All of this information was new to me, told to me by the faceless cancer patient next door. “You sure have an ear for detail.”
“Thank you. I try to stay crisp in the mind by playing sudoku.”
How nice for her.
“While I appreciate the insider information,” I replied, “isn’t it like a federal offense to listen in on someone’s medical history?”
“No. What you’re talking about is doctor-patient privilege. But what we’ve got going on here is called patient-to-patient privilege.”
“Ah, got it.”
“And I wasn’t eavesdropping. I just have good hearing.”
“Great. I get the one senior citizen with supersonic hearing.”
“And a good memory,” she added.
“Because of the sudoku?”
“That’s right. Do you want to hear about the rest of your injuries?”
“There’s more?”
“Oh yes. Much more,” she replied with an almost gleeful undertone. “In addition to the partially collapsed lung, you have multiple rib fractures, an amputated foot that they shaped in surgery for future prosthetics, various crush injuries, and because you bled into your lungs, you had to have a transfusion.”
I sat there a moment, taking it all in. With all that going on inside me, how had I survived in there as long as I did?
“You’re lucky to be alive,” the busybody next door said. “But I don’t think I have to tell you that.”
“No,” I agreed. “You don’t. Hey, what’s your name?”
“Sue.”
“Sue? Isn’t that appropriate? I figure I have a pretty good case against you for listening in on my personal medical history.”
“Again—not a crime to have good hearing. Besides, it’s not my fault your life plays like a soap opera.”
No, she was right about that. I’d been doused in drama my whole life. My eyes began to feel heavy.
“Is there anything else I need to know, Sue, or can I take a nap now?”
Silence. Okay, that was weird.
“Sue?”
“Uh, nope. Nothing else.”
The way she said it indicated that there was, indeed, something else she wasn’t telling me.
“I know you’re lying to me. What is it?”
There was a long pause before she replied. “I shouldn’t say. It’s not my place.”
“None of my business has been your place, but that hasn’t stopped you before.”
“Okay, look. Just a little piece of advice from an old gal with plenty of life experience. Get yourself a better support system.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“It wasn’t just the doctors I overheard. I also listened in on your mother talking on the phone. Your father and brothers are on their way from Idaho. Apparently, your mom flew out first, and there was some…”
She hesitated.
“Some what?”
“Some debate over whether the others would follow.”
“What was the debate about?”
“Well, your dad—I could hear him talking through the phone—he wanted to… um… he… um…”
My face fell flat. Whatever she had to say I wasn’t going to like. “Spit it out, Sue.”
“He wanted to take a wait and see approach,” she blurted out.
A twitch formed in one eye. “Wait for what?”
“To see if you were going to survive first, because he didn’t want to fly out to California twice—you know, like once to say goodbye and again for the funeral. Kill two birds with one stone, he’d said.”
Two birds with one stone? My jaw dropped.
“It’s an hour and forty-eight-minute flight!” I screeched, my voice taking on the squeakiness of a prepubescent boy. “He’s waited longer in the line to get gas at Costco.”
“It gets worse.”
The monitor beside my head started beeping faster. “How can it get worse than my own father skipping straight to the memorial service?”
“Uh… your brothers only agreeing to come if your mom threw in a trip to Six Flags?”
What the ever-loving fuck? I dropped back into my bed, hurt and confused. I mean, I knew they’d never liked me, but I hadn’t realized the extent of the animosity between us. I suppose I’d figured paying their way for six years and giving them a roof over their heads would buy me some favor with them, but no. When I’d needed their support most, my brothers had traded my life for the Drop of fucking Doom.
Sue’s voice cut through the silence. “I don’t understand how they can be so cruel.”
Her and me both.
“I’m sorry, RJ. I should never have said anything. The pain meds they have me on are like a truth serum.”
“No. You should have. At least now I know what I’m up against.”
“Don’t let them get you down. I can tell just by talking to you that you’re better than that family of yours.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“You’re special, RJ. You were spared when a whole lot of others weren’t. Did you know that the building collapsed less than an hour after you were pulled out?”
The shock of her words rendered me speechless.
“You were the last one to get out alive. If you ask me, you’ve got an angel on your shoulder.”
No. I didn’t have an angel on my shoulder. I had Dani Malone.
I owed my life to her. Unlike my father, Dani hadn’t taken a ‘wait and see’ approach to my survival. She’d come back for me when no one else did. She’d cut me free, wrapping her arm around my waist and helping me hobble toward the exit. And then when I collapsed to the ground, Dani had somehow gotten me to the exit. That was devotion. That was family. That was the woman I wanted to create a whole new life with.
I remembered the promise I’d made to myself in the garage just before I took the knife to my ankle: no more playing the victim. I’d get through this and I’d come out stronger on the other side. Suddenly those extra two inches of leg lost didn’t matter anymore. It would be a rough road ahead, but nothing I couldn’t handle. My family might not think so, but I’d proved my worth to myself, and nothing they said or did from this point forward would ever change that.
If they wanted war, then I’d give them war.
“Are you all right?” Sue asked. “Now I feel bad.”
“Don’t. You’ve given me the clarity I needed.”
“You know… I have a big, loving family. We always have room for one more.”
I smiled at Sue’s offer. A stranger was offering me refuge, something my own family refused to give. And that only solidified my resolve. Oh, yeah—my next of kin were going down.
“I might just take you up on that, Sue.”
I was somewhat disappointed that my own personal secretary hadn’t warned me about the trip down to radiology to get a CT scan of my lungs. Nor did she give me a heads-up on the phlebotomist, who took some of that precious borrowed blood that had been pumped back into my veins. By the time I returned to my curtained room, I was eager to get any new intel from my neighbor.