Authors: Brent Runyon
After burn care, I rest. Sometimes I take a nap. Sometimes my mom comes in and holds my hand while I sleep. She's gotten really good at reading a book with one hand and holding my hand with the other. When I wake up, even if I don't move, she's always looking at me when I open my eyes. Sometimes I try and trick her by opening only one eye, but she always catches it.
We have lunch together, Mom and I. She brings a salad from home and I get chicken soup. If I want a glass of juice or some ice chips, she goes and gets it from the nurses'
station.
After lunch, Mom gets the VCR and puts on a movie. Some Hitchcock thing or a goofy comedy, and I usually fall asleep in the middle.
Becky and Dawn come in the afternoon and stretch my arms and legs for me.
When it starts to get dark, Mom goes home to make dinner for Craig. But pretty soon after she leaves, Dad comes from work and has dinner with me in his suit. He still smells the way he used to when he came home from work, like he's been smoking his pipe.
When the good stuff comes on TV, Dad goes home and then they take me in to have my bath and change my bandages again. By the time I get back in bed, Arsenio Hall is already on and I fall asleep while he interviews Wesley Snipes.
My buddies Adam and Jake just sent me a cool present. It's a gigantic ace of spades, about as big as a movie poster, that they must have gotten from a magic shop. They sent a card with it that says, To the one true god, the Ace of Spades. Get better soon, Jake and Adam. That's cool.
Mom and Dad ask me what it means. “It's hard to explain,” I say, “it's just a joke.” They look confused, but they let it drop.
Dawn, the physical therapist, is here and she says I'm going to stand today. She says, “I'll help, but you're going to stand.” It's been almost two months since I walked and I can barely even sit up in a chair. But she seems determined, so I decide not to argue with her. She gets some nurses to come and move me from my bed to the blue chair. I'm starting to get nervous.
Dawn puts the brake on the chair and lowers my legs so my Ace-bandaged feet are hovering above the ground. I've never really looked at the floors in this place. They're a weird olive color and they're shiny. Dawn squats in front of me and tells me to scoot forward in the chair so I can get my feet on the ground.
I say, “How do I do that?” I'm not being difficult. I really don't know how to.
She says, “Lean your weight to the left and push your right hip forward.” I do what she says and it kind of works. My right leg is a little closer to the floor. “Now do the same with your left leg.” I try, but my body is stiffer on that side or something.
I say, “I'm trying, but it's hard,” and my voice sounds really whiny and babyish, even to me.
I think she can tell that if she yells at me, I might start to cry, so she says quietly, “Okay, just do your best and I'll help. Lift your arms up as high as you can.” I do it, but the bands are so tight it's hard to lift them very high. She leans forward and slips her arms under mine and puts her hands on my hip bones.
I say, “Be careful, I've got some open spots back there.”
She says, “I know,” and sounds kind of annoyed when she says it.
She's really strong, stronger than she looks, and she picks me up and slides me forward in one quick movement to the edge of the chair so that my feet are really on the floor. “How does that feel?”
“Cold.” I look down. My toes are uncovered, and for some reason the toenail on my big right toe is completely black. Also, I can only feel the floor with my left foot.
“Are you ready?”
“No.”
She waits about ten seconds and asks me again. “Are you ready?”
“Okay,” I say, but my voice is shaking.
“I'll count to three and then we'll stand up together. One, two, three.” She pulls me up by the hips and I put my weight on my feet and I'm standing. She's still holding on to me, keeping me from falling over, but I'm actually standing.
The floor is so much farther away than I remember it.
“Look at me. Don't look at the floor. Look at me.”
It reminds me of the time my family and I went to the top of the World Trade Center and I looked down and got so dizzy.
“Take a step toward me.”
I remember this. I remember how this is done. It's done by putting the weight on one foot and moving the other foot forward. It's basic. Simple to do. With one foot on the ground at all times and the other one moving very gently across the floor to match the first one.
“You're doing great. Nice and easy.”
I remember this very clearly. Walking. I remember doing this my whole life. Although it might not look like it.
“Okay, let's turn around and go back to the chair now.”
Turning, okay, turning is done by placing the right foot at an angle and then moving the left so that it's at the same angle as the right and then moving the right again at an angle and again following with the left. “The chair's just a few steps away. Can you make it?”
“Yes.” I can make it, from here to there, to the chair, which is actually quite a bit farther than it looks. The blueness of it, that's probably what makes it look so far away, that and the fact that everything tends to be farther than it first appears.
“You made it. Okay, I'll help you sit down.”
She puts her arms around my waist and lowers me into the chair, slowly. I've never really noticed how gentle she is when she wants to be.
Mom and Dad are shocked when they walk into my room and see me sitting in the chair already. I smile and say, “Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Runyon. Welcome to my lair,” in my best Dracula impression. I know that it wasn't very funny, but they laugh enough to make me feel good about myself. Mom comes over and gives me a kiss on top of my head and I bend my elbow so I can kind of get my arm around her. She hugs me back, gently, like she's afraid I'm going to break. Her eyes are wet when she pulls away and she looks like she's going to cry.
I say, “Mom, you don't have to cry.” I probably sound a little more annoyed than I mean to, but she's already crying and trying to stop herself at the same time.
Dad leans down for a hug, but he doesn't cry. He just looks happy.
I say, “Mom, you really don't have to cry. It's okay.”
“I know. I know. I'm just crying a little bit out of happiness.” The last word cracks and she can barely get the last syllable out. She's smiling with her lips turned down and her eyes tipped up to keep the tears from rolling out.
I say, “You don't look happy.” My voice did that thing again where it sounded more annoyed than I really am.
“I am. I am happy. It's just that . . .”
“What?” She's really starting to annoy me now. She should be happy.
“I just didn't know if I was going to be able to hug you again.” And the tears all pour out in a stream down her cheeks. My dad goes over and puts his hand on the back of her neck and whispers something in her ear. She pulls an old tissue out of her purse and starts wiping away the tears and laughing at herself. “I'm sorry. I'm okay. I feel better.”
“Hey, Mom”—I decide to cheer her up—“guess who walked today?”
“What?”
“I walked today. With Dawn.”
They both look at me like they've never seen me before and then like they've known me all my life. And now they're both smiling and crying, and I've never seen them look so proud of me.
They've got me walking every day now. Today Mom and Dad are both here to watch me. I walk with Dad and Dawn out into the hallway, one on each side so they can catch me if I fall. I thought for sure there'd be some nurses in the hallway, but nobody is here, so I yell for them to come out and see me. Janice, Mary, Amy, and Calvin all come. They clap and make a big deal out of it and Amy gets the Polaroid camera and takes a picture. They hand it to me, and when I'm back in bed, I look at it, and I can't believe how skinny I look, with nothing but bones in my arms.
It's early, but I'm out of bed and sitting in the blue chair, drinking a second carton of milk and waiting for Mom. She's bringing her brother, Tom, because he and his family are in town for a few days.
After a few minutes my stomach starts rumbling from all the milk I drank. It sounds like someone is opening an ancient tomb. God, that's loud. Mom and Uncle Tom walk in just as I let out an enormous fart. Mom smiles, pretends not to notice, and gives me a kiss on the forehead. Tom's not sure whether to kiss me or shake my hand, so he leans over and pats me gently on the forehead. It's probably the only part of my body that looks normal.
They pull up some chairs and start talking about everyone in the family and how they all wish me well and how they're so sad they can't be here all the time.
I let out another fart that starts out high and tight and goes lower and lower until there's no sound at all, just air.
I say, “Excuse me.”
Mom and Tom keep talking. Tom tells some stories about his kids, Jared, Nathan, and Amara. I guess the boys are both playing soccer and Amara is thinking about becoming a ballerina like her mom. Tom says Gayle and Amara might come see me tomorrow, on Easter. That'll be nice. The boys are too busy roughhousing.
Tom starts telling the story about how when he was in college, he got drunk and stole a plate from a fancy restaurant. Just as he gets to the punch line where he's walking out of the restaurant with the plate under his shirt and the maître d' comes up and puts his hand on Tom's shoulder and says, “Excuse me, sir, you forgot your wallet,” I let out another huge fart that goes on for at least fifteen seconds.
It goes on so long that Tom starts talking again before it's over. “I'm sorry,” I say. This goes on for another ten minutes, him talking, me farting, until I can't take it anymore and ask my mom to have the nurses put me back in bed.
Aunt Gayle is coming today, and she's bringing my cousin Amara, who is maybe four or something. I know Amara loves pink, so I hope she likes my purple bandages that Barbara dyed for me for Easter. God, what if she asks to unwrap them?
Barbara tells me that my aunt and cousin are outside. While they're lifting me out of bed and into the blue chair, I start my little bit about why there's no word in English for female cousin, like cousina, or cousinette, or something. Barbara is smiling at me. She thinks I'm clever.
“Hi, Gayle,” I say, cheerful as can be, and then, “Hi, Amara.” I make my voice go up and down, how some people talk to small animals. Gayle leans over and gives me
a kiss on the forehead. My mom must have told her to
do that. She says, “You look great, Brent.” She's from Maryland, so she's got kind of a weird accent.
“Thanks,” I say.
“You look really great.”
“Thanks.”
“Moving around and everything. That's so great.”
I'm trying to make eye contact with Amara, who's hiding behind her mom's very long legs.
“Hi, Amara,” I say again. This time making my voice sound even funnier.
“She's shy,” says Gayle.
“Oh.” I don't remember her being shy. I try again.
“Hey, Amara.”
She peeks out from behind her mom's knees but doesn't say anything.
“Hey, Amara, how do you like my bandages? We made them purple for Easter. Do you like purple? I know you like pink.”
She's still hiding.
“Do you like purple, Amara?”
No response.
“Amara, do you like purple?”
Gayle gets my attention with her eyes and I get the feeling she's trying to distract me. “Brent, you look really great. Really great.” Amara mumbles something from behind her mom's legs and Gayle says, “Amara, what do you think of Brent's bandages?”
Amara's still whispering and Gayle leans down to talk to her. “Okay, we can go, but say good-bye to your cousin.” Amara looks up and says, “Bye.”
Gayle says, “I'm sorry, we're just feeling a little shy. I guess we should go.”
“Okay, bye, Amara, thanks for coming. Bye, Gayle, thanks for coming.”
“Okay, get well soon, Brent. We're all pulling for you.”
They walk down the hallway and around the corner, and Barbara comes out and wheels me back to my room. “How did that go?” she says.
“Fine.”
I didn't realize I was such a monster. I don't know why, but I didn't.
Mom's birthday is tomorrow, April 8, and Dad and I are going to have a surprise party for her. We'll decorate the playroom with streamers, and when she comes in the afternoon, we'll have a big party with presents and everything. Dad's going to work on getting some paint and paper to make a sign.
I have these new bandages for my hands. They're called Jobst garments, which are very tight elastic gloves made especially to fit me. They came in a few days ago to measure me for them, but I didn't know what they were doing. They're supposed to keep the scars from getting too thick and also to keep my circulation flowing. Barbara helps me put them on, but they're very tight and it's hard work to get them over my fingers. And now that they're on, I just want to figure out a way to take them off. I think it'll be hard to paint in them.
Dad comes in with the party supplies and starts putting up a canvas on the wall so I can paint it for Mom's party. They let me take off the stupid Jobst garments, and I paint a blue balloon and a red balloon, a yellow one and a green one. Then I dip my brush in the black and paint a big black balloon above the other ones. I paint Happy Birthday in red at the top and To You right below in blue, and I try to make the letter O look like it's a balloon too. And then I paint Love, Brent G. at the very bottom in yellow. I think it's artistic to leave off your last name so nobody really knows who you are. Everybody says it looks great and Carol, the nice social worker, says, “I didn't know you were so talented.”
Dad tapes some blue ribbon to the bottom of my balloons so it looks like the strings to the balloons are coming out of the picture. I say, “Looks good, DF.”
He says, “DF?”
“Designated Father.”
I can tell he doesn't quite know what to make of that, that I called him Designated Father instead of Dad or whatever. It's just something I came up with on the spur of the moment. I hope he doesn't think it means I'm angry at him. That is so stupid. I hope he doesn't tell the stupid psychologist that I called him that and then she'll want to talk to me all about it. God, I hope that doesn't happen.