Page 84 of Playing with the Heartbreaker

My mom pauses. Sighs. I picture her smoothing that same spot of hair again. “Alright. How are you getting back?”

“I’ll call a ride share.” She’s really letting me do this? That tingly feeling caresses my face. This is either a Big Moment for us or my nose is frostbitten already.

“Stop and get a case of sparkling water on your way back.”

“Y-yeah. I can do that.”

“See you soon. And Chloe?”

“Yeah?”

My mom’s voice warms, softens, like brownies fresh out of the oven. “Good luck.”

* * *

I ride the elevator up to the fourth floor, wishing for Top-40 so I can let the flavor of the week pop star numb my senses. Instead, slow jazz seeps through the speakers. I’ve procrastinated this moment, delaying whatever comes next, but I can’t put it off any longer.

Stepping into the hall, I take a deep breath. It smells sterile, like bleach and sadness. It’s either the most perfect backdrop for a Big Moment or the worst.

Soft beeping leads me through a labyrinth of corridors, of blank walls and closed doors and hushed whispers. Doctors and nurses pass in brightly colored scrubs, the only splash of color in a sea of sameness until I reach the area marked as “Acute Care.” I’ve never been to this part of the hospital before.

Rhoads sits on the floor outside room 451, his arms wrapped around his knees. He looks so small, so fragile. Two words, out of the hundreds I’ve studied over the past few months, I never would have associated with him.

“You came.” He stands.

Everything I’ve thought of saying dissolves on my tongue. I hug my arms around my stomach, suddenly self-conscious. “Yeah.”

“Come on. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

Most of the lights are off in the patient room, but the open blinds let the last bit of cloudy gray daylight seep inside. A petite figure hunches over in a chair next to the bed, murmuring. When we enter, the girl lifts her head. My mouth goes dry again.

Cinnamon Pop-Tart.

Candace.

She’s still here.

The air shifts in the moment I decide to follow Rhoads further into the room. To bite back my instinct to run. To trust him. And to find out whether this Big Moment will be the end of us before we even begin.

As we approach, the girl stands, making her way over to us.

“Chloe, Candace. Candace, Chloe,” Rhoads introduces us.

“It is so good to finally, officially, meet you,” Candace says. Her dark eyeliner would look severe on anyone else, but somehow it complements her bubblegum pink lips. “I’ve heard so much about you. An endless amount, basically. We’ve had a lot of down time. I’m sorry about earlier with the vending machines. And that night at Peggy’s. Apparently, I have bad timing.”

I let out a nervous laugh, not sure what to say to this girl I’ve demonized in my mind.

Candace blinks at me a few times, the light bouncing off her blue eyes. She purses her lips, turning to Rhoads. “Simpson, you haven’t told her anything, have you?” She smacks him on the arm, a decidedly unromantic gesture. More like a sibling chastising her brother. “No wonder everything’s gone to crap. You’re an idiot sometimes. A real big idiot.” She makes her way back to the bedside chair. It squeaks when she flops into it, leaning over to address the person lying down. “Are you hearing any of this? I cannot believe you’re friends with this clown.”

The person in the bed makes no movements, no indication he heard or saw anything. The only clue he’s alive is the rhythmic rising and falling of his chest.

Rhoads grimaces. “I’ve been trying. But I didn’t want to leave it all in my messages or via text. It’s too important.” He says all of this to me, his face pleading. “Not that it would have changed anything.”

“Will someone tell me what’s going on, please?” I ask, my voice pinching in my throat.

“This,” Candace says, her voice gentle, her head leaning ever so slightly toward the still figure wrapped in blankets, tubes and wires connecting him to screens and beeping machines, “is Jenson. My little brother.” She shoots Rhoads a look that clearly means “take it from here.”

Rhoads takes a deep breath. “He was in a coma for a few days at the beginning of the semester. He’s been recovering here since.”