted anything so delectable in my life,” I say, mopping up sauce with flatbread and stuffing it in my mouth.

  “Really,” Jessamyn muses. “Most of the time when I want Indian, you fight me to the death for Chinese instead.”

  “Perhaps my taste buds are evolving.”

  “Hmm,” she says, raising a brow. “Who are you, and what have you done with my son?”

  My blood runs cold. Has she figured it out?

  Then Jessamyn laughs. “Does this mean I can start cooking brussels sprouts too?”

  What the devil is a brussels sprout? I force a smile. “Let’s take it slowly,” I suggest.

  I watch Jessamyn pour herself another drink of water. I’ve been watching her carefully since she’s come home, as if her bones are made of glass and the slightest bump might shatter her whole. But with the exception of a small bandage on her temple, she seems to be her usual self.

  Not that I’m entirely sure what that is.

  I know I need to tell Edgar what happened to his mother—that she was in the hospital overnight. And I’m not holding the truth back from him, honestly. It’s just that I want to wait until I’m able to give him good news—to tell him his mother is fine.

  I want to be 100 percent certain.

  Jessamyn begins closing up the ingenious little boxes that hold the food. “How about we watch a movie after dinner? Do you want to pick?” she asks.

  One shelf in the living room is devoted to small folders containing disks that—like Orville’s potion for the future—project a moving image onto the television screen. I’ve watched a few with Delilah. I let my finger trail over pictures of robots and aliens, which all seem to have numbers in the title, and finally come across one that looks much more palatable.

  I hand the movie to Jessamyn, who takes it and smirks. “Very funny.”

  “What? It looks rather interesting.”

  “The Princess Bride?” she says. “The last time I suggested watching this, you said you’d rather cut off your own leg with a rusty spoon.”

  “Well . . . I thought you might like it,” I say, holding my breath.

  She smiles up at me. “Oh, the sacrifices a son is willing to make.”

  We settle on the couch, shoulder to shoulder, queueing up the film. Jessamyn has scooped us each a bowl of ice cream (which, frankly, is one thing this world has going for it that puts the fairy tale to shame. And here I thought “melt in your mouth” was simply figurative language).

  “It’s hard to believe that in a year, you’ll be going off to college,” Jessamyn muses.

  I turn to her, horrified. “What if I don’t want to go anywhere?”

  “Edgar, since you were ten, you’ve dreamed of going to the University of Southern California to major in video game design.”

  Thanks to social studies class, I know that California is about as far away from New Hampshire as one can go in this kingdom without falling into an ocean. If I thought Delilah and I were separated when she was here and I was merely on Cape Cod, how could I ever withstand this distance?

  “I can’t leave here.”

  Jessamyn puts her arm around me. “Edgar, we’ve been through this. You shouldn’t be worrying about me. What would make me happiest is knowing that you’re following your dreams.”

  But my dreams have changed, now that I’m not Edgar.

  Because I don’t know what to say, I grab my spoon and start shoveling chocolate ice cream into my mouth.

  I am halfway finished with the contents of the bowl when I realize Jessamyn is staring at me as if she has never seen me before. “When,” she asks, “did you become a lefty?”

  “What am I going to do?” I ask Delilah, pacing in front of my locker. “She knows I’m not her son. She wants me to go to California, for God’s sake. . . .” When Delilah doesn’t offer even a word of encouragement or support, I turn to her. “What’s wrong with you today, anyway?”

  Delilah rubs her eyes. She looks like she’s been locked in a pirate’s brig all night, not that I’m going to tell her that. “I got, like, two hours of sleep,” she says. “Frump is refusing to eat kibble, which means I had to prepare a gourmet meal after my mom went to bed. And he snores. Like, super loud. And every time I tried t
o take the sheets away from him, he actually kicked me.”

  “Wait, what?” I say, my head snapping around. “He slept with you? In the same bed?”

  “Yes. Just like Humphrey did. Remember? You’re not the only one with the hidden identity!”

  “I’ve seen what you wear when you sleep.”

  “He’s just an animal, Oliver!”

  I grit my teeth. “Exactly.”

  A grin breaks over Delilah’s face. “Someone’s jealous.” She leans closer to me. “And you know what else? I’ve seen him naked.”

  I frown. “Not funny,” I say, slamming my locker. It’s been two days since Frump arrived. “Have you heard anything from Orville?”

  “No. Frump and I opened the book last night, and he’s still working on a remedy.”

  I consider this, and Delilah tilts her head. “What are you thinking?”

  “That maybe we should fashion a pair of pants for Frump in the meantime.”

  “I’m pretty sure my mom would notice,” Delilah says. “Honestly, Oliver? He’s really not my type.”

  Only slightly mollified, I look down. “Then maybe you could wear pants to bed,” I suggest.

  Delilah turns, about to lecture me, but she is interrupted by the arrival of Chris, who needs to get into his locker. “I’m so glad you guys are both here,” he says. “I need your advice.”

  Chris looks at Delilah. “You know your friend Jules?”

  “What about her?”

  “I was kind of thinking of asking her out. . . .”

  Delilah’s eyes widen. “Really?”

  “Yeah, except for one thing. She scares the hell out of me.”

  “Why?”

  “Just yesterday,” Chris says, “I watched her make Mrs. Jacon cry in homeroom, telling her that by taking her new husband’s name she was a disappointment to the female sex.”

  “Jules may be tough, but trust me, she has a soft side. She cried twice watching Titanic.”

  “I cried four times,” Chris murmurs.

  “Perhaps we should all go courting together.”