Authors: Brent Runyon
“I'm tired.”
“Oh yeah? They working you hard?”
“Yeah.”
“That's what they get paid for.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I don't want to talk about anything serious today.”
“Okay.”
“But we've got regular appointments on Tuesdays and Thursdays to talk.”
“Great.” Can he hear the sarcasm?
“I just wanted to find out which would be more comfortable for you, to meet here in your room or downstairs in my office.”
“I don't know. My room, I guess.”
“Okay. So I'll meet you here, Tuesdays and Thursdays at two.”
“Okay.”
“Great. Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too.” I'm not sure why, but I kind of like this guy.
After Dr. Foust leaves, Rose takes me upstairs to the school. It's on the fourth floor, but it's not really a school at all. It's just a little room with a bunch of computers and some kids in wheelchairs. One girl has her face pressed right up against the screen even though the letters are as big as her head. She must be blind or something.
The teacher comes over to introduce himself. “Hi, Brent, I'm Tom Sicoli. I'm the teacher at duPont. Welcome to our humble classroom.”
“Thanks.”
“Have a seat here at this table next to Elaine. Elaine, this is Brent. Brent, this is Elaine.”
“Hi.”
“Hello.” Wow, she's beautiful. She's about my age, maybe a little older, with dark hair and big beautiful eyes. The most amazing thing is that she doesn't seem to have anything wrong with her. She's not in a wheelchair. She doesn't have any artificial limbs that I can see. The only thing I can see is a small scar right in the middle of her forehead about as big as a quarter. I sit down next to her.
I say, “So what are you in for?”
“What?” She looks at me as if I'm speaking Latin.
“What are you in for?”
“What?”
“Why are you here?”
“Where?”
“Here.”
“Where am I?” What's wrong with this girl?
“At duPont.”
“Where is that?”
“Here.”
“Where?” God, I feel like I'm in an Abbott and Costello routine.
“Why are you here at the hospital?”
“I'm in a hospital?”
“Yes, you didn't know that?”
“No. Oh, wait, yes, I did.”
“So, why are you here?”
“To get better?”
“Okay. What are you getting better from?” This girl is really frustrating.
“I was in a car accident and I hit my head.” Boy, did you ever.
“How are you two getting along?” It's Tom.
I say, “Fine.”
She says, “What?”
“So, Brent,” says Tom, “we're going to go through a couple of tests to see where to place you in relation to your grade.”
“Okay.”
“You were in eighth grade, correct?”
“Yes.”
“All right, I'll get the proper tests and be back in a moment.” Elaine looks at me again and smiles.
Tom comes back with a bunch of forms and sits down next to me. He explains that he's going to say some words and I have to write them down. I guess it's a kind of spelling test. I'm okay at spelling, but it's not my best subject. Spelling and handwriting, those have always been my weak areas. Everything else I've always been pretty good at, at least until last year.
My parents worked something out with the school system so that I only have to finish two subjects to be able to pass eighth grade. Science and English. That's it. Even though those were the classes I was having so much trouble with before, I don't think it should be that hard.
When we finish with the tests, Tom gives me a copy of
Tom Sawyer
and says my homework is to read the first ten pages by tomorrow.
“Ten pages?”
“Yes.”
“I can't read ten pages in one night.”
“Try.”
“Okay.” I'm not going to tell him I already read it when I was in fourth grade. Ha ha, joke's on him.
When I get back to my room, there's a pile of mail on my bed. That's cool—it's only my second day and already I'm getting mail. There's a letter from my mom, which means she must have sent it before we even left to come up here. That's just like her. Something from the McCannells, our family friends. And a big manila envelope from Carolyn, a girl from Kilmer. I wonder how she got this address? My mom must have given it to her.
I open the envelope and pull out the Joyce Kilmer Intermediate School yearbook for 1991. Cool. Pictures of all my friends. Here's a bunch of girls all dressed in fluffy, flower-print dresses and smiling really big with makeup on, the caption says, Julie, Jenny G., Jenny S., Jenny S., Allison, and Angie in a limo after the dance. The eighth-grade dance. I totally missed it.
Here's another picture, another bunch of friends at a fancy restaurant all dressed up in suits and ties under a huge oil painting of naked people and lions. The caption says, Evan, Ryan, Kate, and Kevin at Clyde's after the dance. Everyone looks so much older than I remember. They look like high school kids.
I bet they all went out and got laid after the dance. They probably got drunk and had a big orgy in a fancy hotel room. That's what they probably did. And I missed it. I missed everything.
Here's everyone's school pictures. There's Patrick. Kimberly. Kevin. Brian and Greg. There's Stephen. There's me. Right next to each other, just like we should be. Robie and Runyon, one of the great comedy teams in the history of Kilmer Intermediate. He looks a little funny. Not that I look that great, all dressed up in my black button-down shirt, buttoned right to the top. My hair is just a little too long, and my smile isn't right. It's like I raised my eyebrows a little too soon and made myself look surprised. Idiot.
But look at all that skin, look at all that smooth tan skin all down my neck. How it just folds smoothly over my chin and down my throat, just one color all the way around. No big purple spots or anything.
Turn the page. Awards for Best Looking: Ryan and Moira. Yeah, that's about right. Most Athletic: Patrick
and Deanna. Deanna's not athletic. Most Academic: Leah and that kid from GT English. Fucking dork. Best All-Around: Moira and Ryan again. Best Sense of Humor: Megan and Stephen. Most Likely to Be Remembered: Maya, because she's so smart and sassy and doesn't take anything off anyone, and me.
Me. Most Likely to Be Remembered: me. Most Likely to Be Remembered for All the Wrong Reasons: me. God.
I close the book and put it in the bottom drawer.
Today Jodi is showing me the rest of the hospital. They really do have a bowling alley. Also, there's a huge gym with a basketball court. I think it actually could be pretty cool here, you know, if I got to do whatever I wanted and didn't have to work on my strength and stupid range of motion all the time.
I live in the spinal injury section of the hospital, me and all the kids in wheelchairs. Some of them can push the wheelchairs by themselves, others have those motorized wheelchairs, and a few can walk with a cane. There's a black guy, who's at least six feet, who can walk without a cane or anything, but he's the guy that has the big black metal ring around his forehead and the posts that go down to his shoulders. That big metal ring is actually screwed into his skull. I saw the screws going right into his skull. It's so gross.
Rose, the nurse, told me that he was a gangbanger from Philadelphia and that he broke his neck falling out of a car during a drive-by.
The other section of the hospital is the head injury section. That's where people like Elaine who were smashed in the head go to get better. So, between the cripples on the one side and the idiots on the other, I feel like I'm the only normal person in this place.
They say I can't have dinner in my room anymore. I have to go down to the cafeteria with everybody else. It's just like junior high school down here. Everybody that can walk gets a tray and stands in line waiting for the meat loaf. The food smells bad. Especially the corn.
The desserts look okay. Some kind of chocolate cake or Jell-O in a cup with whipped cream on top. I'm going to try the Jell-O.
They have fountain soda. Yes. That's awesome.
I sit with a bunch of people from the Unit, but nobody says anything. I keep looking up right when Lisa puts a big spoonful of corn in a paralyzed girl's mouth. It's so disgusting. Can't she chew with her mouth closed? Maybe not, I guess.
Dinner's over. One of the nurses announces that we're having a little get-together on the Unit. Everybody is meeting in the common area to have soda together.
I'm the only one standing, except for the nurses, and that must be the other burned kid, Harry. He's just a little guy. Oh God, his face got all melted away, and a bunch of his hair is just scar tissue, and the fingers of his hand are melted together so it looks like a claw. Jesus, what a freak. It makes me feel sick to look at him.
I'm starting with the man in the mirror.
I'm asking him to change his ways.
Why is that song in my head? I don't even like Michael Jackson. Wasn't he on fire once? Yeah, with the Pepsi commercial that caught his head on fire. I wonder if that's why he looks so weird.
Lisa wants to introduce me to a couple of people. She takes me over to a blond girl in a motorized wheelchair. She's the one who was eating corn before.
“Brent, this is Chelsea. Chelsea, this is Brent.”
“Hi, Chelsea.” I put my hand out to shake.
“Hi, Brent.” I forgot she probably can't move her arms. Wait, no, she's moving her arm a little. She's lifting up her hand. Wow, she's giving me five.
“Nice to meet you, Chelsea.”
“Nice to meet you.” I wiggle my fingers under her hand like the cool kids do at school, and she giggles a little. I wonder if she can really feel that. Hey, she's not so bad when she's not eating.
There's another kid right next to me. He's got red hair and he looks a little older than me, like maybe seventeen. He's in the middle of telling the story of how he wound up in the wheelchair.
Lisa whispers, “That's Ben. He crashed his motorcycle.”
“Well, it was raining out and, stupid me, I decided to take out my dad's bike, a real sweet Honda 150 cc. Anyway, about two miles away from my house, I took this turn too fast, went straight off the road and headfirst into an oak tree. Snap.” He sounds like it happened to someone else.
A chubby nurse standing next to him with a name tag that says Mary says, “So what are you, a C4?”
“Yup. C4.” I wonder what that means.
The other burned kid, Harry, pipes up, so I don't have to, “What's C4?”
Mary answers him, “Fourth cervical vertebra, honey. It means he broke the fourth bone in his spinal column.”
“Oh, did it hurt?” asks Harry.
“Not really. I mean, I don't really remember any pain, just the feeling of the rain coming down on my face.”
God, I hope this isn't one of those “I'll show you mine, you show me yours” contests. Because I'm not about to tell any of these people what happened to me. Screw that.
Lisa introduces me to the big black guy with the metal ring around his head. The gangbanger. “Brent, this is Latroy. Latroy, this is Brent.”
“Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too.” He seems nice enough. Not as scary as he seemed from a distance. Anyway, he probably can't hurt me with his neck broken like that.
Lisa says, “Have you met Harry yet?”
“No.” And I don't want to.
“Well, let's introduce you two.” She takes me over to him.
“Harry, I want you to meet someone.”
“Why?”
“Because he's very nice and I think you'll like him.”
“Fine.”
“Harry, this is Brent. Brent, this is Harry.” We don't shake hands. I don't want to touch his hand.
“Hi, Harry.”
“Hi, yourself.” What? “Lisa,” he says, “I hate this. I want to go back to my room.”
“Okay, Harry. You can go back to your room.”
“Good.” This kid is a little brat. But now that he said that, I'm really tired too.
“Lisa, I'm really tired. Can I go back to my room too?”
“Sure. Thanks for coming out.”
“Okay.”
I sit in bed and watch TV. Sometimes I think I'd be happy if I could just lie in bed and watch TV all the time. That's the way it used to be at Children's. God, that was so great. I miss those guys.
Phone's ringing. They gave me this weird little phone when I checked in that just sits on the dresser. I guess I'll answer it.
“Hello?”
“Brenner?” It's Mom.
“Yeah?”
“Hey, bud. How's it going?”
“Good.”
“What are you doing?”
“Watching TV.”
“How's the hospital?”
“It's fine.”
Dad picks up the other phone. He says, “Hey, Brenner. How's it going, budder?”
I laugh. Dad's funny sometimes. “It's good. What are you guys doing?”
Mom says, “Well, it's Craiger's graduation today, and we just wanted to call and say hi and say that we miss you. And that we really wish you were here with us. Nanny and Grandpa are here too. Wait, I'll put Nanny on. Here's Nanny.”
“Hello, Brent.”
“Hi, Nanny.”
“Hello, sweetheart. Just wanted to say a quick hello and that we miss you down here. We're just so pleased you're doing so well and can't wait till we see you again.”
“Okay, Nanny. Thanks.”
“Love you, dear.”
“Love you too, Nanny.”
“Here's Grandpa.”
“Hey, champ.” Grandpa's got the most recognizable voice. It's so deep and gravelly. When you sit in a room with him, you can actually feel it through the furniture.
“Hey, Grandpa.”
“Good to hear you're doing so well up there, but we miss you down here. So keep getting better.”
“Okay, Grandpa. I will.”
“Okay, love you, buddy.”
“Love you too, Grandpa.”
“I'll get Craig.”
When I was little and we'd go down to Florida to visit Nanny and Grandpa, I'd sit down by the pool with him in the plastic chairs and listen to his voice through his chest. He had that big old scar on his belly from where he got his gallbladder out. It was so big and smooth and it looked like an oak leaf. I liked to put my hand on it and feel the outline.