Notes to Self (2 page)

I couldn’t concentrate on what the doctor was saying. I looked toward the window, thinking about this news footage of an earthquake I had seen once. These cars were on a highway, driving up a bridge, when disaster struck and the roadway disappeared right in front of them. The image kept playing over and over in my mind when I first saw it and I couldn’t stop thinking about what it would feel like to be in one of those cars. I had this conviction that I wouldn’t be one of those people who swear or pray the moment they know it’s over. I wanted to think of myself as stoic. I’d coolly say something like, “This is going to hurt,” and meet my destiny with total acceptance. Should I be like that now? Was I going to die?

Dr. Insane Eyebrows continued talking as he handed me a tissue. I didn’t understand what it was for, so I didn’t take it. Mom took it instead and held it to my nose. I blew into it, feeling like a five-year-old. “Just the facts, ma’am,” Dr. Kline continued. “That bump on the back of your head is nothing to mess around with. You’ll hear me say the letters ‘TBI’ when I come poking around here. It stands for Traumatic Brain Injury. So far, it looks like yours is on the mild side, but we’ll be evaluating that again with more tests.”

I stared at him. “When?” I wanted to know how long I had been in the hospital. I hoped
when
was the right word.
Maybe I should try who
? I knew it started with a ‘W.’ Yes.

“Your accident was two nights ago now. You’ve been sleeping it off, which is exactly the right thing to do.” He paused. “Can you tell me your full name, please, young lady? We need to see if you’re having any memory problems.”

“Robin…um, Jessica…Saunders,” I whispered. Was that right?

“Very good.” Dr. Kline nodded.

“Can you tell me when you were born, with the year?”

“1996. Um…March.” I was fifteen years old. Mom and I had already started fighting about how I’d learn to drive, seeing as we didn’t own a car. I remember it made me angry that we didn’t. It felt pathetic.
Who does’t have a car?
I felt Mom squeeze my hand. She wasn’t breathing. Was March right? Was March even a month?
March, march, march.
It sounded so weird. Was it even a word?

“Okay, close enough. Now. What did you talk about with the EMTs in the Medivac? They were able to keep you conscious on your ride over, which is a great sign.” He glanced at my chart. I stared at him, trying to put all the words he said in order. What was an ETM? EMT?

“Uh…” I closed my eyes briefly, trying to think about what had happened last night. I couldn’t picture anything. I let my eyes rove around the room to search for clues. I saw nothing that could help me. “I don’t understand the quest,” I murmured. “Question.” I wanted to get up. I fought the hysterical feeling that rose in my chest, but the more I tried not to panic, the more I felt like I might throw up.

“Sweetie, calm down.” Mom sat on my bed and put her hand on my knee. Her face looked terrible, like she’d been crying for weeks. The whites of her eyes were completely pink.

“It’s okay, Robin. You’re doing fine; there’s no need to get up. You need to let your noggin heal. It’s not unusual for someone in your shoes to have some small memory issues. It’s nothing to be concerned about right now. Just one more little thing and I’ll leave you alone. Close your eyes for me.”

I only understood the last thing he said. I closed my eyes, gladly, even though what I should’ve been doing was finding a wastebasket in case I really did vom. I was in hell.

“Now take your index finger—your pointer—and touch your nose.”

I did it, but it took longer than it should have because I had to search my memory to figure out what a pointer was. I opened my eyes and frowned.

The doctor turned away from me and sat down to talk to my mother. I could hear him saying that they needed to keep me longer, probably two nights, maybe three. Then he told her that TBIs were very common and I should make a full recovery in three months. In the meantime, I’d start “cognitive therapy” as soon as possible. I had no idea what that was. Did I have a choice? I wanted to sleep for a year, a decade, the rest of my life. The doctor returned to my bedside. “Time for you to rest and get a break from the likes of me, young lady. Do you need anything? More pillows?”

I blinked, hoping that meant “yes,” as Mom said she’d stay the night with me. The doctor promised they’d have a cot brought in. Two or three minutes later the nurse in green came in with more pillows. Mom asked if I wanted them under my legs. I nodded and whispered, “Yes, I…”
I need to do something.
I had to get to Emily. “I can’t...” That wasn’t enough. There was more to say.

Mom crawled right into the hospital bed and cradled me like I was a baby. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. It’s going to be okay.” She lifted a glass of water with a straw to my lips. I took a sip. For one moment, when the coolness hit the back of my throat, I forgot about my headache and the nausea. I was glad she was there. It had been a long time since I had allowed myself to be held like this, to breathe in her perfume and pretend I was little again.

“Thank you.” The words came out of my mouth like a croak, but it could have been worse. I was ninety percent sure they were right.

“You’re welcome. There, now it’s like you’re really back, thank God. You scared the crap out of me, by the way.” She hugged me close. “How do you feel?”

“Um, I don’t…know.”
Terrified
, I wanted to say.
Confused. Guilty. Wrong.
My throat was sore; even whispering was hard to do. My arms and legs felt strange, like they weren’t mine. Was this a bad dream?
Wake up
.
Now.

“Should I put the TV on until you get tired again? Or maybe another blanket?” Mom propped herself on one arm and slowly reached for the remote. I didn’t understand what she was asking me.

“I don’t understand…what happened,” I couldn’t decide what was worse: the pounding behind my eyes or the waves of nausea washing over my body and settling in the back of my neck.

“The paramedics said they found you and Emily in a heap next to the Waffle House at Fun Towne. This is what I get for never being home.” Her face crumpled up as she tried not to cry. Mom is finishing her bachelor's degree so she can go to law school, and she’s always completely stressed out because she’s a full time waitress too. The Waffle House? What was a Waffle House? A
heap
?

“
Emily
.” The fog in my head cleared a little and I knew I had to tell the doctors something about her, but I couldn’t remember what. “Will she be…okay?”

“They say she’s stable, honey. I don’t know; I think she hit her head too. I suppose it was her idea to pull that stunt?”

“I…I can’t remember!” I said, way too loudly. I started to cry, shaking in my mother’s arms, even though it made my head hurt worse. “I fell!”

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry. It doesn’t matter. Calm down, baby bird.”

She rocked me until I fell asleep again. I dreamed I was running as fast as I could because the ground below my feet kept crumbling away.

CHAPTER 4

TWINKLE, TWINKLE LITTLE PRESSURE MONITOR

Why don’t they let you sleep if you’re supposed to sleep? Nurses kept coming in to check on me. All I wanted to do was pass out, because every time I opened my eyes, everything was too bright, too loud, too painful. I didn’t want food.
No, I don’t want a drink of water. Yes, my head still hurts. Yes, I still feel like puking my brains out. When will this all stop?

Please, just leave me alone.

I fell.

I fell.

CHAPTER 5

WE’RE HERE TO HELP YOU FREAK OUT

The next day two social workers came to my room. Until they showed up, I’d been trying to write down everything I could remember since I’d arrived at the hospital. The nurses said it could help to organize my thoughts. Since nothing had happened to me that morning except an MRI test and the removal of the pressure monitor from my skull, my notepad was pretty empty. I doodled in it because I noticed that if I kept my hands busy I stopped thinking about the screaming. So far, all I had were creepy-looking eyeballs. They were crooked: I couldn’t draw a circle even though I’m pretty sure I used to be able to.

Where is Dr. Kerlin? Corlin? That lady doctor.
I wanted to ask her for more headache meds before the dull throbbing behind my eyes lit up into a brain apocalypse again. I did feel better. Just a tiny bit better.

One of the social workers was an older man with a bushy moustache and goatee; the other was a young woman with glasses and thin lips and possibly only nine and a half fingers, although I may have imagined that. She looked like a spaniel because her hair had waves in it that started halfway down her head. I stopped shading my latest eyeball. To make eyeballs look real, you have to show the reflection of light somewhere on the iris or the pupil. Of course, it also helps if you draw them round. I ripped out the page and crumpled it up.

“Hi Robin. I’m Pedro and this is Kelly. We’re from Kissimmee social services and we’re here to help you.” Pedro sat on the edge of my bed, which felt like an invasion of my personal space. The bed was part of me now. What was “social services?”

“Help me…do what?” Could they order more pain medicine? I set my notebook down. “I fell.”

“We know. Help you get better. Your mother mentioned to one of the nurses that you were feeling anxious. That’s very common when people experience a brain injury,” Pedro said. His voice was all concern. I spent a few moments thinking about what he said.
Anxious
.
Anxious means scared. Yes.
Yes, I was definitely feeling that.

“Oh.” I guess that made sense.

“We need to ask you a couple of questions. The circumstances of your accident were pretty unusual.” Kelly sounded like she was mad about something. I frowned, startled by her harsh tone. She made me want to say
I’m sorry
, even though I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to be apologizing for.
Circum…circum…huh?
“Can you tell us what happened?” she asked.

I looked at them both, my eyes wide. “We climbed the Sling Shot. After. After it closed. Nighttime. I guess that was...not in the law?” I trailed off in a whisper. “I’m sorry. We fell. We fell.” Would they call the cops? I thought about what I had said. Not in the law.
Against
the law.

“Why?” Kelly asked. She took her glasses off and polished them with the hem of her vest. Her eyes were green. I appreciated that her question was just one word. But then she spoke again. “Did you have some sort of pact?”

“Pact? What?”
What is she talking about?
Pact. Agreement.

Pedro shot her a look and said, “It was an accident, your fall. Right?”

Like a firecracker going off in my head, I understood what Kelly was getting at. Pedro’s words arranged themselves in the right order all at once. The social workers wanted to know if Emily and I had jumped. As in, on
purpose.
My bottom lip trembled. I wanted to run out of the room, but I couldn’t. My head was pounding again.

“Accident. Yes. We fell.” I didn’t actually remember that, but there was no way it could have been anything else. “It was windy. I remember…there’s something important, but I just can’t…” My face crumpled up as I tried as hard as I could not to cry. Emily needed me to be stronger. She needed me to tell them something important, about what happened, and I couldn’t.

What happened, Emily?

Where are you?

“Can I please talk to her?” I begged. “She has blonde hair.”

“You can’t talk to her,” Kelly said, resigned. “I’m sorry. She’s in a coma.”

Pedro tried starting over. I stared at the window because I didn’t want to look at them. “Do you remember why you climbed up there in the first place?”

Why? Why? Why did we?
I didn’t remember. I really didn’t. I opened my mouth to reply and then closed it again. My headache switched from major to severe. I closed my eyes.
Worst social workers ever.

“The doctors say you’re suffering from some amnesia, but it should start to recede. Let’s back up a little. How long have you and Emily been friends?” Kelly asked. Her voice was one notch softer.

I kept my eyes closed.
How long?

CHAPTER 6

HUGE IN EUROPE

“Come on, you guys! This is important!” Hadley Greer’s shrill voice made me want to stick a wad of Kleenex in each of my ears. Or better yet, a wad in her face.
No, it’s not,
I wanted to say. But I kept my mouth shut. For now. “We have so much to do if we want to win this year!”

Everyone in my sixth grade homeroom scurried around doing her bidding. We were supposed to be decorating a stretch of the hallway for Color Week. It was a school-wide competition and each homeroom was trying to beat out the others in a series of contests, to prove which one had the most school spirit. Hadley, as our captain, had decided our hallway theme should be Space. So we were supposed to be cutting stars, planets, and space ship shapes out of giant rolls of white paper and sticking them on the walls. Even the boys were into it, which was something. Color Week’s winning homeroom got pizza. That was it. I could have that for dinner every night if I wanted.

I wandered away from my homeroom to the other end of the hall, mumbling something about getting a drink of water to get a few precious moments of non-Hadley peace. At the fountain, there was a girl I didn’t recognize. She was texting. Her blonde hair was perfectly straight. She was in my way, so I said, “Uh, excuse me.”

“Sorry,” she shuffled two steps to her right, not looking up from her phone.

“I’m a spy from 107,” I said for some reason. 107 was my homeroom number. “Checking out the competition.”

“Be my guest,” she said, but not in a mean way. “I think they’re doing a jungle theme or something. I refuse to touch the paint.” She finished with her phone, put it in her pocket, and looked at me. I liked her glasses. They were orange. Her shirt had I
’M
H
UGE IN
E
UROPE
written on it in tiny green print. “I wish I could transfer,” she said.