It’s dark outside, and already after seven by the time we get to my house. I know I need to FaceTime Izzy and tell her what’s going on, but I need to calm down a little more first. I don’t want to freak her out, too. Not when she’s 2,764 miles away from home, and Dad.
“You hungry?” George asks as we walk inside my kitchen and I flip on the lights.
“Not really,” I say. My body and my mind are still numb and shaky, and it’s hard to feel anything else, hard to remember anything else. “Are you?”
“A little. And you should probably eat something. I’ll order us a pizza.”
“Sure, whatever you want.”
George orders it on his phone, and he doesn’t even comment on my mushroom and olives. When he’s finished he grabs me a glass of water and puts it on the table. “Have some water,” he says. “Take a deep breath. I know this is scary and unexpected. But everything’s okay.”
I smile at him, take the water and force myself to take a few sips. “Hey, thanks for taking me to the hospital today, and just...being here now.” For a few hours I forgot about everything else—school, and coding club, and our app. And George and Hannah’s date on Friday. And all there was, was my worry about Dad. And George, who was being so kind, trying to help me.
“Of course,” George says. “You would’ve done the same for me.”
I nod, hoping I would’ve known that was the right thing to do, if the situation were reversed. “It’s weird,” I tell him. “I was so young when my mom died, but I still have this memory of waiting in the hospital waiting room with Dad and Izzy, finding out she wasn’t okay. And even the idea of stepping in a hospital has freaked me out ever since. Honestly, if you weren’t there, I feel like they would’ve needed to admit me, too.”
George smiles, puts his hand on top of mine reassuringly. “I’m just glad he’s going to be okay.”
“Me, too,” I say.
We sit there and stare at each other for a few minutes, and George doesn’t move his hand, and I don’t move mine, either. And then George says my name, Emma, and it sounds different than it usually does in his voice, soft and ethereal.
“What?” I say softly, still staring at him, neither one of us moving our eyes or our hands, and I have this weird feeling like there’s something else I’m supposed to say here and now, something I should know how to say. Or do. But I don’t move. I just sit there, holding on to George.
The doorbell rings, and we both jump up, moving our hands back quickly. “Pizza,” I finally speak, and George frowns. I wish I’d said something else instead. But I stand and walk to the door. My hand is still warm from where George was holding on to it, and I put it in my pocket.
I open the door, and it’s not pizza at all, but George’s mom. I frown when I see her because this means George is going home now and I’m not ready for him to leave yet.
“Emma, honey. George texted me what happened. Do you need anything?” she asks me, a worried look on her face.
George must hear her voice because he walks in from the kitchen and grabs his school bag from the bench by the front door.
“Do you want to come sleep at our house tonight, Emma, so you don’t have to stay here alone?” Mrs. Knightley is still talking, fretting over how she might be able to help me.
The thought of sleeping in a strange house, in a strange bed, sounds way worse than sleeping in my own house alone. “No thanks,” I tell her. “I’m just going to eat the pizza George ordered when it gets here, do some homework and go to bed.”
“Are you sure?” she asks. I tell her that I’m sure, that I’ll be fine now that I know Dad is going to be fine. “Okay,” she says reluctantly. “But George is just a text away. You let us know if you change your mind or if you need anything. Anything at all.”
“I will,” I promise.
George shoots me a half smile, and goes to walk out with his mom. But then he stops for a second, turns back and gives me a hug. He embraces me tightly, and I lean into him. My head falls into his chest, and I remember that feeling of dancing with him, when everything felt comfortable and safe and easy. I hold on to him longer than I should, breathing in the warmth of his sweatshirt and his sandalwood. When I’m holding on to George, I do believe that everything’s going to be fine, that I’m fine.
But then he lets go first, steps back. “Text me if you need anything, okay?”
“I’ll be fine, really,” I say again, extra emphasis on the word fine to try and convince him it’s really, really true. Because when he’s not hugging me anymore I feel weirdly...not fine.
“Okay.” He nods, convinced. “I’ll see you in the morning,” he adds softly.
“Yeah,” I echo back. “See you in the morning.”
* * *
The pizza comes about five minutes after George leaves. When I open the box I see he ordered an entire pie with mushrooms and olives, which makes me smile. If the pizza got here before his mom, I bet he would’ve even eaten a slice, though he thinks it’s gross, just to make me laugh and try and cheer me up.
Great pizza choice, I text him. Mushrooms and olives forever!
You had a rough day, he texts back. I hope it makes you happy.
How could it not? Mushroom and olive pizza would make anyone happy.
Agree to disagree, Emma.
I smile at the words in his text, picturing the way his face would look if he were still here saying it to me out loud. But I’m still not hungry, so I put the pizza in the fridge for later. At least laughing a little over the pizza makes me finally feel calm and normal enough to FaceTime Izzy.
“Em, oh my gosh.” She picks up, sounding, and looking, frazzled. Her hair is piled on top of her head in a messy bun, and she’s wearing her ratty old pink DC sweatshirt that she got when Dad took us there to see the Smithsonian one spring break in late elementary school. “Dad just texted me and told me what happened.” I guess he finally got the Wi-Fi to work. Now I feel bad I waited so long to FaceTime her. “I was working on a paper all day, and I haven’t eaten anything, and now I’m trying to look up flights...” Her voice breaks, and she wipes at her cheeks with the back of her hand.
I was freaking out about Dad, and I was only twenty minutes away from him when I found out what happened. And I had George to drive me to him. I can’t imagine how upset Izzy must be all the way across the country.
“Iz,” I say, wanting to calm her down. “It’s okay. He’s okay. You don’t need to come home.” I explain to her what the doctor told me, about how putting in the stent is a minor procedure that will open up Dad’s artery, and how he’ll have to rest for a few weeks and work on his exercise and diet, but that he’ll make a full recovery. This was a warning, and he got lucky. We all got lucky.