Brooklyn
Morning rolled around before I even realized it, and my mom was at the hospital with coffee and blueberry muffins from Starbucks and a bag with a change of clothes for me.
First, she hugged me very tight, smacking a sounding kiss on my cheek. "You look terrible, honey."
She'd brought enough coffee to feed the whole hospital floor so we all had breakfast—Jazmyn, Kelsey, Sam, Mike, Luke and Will had come first thing in the morning—before Mom dragged me to the restrooms.
I'd changed into a pair of jeans and a red turtleneck and brushed my teeth, which was as close to showering as I would get because I refused to leave the hospital to go home. The comb my mom had brought got stuck in my hair at least twice, and I whined all the time as she brushed it through the blonde tangles and knots that had formed overnight. Secretly, I knew she loved playing beautician with me. By the end of the makeover, I looked half human at least.
"I still think you should go home and get some sleep," Mom said as we joined the rest in the waiting room. The one by the ICU was bigger and a little prettier, with potted plants and glass coffee tables with magazines. It also was fuller than the ER, which wasn't such a positive thing.
"I'm not leaving," I repeated for the umpteenth time. I refused to go anywhere more than a few feet away from the ICU doors. Needless to say, Tyson and I had been kicked out of the room about ten minutes after we'd come in by the nurse that was in charge of those patients last night. She'd nicely warned us that if she caught us there again she'd call security. Even though I wanted to be next to Justin in case he opened his eyes, I was grateful we'd at least been able to see him for a bit because now that it was morning the hospital was much busier and there were so many nurses and doctors that it'd be impossible to sneak in. Not even with the fiancée excuse.
Pattie and Jazmyn were allowed to go in and that's where they'd been most of the time, thought I knew it did get boring when you couldn't get any response out of Justin and you had to stare at his sick form for too long. It was a whole new level of heart-aching.
Sam patted the seat next to hers when she saw me pacing up and down the hallway. I don't think I'd ever bitten my nails so short. One was even bleeding.
"You need to chill or you're going to give yourself an aneurysm," she said as I plopped down on the little blue couch.
I sighed. I had been feeling uneasiness in my stomach for so many hours straight that it didn't feel uneasy anymore.
"I'm just so worried," I said, bouncing my knee up and down.
Sam put her hand on my leg to stop it. "We are all worried, but this is Justin. He loves being the center of attention now and then. He'll wake up any minute when he gets tired of the show."
I knew she was trying to make light of it and crack a joke, but I couldn't even manage a smile. "I don't even know what's going to happen when he wakes up," I admitted.
"What do you mean? If I'm honest with you, I have no idea of what happened between you two because Justin's been dodging my questions. That means he feels bad."
I looked at her. Her belly was getting huge. The baby was due to August so that meant only four more months left. To me it looked like it could come out any minute, but what did I know about babies.
"Why would he feel bad?" I asked, confused.
"Duh, because he knows he's hurt you. He cares about you. He loves you."
"That's not what he said a week ago," I mumbled acidly.
"I thought by now you'd learnt that Justin hardly ever means what he says. He has strange brain mechanisms to process his feelings for people and sometimes he does stupid shi—crap," she corrected herself. "No swearing in front of the baby," she explained.
I made a sound that was meant to be a chuckle, but it was more of a whimper.
"He basically told me that I was in love with someone that didn't exist," I stated, trying to sound matter-of-factly instead of emotional.
"Oh, please, he's so lamely dramatic." Sam scoffed. "He's been acting all weird with everyone since his dad... you know." I nodded. "I bet he's been trying to push you away because he felt bad by making you stay with him when he knew he was causing you pain."
"But isn't it easier to stop hurting me so he'll stop feeling bad?"
"Do you know that common belief that men are simple?" Sam said. "Well, it's not true."
In that moment, my mom broke into the conversation. "Oh, you must be Sameera. I'm Brooke's mom, Kate." She sat on Sam's other side, and I buried my face in my hands. My mom had never been like this, so why had she changed so much all of a sudden?
They began a chit-chat about the baby's sex, which both Sam and Mike had agreed to leave a mystery until he/she was born, and what names they'd thought of—my mom contributed with some ideas of her own, which I knew Sam hated but was polite enough to keep that to herself.
I didn't listen to them very log, though, because the appearance of a certain someone made me freeze.
Alejandra looked as if she'd shown up at a party uninvited. Everyone turned to face her and she even blushed. I couldn't imagine why she'd come back here after last night, neither why she seemed to care so much about Justin. Or he about her.
As soon as our eyes locked, I knew she'd come here to talk to me. She looked much better than last night and much better than me, but I was past the point of caring. My mom gave me an inquisitive glance, and Sam widened her eyes when she saw me standing up. I wasn't sure whether she was warning me not to leave her alone with my mom or just surprised that I was willingly walking towards Alejandra.
"You relaxed enough to talk?" Alejandra asked with just a hint of attitude in her tone.
I nodded. Truth be told, I was awfully embarrassed about the scene I'd made at the ER the night before. After the fury had gone down and I'd started feeling sad, anxious and helpless again, I'd wanted to kick myself for screaming and swearing like a fishwife. That didn't mean I was going to apologize to her because, after everything Alejandra had done to me, being called a whore seemed like a small punishment to bear.
"Can we go somewhere private?" she inquired, keeping her pose straight to make it look like having everyone's eyes on her didn't face her one bit.
"I don't wanna leave him," I said before I could stop myself, and I hated admitting such thing in front of Alejandra.
She rolled her eyes, but surprisingly her voice was gentle when she spoke next. "The cafeteria is only one floor down."
"We'll call you if anything changes," Kelsey said gently, putting a hand on my shoulder. She'd come as soon as she'd been able to, and she hadn't left Tyson's side. I was glad he had her with him in such a difficult moment, but it hurt a little bit to see them so united while I was so bleak and alone.
"Fine," I told Alejandra. "Lead the way."
We didn't speak again until we both had a cup of coffee—I would take as much caffeine as I could get to keep me awake—and were sitting across from each other at a small round table.
"Okay," she started. "I assume you hate me right now because you think this is all my fault."
"I didn't say that. I just don't understand what happened, that's all."
"That we have in common," she said stirring the cream and sugar into her mug. "I have no freaking clue why he jumped in to save me, but I can tell you my theory."
I narrowed my eyes at her, scrunching my nose. "You have a theory?" Did this girl think this was CSI or?
"Yes, I do. Do you want to hear it or not?" she snapped, and I couldn't blame her because I was being rude to her first.
"I'm all ears," I lilted.
"Okay, let's start with last Friday, the day you guys broke up." Rub it in. "Let's say, Justin and I had some sort of heart-to-heart before you arrived with Tyler. I told him that I'd broken up with him because what he'd done to you—even if you're not my favorite person in the world—was twisted and sick and I couldn't be with someone like that."
I was taken aback by the fact that she'd dumped Tyler for what he'd done to me.
"Don't think you were the only reason," she added like she'd read my thoughts. "I just realized I didn't really feel anything for him." The way she said it made me believe it was rather the other way around. "So I basically told Justin that I had nothing against his relationship with you anymore and that I wouldn't try to screw you two over, but that I thought he was doing that all by himself. I know what he's been doing behind your back, and how he's been lying to you because he thinks what you don't know won't hurt you. I warned him that you would get tired of his shit and that he would end up losing you if he didn't get his head out of his ass."
"Seems like he didn't listen to you," I retorted unintentionally.
"In case you haven't noticed, Justin isn't one of those people that actually listen when given advice. He is too clouded by his self-hatred to see clear, and consequently he fucked up."
I was actually impressed by Alejandra's use of a metaphor until she finished that sentence.
"So what you're trying to tell me is that is not your fault that he broke up with me? That you actually advised him to stop being an asshole so we wouldn't wind up like this." At least she hadn't mentioned them hooking up, and I wasn't brave enough to ask.
"No, that's not it," she said with a gesture that meant she was losing her patience. "I mean, I guess it is in part, but what I'm really trying to say is that Justin hasn't been himself for weeks now. He's doing all this crazy dangerous stuff. He was playing with fire and so he got burnt."
"I think that's an understatement," I said wryly.
"Brooklyn," Alejandra pronounced my name with such determination I had to take her seriously. She laid her hands on the tiny table and leaned toward me. "I think he feels guilty. Guilty that he broke your heart and messed up the only good thing that was left in his life. He's good at masking emotions, but not that good. Before the accident happened, I talked to him. He was being a jackhole, and that's what he does whenever he's upset with himself."
"How do you know Justin so well?" I felt a pang of something that wasn't envy or jealousy—I knew him better than her—but it was definitely negative. I didn't like the fact that she'd noticed those things I was positive only I'd noticed before.
"You don't need to play the jealous girlfriend card with me." Alejandra smirked at me. "I'm not interested in Justin anymore."
I raised an eyebrow.
"To answer your question, while we were together—"
"You were not together."
"—I used to watch Justin more than he cared to look at me. I learned a few things about how his mind works. Besides, I've known him for years," she finished a bit wistfully, completely ignoring my interruption. Now I was positive Justin hadn't cheated on me—or post-breakup-cheated on me—and a weight lifted off my shoulders.
"That doesn't explain why he jumped in front of Tyler's car. No offense, but I'd rather see you in a coma in that bed."
Alejandra sneered at me. "I liked you so much better when you didn't talk."
I shrugged.
"Whatever. That's where my theory comes in," she said, picking up where we left. "Actually, I have two, but they're kind of related. The first one is he did it because he knew Tyler was actually going for him and he didn't want to add up to the guilt he already felt. Maybe he thought if he saved an innocent life—that would be my life—it'd be like some kind of redemption. You know, a good deed in exchange for a bad one."
"Giving up your life is a good deed?" I asked, rather horrified.
"That leads to my second theory," Alejandra said. "And he didn't give up his life. He's not dead yet, remember?" Yet. She seemed to want to take the word back as soon as she said it. It sounded so wrong. Justin was going to live. "What I mean is that the hatred he feels towards himself might've led him to do something as recklessly stupid as that. Don't you believe it's possible? It sounds like Justin to me."
It did. "Lately, he's been saying that his life is wrecked and that nothing matters anymore," I whispered. Her theory made an awful amount of sense, but it made me shudder. "You don't think he did it on purpose, that he wanted to, you know... right?"
"No!" she exclaimed, and I felt oddly relieved. For just a second there my mind had considered the idea of Justin actually wanting to die. "No, he would never do that to you, to his family. He's not that screwed up. But all that pent-up negativity—and from what Tyson told me yesterday it'd gotten worse since you left—he must've wanted to do something good that would outweigh the bad. Something that wouldn't make him feel even shittier than he already did."
I nodded slowly, reluctantly agreeing with her. "It makes sense."
She gave me a genuine, if toothless, smile. "I just came up with a third theory. He's actually in love with me. Enough to trade my life for his."
"Ruled out," I replied flatly, although I almost cracked a laugh.
After a pause, Alejandra spoke again, her tone earnest. "I was serious when I said I was over him, you know. He's so madly in love with you, it'd be stupid for me to keep holding on." Her dark eyes were fixed on the empty coffee mug. "I bet he's dreaming about you right now," she added with a sound between a sad laugh and a snort. "He loves you that much."
If that was what everyone was telling me, including Alejandra, why could I still not believe it? Because you need to hear him say it, I answered myself.
"Alejandra," I said before she left the table.
She looked at me expectantly.
"Thanks," I said quickly and hesitantly, because c'mon, I was really thanking Alejandra.
She looked equally caught off guard by my words, so much that she staggered forwards. Then, the unexpected happened. We hugged. And it was as weird and awkward as I'd always thought it'd be.
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When the staff left around 10 pm to be replaced by the night shift, there were only Pattie, Tyson, Jazzy and me left.
Unfortunately, when I'd returned from the cafeteria after the strangest, weirdest, oddest, most unexpected conversation of my life, Justin's prognosis was the same. If you ask me, it wasn't even a prognosis since they couldn't give us any useful information. He's stable, but we still don't know when he'll wake up. It hadn't even been a day yet and I was already stressed out. I needed him to open his eyes and just say one of his inappropriate comments or terrible jokes and make me laugh and make me forget every bad thing that had happened since his dad died. But life doesn't work like that. There's no such thing as miracles.
What had called my attention, though, was that Pattie and my mom were totally absorbed in some conversation in a corner, speaking in hushed tones, and my mom had her hand on Pattie's shoulder. I hadn't introduced them to each other before, since Pattie had been with Justin, but they must've made their own acquaintance. I'd never imagined my mom to be a very empathic woman, but then again, she'd managed to surprise me a lot recently. I guess the simple fact of them both being mothers drew some connection between them. I was glad they got along.
Mom had left for work after making me eat some crappy cafeteria lunch I wasn't hungry for. I hadn't seen Justin all day, and being at the hospital doing nothing could get boring to the point that Jazzy, Tyson, Kelsey and I had ended up playing I spy. Sometime after five I had dozed off on Tyson's shoulder, only to wake up to a couple of nurses giving me dirty glares. You'd think that working at a hospital they would be used to seeing people asleep in the waiting rooms. I hadn't slept long because I was so jumpy and restless it was fruitless. Sleep didn't come and when it did and I closed my eyes, I saw Justin all bloody and pale and gasping for air and I would wake up with a bolt. So I was basically surviving on coffee. It's not like that was new. I'd been doing it since the whole Tyler-set-a-trap-for-me-then-played-hero thing. I could no longer shut my eyes and dream about good things. But I didn't want to deal with that yet.
"You wanna go in?" Tyson asked when the night workers were already settled down. The same blond woman from the night before was behind the desk by the ICU doors. She was sorting through some papers while she snuck looks at Tyson and me and shook her head. She was probably expecting to have to pretend to believe our lies again. I think that was Tyson's plan too. And I was up for it.
"Sure," I said with my little mischievous smirk.
I almost did a happy little dance when the blond woman said, "Wow, I can't believe I forgot my robe. I'll be gone for a few minutes. No one will be keeping an eye on these doors for a while." I was tempted to say thank you, but I played along and we just waited until she was out of sight to sneak in.
Justin looked the same as the night before. I guess I'd expected some improvement, some change, some sliver of hope. But he was still pale, still unconscious, still intubed.
Jazmyn and Pattie had been coming and going all day. The doctor had advised for them to let Justin rest—not that we were disrupting his sleep, anyway. Jazmyn had complained that it wasn't fair that they would only let immediate family in because it meant just her and Pattie. Jaxon was too young to see his brother in that state, especially after how much he worshipped Justin; and their grandparents couldn't afford plane tickets. I was saddened by the fact that Justin was badly hurt and they weren't making a bigger effort to come visit. I hoped they would eventually come.
According to Jazzy, Tyson and I should be able to see Justin because he would want us to and because we were like family. I don't think she realized how much it meant to me that she considered me part of her family, even when she did know we were no longer a couple.
Tyson and I didn't say anything as we hovered over Justin. He was so still I was afraid the lowest noise would startle him. His hair was combed back as if he was a prissy geek. He would hate it. I bet Jazmyn had had fun playing with it and making him look ridiculous. I giggled a bit as I ran my fingers through it and left it looking all messy the way he usually wore it. It was so soft I wanted to keep touching it, but I pulled my hand away.
"Shit," Tyson cursed lowly when his phone started ringing. The ringtone sounded like Drake. I wouldn't have known that if you'd ask me five months ago.
"Tyson, you're gonna get us caught," I whisper/yelled.
"Sorry. It's my mom. I'll be back." He left in a rush, so I had no time to tell him he most likely wouldn't be able to get back in.
When it was only Justin and me, I felt almost as if I shouldn't be there. The ICU was so quiet—despite the sound of ventilators and heart monitors—you could hear a pin drop. I sat on the stool next to Justin's bed and my hand instinctively covered his. They'd put a new IV in his arm so I was careful not to get mingled on the tangle of tubes. Some blood had leaked from his chest wound into the bandage covering it. I worried the stitches had opened or something, but I forced myself to calm down. It probably was normal for the wound to bleed a bit.
"I would've sworn you were his girlfriend and not his sister," a voice said, almost making me jump off the chair. It was Dr. Holloway.
I opened my mouth, racking my brain for a decent excuse as to why I was here and who had let me in, but he didn't even glance up at me from his notepad. He had a pair of reading glasses perched on the bridge of his nose and was reading intently. Behind him trailed the same nurse that had talked to us during Justin's surgery last night. She looked a bit intimidated by the doctor, but smiled politely at me, not commenting on my presence.
"Check his vitals and write them down." Dr. Holloway passed the notepad to her and started shining a penlight on Justin's eyes. His lids fell down as soon as he let go of them, and I tore my gaze away. That simple gesture made him look lifeless and I couldn't bear to think of that.
The nurse seemed to be very methodic and cautious with her job, checking everything twice and then scribbling it down before moving on to the next thing. All of this without a single one of her ginger strands of hair coming out of her ponytail. I stepped away when she started changing Justin's bandage after being told by the doctor how to do it without popping the stitches open or causing internal damage. I was relieved they'd noticed the blood.
Even through being fiddled with, Justin didn't move a muscle. He was completely limp. I bit my lip hard to keep from crying in front of the doctor. I had a feeling he would scold me or at the very least scowl at me.
"He'll need a chest tube."
At that my ears perked up. "What does that mean?" I asked, alarm evident in my voice.
Dr. Holloway seemed surprised the ginger nurse—I needed to find out her name—had noticed that herself. Her green eyes twinkled with self-pride.
"We need to suction the air that's continually filling the damaged part of his lung. We didn't think it'd be necessary after surgery, but it seems like it will," she told, I'm not sure if me or her boss, without taking her eyes off of Justin's chest wounds. Now that I peered around her shoulder I noticed his chest was a bit swollen.
"Good," the doctor appraised in his monotone voice, although some mixture of pride and surprise slipped in. "Do that and come find me when you're done."
After he left without giving me a second glance—I'd still take that before getting kicked out—the nurse got to work. She looked a little shocked that he'd left her alone at first.
"I know it's a stupid question, but do you think he can hear us?" I said, still keeping my distance from the bed. Seeing Justin being pierced with a needle that was almost as thick as a Starbucks straw wasn't pleasant.
She shrugged. "It's not a stupid question, but I don't really have an answer," she said gently. "It doesn't come in my text books, but I guess I'd like to believe he could if it was my boyfriend there."
"Oh, he's not my boyfriend anymore," I said, because I was starting to feel weird about not correcting people's assumptions.
The nurse turned momentarily to give me a disbelieving look. "He must be a really good exboyfriend for you to spend the night in the hospital for him," she commented. "When he wakes up, he should consider begging you to get back with him."
I laughed a little, glad that she'd said when and not if.
After a few minutes of me observing how she carefully worked the tube into Justin's chest while trying not to puke, I spoke again. "Are you an intern?" I asked. I don't know why I'd thought she'd be a nurse when she was clearly a medicine student training to be a doctor under Dr. Holloway's wing. Not the doctor I would've chosen given the chance.
"First year," she replied, flashing me a smile.
I nodded. She seemed really smart for her first year. I mean, she had to be if a head medic had left her alone with his patient.
"I wanted to go to med school too, but after this... I'm not so sure anymore," I confessed.
She finished patching Justin up and patted the top of the gauze affectionately.
"You get used to it," she said, taking off her latex gloves and moving on to adjust the fluids hanging from the IV pole standing next to Justin's head. His breathing was a little uneven after the intern had been messing with his lung, but the line of his heartbeat in the monitor had barely increased speed. "I fainted when I saw a corpse in the lab for the first time." She giggled. "But it's amazing to feel that you can help save someone's life, you know?" She moved her light green eyes from Justin to me, and I could see how much she meant her words.
"I have to go or else Dr. Holloway will kill me, but keep Justin company and talk to him. Just in case he's bored." She smiled, only turning around before she reached the glass doors to tell me to ask for Melanie if I ever needed anything. I smiled in return.
________________________________
It was weird to talk at first. It felt like I was invading his sleep, bothering him. But after Melanie had left and I was positive there was no one around—no one conscious at least—to eavesdrop and label me as crazy, I decided to give it a go.
I told Justin that his family and Tyson and Kelsey and his other friends wanted him to wake up. That even Alejandra was worried. I told him that on the chance that she was right and he'd really made the stupid decision of getting himself almost killed because he felt like that was what he was supposed to do to absolve his soul, we were going to have a talk as soon as he was up. I even guilt-tripped him. I told him he was breaking his mom's and his sister's heart and that everyone was devastated and that he needed to come back to them if he really cared.
Only at the end, when I'd ran out of topics that didn't involve talking about myself, I told him that I wanted him to wake up too, even if I knew things would still not be the same. Too much had happed for that to change.
"I miss you, too," I whispered at last, when I was sure if I didn't get out of there my heart would implode. Before I left, I allowed for my lips to touch his forehead just barely, hoping that if he could hear me, he might be able to feel me too.
________________________________
On Sunday I went home. Justin was still in the ICU when my dad dragged me out—literally—after nine in the evening. I had only been able to see Justin for five minutes since the day before.
That night I hadn't considered sleeping because I'd been glued to my phone since we crossed the doors into the parking lot and had left it on the sink while I was showering. I hadn't realized how much I needed a shower until I was under the scalding water. In any other occasion, I would've found it gross to go without washing for two days, but since I hadn't even looked in a mirror, I wasn't aware of my appearance. Let's say when I'd finally faced the mirror, I nearly emptied a whole bottle of shampoo on my hair.
Surprisingly, I had fallen asleep as soon as I had snuggled under the covers. I was wearing Justin's t-shirt again, although it no longer smelled like him because María had accidentally added it to the laundry basket. Around 6 AM I'd woken up startled from a nightmare. I had a couple of texts from Tyson saying everything was the same and that I'd better be getting my beauty sleep. I smiled despite the way my body was still shaking from the nightmare. This time it had included Tyler and Justin and my own made up version of the car crash. Only in my dream Justin died on the spot and I had woken up sweating and crying and it took me twenty minutes and my mom to assure myself that it was just a dream and that Justin was alive.
At school, I'd been checking my phone for updates instead of paying attention to the classes, which had earned me a detention slip for tomorrow before first period. Whatever, I couldn't care less. Kelsey had smirked at me from her spot far in the back. Your first detention ever, gurl, she had said with her eyes.
It was during Chemistry, as Nate and I worked together—in perpetual silence, obviously—on an experiment, that my phone beeped in my pocket. I took off the ridiculous goggles Mrs. Marshall made us all wear and my blue plastic gloves and discreetly checked my new messages. Sure enough, there was one from Tyson. I couldn't help but to squeal when I read that they'd removed Justin's ventilator and that he was breathing by himself now. They would most likely be moving him out of the ICU later today.
Kelsey widened her eyes at me from across the room like I was insane. "Do you want another detention?" she mouthed at me. The way she eyed me made me seem like a detention-junkie or something.
I grinned and shook my phone so she'd know what I was so delighted about. I was positive Tyson had sent the same text to her as well. Luckily, the teacher was too busy trying to keep a guy from igniting himself to notice my squeal and I finished the day with just one detention sleep. Justin would've been thrilled to know I had gotten one before finishing high-school.
I had never tried telekinesis on a clock before, but as I waited for the last period to be over, I tried to somehow make the hands move faster. Needless to say, I didn't have newly-found superpowers. When the bell finally rang I was out of my seat and opening my locker in record time. Kelsey was having difficulty catching up with me in her heels and kept huffing and muttering under her breath. That was one of the reasons why I'd put on my Converse All Stars today. I needed to be comfy and ready to sprint at any text message that implied an improvement in Justin's health. My mom had let my choice of clothes go this time, although I had seen clear on her face how much she disliked me wearing sneakers to school.
"At least I'm going to school," I 'd told her, almost scoffing. I'd wanted to be at the hospital so bad that I might've played hooky had my dad not given us a ride.
I had my car door opened and visualized Kelsey jogging down the stairs when someone else appeared at my side, scaring the life out of me.
"Hey," Caleb said, waving his hand awkwardly at me. He seemed sorry that he'd scared me.
"Hi," I replied, not able to keep from frowning at the fact that he was talking to me.
"Are you going to the hospital?" he asked when the silence had stretched far too long.
"Yeah, just waiting for Kelsey." As if speeded up by the sound of her name, she finally reached the car, almost panting. If I was out of shape, then I don't know what she was.
"Going to meet your girlfriend's big brother while he's knocked out, huh?" she said, trying not to sound like she was wheezing. "Good idea."
Caleb let out a laugh. I think it was a laugh, anyway. It was difficult to tell with Caleb. He was so reserved.
"She's right," I added. "Justin will give you less of a hard time while he's unable to stand up. Or talk."
Caleb looked as if we had inspired some fear in him. "Jaz said he wasn't that bad."
Kelsey snorted, then covered her mouth as if she'd committed a crime.
I smiled at the fact that he had already given her a nickname.
Caleb ended up driving because I was too fidgety to even start the car and Kelsey was wearing heels no one should try to drive in. He'd gotten his license not too long ago so he was still a little abrupt when braking and turning, but we managed to arrive at the hospital unharmed.
Tyson was waiting for us at the entrance, smiling for the first time since the accident. He led us to the elevator, pressing the button for the 7th floor, which meant Justin was no longer in the ICU. Kelsey told me off for bouncing on my feet inside the elevator.
Tyson continued down a very long hallway, so long that you couldn't see the end. There were people hanging around every door we passed, and I felt nervous anticipation building up. Tyson hadn't said Justin was awake so I guessed he wasn't, but at least we were moving forward.
Caleb looked sort of sick, and it reminded of Blake and how much he hated hospitals because he'd spent so much time in them as a kid with epilepsy. Now going to the dentist was torture for him, and no one even knew how he was able to remember his episodes being so young. The point is, if Caleb had a story remotely similar to that one and he still was coming, Jazmyn was getting a golden boy.
When we got to Justin's room, she was just coming out with Jaxon.
"My mom couldn't get time off work, so I had to take him with me," she said, pushing her bangs out of her face. Jaxon ran away from her arms and towards a table with crayons and sheets of paper. There was a nurse smiling at him as she watched him draw.
"Caleb," Jazzy breathed when she looked up and saw him with us. She had the same dark circles under her eyes all of us sported, but the green in her irises lit up when she noticed him. "What are you doing here?"
"I wanted to see how you were doing." He shrugged sheepishly, hiding under the brown hair falling on his eyes.
Kelsey and I exchanged one of those Awww glances.
Knowing Jazmyn, she was unable to believe someone would do that for her. Her lips turned up in a smile when he tentatively reached for a hug. Caleb stroked her cheeks with his hands and looked down at her with nothing short of adoration. There was no way Justin couldn't not approve of him for his little sister.
"You girls can go in." Tyson pointed his chin at the door. "Only two visitors at a time, and I've already been chewing his ear off."
Kelsey smacked her lips on his cheek. "You could never chew anyone's ear off, babe. You're too interesting."
I rolled my eyes and had to go away because, suddenly, every single loving gesture couples made seemed like enough to make me gag. In jealousy, obviously. Everyone knew I was the biggest romantic in the state.
Seeing Justin still asleep but at least breathing by himself was a huge relief. I took careful steps to his bed. He didn't look much better than he'd done the day before but now that he wasn't intubed, his pose looked more natural. His chest was raising and falling steadily and his heart monitor showed a slow heartbeat. I hoped that didn't bode ill.
The room he was in was plain, with a bed that looked pretty much the same as the one in the ICU and white walls interrupted by a blue frieze across the middle. There was a window overlooking a little park that was behind the hospital and an uncomfortable looking couch on one side of the bed. I left my coat and my scarf on the backrest and then shuffled to the bed.
Warm light was pouring from the window and I knew that, if Justin's eyes were open, they'd look more green than brown right now.
"Hey," I finally said. You'd never understand how weird it felt to talk to someone that wasn't responsive until you experienced it first hand. I almost expected Ashton Kutcher to come out from under the bed with a hidden camera and scream, "You just got Punk'd!"
Right when I'd gathered enough courage to start talking, Kelsey walked into the room. She was tiptoeing as though Justin was going to be annoyed by the clicking of her heels on the linoleum. She came to stand by my side next to the bed, looking at Justin for the first time. I was glad she hadn't had to seen him when he was all wan as a sheet of paper, bloody and with tubes coming in and out of everywhere. Kelsey was very sensitive to the stuff since her grandma had been hospitalized a few years back.
"He looks like he's asleep," she whispered, keeping her hands on the railing of the bed.
"Yes."
"Do you think he's having one of those out-of-body experiences where he can see us and hear us but we can't? You know, like that episode of Hannah Montana when she has an accident skiing and while she's in a coma she's seeing everyone that goes visit her at the hospital. Like a ghost."
I twisted my neck to face her, gripping the railing myself. "Kelsey, that's a Disney Channel show," I said, maybe a little harsher than I'd meant to. "Things like that don't happen in real life." We were lucky if Justin could actually hear what we were saying, although I don't know how he would take being compared to Hannah Montana.
"I know, it's just... there has to be more to it than just being unconscious. I mean, that sounds boring. He's been out of it for almost three days straight already. I believe if he can't see us, he can at least hear us so we should be careful what we say just in case."
I cracked a smile, because she would probably be the one to say something she shouldn't in front of Justin. I didn't tell Kelsey what Melanie, the intern, had said, that she agreed with her; because as much as she was my best friend I wanted her to leave so I could really talk to Justin without an audience.
"Okay. I get it. You want me to leave." She put her hands up. "Fine with me. You better listen to her, Justin, or else I'll finish you off." She kissed her index and middle fingers and pressed them to his cheek before sauntering out of the room.
I exhaled in relief, fear, confusion, doubt. A little bit of everything. My feelings were so messed up that I couldn't tell them apart.
I sat on the other side of the bed, where a single chair stood. I scooted closer to Justin and, as always, took his hand. It wasn't as warm as it had been other days, and I made the connection with the lower heartbeat, pushing the worry away.
There was some kind of tall piece of furniture—trademark white— level with the pillow Justin's head was resting on that I hadn't noticed before. The drawers were shut so I had no idea what was inside. Most likely pills and bandages and stuff like that. My curiosity got the best of me, and since I had nothing else to do, I opened the first one.
Mistake.
Justin's clothes were wrapped in a plastic bag. The clothes he'd been wearing during the accident. They were practically in tatters, so you wouldn't be able to make out what was a piece of a t-shirt and what part of his jeans, but I could perfectly recognize the dark blue sweatshirt with the yellow print letters saying B.R.O.N.X on top of everything else, not quite covered by the bag for me to have missed it. The front was cut into two from where the paramedics had torn it to access his chest and the blood had pooled so much around the collar and the chest part that you could barely distinguish the letters anymore. Stupid how some piece of clothing could do so much harm to me, but I had a blurry vision by the time I'd closed the drawer with more force than needed.
"That was my favorite hoodie," I said out loud, surprised that it didn't feel awkward. Talking about memories to Justin seemed so much easier than talking about the uncertain, unpredictable future. It felt more real, like if I didn't sit down and remember now and then, those memories would get lost forever. "It's almost comical that you were wearing it that day."
I don't know why I had assumed Justin wouldn't want anything in his life that reminded him of me after the breakup, but wasn't that what people did? Avoid more suffering? I was a glutton for punishment then.
"I've thought about stealing it from you many times, actually, but I loved seeing you in it. I don't think it would pass my mom's test, anyway," I joked, wishing I could hear Justin's laugh one more time. "She's so worried about you. I think even my dad is. But you know how Dad is, he's never going to admit it. He is working on your case personally, with all the Tyler stuff." I don't know why it didn't bother me that my dad was trying to help Justin even after everything he'd done to me. I had asked him myself. "And Blake asks about you every day. I think you're more of a role model to him than Ryan is." Another humorless laugh.
Justin didn't react. I should've stopped waiting for him to when it so clearly wasn't going to happen.
"Kelsey still wants me to go to prom," I said, because I was out of topics that weren't too deep to go into at the moment, even though I knew I'd get there eventually. "I don't want to go. It feels weird, because I'd dreamt about prom my whole life and now that it's here it feels like a silly idea. I don't have any friends in school I want to spend time with other than Kelsey." And I don't have you. "I'm already thinking of ways to bail out. She's going with Tyson anyway. And you would hate the dress we picked for me. The skirt looks like a cupcake."
It was quiet in the room for a few minutes after that, because I was too preoccupied wondering whether I'd sounded like a loser when talking about prom.
"Oh, and I was admitted into Stanford." I changed the subject. "But I already told you that, didn't I? Yes, I did. I accepted." Actually, that was the last thing I'd told him after he'd been done with us. The last thing I'd told him, period. What a stupid last thing to say.
The sadness of it struck me out of nowhere, and I was digging my nails into my thigh. It was absurd. It was lame. It wasn't how things were supposed to happen. I'd cried so much over the past days that I had no urge to do it anymore, but I did feel the anger and frustration taking the best of me.
"I wouldn't have gone, you know," I said, looking straight at Justin. I wouldn't be throwing out my feelings like confetti if he weren't asleep. I wouldn't still be holding his hand either. "If you had asked me to stay here, I would've. I hadn't made up my mind to go to Stanford before that night. I made the decision the next morning because I didn't want to be so close to you if we weren't going to be together. I know, what are the chances of running into each other in such a big city? Still, I'd rather be on the other side of the country if it means those chances are zero. I could've gone to college here. We could've been together like all this time and it would've have been so much easier. It was what I wanted. It would've been perfect. It still could be. If you woke up and we talked and I told my parents that I want to stay here. If you just wake up... Because I'm going to miss you so fu— so much."
I dropped Justin's hand and stood up, feeling my body begin to tingle and bounce with anxiety. I paced around the room for a bit to calm down, but it was fruitless. My sentences weren't making any sense. I didn't know what I was trying to say. I felt like I was grasping at straws. Would it really be possible to start from scratch and forget all the pain and crap we'd gone through even if Justin recovered?
"Damn it, Justin," I mumbled, tilting my head back to stare at the ceiling as I breathed in and out. "Why did you have to do that? Why did you have to mess up the best thing that I had?"
Justin hadn't moved or uttered a sound yet. It was beyond nerve-wrecking. I wanted to shake him until he gave me some kind of response. I wanted to know that I wasn't the only one with serious emotional issues. Above all, I needed to hear him ask me to stay and not go to Stanford and to give ourselves another chance.
Something that wasn't going to happen.
I plopped down on the couch, which squawked under my weight, and put my head on the pillow next to Justin's. I could hear the sound of the machines louder in that position, but all of that shifted into the background when I felt pressure in my hand and was positive that Justin had squeezed it. My hair flew everywhere as I jerked my head up. It had been more of an involuntary kind of thing to do to hold his hand, but I was sure I wasn't imagining things.
"Justin?" I said urgently, willing his fingers to close around mine again. It didn't happen, but as I stared at our hands, mine shaking with what it could mean, tingling where the imprint of Justin's fingers had been, the sounds in the room grew louder.
The beeping of the heart monitor increased at a fast rate, and the line that showed his heartbeat started curving in higher peaks.
"Oh my god," I whispered to myself, immediately pressing the button to call a doctor. I started panicking when Justin's chest lifted off the bed and his skin paled. The breaths that left his lips were ragged and sharp. Thankfully, Melanie and two nurses barged into the room in only a few seconds, wasting no time in getting to work.
"I just—I was talking to him and then he squeezed my hand. I swear to you he did. I thought it was a good sign, but then his heartbeat and his breathing started going crazy and I... " I rambled on frantically, having to let go of Justin's hand when Melanie went to auscultate him.
"Call Dr. Holloway," she ordered a nurse, then turned to me, putting her hands on my shoulders. "Don't worry, okay? The fact that he moved his hand is a good sign, but his lung is causing problems again so we're going to take him for a few scans and x-rays."
I nodded, unable to speak through the burning in my throat. This was my fault. I had been too loud and harsh and pushy and not understanding and he'd listened to everything I said and he'd tried to reply but his body wasn't ready and it had rebelled against him and it was my fault.
I fell back on the couch after they'd wheeled Justin's bed out of the room. The orders being shouted and their hurry made me believe this wasn't as unimportant as Melanie had made me think.
It was two hours before anyone told us anything. Melanie explained that Justin's response to a collapsed lung was somewhat normal. She said the fact that his spleen had been affected in the accident increased the risks as well. I still blamed myself for the little outburst. If I had been gentle and more considerate of Justin's condition, if I hadn't acted like a madwoman, Justin's heart wouldn't have gotten so stressed out. So as much as Kelsey—who had comforted me as I told her everything I'd blurted out to him—tried to assure me it wasn't my fault, I didn't believe her and I felt guilty.
Pattie arrived while Justin was in the operating room, looking exhausted and worn out. Tyson had been the one to call her. To be honest, he was sort of like the rock everyone was leaning on, and I wondered when he would snap too. I hadn't seen him cry since Friday.
After the surgery and countless Styrofoam cups of coffee and tea, Pattie and Jazzy were allowed to see Justin. He was back in the ICU, which meant that only immediate family was allowed. I didn't try to sneak in this time, not even when the blonde nurse behind the counter left the doors unguarded for us. I didn't feel like seeing Justin after what had happened. Not when I was damn positive that he could hear everything we said now. I still wasn't sure how I felt about that.
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The next day I drove to the hospital alone. I hadn't run into Caleb, and Kelsey was stuck with a Math exam the next day so her mom was making her study. Tyson had given me indications to the room Justin was in now, which apparently wasn't the same as the day before because the hospital was chaotic these days. However, I had to ask someone for directions because that hospital was like a maze. No joke. It took me around ten minutes and asking three different people until I finally found the room. It was on the opposite side of the hospital, closer to the ICU, which didn't seem like a great sign.
I thought someone would be loitering outside in the hallway, but there was no one and the door was closed. Tyson must've gone home to rest, and Pattie and Jazmyn must've not arrived yet. I had to double-check that it was the correct room. When I knocked on the door and there was no response, I supposed there was no one inside either—which also meant that Justin was still unconscious, obviously. I pulled down the knob, but froze when I heard a whimper. A girl's whimper. I couldn't get a glimpse of the person inside because there was a little corridor leading into the room, but it didn't take me long to recognize it was Jazmyn.
"You're a jerk. Wake. The. Hell. Up. Justin," she was saying, clearly irritated. "You promised that you wouldn't get into any more trouble. Do you have any idea of what you're doing to mom, to me? I'm so sick of this, Justin."
I was about to leave, feeling bad for spying on a private conversation, when I heard my name.
"Brooklyn has been here every day. And you know what? You don't deserve it. You've broken her heart, and she still cares enough about you to come visit. She has hardly left your side, and what do you do in exchange? Get into this mess?" she asked rhetorically, like she was taking advantage of the time to let out everything she had bottled up inside. "You know, Justin, you weren't the only one that was suffering because of Dad. But you haven't stopped to consider how it was affecting the rest of us. Mom is crushed. I've never seen her looking so depressed before and I feel like I'm the only one that's fucking worried about her. And Jaxon... Jaxon doesn't even understand what's going on. But he knows you're supposed to be the male figure he needs in his life whenever Dad's not around, and you're not being it for him. He looks up to you, but you're not acting like a role-model. I don't want him to be like you. And you wanna know what bothers me the most? Your promises. Your stupid empty promises.
"You swore you would stop doing all this illegal stuff and you would be a good brother. I thought you'd look for a decent job, take care of us, help mom. Instead you're ruining this family even more!" The barrier that had been holding Jazmyn back broke down, and a sob escaped her throat. I could tell she was trying not to let her emotions get the best of her, but it was pretty hard when you were talking to someone that didn't react. "You are the worse big brother ever, and you don't deserve all the people that care about you. You don't deserve Tyson, nor Brooklyn, nor me. Hell, even Alejandra has been coming to see you! And why the hell did you have to play hero for her? Risking your life like that it's not being a hero, it's being a coward. You wanted an easy way out of everything and now that you got it, you can't decide if it was such a good idea. I know you can hear me, and I know that you're trying to decide if you should come back. If you don't... You're going to break mom's heart, and as for me, I will never, ever forgive you, Justin. You're stupid and reckless and a dickhead, but you're still my brother and I need you!"
I felt wetness in my cheeks that I hadn't noticed. I was crying with Jazzy because I felt exactly like her.
"Just—Just come back, please," she said hoarsely after a few moments, like she'd finally calmed down from her anger. "Wake up and make everything right again because I can't bear to lose you too after Dad. Nor can Mom or Jaxo. Please, Justin. I promise that I'll forgive you and I won't throw it in your face. I won't annoy you and I will mind y own business and I won't ever ask you to buy me anything. And Mom will forgive you too. She loves you so much, even when you don't love yourself. Shit, Justin, you're not the worst brother ever. You're amazing and you've done so many things for me through the years... You always defend me, and I know you'll kill any guy that hurts me and you won't let anything bad ever happen to me. I know you don't think you're important, but I'm lost without you. I need my brother back.
"And we'll help you, okay? We'll help each other get through this, and you can find a nice job or keep studying if you want. You can start from zero, a new life far from the one you've been living all this time. You can get a second chance. You can make it right." She sniffed, and I could almost see her leaning her head on Justin's arm, wetting his skin with her tears.
I hadn't seen Jazmyn so distressed since Jeremy's death, and had definitely never heard her open her heart up like that. She was like Justin that way. They were more alike than they believed.
"Brooklyn will forgive you, too. You'll have to work on it, but I know you can get her back. She loves you more than you think. And we all know you love her, too. You are a bad liar. I'll help you win her back, okay? We'll fix all the damage that you did. Don't lose hope. I promise I'll convince her to take you back if you promise to wake up and change. Please, Justin. Please, please, please. I'll do anything."
I closed the door, feeling like I couldn't keep listening if I wanted to keep from falling back into my crybaby routine. Silently, I walked to the chairs lining the opposite wall, thinking that I'd do anything for him to come back, too.
Justin
I lost track of time.
I lost track of reality.
I didn't know if I was anymore, if I existed. All I saw was black, no light at the end of the tunnel like they do in movies. I felt like I was swimming in the bottom of the ocean, deprived of any sense of direction. I couldn't even feel my body sometimes. I could hear voices now and then, muffled by the depths of the waters, like they were talking to me from the surface so I couldn't really make out their words or who the voices belonged to. I don't know how long it was until the voices got clearer. It could have been a minute or a hundred years for all I could tell. The sense of disorientation was so strong that sometimes I felt like turning it all off.
I knew that they were messing with my body, and I gathered that I was in a hospital from the mingled voice shouting medical terms that I hadn't heard before. I was thankful for the numbness. I knew how disturbing it must be to feel your own self being opened up on an operation bed, blood and guts everywhere. I didn't need any more pain.
The blurriness dimed overtime. I had no way of knowing how long it had been since I'd started discerning voices and words. I'd heard my mom first of all. Then Jazzy. She was mad at me. Tyson had talked to me about basketball and stuff I honestly couldn't care less about while I was in a coma, so those were the moments when I tried to shut down my mind.
Then, there was her voice. I had strained so hard to hear it, because at first I couldn't believe it was really her. I had enough self-awareness to know that I'd fucked up and that there was no reason why Brooklyn should be there. I didn't deserve it. Yet, there she was. That or I was more delirious than I thought and I'd been imagining things. I hung onto every word she said, even when she just babbled about prom dresses or cooking recipes. I was so focused on her voice sometimes that something would suddenly hurt, and for a moment, I got an idea of where my head or my chest was. Then, it would fade back again, along with her voice, and no matter how hard I tried to keep listening, my mind just turned off on its own.
At one point, she was telling me how much I had screwed things up this time. I was so aware of her that I started feeling how her hand was holding mine. I'd wanted to thread our fingers together, get a sense of reality. It had taken so much effort. First, I had to locate my hand, then will my fingers to move. I only managed a squeeze, and I felt exhausted afterwards. I hoped she had noticed it. After that, pain shot through my whole body, and for the first time I was conscious of my breathing and of how bad it worked. Something wasn't right. The pain was so intense I think I regained consciousness for a second. It wasn't long enough to even open my eyes, and then I was back into the darkness.
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The second time around, it didn't take me so long to get my bearings. It was still dark and still confusing, but I could feel a dull ache where my heart was, supposing my calculations were correct.
Jazmyn was talking to me. I forced myself to listen, even though I knew I wouldn't like what was coming. It was hard to resist the urge to fall asleep and not have to deal with her pain. Jazzy hardly ever cried and now she was full on sobbing. I think I could feel her tears when they hit the skin of my arm, which meant I was more conscious than I thought.
When she started talking about Brooklyn, I couldn't listen anymore. I let sleep or unconsciousness or whatever it was fold me in his comfy blanket of ignorance. I wasn't ready to face things yet. I knew I had to wake up; I couldn't leave, but the perspective of how fucked-up things were on the surface made me want to sink to the bottom again.
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I can't tell you the exact moment when it all started getting clearer. I only know it happened way too fast for me to stop it, as much as I wanted to. Cell by cell, my body started waking up, and I wondered if one side of my brain had decided it was time to leave the state of hibernation without consulting the other first. It started like warmth slipping in my bones, from my toes all the way to my teeth. I was still a little confused and my body felt like it weighed a ton, but I knew this was it.
I was emerging into the surface and there was no turning back.