Flash. Pause. Beep. Flash. Pause. Beep.
Stevie tried not to think about it, to close her eyes and sleep, but even with her eyes closed, the light seeped in under her eyelids.
Flash. Pause. Beep. Flash. Pause. Longer pause. Beep.
This was intolerable. But her head didn’t hurt anymore, and neither did her arm. That’s right—they said something about giving her medicine for the pain.
Still, even through the haze, it was amazing how distracting a flashing light could be. Maybe she would make the light her friend. The light was saying, Go to sleep, Stevie. Night night, Stevie.
No it wasn’t. No flashing light says that. The point of a flashing light is to say, Look at me! Look at me! Something is happening!
What was happening? Nothing. She was in this bed, tired and sleepless, a cast molded neatly to her arm.
Flash. Pause. Beep. Flash. Pause. Pause. Beep. Flash.
Look at me! Look at me!
Stevie felt something click in her brain.
The cast was snug. The cast was a part of her. The cast—
Look at me!
Stevie fumbled around in the bed, scrambling in the half dark with her right hand until she found the clicker she sort of remembered the nurse putting by her hand. She pressed it once, then again. A figure appeared in the doorway after several minutes.
“You okay?” said the nurse.
“Pen?”
“What?”
“Please can I have a pen?” she said. “Please. It’s important.”
The nurse let out a barely audible sigh but produced a Sharpie and handed it to her.
“Thank you,” Stevie croaked. Her throat was rough from coughing out that water.
When the nurse was gone, she pulled off the cap with her teeth, realizing after she did it that maybe it wasn’t a great idea to stick hospital pens in her mouth. No matter. She had the Sharpie now. It was dark, but she could about make out the words she was writing on the cast:
light. flash. form.
Now she could sleep.
26
STEVIE WOKE IN A STRANGE, NARROW BED, DRESSED IN THE THIN HOSPITAL gown.
She sat up slowly, using her unbroken arm to push herself up. She was surprised when this hurt her hand and looked to find her palms covered in scratches and cuts. The fall off the point had not been elegant or clean. She padded her way over to the bathroom in the grippy sock-slippers someone had put on her feet the night before. The bathroom mirror revealed the extent of the damage—her hair was sticking up at all angles, there were dark circles under her eyes along with a long scrape down the right side of her face. Her arm was green with bruises, which were accentuated by the green fiberglass cast that now adorned it.
These were all things that suggested she should return to the bed behind her. But then she looked down at the three words she had written on the cast the night before. She splashed water on her face (a mistake, this hurt), then shuffled over to the landline phone on the wheeled bedside table. She blinked, trying to recall the number she needed, then dialed.
“I need you,” she said when the person picked up. “And I need clothes.”
David turned up within the hour. Stevie had spent that hour wandering the halls, trying to find her nurse, and then bugging that nurse about when she would be allowed to go. The nurse asked her politely to return to bed, explaining that the doctor would be up in the early afternoon, and that she would likely be allowed to go then. But early afternoon was too far away.
So when David walked through the door with the bag of clothes, Stevie immediately pushed herself out of bed, took it, and disappeared into the bathroom.
“How are you feeling?” David asked through the door.
“Everything hurts,” she said. “Fine.”
He had come with a pair of sweatpants and a stretched-out T-shirt. She fumbled, trying to work out how to shimmy out of her hospital gown. She pulled on the ties, loosening it, and it fell off the one side of her body, but it got stuck on the side with the sling. She managed to get this off and shake the gown to the bathroom floor. They had taken all her clothes last night, cut them off her body (which felt excessive, but it turned out they had to do that if they thought you broke your neck or spine or something). She was wearing giant stretchy underpants and nothing else.
“So you’re being discharged?” David asked.
Stevie was too busy trying to figure out how to get the sweatpants on to answer. She dropped them onto the floor next to the gown and stepped into them, then dragged them up with her right hand, hoisting each side. She looped the shirt around her neck and got the right arm through, but the left was going to be difficult.
“Help,” she said, tapping the door open with her foot and presenting her back to him. He was her boyfriend, but this was a messy situation, and also a public one. She wanted to get the shirt on. He moved around, trying to work out the physics of the situation, was big enough not to make any side-boob comments, and guided the sleeve over her cast.
“Okay,” she said. “Time to go.”
“Go? Don’t they have to . . .”
She shook her head.
“Time to go,” she said more quietly.
“Is that a good idea? Forget that—I mean, is that a medically sound idea?”
“I’m fine,” she said, padding out into the room in her nonslip slippers and looking for wherever they had put her shoes and whatever else of hers was still intact. She found both the shoes and the remains of her clothes in a plastic bag marked PATIENT BELONGINGS in a chair by the window. She scooped it up and examined the contents. Her camp T-shirt had been cut open and there was condensation from the trapped moisture inside the bag. She tucked it under her good arm and went to the door to look out. Her nurse was not in the hall. If they hurried, they had a clear shot at getting to the turn to the elevator bank. Without waiting another moment, she slipped out of the room, David following behind.
“Are you sure?” he asked as they reached the elevator.
“Seriously,” she said. “I have a broken arm. I’m fine.”
The elevator arrived and she stepped inside, so he followed. No one paid them any attention as they wandered out the front door of the hospital to the old Nissan. David opened the door for her, and Stevie lowered herself into the passenger seat, choosing to ignore the aches through her body. She leaned back, closing her eyes for a moment against the sun. David got into the driver’s side. She could feel him looking at her, but he had the good sense to start the engine and not ask her again if she was sure.
“Some good news for you,” he said. “The head of the camp was freaked out when you two went off on bikes to town and never came back. Carson and Nate came up with some kind of cover story where you were riding in town, and a car pulled out fast in front of you, and you both swerved and fell.”
“It’s good to have an irresponsible adult on our side. It’s the only way to get anything done.”
“Camp?” he said. “Carson’s house?”
“Camp,” she said. “Not the Sunny Pines side. Your side.”
“You want to tell me why you walked out of the hospital without waiting an hour or two for the doctor? I’ll bet there’s a reason.”
“Someone shot at us last night,” she said, opening her eyes and looking out the window. The bright light stunned her for a moment, but she acclimated.