Radiant (28 page)

"I was," he said.

"But not now," she said. "Not with Mary. I was looking for any shred of jerkiness in you so that I could tell her, 'See? This is what men are like! They'll use you and leave you just like that!' But you weren't like that. You're surgical room clean."

"We broke your rules, though," he said.

"I was waiting for that," she said. "A moment to pounce. I know you two didn't do anything on the roof. But I used it to both protect and break my little girl."

Mom blew her nose. Phos said nothing.

"Do you know how I came to have her?" Mom asked.

"No," he said.
"But I'd like to hear your story."

"
I got pregnant the first time when I was sixteen," Mom said. "I was so scared and I didn't know what to do, so I got an abortion. I didn't tell my parents, but my father found out about it. He did everything he could to keep me in line without telling my mom. He took a huge pay cut for a job where he didn't have to travel as much. He wouldn't let me go anywhere by myself and would ride the bus with me to school. He'd take his lunch break late so that he could ride back home with me. During the summer, he made me work at his office filing stuff or cleaning out storerooms. He had me on such a short leash that I hated him.

"But of course, that didn't stop me from finding jerks. I found ways to sneak away. Some
times my father caught me. Other times he didn't. Then things changed when I graduated from high school. My dad couldn't keep tabs on me the same way. When I went to the university, I never went to class and would go partying and be gone for days at a time. Eventually, I got pregnant again."

"What happened to that child?" Phos asked.

"I miscarried," she said. "That's how I learned that I had a hole in my uterus. It came from the abortion. I had actually wanted that one. I had wanted the first one too, but—" Mom blew her nose again. "Then my father died. They say it was from lung cancer, but I felt like I was responsible. That I had broken his heart too many times and he just couldn't hang on anymore and wait for me to get my act together. I felt like I had killed my own father, who worked everyday of his life at a job he hated so that I could keep screwing around."

"And Mary?" Phos asked.

Mom smirked. "You think I would've learned my lesson by then. But of course I didn't. I kept partying. Kept drinking. Kept doing whatever I could to not feel anything or think straight enough to face what kind of monster I was. And I got pregnant again. When I went to the doctor, she told me that with my condition, my chances of successfully carrying this baby to full term were almost zero. And if I tried to have her, it was possible my whole uterus would come out, too. That's how bad off I was. She recommended I abort."

"Why didn't you?" he asked.

Mom cleared her throat. "When I was told that this baby might not survive, I don't know what happened. But I realized how badly I wanted her. I hadn't wanted anything so much. Not even a knight in shining armor. I felt like if I were to succeed at only one thing in my life, I wanted to be able to have this baby. So, I went home. I begged my mother to help me. And just like the great woman she is, she did. When Mary was born, I felt like the sun had broken through some clouds that had covered me for years. I cleaned up and never looked back at that woman I was before. Mary saved my life."

Neither of them spoke for a moment. Then Phos said
softly, "Thank you for telling me. I understand better why you want to protect Mary so much."

Another moment of silence. Then Mom said, "I'm
glad you were there tonight. If she had died, I—I don't—"

Mom fell back into sobs.

Mary heard a different beep. Something cold flowed into her veins. Then she was pulled back into the darkness where even her ears didn't work.

***

Mary drifted back into dreaming, but this time she felt extremely hot. She couldn't open her eyes or move again, but her ears picked up a beautiful voice. It spoke softly and sounded familiar. "Phos. There is nothing I can do."

"
You helped before, Mayim," he said. "Humans are mostly water. You work with water all the time."

"
This is not the same as a burn," Mayim said. "This is an infection. Her body needs to fight it on its own. Let it do what it was made to."

"I'm not talking about the infection," he said.

They said nothing for a moment. Then Mayim spoke. "I see. That is definitely beyond my ability."

Mary felt a familiar hand take hers. With her fever, it didn't feel as hot as it normally did.

"We are supposed to protect humans," he said. "And I cannot even protect her from this."

"The only one who can help her is
the Master," Mayim said.

"I know," he said.
"But I cannot ask him."

"He
might heal her."

"He'll
definitely take her memory," he said. "If the judges don't find her first."

"Ah," she said. "That is why you asked me for more rain. To hide her energy from the
m."

Who was this "M
aster" they mentioned? Mary wanted to ask, but she couldn't move her mouth.

"
Phos," Mayim said. "Do you not think it is time? How long have you been pretending to be human?"

"
I was trying to protect her," he said.

"
But
are
you protecting her?" Mayim asked. "By being here? By breaking the rules?"

He didn
't answer.

"
Maybe it is time to let her go," Mayim said. "Maybe it is time to give the boy back his body and go back to how things were. Perhaps the judges or the Master will never know."

No!
Mary wanted to shout. Phos couldn't leave her. Not now. Not yet. She needed him.

The
soft beep and the cool liquid in her veins came back, and Mary was under again.

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- 29
-

Loss

Mary opened her eyes. She saw blurry shapes. She blinked a couple times to focus. At last, Mom's teary face became clear.

"
Mom?" Mary's voice was weak, and her mouth was parched.

Mom smiled as best as she could. "Hi
, Sweetie."

Mary
scanned the room. She saw Ba, Emma, Julia, George, and the Pennys. There was also a nurse she didn't recognize. At last, her eyes settled on Phos. Unconsciously, she raised a weak hand towards him.

He took it and squeezed it. "Hello, Mary."

"What are you all doing here?" she asked.

"We've been waiting all week for
them to finally let you wake up, Baby Girl," Emma said.

Mary looked around. It
then dawned on her that she was still in the hospital. "I've been here for a week?"

"What do you remember?" Ba asked.

Mary thought hard. "The guy at the store. There was blood on the floor. And I heard voices." She put her hand on her forehead. "Everything else is fuzzy."

"You're still getting
over the medication," Mom said. "It might be a little while before you remember everything."

Mary stared at her. "I was really shot, wasn't I?"

Mom pressed her lips together and nodded.

Mary looked over at Phos.
"And you're not yelling at him?"

Everyone chuckled
.

"No," Mom said. "We're all right now, Mary."

A knock came to the door, and a doctor in scrubs and a white coat poked her head in. "Hi there, Mary. I'm Dr. Han. Glad to see you're awake. If I may ask everyone to step outside for a moment? You may stay, Ms. Phan."

Ba kissed Ma
ry on the forehead before she left the room with the others. Phos squeezed her hand again and followed them out.

Dr. Han explained that when Mary arrived at the ER, she actually hadn't lost much blood because the wound in her stomach had cauterized. "That was very unusual," the doctor said. "Can you tell me what caused that?"

Phos' hot hand, Mary thought. But she answered, "I don't know."

"Hm," the doctor said. "Well,
it left a scar. I don't know how you feel about it, but I can make some recommendations for plastic surgeons."

"
No," Mary said quickly as her hand went to her stomach. She could feel through the hospital gown the rough patch of skin there. "I want to keep it."

Dr. Han and Mom looked at one another.
"All right. It's not causing any complications, so that should be fine. Anyway, just to bring you up to speed, a bullet fragment had nicked your small intestine, so you had an infection to deal with for a few days. That's why we kept you asleep for a while. But now that's past and you're awake, I'd like you to do a couple things for me. Would that be all right?"

Mary nodded.

"Good, nodding your head was actually one of them," she said, marking her clipboard.

Dr. Han asked her to do different things, like raise her arms and tell her if sh
e felt her pinch her fingers. Then she asked, "Can you wiggle your toes for me?"

Mary did.

Mom's brow wrinkled.

"Can you do it again?" Dr. Han asked. "Wiggle your toes?"

Mary did it again.

Mom's hand went to her mouth as tears filled her eyes. "Excuse me," she said quickly before running from the room.

"What is it?" Mary asked. "Why is she crying?"

Rather than answer her, Dr. Han touched parts of her left leg. "Can you feel that?"

"Doctor," Mary said firmly. "Why is she crying? Please. Tell me."

The doctor marked her chart. Then, she looked Mary in the eye. "
A larger bullet fragment was lodged in your spine. In your lower back. There's a chance you may be paralyzed from the waist down."

Mary
looked at her. "You mean I can't walk?"

Dr. Han sighed and shook her head.

Mary looked down. She pulled away the blanket so that she could see her feet. She tried wiggling her toes again.

They wouldn't respond.

Mary tried and tried and tried. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't get any part of her feet or legs to move.

***

Mary was moved from ICU to a regular bed. Ba and her friends stayed as long as they could before it was time for them to head back to Agape.

"I'm praying for you, Baby Girl," Emma said.

"She gonna need it," George grumbled. "Only doctors who know what they's doin' is army doctors."

"Shut up, George," Julia said. "You get better
, Mary. You hear?"

The Pennys also said goodbye, and they shuffled from the room with the help of the Agape workers
who came with them.

"Looks like it'll be me coming to visit you for a while," Ba said. She kissed Mary on her cheek.
"I love you, Con."

"I love you,
too, Ba," Mary said.

When Ba had left with the others, Mom said, "I have to go home and get ready so that I can come back for work. I'll pick up dinner on the way. Is there anything you want?"

After a week of just IV fluids, Mary was famished. "Can you stop by Spice?"

Mom smiled. "All right, b
ut nothing too spicy. You need stuff that's easy on your stomach." She kissed Mary on her forehead. "Carter will be with you until I get back. You let the nurses know if you need anything, all right? Love-you-buh-bye."

Mary nodded. "Love-you-buh-bye."

When Mom had gone, Phos pulled a chair over and sat by her bed. He took her hand and held it in both of his.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

"Tired and sore," she said. "You?"

He rubbed her hand. "I learned something new."

"What is it?" she asked.

He didn
't say anything, but looked down. A second later, Mary felt boiling tears fall on her hand.

"You can cry," she said.

Phos buried his face in her side. "I-I'm so sorry," he choked. "I wish there was something I could do. I'd break a million rules if I could just—" The rest of his words were lost in sobs.

Mary squeezed his hand.
"There is something you can do."

He looked at her with glossy eyes.

Mary reached over and wiped away his tears. "Don't leave me," she said.

Phos
said nothing. Then, he wiped his nose on his sleeve and kissed her.

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- 3
0 -

Therapy

Phos still had to pretend to be Carter, so he left the hospital once visitor hours were over. He promised to return the next day after school.