CHAPTER 26
Austin
I don’t think twice about it. When I get her text, I bolt out of bed, slip on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, and jump on my motorcycle. Forget the morning workout. Somehow, I’ll be ready for football this fall.
I speed down the street, annoyed with traffic. I start weaving through cars. Shouldn’t drive like this. I hate this feeling, like I’m walking on a tight wire. One wrong step, one wrong turn, and all my plans for football could crumble. So much is expected this fall, I can’t get injured.
But I couldn’t sleep last night—couldn’t sleep. I always sleep. But there I lay in bed all night, thinking about how things went down with Sienna.
I park my motorcycle and jog across the street to the beach. Scan the horizon. I grab my cell from my pocket and pull up the last message.
Meet me by the pier?
I look up, shielding my eyes from the sun, and I see her.
She starts jogging toward me and so do I, the small outline of her figure in the distance coming slowly into focus. A smile lights up her face as we meet, and I wrap my arms around her.
“You got my message,” she says. I hold her, kiss her forehead.
She pulls back. “I’m sorry, Austin. I was so angry.”
“You had a right to be.”
“I took it out on you. I—”
I kiss her before she can say more. “Seriously, you have nothing to be sorry about,” I say, our lips a breath apart.
“But your friends—”
“They deserved a whole lot more flack than you gave them.”
“Are they gone?”
“They will be, soon.”
She wears a thoughtful frown. “Can you tell them for me? Can you tell them I forgive them?”
Her words hit me from the side, unexpected. “They don’t deserve that.”
“But it’s what my dad would have wanted.” She heaves a deep sigh. “It’s what I want. Tell them for me, okay?”
I sense her mind is made up. Impressive. Hard to believe, really. Seeing her contented smile makes me think twice about what I would have done in her shoes. “Sure, I’ll tell them.”
“And Austin?” she asks, making sure she has my attention. “One more thing.”
I clasp my hands at the small of her back. She hasn’t even voiced the question, yet I already know I’ll do anything she asks. Pathetic. I’ve turned into one of those lovesick puppies we all used to make fun of in the gym. “What is it?”
She bites her lip, thinking. Finally she looks up and meets my gaze. “Take me to see that professor?”
CHAPTER 27
Sienna
Performing onstage is one thing, but this? I look up as the professor takes a seat across from me. This kind of spotlight I hate. But fainting in the closet five days ago made me realize, once again, that I have . . . issues. No way to put it lightly. So here I am. Ready.
Brian is covering for me, again. My mom thinks I’m playing the weekly Friday morning volleyball game on the beach with him and his friends and having lunch at his house afterward, not sitting across from Dr. Diane Kovac, a University of Florida professor in the Department of, yep, Mental Health Counseling. Maybe I’m not so ready for this after all.
She situates herself in the rocking chair, eyeing me over rectangular glasses. I divert my gaze, glancing around the living room. Professor Kovac took a weekend trip to St. Simons Island, Georgia. She insisted we come to her condo, which was a much shorter drive for us anyway.
So I straddled Austin’s motorcycle, and together we made the hour and a half drive down Georgia’s coast to this quaint little island. I almost wish we had driven to Florida, so I could see the campus where Austin will be spending all his time. I feel a sliver of remorse (and a healthy dose of envy) thinking about the life he’ll have this fall without me in it. And all the girls that are bound to flock his way. Not cool.
“So,” the professor starts, pulling my thoughts back. “Austin told me you’ve been having dizzy spells of one sort or another.”
I straighten up, an effort to hide my nerves. “Yes. Thank you for meeting us so last minute, Ms. Kovac.”
“Dr. Kovac,” she corrects me with a flourish, her thin lips pulling into a tight smile. Sheesh. “Well, let me start by telling you what I do. I am a professor of behavioral health. I can’t make any official diagnosis, and I can’t give you any prescriptions. But I hope to help you find the cause of your fainting so you can go from there.” She pauses, flashes a nominal smile. I barely have a chance to nod before she pushes on. “Tell me, when was the first time you fainted, and how many times have you fainted since?”
I briefly mention the first time, nearly three weeks ago, as well as the subsequent times I fainted, a total of five.
“And you have no prior history of fainting or seizures?”
“No.”
“Do you tremble or have convulsions while you are passed out?”
I stare at her blankly. Convulsions? How am I supposed to know if I convulse? In fact, I’ve never even thought about it.
“Yes,” Austin answers for me. I look over sharply. He slips his hand into mine and offers it a reassuring squeeze. “I’ve been there three of the times she passed out. Each time she was shaking. A little.”
Dr. Kovac jots something down on a notepad. “I see.”
I watch her silently taking notes, feeling like a patient in an operating room with my chest cut open, doctors poking around inside muttering “I see” and “Hum, how interesting,” without bothering to explain. “What does that mean?”
Dr. Kovac looks up at me above the rim of her glasses. “It means, most likely, you are having seizures of some type.”
Suddenly, I feel sick. “Seizures?”
“Let me ask you something, Miss Owens.” The way she addresses me by my last name only feeds my unease. I remind myself she’s a professor, not a therapist who’s trained to make patients feel comfortable. “Do you have any history of epilepsy in your family?”
“No.”
Her brows pull together as she jots a few notes. “Do you remember the minutes and even seconds preceding your seizures?”
“Yes,” I reply. Do I tell her everything, how each time before I fainted I was reminded of my dad and the accident?
“How do you feel before you pass out? Do you experience any difficulty breathing, for instance?”
I meet her gaze because she nailed one of my symptoms dead-on. “Yes.”
“A cold sweat?”
“Yes.”
“Trembling in your arms or legs?”
“Yes.”
“Palpitations?”
“What’s that?”
“Can you feel your heart pounding?” She rephrases it.
I hesitate to answer in the affirmative, because she’s narrowing in on what my problem is and I’m suddenly terrified to find out. “Yes.”
“What were you doing before the first and subsequent times you passed out?”
I loosen my grip on Austin’s hand, my palms a sweaty mess. “The first time I was in my living room, the second time I was watching fireworks, the third time I was afraid Austin was drowning in the ocean, the fourth time Austin’s friends were driving their motorcycles, and the fifth”—I pause, quickly thinking of a roundabout way to phrase it—“I was looking at a binder of pictures.”
“Pictures?”
Here we go. “Of my dad.”
Dr. Kovac jots a few notes, then glances up, looking confused. “Do you have a fear of drowning, Miss Owens?”
I swallow at least three times, my throat a wall of sandpaper. “Um, yeah.” A bit of an understatement.
Her lips twitch to one side, her eyelids narrowing. “And what exactly were you doing in the living room, the first time you passed out?”
I try to swallow, but I give up. “Looking at a picture of me and my dad,” I croak out.
A hint of insight replaces the question mark in Dr. Kovac’s eyes. Removing her glasse
s, she leans forward. “Where is your father now, Miss Owens?”
Austin tightens his grip on my hand. “He died,” I say, and my heart hammers the pain of these words throughout my body.
I see the connection being made on Dr. Kovac’s face. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Really, what do people expect me to say to that?
“Let me ask you, hun, did your father drown, by chance?”
I nod reluctantly, a knot of raw emotions burning my throat. “On the Fourth of July, last year.”
Dr. Kovac lets out a deep breath with a frown. “That explains the fireworks.”
I clear my throat, forcing away the tears I’ll never cry again. “It feels like a cold breeze.” I finally open up. “Then my vision wigs out, like a bright light covers everything.”
“An aura.”
“A what?”
“An aura,” Dr. Kovac repeats. “A common sensation that precedes the onset of a seizure. You probably have a headache and might even feel nauseous when you wake up.”
I nod. I’m caught in a trance, thinking about the bright light and my dad or Austin or whatever I rewind to coming into focus.
“Miss Owens?”
My head snaps up.
“Did you witness the drowning that took your father’s life?”
My voice cracks as I reply, “Yes. Our car flipped off the highway and into a river.”
Her narrow eyes fly open, scrunching her purple eyelids. “You were in the car?”
I rub my finger along the side of Austin’s thumb, a nervous motion. At last, I nod.
“Oh my.” Shock shapes her penciled eyebrows. “I’m very sorry.” After some terribly awkward seconds of silence, she pulls herself together, checking her notes with an audible clearing of her throat. “The first time you fainted, you were looking at a photo of you and your father; the second time you were watching fireworks that reminded you of the accident that took his life. Your third seizure was brought on by fear as well, the fear of someone else you love drowning.” She glances at me and Austin, her gaze dropping to our clasped hands. “And the motorcycles?”
“A motorcycle veered in front of my Jeep. That’s why I swerved.”
“You were driving?”
I nod.
She doesn’t blink, doesn’t flinch. Just stares at me like she should have guessed as much. I’ve seen the look before. Reckless teenage driver, they all think.
“I see,” she says, her eyes shifting back down to her notes. “And the fifth time you were looking at a binder of pictures of your father, you say?”
“Yeah, memorabilia. Newspaper clippings from the accident and stuff.” My heart is pounding mercilessly. “Dr. Kovac, what’s happening to me?”
“Well, we can skip right over the possibility of epilepsy, because it’s clear your condition has a far deeper emotional root. I believe, Miss Owens, you are suffering from psychogenic non-epileptic seizures, or PNES.”
I stare blankly. To me, the only thing that medical term means is that I have a major problem. I know I’m not perfect and my mom has unrealistic expectations. But this is big. Something is seriously wrong with me.
“What’s the difference between that and epilepsy?” Austin asks, filling in my silence.
“Epileptic seizures are caused by a disturbance in the electrical activity of the brain. Non-epileptic seizures are different in that no disruption in that electrical activity takes place. Sienna’s seizures stem from a traumatic psychological experience.”
Austin nods like a student on the first day of class, pretending he fully caught on to all of that.
At last, she addresses me in plain terms. “Your seizures are stress-induced, a result of trauma. It’s your body’s way of expressing what your mind cannot.”
I take a deep breath and exhale.
“Miss Owens, I’m glad you came to talk with me. Patients with PNES are frequently misdiagnosed and treated for epilepsy. When you see a doctor, tell him you speculate you’re having psychogenic non-epileptic seizures. Got that?” She jots it down on a Post-it and pulls it off. “This way, your doctor can make sure you receive proper treatment.”
“Treatment? What kind of treatment?”
“Typically antidepressants. Possibly an antiepileptic drug, but most important of all, therapy with you and your family. Family support is critical.”
I stare at her and almost laugh. Family support? That’s exactly what I don’t have. No way am I going to tell my mom any of this. Stress-induced seizures? Antidepressants? She’ll freak.
I shake my head. “I can’t.”
“You can’t what?”
“I can’t do that. Any of it.”
Dr. Kovac pulls out a perceptive grin. “This is serious, Miss Owens. You have post-traumatic stress disorder.”
She doesn’t need to say more. I have a major problem that’s not going away on its own. But she doesn’t understand. My mom’s precious hair has slowly been turning gray from stress over raising an ADHD, bipolar son. Dr. Kovac doesn’t understand what my dad’s death did to us all. The peacemaker in our home is gone. She doesn’t realize that my life, my success, moderates the tension in our home.
I nod, keeping this all to myself. Dr. Kovac nods as well with a proud smile. Her arrogance is getting to me. Makes me feel like a number, a statistic. Nothing more than data on her chart. Sure, she’s been helpful, but I want out of here. I have only one question left.
“Dr. Kovac.” I speak with resolve, finally broaching the most critical part of this all. How should I phrase it, though? “Do people with these seizures ever have dreams, you know, while they’re having a seizure?”
Replacing her glasses on the tip of her nose, Dr. Kovac looks more like a detective than a professor. “Do you have dreams during your seizures, Miss Owens?”
I hesitate, wondering if she could possibly provide an explanation. “Yes,” I finally say.
Her eyes flash with interest. She jots a few notes, turns the page, and looks back up at me. “Do you remember anything about these dreams?”
I think about my visits to the garden, seeing my dad. Then I remember kissing Austin for the first time on the beach all over again, and I realize how incredibly ludicrous this sounds. Am I suggesting that I can rewind to previous moments in my life? Moments I can choose? I consider the treatments she mentioned, treatments that will stop these seizures, and I suddenly fear something I haven’t thought of. If these seizures stop, I’ll never be able to go back and see my dad again.
I shake my head. “Not really.”
Dr. Kovac studies me for a second before closing her notepad. She hands me the sticky note, thanks me for coming to see her, and invites me to stay in contact. She and Austin exchange small talk before we leave, mostly about the University of Florida: the campus, football, classes. I listen halfheartedly, still thinking about the moments I rewind to, wondering if I could give them up.
“May I ask one more question?” Dr. Kovac says as she opens the door. “What does it feel like, having a seizure?”
I step out and turn, taking a minute to think. Seeing my dad, reliving those memories with Austin . . . simply the thought makes me smile. “It feels like being in another place for a while.”
She nods, and together Austin and I walk out into the sunshine.
“Why didn’t you tell her,” Austin asks when we reach his motorcycle, “about how you see your dad when you have a seizure?”
I look at the ocean, the distant sounds of kids playing at a park drifting on the breeze. “Last time I had a seizure, in the closet before I texted you?”
“Yeah?”
“I didn’t rewind to my dad in the garden.”
“ ‘Rewind’?” His tone expresses the oddity of that word.
“That’s what it feels like, at least—like I’ve rewound to an earlier time, and I’m really there. I can say and do whatever I want.” So long as I don’t try to change the past.
He nods. “Okaaay, so what did you re
wind to?”
I pull my lips between my teeth, suppressing a grin. Would it work again? Could I choose another moment like I did with Austin on the beach and rewind to it? I smile, seeing these seizures in a different light now.
“I rewound to you.”
CHAPTER 28
Sienna
“Where ya from, anyhow?” Jesse asks me the next morning.
I look up from the dog kennel Austin and I are building to see old Jesse staring at me with an assessing eye matched only by one my mom could give. “Richmond, Virginia,” I answer with a cautious smile. “It’s nice. There’s a lot of neat history. Some good shopping.”
“Huh,” Jesse huffs, wiping away a bead of sweat. “Never liked that shopping none.”
Austin warned me the old man would come off gruff, but I had no idea. You’d think he’d extend a little more Southern hospitality to a couple of teenagers sacrificing their Saturday morning to build his dog a kennel.
“My wife, Marjorie, loved them big fancy malls, though. Named our café after her.” Jesse gibbers on but I lose interest. Austin hammers in another nail. I wonder why he cares for people like this, volunteers even, to help crusty old people like Jesse.
“Boom Boom Pow” by the Black Eyed Peas splits the relative silence and my phone vibrates in my pocket. Austin throws me a sideways glance. I swear, Kyle has called at all the wrong times: once while Austin and I returned to River Street for ice cream, another when I stopped by to see Austin in the beach shop, and even once when Austin leaned in for a kiss. How’s that for bad timing? Needless to say, I can tell Austin is getting suspicious about this ringtone.
Slipping away, I pull out my phone. “Hello?”
“There’s that sexy voice.”
“Hey,” I say, drawing a blank as I glance back at Austin.
“Did your mom tell you?” Kyle asks. “We’re coming to Tybee for the Fourth of July!”
“Yeah, she told me!” I try to sound perfectly at ease, incidentally recalling how my mom told me to make sure that first date with Austin was my last. Whoops. I cut the conversation short, assuring Kyle I’m thrilled. I return to the back patio as Austin finishes the last touches on the kennel.
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