Changing Fate (8 page)

His grip tightens. “No. But I did ask Giana for some ideas.”

My jaw falls. “You did? I thought she didn’t know about the date.”

Kyler shrugs. “She’s good at keeping secrets.”

Of course she is. And she acted so surprised…or maybe she was just excited. She knew all along. Another cough kills the conversation and I decide it must be all the talking. Usually when I’m sick, I stay at home with Mom. We watch movies, play games, or mind our own business. None of that takes much talking.

Besides, it gives me more time to think about Kyler’s hand in mine. I mean,
he’s holding my hand
! That’s a huge deal. I’ve held a few other hands, but none of them belonged to boys as charming as Kyler. He hums a soft melody and my insides turn to jelly. A tingle spreads across my shoulders and races down my arms. I close my eyes and lay my head against the headrest, sinking into a blissful frenzy. My body is relaxed, but my insides are having a party. Elephants are stomping across my heart while butterflies flitter with excitement in my stomach.

Not only do I think of France, but I think
of a French celebration at night with Kyler next to me. The Eiffel Tower is lit in the distance and fireworks explode through the air in sparks of color. A sweet, vanilla scent fills my nose and I imagine my teeth sinking into a bite of crème brûlée.

It’s perfect. Even with the persistent cough that’s bent on ruining the moment.

Kyler’s hum dies down and the car stops. “We’re here.”

I hesitate to open my eyes. I don’t know where “here” is and the place in my head is so dreamy, there couldn’t be anything better.

Kyler squeezes my hand. “Kate. Open your eyes.”

I open them in anticipation…only to see a plain brick building with a handful of cars in the parking lot. “Where are we?”

Kyler chuckles. “Come on. You’ll see.”

He
releases my hand to get out of the car, but takes it again once he gets my door open. I grab my purse and sling it over a shoulder as we head toward the building. A sign rests on an easel by the door, but I can’t read it until we get closer. 

Once I can make out the letters, I read:

Local Art Show. Jean de Chelles, Pierre de Montreuil, Matthias of Arras, and other period works: Gothic French art and architecture of the 13
th
century. No touching, please.   

“Really?” I can’t say anything else. An overwhelming
sense of appreciation takes over my body and pricks my eyes with moisture. I swallow back a wave of gratitude and sniff into a tissue. Of all the places a teenage boy would want to go on a date, I imagine this is the last one. How did he know about it anyway? I’d ask him, but I’m afraid to open my mouth. He tugs on my arm and we walk inside.

We enter a room separated with light gray partitions. Spotlights hang from the ceiling
, shining on different works of art. I linger in front of the first painting and my daydream in the car comes to life. It’s Paris at night with the Eiffel Tower lit up, reflected in the Seine River with watercolor squiggles. We move from one piece to another, some of them as big as the wall and others as small as my hand. There are sculptures of Notre Dame, palaces, and cathedrals.

Even though there are other people in the room, I feel like Kyler and I are alone.

“What do you think of this one?” he whispers in my ear and points to a wooden carving of the Gallery of Kings.

The twenty-eight kings
are lined up, each one wearing a crown, holding a staff, and wearing a draped robe. The faces are turned down and the eyes are left blank—like the artist couldn’t decide which emotion to portray. Or maybe they wanted the observer to see their own emotions. I turn to Kyler and find his eyes on me.  

“It’s beautiful, Kyler,” I say quietly. His gaze travels down my face and pauses on my lips.

His mouth quirks up on both sides and he reaches a hand to my face. His finger leaves a burning trail along my skin as he tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “You know, you don’t say my name very often.”

Maybe not to him, but it fills my mind all day. Even now, my heart is pounding his name through my body. My fingers ache to draw his name in patterns through his hair. And right at the tip of my tongue, his name is ready to be s
aid. I lean closer and say it with a sigh. “Kyler.”

It releases a million heart beats at once and leaves me weak, leaning closer and hoping he’ll catch me in his arms. His hand wraps around my back and he pulls me forward until
our stomachs touch. I breathe in deeply…too deep. Before I can push away, I cough into his shirt. I hoped it was a small cough, but it keeps going. One after another and I have to get away. I push against him and bend over. The cough curdles in my chest and rips its way out my throat.

“What can I do?” Kyler asks, panicked.

I struggle to respond. “Water.”

He reaches inside my bag and pulls out my water bottle. Before he can get it open, a man approaches and says, “I’m sorry, but you’ll have to take that outside.”

I barely see Kyler’s wild eyes before another cough takes over. “You’ve got to be kidding. She’s practically choking.”

The man folds his hands together and I close my fist into a tight ball. How can he be so calm? If I weren’t on the verge of hacking up a lung, I’d show him my anger.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “But we can’t risk the art.”

I curse the art and stumble toward the door with a fuming Kyler behind me. He leads me to the parking lot with a hand on my back. Before we make it outside, he shoves the water in my hand and tells me to start drinking. I guzzle the water but it doesn’t suppress the urge to keep coughing.

“Kyler,” I say, my chest aches and silver sparkles flash across my vision. “Inhaler.”

Kyler digs through my purse and finally pulls
it out. I stick the bottom end in my mouth and push on the top to release the meds. I breathe it in, and cough it out. Hopefully some of it is in my system rushing through my veins and attacking the infection. At least, that’s what it’s supposed to do. But maybe it’s not working.

The coughing has subsided a little but I need to get home. “Kyle
r, I’m sorry about this.”

He takes my hand and shakes his head.

Before he can respond, I say, “Please. I need to go home.”

The request kills me because I don’t want my time with Kyler to end. I don’t want to go home, to face the reality of what might
really
be happening. But I need to. I need my mom to tell me what to do. She knows the answers. And if she doesn’t, the doc knows. As much as I don’t want to call Doc Perry, I hate to think about the consequences if I don’t. 

Kyler drops me off at the door and Mom pulls me inside with her eyebrows drawn together in obvious worry.

“I’ll take it from here, Kyler,” she says with a pointed look. “Have a good night.” She shuts the door in his face and I want to scream, but there’s nothing left in me. I’m like an empty cave taken over by a raging storm. My body aches and there’s an overwhelming pounding against the base of my skull.

Mom leads me to the couch and makes me lie down then touches her wrist to my forehead. “No fever. That’s a relief.”

I don’t feel relieved.

“Your pulse is high, but that’s to be expected after a coughing attack. Especially on a date.”

Attack? More like an ongoing episode on a hot date. The hot part is important, along with the almost kiss. I close my eyes and
let my heart pound with the memory. Another cough tries to escape my mouth, but it’s weak. I curl over the pain in my chest and turn to my side.

“I’m calling Doc Perry,” Mom says. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

I just lie there, keeping my body still. I try to forget the last ten minutes in order to focus on the few moments I had in Kyler’s arms. Exhaustion is taking over my body and I fight against it to find the memory. There. In the protected part of my brain that holds my most precious moments. Mom taking me to a French boutique after a long hospital stay. The old lady that lived next to us supporting me at a CF walk. Giana giving me food on the first day of school. And Kyler taking my hand, searching my eyes like he can’t wait to spend another second together. Like he can’t wait to kiss me the way I was supposed to have my first kiss. However that’s supposed to go.

But why does he care about me? What is there to like? He doesn’t even know me. And what will happen when he finally does? I release the memory and fall into a daze. My chest convulses with a constant cough but I’ve grown distant, retreating into my safe zone. I tuck my thoughts into a bed of black blankets and think of nothing. No death, no life.

I’m not sure how long I sit there, but Mom finally returns.

“Can you sleep?” she asks.

I open my eyes and look up at her. A question forms in my head, something along the lines of trying to drive straight on a curvy road: not possible. But I don’t ask because I don’t have enough energy to get it out…or deal with her response. Instead I close my eyes again and shrug.

“Doc thinks you’ve overdone it.”

My eyes open. That’s it? Overdone it? I’d like to see him rest while someone’s jumping on his chest.

“He wants you to get some sleep and see how you feel in the morning.”

I already know how I’m going to feel. Rotten. I retreat back under those mental blankets and cough my way into a dreamless oblivion.

* * *

I’m awake the next morning before Mom comes in. In fact, I’m not sure how much time has passed. My head hurts too bad to open my eyes, but it could be mid-day. I’m still on the couch and even though my chest hurts and my throat’s raw, I must’ve been able to sleep a little. The cough shakes me more awake and I know I need to get to my room for breathing treatments.

“You awake yet?”

I lift my eyelids and whisper, “I’ve been waiting for you to come in.” The response tears at my throat.

“How
are you?”

I wonder if I can do impromptu sign language. This one should be easy. I give her a big ol’ thumbs down.

“Let’s do your therapy and meds and see how you’re doing after that.”

Mom pulls me
into a sitting position and gives me a handful of pills with a glass of water.

“By the way, Giana called this morning. I told her you’re still sick and won’t be able to do anything for a while.”

Of course she called. She probably wanted the 411 on my
surprise
date with Kyler. And Mom basically gave it to her. Still sick. Can’t do anything. That’s how it ended.

Mom helps me off the couch and
up the stairs to do my nebulizer meds. Then she straps on my vest and checks on me multiple times before it finishes. It’s like she thinks something might happen in the middle of therapy. But whether that something is good or bad, I don’t know. I stare at the poster on the wall and French artwork flashes through my mind from the art gallery. Pictures and sculptures of places that I love. Places I want to visit.

I swallow a dash of hope and realize last night might’ve been the closest I
’ll ever come to experiencing the real France. At least Kyler was there with me.

Mom opens the door and my timer goes off.

“Any better?”

I take off the vest and let it drop to the ground. My shoulders fall forward. “What do you think?”

She bites her lip, folds her arms, and stands with her head tilted. After a whole minute of staring at nothing, she finally snaps out of it. “I’m taking you back in. Your resistance tests haven’t come back for this round of antibiotics, but I don’t think they’re working. I’m going to ask Doc to put you on something else.”

I pull what’s left of my
sanity into a tight knot and hold onto it so it can’t escape. Back to the doc’s I go. Back to the prison cell and back to the hard bed with only a paper sheet to protect me from other people’s sicknesses.

This time it’s a different doctor, since Perry’s out of the office. The new doctor’s name
doesn’t stick in my memory. I stare at his white lab coat and breathe in. He places the PFT reader in my mouth to test my lung function and I exhale as long and hard as I can. Three times. The first test result is similar to the one I got at my last appointment, but the next two readings are lower.

“She’s not getting any better,” the doc says while studying my file.

“I think we need to change the antibiotics,” Mom says.

It’s like I’m living the same moment over and over. Like no matter how far I’ve come from one sickness, I still fall back to where I was. I hear the same results from the same tests and nothing ever really gets better. I know that’s how it’s going to be. But I hope every day that it will be different—that eventually, someone will find a cure and all my hope can turn into reality.

The doctor rubs his eyebrows. “She needs a stronger antibiotic and it’s going to have to be through an IV.”

Mom’s face goes rigid. “Hospital or home treatment?”

The doctor’s gaze flicks to Mom and then his eyes focus on my face. “She looks pretty tired. Is she getting enough rest at home?”

“She can.” I know Mom doesn’t want me stuck in the hospital. But if she can’t convince the doctor that I’ll get everything I need at home, it will be a lost battle.

“What about all the IV treatments and extra therapy? Can you help her with those?”

Extra therapy. How do they expect me to get any rest at all? It doesn’t matter if I’m at home or in the hospital.

“My work is flexible.” Mom’s face is relaxed but her hands are balled into fists. “I can come home when I need to and work while she’s resting.”

The doctor walks back to the small counter and sets my thick file down with a soft
thud
.

Mom shakes her hands out and folds them together. “I don’t go back to work until Monday. Kate will have all my attention until then and every second I can give her after.”

He turns around and eyes her with a stern look. “That’s fine. But if she’s not improving by then, we’re going to have to admit her. She needs to get better or she’ll be in the hospital for something far worse.”

The weight of his statement settles over us in a heavy silence. Mom seems a little less tense and I’m thankful that she fought to keep me home. I can’t go back to the hospital. Not yet. Even without treatments, I still wouldn’t rest. How can I? Everything in the hospital reminds me of sickness. All I see is buttons and windows and nurses. I hear murmuring in the hall and think that everyone is talking about me. I worry that things aren’t going right. At any moment they can come in and tell me I only have a few days left to live.

At home, I can pretend everything’s okay. I have my architecture magazines, my light purple walls, and my darts. It distracts me and helps me calm down—only then can I get rest.

“You’ll have to stop by the hospital for an initial treatment,” the doctor says. “They’ll send you home with all the IV medication.”

Focus.

Breathe.

It’s an initial treatment. It’s not that bad. Go in, prick my arm, give me a dose of medicine, then walk out with everything else. I can do that. Mom stands up and shakes the doctor’s hand. I slide off the bed and count the footsteps to the car.

Step. One... Step. Two…

All the way to forty-eight.    

I focus on that number until I’m home. Forty-eight steps, forty-eight minutes in the hospital, forty-eight deep breaths in the car. Forty eight minutes past two in the afternoon.

I’m home. I’m alive. I’m going to be okay.