by Lacy Camey
“Let’s just focus on saving this man’s life.”
“Of course, absolutely.”
“Grab my walkie-talkie out of my back pocket and get the doctor’s attention.”
“They have—” I began.
“The other walkie-talkie. Yes. We gave it to them when you hadn’t come out of your shower in forty-five minutes.”
My hand was shaking as we made our way back into the jungle.
“Do you know where to go?”
“I have a photographic memory, hence the reason I work for your family,” Vinny said.
No doubt he was telling the truth.
I pushed the button on the walkie-talkie. “Urgent! Urgent! Logan’s been bit by a poisonous spider. Get all necessary shots, injections, and materials ready, he seems unconscious. Oxygen masks, recitation . . . I . . . please hurry. Over.”
Static.
“Roger that,” I heard one of the doctor’s answer.
The walk back to orphanage was one giant blur. When we finally made it to the small dirt road that led to the orphanage, fresh tears poured down my cheeks.
We made it.
There would be time.
I ran as fast as I could into the medical headquarters.
I saw Norah and Maycee near the fountain, who froze when they saw me and ran as equally fast towards me.
I flung open the door and saw that Dr. Richards and Peter had an array of shots lined up, as well as a life resuscitator.
Please God, don’t let them have to use that.
I didn’t say anything to them. My face said it all. I opened the door and waited for Steve and Vinny to make their way. They brushed past me with their giant bodies as Logan hung limp in their arms.
As soon as he lay on the operating table the doctors went to work administering injections to counteract the venom.
“Logan, you’re going to be just fine. Chloe did a fantastic job keeping you stable,” Peter said. I stood taking it all in, arms crossed. Norah and Maycee made their way quietly in the room and stood behind me. Norah put her hand on my shoulder.
“I am so sorry,” she whispered.
“Ladies, this isn’t a spectacle. This is serious. We need privacy.”
Maycee shook her head and grabbed Norah and made their way out the door.
“I’m not leaving. I’m not leaving him,” I said.
“Fine. It might get pretty intense.”
“Vitals!” Dr. Kingston shouted.
“He’s slipping!”
Then I saw the very thing I’ve only seen in movies and television but never in real life. Defibrillation.
“Clear.”
I saw Logan’s body jilt from the electricity as I sobbed like a baby.
“Please, Logan. Stay with us,” I said.
“Vitals!”
“Nothing!”
“Clear.”
Steve and Vinny stood looking grave with their heads down as Vinny came near me and provided the kindest gesture towards me—his left hand on my shoulder.
I lowered my head and silently prayed as my eyes closed tightly for dear life. God couldn’t take such a great man, such a great man who had a full life ahead of him.
I heard the jilting electricity once more and could smell the burning of his soft skin.
“Stable,” Peter said.
“Heart rate coming back. Appears to be in a coma.”
“Yeah,“ I said, quietly as a mouse. “His body’s allergic.”
The doctors didn’t say anything but worked with every fiber of them to get him stable.
All the while, Logan laid there like an angel with his eyes closed. I wondered if he had an out of body experience and if he were floating in the ceiling. Did he go to Heaven? Did he see a bright light? Was he there already? I didn’t want him to leave.
Vinny gently nudged me and said, “Come on. Let’s get you into fresh clothes. Your father’s waiting for your phone call. They’re on their way.”
I shook my head standing there, feeling in a daze. “I’m not leaving his side until my father himself drags me out of here.”
They shared a glance and Vinny grabbed a chair nearby and offered for me to sit down as Steve sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, shaking his head. I lowered myself in the chair feeling completely numb and in shock.
Had this all really transpired?
Logan, in a coma? My parents on their way in their private jet to order me home?
“Chloe,” Steve said quietly. “You’re father is waiting to hear from you. You musn’t keep him.”
I sighed a long drawn out sigh.
He was right.
At least I didn’t have to talk to my mother.
As I stepped outside, the night had slowly descended. The children were likely oblivious to what was going on with Logan. Maycee and Norah stood with arms crossed, talking. When they saw me they both embraced me.
“We thought you were dead!” Norah said with tears in her eyes.
I shook my head.
“Have to get another phone since this one’s ruined from water damage. Don’t move an inch,” Steve ordered.
“What happened?” Norah asked.
I really didn’t want to get into it.
I shook my head. “Want to know? You’ll find out when I have to explain to my father who’s on his way right now to get me. I’m so sorry. I know this isn’t exactly what you two were planning on when I asked you to come to Venezuela with me.”
“Don’t even begin to apologize,” Norah ordered. “You stepped out and did something for yourself for once.”
“Yeah.” I just nodded. “Now let’s just wait and see what my father thinks.”
I didn’t have to wait long. Like a speed walker on a mission of burning excess body fat, Steve walked holding a phone to his ear, nodding. Grim.
Great.
I breathed in and out into my fist like someone does on an airplane with too much turbulence in effort to avoid tossing their cookies. I wasn’t sure if I could face talking to my parents, especially my mother.
Norah and Maycee stared at me with the look of
Glad it’s you and not me.
Steve handed me the phone and I simply stared at it, hands shaking, wondering how this was going to go.
I didn’t have to wonder for too long because I heard my mother’s hysterical voice, “Hello? Hello? Chloe Banks? Answer this phone right now, this instant. Steve said you were there.”
I held the phone to my ear.
“Of course it’s her, Richard. Steve said he was bringing the phone to her. No, I want to talk to my daughter,” I heard her saying to my father.
Gulp.
“Hi,” I said weakly.
“Oh, good heavens, Chloe! Your father is a very busy man. You know how much stress he’s under. How much stress I am under. Do you know the media has caught wind of this and now I’m going to have to spin the story to spare humiliation to our family?”
To spare humiliation of your friends who lunch.
I thought to myself—I could literally just drop the phone and pick it back up in ten minutes and she would still be saying the same thing over and over but in different ways, different voice inflections.
Yes, I know I’m an embarrassment to her.
No, I’m fine, Mother, really. Just had a concussion. Could have died. But don’t worry about me. I carried the imaginary conversation in my mind as she blabbed.
Bleakly I said, “Just what story will you spin, Mother?”
“That you were being courted of course by the Prince and—” I heard a rustle over the phone and static as it sounded as if my father took the phone from her.
“Chloe. I was worried sick. Thank God you’re alive.”
My loving father. My logical father. My father who lives on Earth and not some fantasy planet that clearly my mother was from.
“Steve said they had you for a few hours. Are you all right? Are you harmed? Did—”
“They? What do you mean? What
are you talking about?” I cut in.
“Word is you were taken hostage.”
“What? Is that what Steve told you? Dad, that’s not even true!” I blurted out. I glared at Steve. He looked down at his feet with his thick arms crossed.
“Why did you tell him that?” I asked Steve.
“Look, honey, we’ll talk about all of that when we get there and straighten it all out in about six hours. I’m just happy to hear that you’re alive and unharmed. Thank God. Was worried sick.”
“Dad, you don’t have to come. It’s really all my fault. Please. I need to stay here. I need to finish my time here. I need to make sure Logan’s all right.”
“I told her she should have never gone. She’s just embarrassing us with her silly antics of wanting to be normal! Do you know how many women would kill to live in her shoes?” my mother scorned in the background.
“Which is exactly why I want to stay here. Clearly,” I said to my father, no shame in saying.
“Understood. Feel the same way ninety-nine percent of the time about your mother,” my dad said. “Look, just get some rest. Steve also tells me you had a concussion.”
“Steve. About Steve . . . . ”
There was silence. But only a split second as my mother continued to yap insistently about Elenanor’s daughter who just married one of Forbes most eligible bachelors, a billionaire who wasn’t even thirty yet. Why couldn’t I be more like Eleanor’s daughter? Where had she gone wrong in raising me?
My mother was unbelievable.
“You might want to start packing your bags and saying your goodbyes. I do not plan staying there but for a brief pickup. Brief. As in minutes. I can’t afford allowing the press to get in the way.”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s a situation bordering Venezuela with drug lords and CNN is there reporting. If they catch wind, a few of their reporters will be there in a heartbeat.”
I sighed deeply, feeling sick and faint.
“But the good news is you’re safe and sound. And we’re coming to get you. I’ve got to run. Last minute briefing, unless you would like to speak to your mother.”
“Yes, Richard. Give me that phone this instant. I’m not through talking with her!” I heard my mother say.
“Uh, Dad. It’s fine. I better go. See you.”
“Right. Understood. Love you. Bye.”
“What? Why are you hanging—” I heard mother’s voice.
I hung up and looked at Maycee and Norah’s faces.
“Y’all are so lucky,” I said quietly as fresh tears poured down my face. They both embraced me.
“It’s going to be okay. You’re probably so exhausted from all that’s happened which heightens everything.” Norah ran her fingers through my almost dry hair.
I sobbed as if I just found out I had a terminal illness and there was no cure. I felt hopeless and helpless.
“It’s just not as easy as everyone thinks. Being here, when I was lost, I never felt so free.” I was now hiccupping. “It felt great.” I pulled away and wiped my tears.
Norah said, “Someone profound once told me, ‘Life’s not always peaches and roses. It’s how you handle the thorns in life.’”
I had said that to her when she was dealing with her horrible breakup.
But it wasn’t comforting to me at all.
“It’s not that easy, Norah. I can’t just go back to my life and fit the mold my mother so desperately wants me to fill. I don’t belong in her world she’s creating for me. I don’t want to marry a Prince. I don’t want to marry a billionaire.”
Maycee looked shocked as if to say, “Heck, I would.” Most people say that but really didn’t see the tears and loneliness behind the grand walls.
“I don’t want to live a life that’s not me. I’m very much tempted right now to march right back into that jungle and never be seen again,” I said in desperation.
“I understand,” Norah nodded slowly.
“And you! Steve! You scared the wits out my parents with that false account of what really happened. Why?” I understood, sort of, I guess. He lied to save his job. But I would have helped him salvage it. He should have let me help him. Now I doubted he would have a job much longer for lying.
“You wouldn’t have lost your job you know. I’m very persuasive. But now the whole world will think something that’s not true.”
He didn’t speak.
“Let’s just try and make the best of your remaining hours here,” Norah said, trying to take control of the situation.
My thoughts immediately went back to Logan and I shook my head. “I’m not leaving his side until they come. He’s in a coma. All because of me. It’s all my fault.”
Never had I felt so low.
Chapter Thirteen
“Chloe, goodness. Get a grip. You’re internalizing everything,” Maycee said in her tell it like it is way, which I knew I needed to hear at that moment. “This isn’t all your fault,” she continued.
But wasn’t it? Wasn’t it all my fault? It sure felt like it.
“The whole world is watching! I’m a laughing stock—again!”
“Again?” Norah asked. “What do you mean?”
I reached with both hands and clasped the back of my neck, lowering my chin to my chest and took in a deep breath. I closed my eyes and exhaled, bidding the hundred pounds of brick on my chest to go away. But they did not. I opened my eyes and Norah and Maycee looked at me with looks of sudden fright.
“You don’t look so good,” Norah reached for my arm to steady me since I was swaying. But as she reached for me I was already making my way down to the ground, but Steve swiftly caught me.
“What’s happening to me? I feel like I’m having a heart attack,” I said in total panic. Wasn’t I too young to have a heart attack? Was I, too, having a poisonous reaction from something?
Steve gently lifted me to my feet. I grabbed my chest and fought to breathe.
“Chloe, are you okay?” Norah looked horrified.
Steve swept me in his arms and carried me towards the medical quarters as I fought to get out of his arms.
The door opened—I guessed Norah opened it—and I was laid on a cot. I tried to sit up but couldn’t. The room was spinning.
“Panic attack,” I heard Steve say.
Peter rushed to my side and put his hand on my forehead. “Chloe. It’s Peter. I need to you breathe in slowly and try and calm down.”
I couldn’t breathe.
“I–I . . . can’t. Can’t.”
“She’s hysterical,” I heard Norah say in complete worry to Maycee.
Help. I can’t breathe.
“We don’t have any Xanax. She just needs to calm down.”
Trying to calm down, I heard myself think.
“Well, can’t you just give her anything? Something? Knock her out. She needs to rest, poor thing,” Norah said.
Peter looked worried as he looked around the room. He scratched the back of his neck. “We just need to get her to relax.”
“Are you sure it’s a panic attack and not a heart attack?” Maycee asked in the same heightened concern.
I wasn’t sure what was happening to me. I’d never had a panic attack before, if that was indeed what was happening. But I felt like I was about to die.
“Can’t you, like, inject a sleeping pill via a shot?” Norah asked.
“I’m not exactly a psychiatrist. She just needs to breathe.”
“Breathe, Chloe,” Norah said loudly as if I were giving birth to a baby. “Try and calm down,” she said louder as if I were deaf or illiterate.
But I couldn’t calm down. I couldn’t bear the pressure of seeing my mom, facing the press, going home. I wanted to stay here in Venezuela and make sure Logan woke up.
I tried with every thread in me to finish a sentence but I just couldn’t. I tried desperately to sit up but couldn’t.
“Administer anything. Something,” Steve said.
