Reaching Rose (Hunter Hill University Book 3) (4 page)

BEN

It's been two days since the pudding incident, and I haven't seen Rose since. When I ask Lou if she knows anything, she says that she does, but she's not at liberty to share that information with me. So I ask Craig, who's not so much about the rules.

"Falco, man," he says, "you gotta promise me you won't say anything to anyone."

"Of course not," I promise. "I just want to know if something happened to her?"

He nods. "She had some kind of breakthrough."

"Breakthrough?" I interrupt. "That's good, no?"

"I don't know. Yes, I guess, but it was more like a break
down
. They put her in a private room, because her crying was disrupting her roommate. She was screaming all night."

"Why? What happened that caused that?"

Craig shakes his head. "I don't know her whole deal, but since she's been here, she's been like this zombie. Just stares at the walls. I mean, not all the time. Sometimes she's here in this world, but mostly, she's not."

"Really?"

"Yup. I told you how she doesn't speak, right? Well, that's the other part - her zombie-like state. But Nina, her therapist, thought she was getting through to her two days ago. She actually stood up on her own, which she hasn't done ever. But then, she started to turn into that zombie girl again, and then boom. I heard she started screaming. Not sure what triggered it, but I hear that even though she's been non-stop crying, her psychiatrist said it's a breakthrough. Her accident is finally sinking in. But...I don't know. She's a strange one."

Strange? I don't think so at all. I think she's just depressed. "She lost her leg, dude. I don't think I'd handle that well either."

"Yeah. Guess you're right."

"Damn right I'm right. I don't think I could handle losing one of my legs. And never be able to play ball again? No way. Her whole life changed because of this. I mean, I don't know how active she was before, but I'd guess that even going to the mall with her friends is going to be different. No?"

"No, man, you're right. I get that. I didn't mean anything by it. God, you like her or something?" Craig says with a quirk of his mouth.

"Like her? I don't know her. I just feel bad for her." Like her. How could I like someone I don't even know?

"Got it, man. You feel bad for her. Me too. Really, I do. I'm sorry I made it sound like I didn't."

I nod, silently accepting an apology that really needn't have been made.

"Let's get on with your therapy." Craig bends down and unlocks my brace. "I think we'll keep this unlocked for a few hours today. Get your knee moving a little more. Sound good?"

"Sounds great." It may not sound like a big deal, but when you can't bend your leg, you realize how necessary the knee is in getting around normally.

While Craig is guiding me through different exercises, he asks me if I’ve finally met my roommate Johnny.

"I did. He's cool. Happy guy, no?"

"Yeah. Very. He's so positive he'll walk again, you can't help but believe it too."

"Right? I feel guilty just being here. I mean, my injury is nothing. I could've done this from home, but my coach convinced me it'd be best for my career. I'm not like everyone else here, though. It's just..."

"Don't feel bad. You need to be here if you want it done properly. And hey, your insurance pays, so you might as well. Daily therapy is better than a couple times a week. Not everyone has permanent or severe injuries here. There are plenty of patients just recovering from surgeries. Stop knocking yourself."

He's right, but it doesn't help me feel less guilty about not being severely injured.

Craig continues running me through exercises, and when my hour is up, he lets me use crutches to walk to the rec room or the cafeteria. I choose the rec room, because I'm really hoping Rose will be in there today, and I highly doubt that she'll be in the cafeteria. I kind of doubt she'll even be out of her room, but I hope anyway. I scan the room as soon as I enter, but immediately learn she's not there. Not a redhead in sight. But I do see Johnny, so I hobble over to his table and pull out a chair. As I do, a burning pain shoots from my knee up my leg and I flinch.

"Hey, Ben," Johnny says, "you okay?"

My eyes are closed when I answer him. "Yeah." I pinch my eyes closed tighter before opening them. "Wow. Just a bad pain. I'm good." I sit down, set my crutches to the side and ask Johnny how he's doing.

"Good. Making progress in therapy, so that's always good."

"Yeah? Progress?"

"Yup." But he doesn't elaborate, and I get the feeling there was no real progress at all.

Again, my guilt kicks in, but I smile anyway. "That's awesome, Johnny. Great news."

"Yeah. So when you get that brace off?" he asks me.

"I don't know. Soon, I think." I lift my leg to show him my knee. "Got it unlocked today." But I feel like I'm bragging, so I ask about him. "So, you go to college?" I ask, not thinking if it was appropriate to ask or not. I mean, he is a quadriplegic;
can
he go to school?

But without missing a beat, Johnny says, "That's the plan. I'm a senior in high school right now. My accident happened this past spring, during my junior year. I get a lot of tutoring, so I completed my junior year. Hopefully I won't have to redo this year, since I'll be out the entire year most likely. So, in answer to your question, I don't go to college, but the plan is to go for engineering."

I raise an eyebrow. "So you're smart, I assume?"

He laughs. "Genius." Johnny takes a deep breath, as he does frequently between sentences. "Good thing my brain wasn't affected in the accident, huh?"

Nodding, I smile, not too sure what to say, so I ask, "What happened?" Hopefully it's okay to ask.

"Fell off a ladder, cleaning my mom's gutters." He shakes his head. "See what happens when you don't have a dad around. The loser left my mom and me, so I take care of everything for her." For the first time since talking to him, I see a frown on his face. But it's quickly hidden when he says, "That's why I'm going to recover. She needs me. And she needs those gutters cleaned...I fell before I even made a dent in them."

Again, I nod, but this time he leaves me speechless. Literally, I don't know what to say, and he sees me fumbling.

"Dude. It's okay. I'm gonna be fine."

He's gonna be fine. It hits me the differences between his outlook and Rose's. What is it that causes such extremes in the mind? Why do some people face trauma with such optimism and some with such pessimism? How would I react in a similar situation? Fortunately for me, it's a hypothetical situation, but for Johnny and Rose, it's their reality.

"So, what about you?" Johnny interrupts my thoughts. "You go to college, right? I asked Lou. She said you're a big-time ball player?"

I laugh. "I play ball, yeah. Hunter Hill. Ever heard of it?"

He nods. "I have. Good school. Great engineering department."

"I've heard. I'm going for sports psychology. Love the mind. There's never a concrete answer to how it functions," I say, reminding myself that I may never know the answer to why Johnny and Rose react so differently to their respective circumstances.

"So you're pretty smart, too, I suppose."

Again, I laugh. "Not even close. But I do try hard."

He laughs with me, and then one of the aides comes in with a tray of food for each of us. "Anything you guys need besides lunch?"

"No, but thank you," I tell him.

"Yeah, thanks," Johnny says.

"No problem. It's why I'm here. Marti'll be in to help you in a second," the aide tells Johnny.

When he walks away, I ask Johnny, "Is everyone here super nice?"

"Everyone
I've
come across in the past month."

"You've been here for one month?"

"A month and a half." His frown reappears when he looks down at his food.

I feel bad for the guy. He can't even feed himself. What will happen if the future he sees is not the one intended for him? Will he succumb to depression like Rose? Or will he thrive? As optimistic as he is, something tells me anything but what he expects...will kill him.

His lunch aide, Marti, comes in to feed him, and Johnny keeps smiling through lunch, but all the while he's chatting away, I come to the conclusion that maybe his optimism is a façade that hides his true emotions. Maybe his outlook is not so different from Rose's. And maybe I'm going to have my work cut out for me when I finally become a psychologist.

After the Major Leagues.

ROSE

I'm not ready to get back out there, but at least the tears have stopped. Not sure what came over me, but I had a complete meltdown in front of Nina and didn't stop crying for thirty-six hours straight - give or take a few minutes. Dr. Rappaport keeps telling me that it was some kind of breakthrough, but I don't feel better, I feel worse. But it doesn’t matter, because he insists I leave my private room and move back in with my roommate, Kimberlee. Which makes me feel bad for Kimberlee, because I know she is uncomfortable around me.
I'm
uncomfortable around me. Kat rolls me into my old room after dinner and Kimberlee is sitting in the corner chair, watching television. She looks at me before averting her eyes and returning her attention to the television. She's in here because she had a stroke and had to relearn how to do many mundane things, including talking, which I must say she does very well now. Kimberlee was talkative the first night I moved in, telling me all about how she is prone to seizures and that those seizures were related to her stroke. She had to relearn how to walk, and eat with a utensil, and write. Everything. But she recovered fast, and I'm sure she'll be going home soon. I wouldn't know though, because that's the last time she spoke to me. When someone doesn't respond to you at all, there is no reason to keep communicating with them. I didn't respond. She doesn't talk to me anymore.

Since I broke down and cried two and a half days ago, it's harder to keep my emotions in check. My throat is constantly hurting from holding back more tears, and my eyes burn from keeping them from falling out. But Dr. Rappaport doesn't want me to be by myself. He says that would be counterproductive and so I need to be out and attempting to socialize with the rest of the patients and staff. Socialize? I've forgotten how to do that.

The night is quiet and I fall asleep quickly, one thing that hasn't been hard for me since the accident. I love to sleep. I long for it during every waking hour. But morning comes too soon when I wake to Lou nudging me in the arm.

"Come on, love, it's time to get up." She places some wipes and a washcloth on my table tray and helps me sit up in bed. "Let's try to do this on your own today. Please?" she asks, and I feel bad that I've been so uncooperative. But today, I find myself reaching for the wipes.

I know Lou wants to scream with pleasure, because, yeah, I just attempted to do something for myself, and I don't even know why. But she refrains from singing "Hallelujah," and I'm grateful.

"Would you like me to leave you alone?"

Yes, I do, but I don't think I can stand on my own yet. Not because my good leg may not be strong enough, but because one look at my half-leg may send me straight into another breakdown and I'll fall. And if I fall, how will I get up? These are the thoughts that scare me. The normal everyday tasks I took for granted before my accident have become the exact things that scare me now.

I attempt to shake my head, so Lou knows I don't want her to leave. It's a start, right? Shaking my head, as imperceptible as it may have been.

Lou's smile brightens. "Come on, girl, let me help you up." She lifts me up, and instead of putting me in my wheelchair, she places a walker in front of me. "I think it's time now, sweetie, to use this. I know this is all new to you, but you need to help yourself. You got fitted for that prosthesis, and it's going to be here any day now. You need to be ready, and..." She pauses, because she sees me frown.

She sits me back down on the bed and sits next to me. With her hand on my left thigh, the thigh that doesn't have a whole leg attached to it, she sucks a breath in. "I know this is hard on you, honey. And I'm not your psychotherapist or psychiatrist, I'm just your nurse, but as your nurse, I'm telling you how important it is for your recovery to do things for yourself. Sitting here in this slump you've been in—" she shakes her head "—it's not going to help you move forward." She tips her head in Kimberlee's direction, even though the curtain's drawn. "Look at our friend over there...you over there, Kimberlee?"

"You bet I'm here," Kimberlee announces joyfully.

"She came in here with no idea if she'd ever be normal again, and look at her. She's ready to leave. You know why?"

She waits for a response from me, but I don't offer one.

"Because I rock," Kimberlee responds for me.

"That's right," Lou agrees, "she rocks. She knew right from the beginning that her attitude was key in recovering." Lou sighs. "I know not everyone who keeps their head up gets the results they want, but I do know that if you don't even try, there is no possible way to recover. The physical wound may heal, but your heart and mind won't, and then where will you be?" She raises her eyebrows at me in question.

I answer her with the slip of a tear that I did not want to let out. She uses her thumb to wipe it away, but more follow, and now I'm afraid that they won't stop again.

"Use those tears for good, Rosie. They mean you care. They mean you want to move forward."

Kimberlee's bed squeaks, and next thing I know, she's standing in front of me. "I know you don't like to talk," she says to me, "but talking about it, getting it out, it helps. Shit, I
couldn't
talk in the beginning, and that was rough. My brain was screaming. But once I figured it out...you couldn't shut me up." Kimberlee sways her head from side to side. "Well,
you
shut me up," she says of my refusal to respond to anything she'd said to me. "But seriously, Rose. You're only hurting yourself. I'll shut up now." Kimberlee winks and walks back behind her curtain.

"Come on," Lou says, getting up and pushing the walker back in front of me. "Let's get you cleaned up."

I use the sleeve of my robe to wipe the rest of my tears, but no more are shed. My tears don’t continue, so maybe I'm breaking through after all.

***

During physical therapy, Nina can't believe her eyes. "Girl, look at you," she exclaims, singing my praise, because I'm finally walking along the parallel bars on my own. "Look at those guns. So, you do have muscle in those skinny arms of yours."

If I were talking, I'd say, "My arms ain't skinny, they're strong." Because they are strong. I've always been strong. It's one of the reasons I'm a good dancer.

Was
a good dancer.

As hard as it is, I try to shake it off.

I'll never be a dancer again.

But I'm not dead, and so I guess I need to at least learn to walk.

I take a deep breath and push myself forward. After about ten minutes of "running relays" through the parallel bars, I joke to myself, my arms hurt. As strong as they used to be, I guess not using them weakened them.

"Good job, Rose." Nina literally pats me on the back. "I'm proud of you. I know today was rough, but you made a huge stride. Please keep that in mind...please," she almost begs.

I blink my eyes, knowing that isn't the best of responses, but it's the best I can give at the moment.

"Do you think you can manage on your own in your chair?" She looks me in the eyes.

Do I want to keep depending on someone else to push me everywhere I need to go? I certainly know how to use this power wheelchair, so do I continue being an obnoxious ass and have someone push me around, or can I continue with my efforts and direct the chair myself?

I respond by pushing on the chair's joystick and rolling forward a foot.

Her grin widens as she nods. "Atta girl. C'mon, I'll walk with you to get some lunch." Which is a good idea, because I don't trust myself to move on my own once I'm by myself. "I'll get you to the rec and then I'll have someone bring in your lunch. Good?"

She looks at me for a response, but all I can manage is a blink.

"I'll take that as a yes," she says and keeps one hand on the back of my chair while I wheel myself to the rec room. It's only been three days since I sat in here, but it feels longer. And it may be egotistical of me, but I'm afraid everyone is staring at me, so I keep my eyes on the floor in front of me. "Girl, look where you're going," Nina reminds me. "You gotta look at the road ahead of you, Rose."

I look up, and the first person I see is Ben. Looking right at me. Quickly, I drop my head down again and stop wheeling myself.

"Rosie, what's going on?" Nina asks, exasperated. "C'mon, girl." She gives up on me and pushes me to an empty table. "I'll have your lunch brought to you." Nina walks away, leaving me alone and paranoid.

I'm so hyper-aware all of a sudden. It's as if that breakdown I had the other day broke my shut-off valve and turned on my emotions. I don't like it at all. Closing my eyes, I try to slink back into my daydreams and shut the room out so that I'm alone with my past. But it doesn't come. I close my eyes tighter, willing my past life, before the accident, to appear behind my eyelids, but it remains black, the sounds of the rec room breaking in too loudly for me to get there. Wetness takes the place where my dreams should be. No. I won't let them fall. Damn these tears. Why did I have to break down the other day? Why couldn't I just remain empty and emotionless? Damn that chocolate pudding. He did this to me.
He
broke through my resolve.
He
made me feel again.