It doesn’t seem like enough, but I don’t have anything else to say.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Everything is light and sound and nothing else for a while. I’m not sure how long, but it feels like days. I keep heaving my eyes open to see what’s happening, but it takes so much effort every time, and I still can’t piece together the things around me more than the basics.
I was in the race. I think there’s a brief flash of memory of being in an ambulance and seeing Silas. But I wasn’t sure if I was the patient or he was. He looked terrible. Pale and dirty and hunched in on himself. I tried to reach for him, but my hand wouldn’t do what I was telling it and my head felt thick and fuzzy.
Then it was the hospital. Which feels real. I don’t think it’s a dream. My eyelids are still heavy, but there’s the persistent sound of beeps and people walking quickly down hallways that’s so familiar. An IV pump alarm is going off somewhere close to me, and it’s driving me insane. I keep trying to open my eyes and reach for it. Probably just a little air bubble or a kink in the line. I want to fuck with the patient’s arm in case it’s positional, butthat makes the realization that I’m probably the patient swim slowly up into my consciousness.
Everything goes dark and quiet again. This endless tug of war with my awareness goes on and on, until one time, I’m able to open my eyes, and I feel rooted in my body enough to look at the world around me.
I didn’t realize how much I wanted to see Silas until I look around and he’s not here. No one’s here. I can tell I’m in one of the inpatient rooms, not the ER, but other than that, the room is empty.
Wait. Not totally empty. When I arch my neck enough, I can see someone sitting in a chair wedged into the corner of the room. It takes long, syrupy chunks of time for me to figure out who it is, but eventually it comes to me.
The girl that came with Dad. K-something. Krista?
Krystal. That’s it.
“What happened?” I try to ask, but it comes out as more of a rasp.
Krystal looks up from her phone at the sound of my voice. She’s silent for a minute, then untucks her legs from beneath her, drags the armchair up the edge of the bed and folds herself back into it.
I almost suspect that time is moving wrong for me still, but finally she speaks. Her Arkansas drawl is thick as hell, more than I noticed the other time we met, but she’s not yelling at me. Which is probably more than I could ask if Silas were here.
“You crashed your bike. I don’t really know the details, but Silas called your mom, and we were with her at the time so we all came down. Her and Kyle were here a minute ago but they couldn’t stop fighting, so I told them both to get until they could behave themselves. Said I’d sit with you. We were all waiting for you to wake up.”
God, everyone must be so fucking mad at me.
I’m so fucking mad at me.
“How long has it been?”
It takes me a couple of tries to get the words out though, because my throat is so raspy and it triggers a weak coughing fit. I realize there’s an oxygen cannula under my nose, and do my best to breathe some O2 in.
Krystal passes me a plastic cup with a little water in it and helps me drink. Her expression is flat, but something about her presence is more maternal than I would have expected. Or maybe I’m just so starved for it, I’d enjoy a hug from a wire sculpture, at this point.
“Not long,” she says. “You came in late last night, it’s only just gone morning now.”
She pauses, and I feel like she’s waiting to say something else.
“Your throat hurts because they had to put a tube in it when you weren’t breathing enough on your own. Something about a cracked rib and a little hole in your lung. You scared your momma half to death.”
My throat clenches and my heart rate picks up, but I don’t know what to say back to that.
“I’m sure your head hurts, they said you busted it pretty bad.”
This time I turn to look her in the eye, my mouth hanging open.
“No way,” I start. “I had my helmet on like always. It should be fine.”
Krystal taps long, coffin-shaped acrylics on the arm of the chair a few times before she answers.
“The helmet was still on when they brought you, I think. I wasn’t here yet. But they were talking about your brain bouncing around in your skull. There was a fancy word for it, but I don’t remember. Coo-something.”
I drop my head back into the pillow and look at the blank ceiling, already tired from turning to look at her.
“Coup-contrecoup.”
