Push Girl (7 page)

Silence fell over the room.

“Oh,” Jack said, and he jumped up from the chair and reached behind him. “We brought you some stuff.”

Amanda’s sad look fell away, and that big smile was on her face again. “We figured you were probably bored, so we brought you some things to keep you busy.”

Jack sat down and balanced a bright green tote bag on his lap, looking so proud of himself. He’d always been pretty enthusiastic about things, much more than the average guy, but I could tell he was laying it on extra thick today for my benefit.

He pointed at the bag. “Books—”

“Trashy ones. Romance novels, not schoolbooks,” Amanda was quick to clarify.

“Magazines, a crossword puzzle book, some snacks.”

“I was thinking I could paint your nails right now. If you wanted me to.”

“I’d help, but that would be weird.” Jack smiled. “But I can read to you from this trashy magazine. I hear it says in here that stars are just like us.”

The unease I’d felt when I woke up and saw Jack and Amanda sitting there next to me was ridiculous. These two people from my past—the best friend I was growing away from and the ex-boyfriend who was still a friend—nothing was weird with them, and I always seemed to forget that.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Curt’s conspicuous absence, though. I didn’t know why he hadn’t come, or why anyone else hadn’t come, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask. There weren’t many things more pathetic than asking someone to find out if my boyfriend was going to bother to show up to visit me in the hospital.

“Thanks, you guys,” I said, forcing a smile back at them. “Really.”

Amanda smiled, too, as she rustled through the tote bag. “So, hot pink? Lavender? Or black?”

“Let’s do the black,” I said. “It matches my face.”

HEY CURT. I’M AWAKE NOW AND I’D LOVE TO SEE YOU. CAN YOU COME BY THE HOSPITAL? 6TH FLOOR, ROOM 6750.

SOME PEOPLE FROM SCHOOL CAME BY TO VISIT TODAY. I WAS HOPING IT WOULD BE YOU. MISS YOU.

YOU DIDN’T FORGET ABOUT ME, DID YOU? LOL

*   *   *

“Do me a favor,” I asked Amanda the following day as she sat next to my bed, reading my horoscope from another trashy celeb magazine. (“Changes are afoot for you, Aries.” Interesting choice of words.)

“Sure. Anything.”

“Can you walk around and tell me who all these flowers and things are from? I feel bad that I don’t know.”

“Oh, yeah.” She bounced up from the chair and walked up to the first arrangement, a small and delicate vase full of Stargazer lilies. “This is pretty,” she said. She grabbed the card and read it in a dramatic voice. “‘Dear Kara, Wishing you a speedy recovery. Our thoughts are with you. Best, Dr. Alexander and everyone at Pacific Coastal High School.’ Aww, the principal sent you flowers. That’s sweet.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t actually Dr. Alexander. I bet anything it was Mrs. Mehta in the front office. You know she does everything for him.”

“Fair enough,” Amanda said. “Moving on. Here we have a tasteful arrangement of yellow roses in a clear glass vase.” She moved her hands up and down in front of the flowers like she was presenting them on a game show. “And the card. ‘Dearest Kara, We are praying for your quick recovery. Hope you are back on your feet soon.’” Amanda made a face and shoved the card back into the flowers. “Ouch.”

“Who was that from?”

“Your dad’s office.”

“I guess they haven’t heard the latest,” I said.

“Well, these flowers are looking a little wilted. Maybe they sent them when you first got in the accident.”

“Yeah, but they didn’t even know if I would live at that point. Much less be back on my feet.”

“Maybe they are just a bunch of douche bags?”

“That’s much more likely. Douche bags who send wilted flowers. Boo on them.”

“Next!”

“Next we have this beautiful vase of colorful gerbera daisies, which I can already tell you is from me and Jack and does not have a jerky card attached to it.”

“Those are pretty,” I said.

Amanda smiled. “Jack picked them out.”

I couldn’t help but remember the long conversations Jack and I used to have about our favorite things. I told him about so many of the little joys in life that never failed to bring a smile to my face. My jazz shoes with the hole in the toe, the mug I’d made for my mom at a paint-your-own pottery place when I was five, the goofy dance sequence in the movie
(500) Days of Summer.
There were so many favorites I’d mentioned to him over the years we’d been together, how did he possibly remember how much I loved gerbera daisies?

“Our card says, ‘We love you, Kara! Love, Jack and Amanda.’”

“Aww, that’s sweet.”

“Okay, next.”

“You don’t have to read them all,” I told her. I didn’t need to hear “praying for your speedy recovery” worded a million different ways, and I certainly didn’t want to know if anyone else wished for me to be back on my feet soon. “I just want to know who they’re from.” What I wanted was to know if Curt ever sent me anything. Mom said he’d been busy with school and water polo, but too busy to go online and order some flowers? Too busy to answer my texts?

“Okay,” Amanda said, and she peeked at every arrangement left in the room. “Your grandpa, your aunt Erin and your cousins, your dentist—wow, that was nice—and this one is from your dance studio. Look at this cute card! Aww, and everyone signed it, even the little kids.”

She waved the homemade card in my face, and as much as I wanted to look at all the sweet signatures and notes from the dance girls, I couldn’t bring myself to focus on it. All I could think about was the fact that I’d been in the hospital for over two weeks now, after getting in an accident so bad that I’d lost the use of my legs, and none of those flowers were from my boyfriend.

I TRIED TO CALL YOU TODAY, BUT YOUR MOM SAID YOU WERE AT PRACTICE. ARE YOU HOME NOW? YOU CAN GIVE ME A CALL ON MY CELL.

YOU KNOW I’M IN THE HOSPITAL, RIGHT?

I’M GETTING WORRIED ABOUT YOU. IS EVERYTHING OK?

Dr. Nguyen, the nurses, and my parents had talked for days now about me learning to use a wheelchair. And I knew it made sense. I couldn’t walk on my legs. I needed to get around. A wheelchair would help me do that. Still, my brain was having difficulty processing the reality of a lifetime spent sitting in a chair. Miracle-walking made much more sense in my head.

After a few days of talking about the future of my mobility, Dad came into my hospital room and said, “You ready to be on the move, sweetie?” And for one sad second, I thought that my ridiculous fantasy had come true, that the doctors found a miraculous cure for my spine and I’d be back on my feet again soon, like the jerky card said. A nervous flutter spread through my stomach, and I propped myself up on my elbows, waiting for an explanation. But Dad wheeled an ugly, hospital-issue wheelchair into the room, and I felt my face fall. Of course that was what he meant.

“It’s your new set of wheels,” he said. He waved his hands over the top of the chair, like I was supposed to be impressed. His enthusiasm was obviously forced, but I appreciated the effort. “Now, this is just a temporary chair from the hospital. We actually ordered a special one that’s being custom-built just for you. But Dr. Nguyen thinks you’re ready to get out of bed and get moving.”

There was something about moving around without my legs that made everything more real, and way more scary. Like getting in that chair was admitting to myself and the world that I was different. I wasn’t prepared to do that, to be that person yet.

So instead of being excited over the prospect of getting out of this bed, this room, and moving around, I blinked back the tears that had suddenly appeared in my eyes. I didn’t want to cry in front of Dad right now. Not when he was trying so hard. But I didn’t want to get in that wheelchair, either.

What choice did I have, though?

“You ready to take her for a spin?” Dad’s eyes met mine, and I saw so much there. Care. Exhaustion. Pleading, but sympathy. That combination of emotions in Dad’s face made me push the tears back down where they came from for now and force a smile. For his sake.

“Am I going to need a helmet for this thing?” I asked. And for the first time since I woke up in the hospital, we both laughed.

CURT. WHAT’S UP WITH YOU? PLEASE CALL.

Between my parents coming by on their respective shifts, Jack and Amanda, and various other family members, plus the nurses and doctors always in and out of my door, I rarely spent a day in the hospital alone. The nights, though, were a different story. The more I was being weaned off the painkillers, the harder it was for me to fall asleep, and the more time I spent scrolling to the end of the Internet on my phone in an attempt to turn my brain off and get some quality rest.

One night, after I’d gorged myself on celeb gossip and couldn’t stand to read one more article about an actress’s post-baby body, my finger hovered over my touch-screen for at least a minute before I let myself type “paraplegic + wheelchair” into the search field.

I was shocked by all the results that popped up, particularly all the videos. People who had filmed themselves moving from their wheelchair to a kitchen chair without help from anyone. Moving from one wheelchair to another. Even one girl popping wheelies on her chair. People in colored wheelchairs and customized wheelchairs and wheelchairs that had seats covered with funky fabrics. Nothing like the boring, hospital-issued chair I’d been using.

This world of people out there in wheelchairs was so new to me. But it was just that, a world. An entire world I’d had no idea existed, but I was now officially a part of.

*   *   *

Mom wheeled me down the hallway into the elevator and pushed the
2
button. Getting out of my bed and my room was liberating. Leaving this floor of the hospital, going somewhere, it was almost like a vacation. But it was strange doing it via wheelchair, and I still pushed away the fact that I wouldn’t be able to walk out the doors when it was time to go in a few days, like I really wanted to.

Mom and I fell into silence on the quick elevator ride. She hummed along with the generic music piped through the speakers and I let my mind wander, as I’d been doing a lot recently. Dr. Nguyen had put me on some new pain meds, and these made it hard for me to focus very long, so I often caught my mind traveling to strange places. This time I thought about how I used to choose to take the stairs in buildings to strengthen my legs for dance, and I’d never be able to do that again. Dance or take the stairs.

The elevator dinged and the door slid open. Mom wheeled me out, smiling at the nurses and doctors on the floor. “Physical therapy?” she asked the nurse behind the reception desk, and the nurse pointed to her left.

“Here we are,” Mom said, turning me into a spacious room set up with various tables, machines, balls, and pads scattered around. Doctors and nurses worked with a few people spread around the open space, but mine was the only wheelchair in the room.

Mom signed me in, and I watched the nurses bend people’s legs back and forth and saw people pull on giant, colorful rubber bands between their arms. I felt like I had wandered into some sort of top secret movie stunt room or something, the way everyone seemed so focused on twisting their bodies into odd positions. I had no idea what was happening, but I wouldn’t have been surprised to see someone rappel down a wall or launch into a back handspring out of nowhere.

“Sorry, I’m late! Did you wait for me?”

I turned my head and found what I had been hoping to see—another wheelchair. This one was occupied by a dark-haired girl who was a bit younger than me, but who looked a lot more comfortable in it than I did in mine. She looked like she belonged there, like her wheelchair was a comfy throne she lounged in by choice, and she smiled at the nurse behind the check-in desk.

“Oh, hi,” she said when she saw me waiting by the door. “I’ve never met you before. I’m Ana.” She smiled this huge, genuine smile, and she waved at me.

I stared back. I didn’t smile, I didn’t wave, I had no idea how to respond to this girl who was in a wheelchair and seemed to be happy about it. Did not compute.

Luckily, I had Mom with me to keep me from spiraling into total bitch mode. “This is Kara,” Mom said on my behalf. “This is her first time in physical therapy.”

“Oh, well, you’re in for a treat, Kara.” Ana had this voice that was so light and airy, it almost sounded like she was laughing when she talked. “They’re pretty nice here. But they can hurt sometimes. They tell me it’s for my own good, but I don’t know if I believe them yet.”

She signed herself in and rolled her wheelchair right up next to mine.

“I’m assuming that since it’s your first time in PT that the chair is a new development for you?”

I nodded. I still didn’t know what to say.

“I’ve had mine about a month now,” she said. “Still getting used to it. But it’s okay so far. It’s sorta nice to always have somewhere to sit, you know?”

I narrowed my eyes at her. Ana had a ridiculously positive attitude, and the fact that she kept cracking jokes about being stuck in a wheelchair while I’d spent about two hours the previous night crying about it was grating on my nerves.

“You haven’t been out of the hospital yet, have you?” she asked, undeterred by my stink eye.

I shook my head. Was it that obvious?

“I was out for a week, but I got an infection and had to come back. Just you wait, though. You’re going to get so much sympathetic head tilt out there, you won’t even know what hit you.”

“What’s that?” I was still wary of her perkiness, but I couldn’t help but be drawn into this conversation.

“Oh, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about when you get it. I get it a lot, especially when people find out what happened to me.”

I opened my mouth to ask, but she kept right on talking.