The Story, Revised
Adam stood in the doorway of his room, hands pressed on both sides of the wooden frame. An hour earlier, his floor and bed had been littered with bags and boxes; now it was spotless. His bed was neatly made, probably for the first time in weeks, and would remain so until he felt like returning home.
Suddenly, a small frame carrying bouncing brown pigtails appeared at his side and wrapped her arms around his waist.
“I love you.”
Adam reached down to gently pat the top of his sister’s head. “I love you too.”
Quietly, she continued to tightly hug his waist.
“Annie, what’s wrong?”
“Nothin’.”
His lips turned in a half-smile, and he gently pried her arms from him. Still keeping a careful hold on each of her hands, he lowered himself so he could meet her face-to-face.
“Are you telling me the truth?”
She shook her head lightly and turned her eyes to the floor. Finally, she spoke. “I don’t want you to go away to college.”
“I know, but I have to. You know that. One day you’ll go away to college, too.”
She nodded quietly.
He pulled her close into a hug, and she curled her arms about his neck, sniffing softly.
“I’ll come back. I’m not leaving forever.”
“Promise?”
“Yes, I promise.”
Adam pulled back, set a kiss on the top of her head, and stood up.
His mother appeared around the corner, smiling. “You guys are getting along, I hope.”
“Oh, always.” He grinned and reached down to tousle his sister’s hair.
“Hey!” Her hands went up to bat away his hand.
His mother just shook her head. “Grandma’s here to watch Annie, and Jo just pulled up with her parents. Are you ready to go?”
“Yup. Let’s head out.”
He turned to his sister as his grandmother entered the room. She and Adam exchanged a warm hug and she offered him well wishes for college. Adam thanked her, then turned one last time to his sister. “You be good, okay?”
“I will.”
As Adam and his mother headed out to meet Jo and her parents, Adam could hear his grandma talking endearingly to his sister in the background.
“You going to ride with me or Jo?” his mother asked, as the stepped out the door and into the summer air.
“You. I’ll see Jo plenty at school, and you have the whole car ride back to spend with her parents.”
She smiled and wrapped an arm around his shoulder.
***
October had folded into early days of November, and the ground was blanketed in the warm colors of the autumn leaves. But there were still nights, like this one, which retained the comfortable coolness of late September. Using his hands for a pillow and Jo using his chest for hers, the two were stretched comfortably in the midst of a large patch of grass and trees that constituted one of the local inner-city parks. Adam’s eyes bounced between the stars as he replayed the scene at the dance club earlier tonight. He had watched her, out on the floor, flirting with boys and making casual friends with the woman, until she took a break at the end of a song to visit him.
“Are you going to join me?” she had asked.
“No.”
“Why did you come, anyway?”
“Because you asked me to.”
Now Jo was hugging him lightly for the warmth, and he wondered what she might be thinking about.
“How’s Annie?” she asked, interrupting the silence.
“She’s good, I guess.”
“And your mom?”
He shifted his shoulders in a shrug. “I haven’t talked to them in a while. Why are we talking about my family?”
“We don’t have to.”
He remained quiet, with mahogany eyes focused on the thin sliver of moon above. The trees whispered as a breath of wind drew past.
“What are you thinking about?”
“The stars. And the planets. And how I would much rather be up there than down here.”
“There’s not much for oxygen up there,” she teased.
“Maybe that’s the point.”
She drew back from his response, lifting her head to look at him.
“Adam, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” He paused and returned her glance. Looking back to the moon he started again, quietly. “I just wish I had something more important here to do down on earth. You know, cure AIDS, take out terrorists…slay vampires…”
“What about keeping me company? Supporting your mother? Caring for your sister?”
“What about it? If I left, if I died…you’d get along. You’d keep living, keep growing, keep smiling. I don’t have to be there for you to do that. For any of you to do that.”
“Fine. So why don’t you leave?”
“I don’t know. Why do you stay here and listen to me, instead of going out and dancing and dating boys?”
“Because I keep hoping you’ll see exactly what you have.”
“I can’t have what I want.”
“You could if you realized what you wanted.”
He sighed, frustrated. “Jo, do you remember when I was in that car accident with my mother? When we were both still in grade school? I was in the hospital for weeks.”
“Yeah.”
He relayed for her what he remembered of the accident. Then the story his mother had told him of how his heart faltered shortly after arriving at the hospital.
And then his memories from that time. Not of doctors, nurses, machines, and blanched hospital walls, but of an entirely different nature. His mother was the only other person to know this part of the story, and he had been young when he had tried to explain it to her, but he found it no less difficult to put into words for Jo eight years later. Adam tried to best to create for Jo a place made only of pure, soft light, where shadows had no place to dwell. There was no scenery, no fields of green or pristine lakes, but he wasn’t alone. Kind hearts surrounded him, though there were only two he knew: his mother, and his real father. Together, and happy, as if they had never divorced-they were a family again. He remembered being completely content…that happiness was tangible in this place, and he could wrap himself in it like a blanket, and it kept him safe from the chill of despair. And that for those moments he had felt complete, until the doctors had brought him back to face life, where things were cold and empty.
“Are you saying you were in heaven?”
“I’d like to think so.”
“Adam, you can’t be serious. You were young, it was a traumatic experience, and you have no idea what sort of drugs were in your system.”
“I don’t care what it was. It was nice.”
***
With nothing to demand his time, Adam chose to sleep in, as his conversation with Jo the night before had run early into the morning. So when noon rolled around, it was the phone that woke him, and not an alarm.
His hand sought out the phone, and missed. Adam sat up, and found it on the second try.
“Uh, hello?” He rubbed at his eyes with his free hand.
“Adam?” It was his mother. She sounded strange. He blinked.
“Yeah mom?”
“I’m at the hospital.”
“What?”
She didn’t allow him time to process before continuing. “You need to come.”
“Mom?”
“I don’t know why she crossed the road. She knows she shouldn’t.”
He could hardly understand her. And now he couldn’t hear her at all, just strange gasping sounds coming from a far away place.
“Adam, they don’t know if she’s going to wake up.” Suddenly her voice was very clear.
“I’m coming.”
“The doctor needs me now.”
Adam heard the line go dead, and he finally removed the phone from his ear. He stared down at the headset, and he couldn’t seem to tell which buttons had which numbers on them.
Finally, on instinct, he moved his thumb to hit the speed-dial that connected him to Jo.
She picked up on the first ring; evidently she had not indulged in sleep as he had.
“Hello?”
“Jo, I need you. And your car. Come quickly.”
She didn’t ask questions. “Okay.”
Adam clicked the phone into the receiver. He would have preferred the alarm clock.
***
Adam had quietly explained to Jo the situation when she had arrived to pick him up and had then gone silent. It was now a half hour into their three-hour drive, and they had made little progress in the way of conversation.
“Adam,” she started.
“Jo, don’t.”
“Why not? It’s not good for you to sit and brood.”
“Did you not understand me this morning?” He didn’t mean to be so angry with her.
“Yes, I did. And if you sit here like this for the next two hours, how do you expect to be ready to talk to your mother?”
He cast her a look, but said nothing. She was right, of course. Why couldn’t he be like that?
“Look, just talk to me. I don’t care what about. Your latest story. How you cried when Lord of the Rings ended, but don’t want to admit to me because you have this idea that I’ll think less of you. Maybe the last Star Trek episode you watched.”
“You watched it with me, Jo. And it was a movie.”
“Right.”
“Spock died.”
“Adam, Annie is not going to die.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Well, at least I’m being optimistic.” It was an unfair shot to make, no matter how true, and she winced.
“What if I don’t see her again? We talked on the phone last week, and I hardly paid attention.”
“You’ll see her again.”
He fell back into thought, and Jo was left with only a Jake Donze CD as her company.
“A busy mind, I think too much
About the things I can't control
So many times I've only touched
The things I've most wanted to hold”
***
Last week’s Saturday morning found Adam seated at his small dorm desk, his history textbook spread flat over its surface. He had been there unmoving for some time, when suddenly the sharp ringing of his phone pulled his eyes from the blocks of text. He took up the receiver in his hand.
“Hello?”
“Hi, honey.”
“Hey, mom.”
He went through the usual banter with his mother, discussing his classes, his friends, and his grades. He asked her how work was going, and it was going fine, just like always. His eyes idly scanned the pages of his history text as she spoke.
His mother went quiet, and he heard a muffled, high-pitched voice talking to her on the other end. His sister.
“Adam, hold on. Annie wants to talk to you.”
There was a pause as the phone back home changed hands.
“Hi!” He could hear the smile in her voice.
“Hey, sweetie.”
“Guess what?” There was a soft giggle.
“What?”
“Mommy got me a scooter.” He could picture her grinning. She’d badly wanted one since they had become popular several years ago.
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. It’s blue and silver. Every day I ride it down the sidewalk.”
“Wow. That’s neat.”
“Mom said it was for my good grades. I got all A’s, just like you when you went to school.”
“I’m still in school. It’s just farther away.”
“Are you coming home soon?”
“Maybe.”
“You can ride my scooter, too. I’ll let you.”
He laughed softly. “That sounds fun.”
“You should come home next weekend.”
“I probably won’t be able to.”
“Why not?” He hated the way he made her disappointed.
“Because I have things to do here. And my friends are here. This is where I live now. Remember?”
“You should come home soon.”
He sighed. “Okay. We’ll see how it goes. I love you, Annie. Give the phone back to Mom now.”
“Okay. I love you too.”
There was a rustling as she returned the phone to his mother.
“You really should come home, Adam.”
“I’ll think about it. Maybe Jo will be heading back soon and I can hitch a ride.”
“Yeah, why don’t you ask her? I’m going to let you get back to your work now. Have a good week, okay? Call me and let know how things are going for you.”
“I will. Love you, mom.”
“Love you.”
***
Between his own accident and his second father’s death, Adam had come to know the hospital well. He strolled by the information desk and turned immediately to the elevators that would take them to the ICU. After it had taken them up, the doors slid open to reveal his mother on the other side. She was sitting in one of the lobby chairs with a blank expression over her flushed features, hands sitting plainly in her lap. Unsure of what to do, Adam finally moved toward her after a gentle nudge from Jo.
“Mom…”
She turned to him as he spoke and hugged him. He squeezed back and she kissed him. Her cheeks were cold and wet on his.
“How is she doing?”
“I don’t know. They’ve been with her since I called.”
Adam was silent. She had called him over three hours ago. Jo stepped forward and embraced his mother.
“Thank you for coming, Jo. It was very nice of you to drive Adam.” She attempted a smile. The gratitude, at least, was genuine.
They stood facing each other, unspeaking, in the white and teal of the room. A nurse in blue scrubs hustled by and down the hallway. At the desk, the phone rung and the friendly receptionist at the counter answered it.
“I don’t know what I’ll do if she doesn’t make it, Adam.” There was a long pause as her hand drew upwards to cover her mouth. “But I’m glad you’re here with me.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t come home this weekend. I should have been here.”
“It’s alright.”
No one said anything for a while. Then, from his mother, “would you excuse me? I’m going to go find the bathroom.”
Adam turned to look at the row of seats that lined the waiting room wall. He took a seat next to his mother’s belongings, and Jo settled in quietly beside him. He stared ahead, looking toward one of the hallways. Which room was his sister in?
“What are you thinking about?”
“Hmm?” He gave her a sideways glance, then shook his head. “Annie. Moments we’ve had, things I’ve said, things she’s said…”
“Tell me.”
So he did. At first, he only had little moments from her to share. How her first word had been much closer to “Adam” than to “Mom” or “Dad.” And how excited he had been that she had chosen his name to speak first. How angry he had been with her when she had snuck into his room with a box of crayons, and decorated his white walls with her colorful artwork. And, a story from when she was younger, maybe two or three, and he had caught her on the porch with a bag of apples they had just collected from their backyard tree in her lap. She had taken a bite from each fresh apple, and then set it aside. He remembered that both mom and her father had been furious, but it was a story they all laughed about later. Thinking about this, Adam even managed a chuckle, and Jo was happy to join him.
Those were the moments. Jo even found one of her own to contribute.
“Do you remember when she told me that you had written that you had a crush on me in your journal?”
Another small laugh. “Ugh, don’t remind me. That wasn’t that long ago, you know. I remember, you wouldn’t even look at me for a week.”
“Heh. Yeah.”
As they continued to talk, he found more than moments between him and Annie. He found stories, many he realized he had never shared before. Not because they were private, but because he had never thought to talk about them.
One in particular stood out. It was a day in August, and he, excited with the prospect of becoming a high school freshman, had convinced his mother that he was old enough to be home alone with Annie to watch her.
They had gone outside to play in the summer sun, which had invariably led to each of them retrieving their water guns and running about the yard until each was sufficiently drenched and dripping. He had forced her to surrender, like always, and on heading back inside the house, discovered that the door had been left open. Both spent a good deal of time blaming the other for the faux pas, when their arguing was interrupted by a strange sound. First a buzzing, like a very large bee, and then tiny thwack, and then buzzing again. Closing the door as they left the entranceway, both he and Annie, wet and dripping, tiptoed toward the sound. Entering into the living room, they found their culprit.
“What is that?” Annie had whispered.
Adam just stared.
“It is a big bee?” She eased herself further behind him.
“No, it’s a hummingbird.”
They spent the rest of the day trying to catch it, which had proved difficult, since none of their butterfly nets were completely intact. Finally, from the exhaustion of their relentless chasing, the hummingbird had collapsed.
He remembered the two of them slowly approaching it, as it quivered on the floor, until he found the courage to gently scoop it up into his hands.
“Can I hold it?” Annie asked him.
“Yeah.”
With the creature resting gingerly in her hands, he led her outside, and gently coaxed the tiny bird onto one of his mother’s hanging flower baskets. It found a perch, found sweet nectar in the belly of a blossom, and once full, was gone with a quick buzz.
Adam remembered most her wide eyes upon feeling the tiny creature in her hands, and the sweet smile and excited clap she gave when it flew off towards home. As he conveyed this to Jo, he wondered if he would watch his sister have moments like that again.
When he had finished, he realized how long his mother had been gone. Looking away from Jo, he scanned the area.
“Looking for your mother?”
“Yeah…”
She appeared from the hallway she had exited to, with a doctor in tow. Adam assumed he had caught her as she was walking back to them. As they approached, he and Jo rose in unison. Adam noticed that his mother carried none of the solemnity that she had when he first arrived.
“She’s waking up.”
The doctor behind her smiled. “As I’ve already told your mother, it looks as if she’ll pull through.”
They hurriedly followed his mother and the doctor down the hall and into the bright hospital room. The nurses in their bluish scrubs were finishing the last of the cleaning, and took what readings they required before quietly going on about their business wherever else it was needed. The doctor, have already spoken at length to Adam’s mother, stepped out as well, leaving them with a way to contact him if needed.
“She’s seen me already…I didn’t come get you right away,” his mother informed him. He smiled and gently touched her shoulder; her concerned expression eased.
Adam took his step forward, taking a moment to look upon the small, bandaged frame of his sister that rested unmoving before him. Before this, how long had it been since he had seen her? Guilt pounded in his heart. What if he had never seen her again? He silently chided himself. None of that mattered. He was here now, and she was going to be okay. She did not make any motion towards him, but he saw her eyes grow bright as she spotted him, and the stiffness in his shoulders left.
“Hi, sweetie.” He bent down and kissed her. As gracefully and gently as he could, Adam wrapped his arms about her, and he started as he felt her warming fingers curl about his arms. “I told you I’d come see you.”
“You were there.”
Wispy and at the edge of inaudible, he looked to her face, eyes wide, waiting for her lips to move again. They did.
“You kept me safe.”
He held her then as tightly as he dared, as if perhaps he had never really held her before, but understanding precisely what she meant.