Sublime
Page 23
With one more apologetic smile, she disappears down the hall.
“Well, look who’s awake.”
Colin turns his attention to Maggie as she begins adjusting his tubes, checking the monitors. He wants to ask her what happened with Lucy, how she knows that Lucy is a ghost, and what she meant by “haunting.” He wants to ask her if he hallucinated the world of light and shadow, silver fire from Lucy’s touch. His heart squeezes painfully at the thought that it wasn’t real. But when he meets Maggie’s eyes, he realizes she’s waiting for him to say something.
“Sorry, what?” he asks.
“I asked you how your pain is, honey.”
He stretches his arms. They hurt. His head hurts. His legs hurt. “I’m a little rough,” he manages.
“Can you give me a number?” She points to a series of cartoon faces on a poster, ranging from smiling to crying with a score below each.
“Um . . . I’d say eight?” His skin screams ten. It feels like it’s peeling away, from his fingertips to his torso.
Nodding, she pushes the contents of a syringe into his IV. “That’s what I thought.”
Colin watches the clear fluid disappear into his arm. He remembers the burning cold, the colors, the girl. “What did you give me?” he asks. Whatever it was, he wants more.
“Don’t worry, sweetness. It’s fentanyl. You were screaming when you came in. Should have taken you to the hospital.”
“Can you let me see her? Lucy?”
Colin wonders if he’s imagining the way she seems to stiffen. “You need to rest now, sweet boy. Joe went to get some dinner and will be back soon.”
He doesn’t stay awake long enough to see Maggie leave the room.
Opening his eyes feels more challenging than lifting a car. The weight of sleep is unbelievable, and it’s only the sound of Joe walking into the room with Maggie that convinces Colin to struggle against the pull to return to sleep and memories of Lucy and her luminous world.
Joe tells him what Colin has already remembered: He fell into the lake, and the low temperature caused his heart to slow. Luckily, the exposure was minimal, and being young and fit enough means there should be no lasting effects.
Apparently, word of the accident has spread across campus, and some of the braver students have begun venturing out on the ice to see the scene of the crime for themselves. Joe’s rambling fades out when Dot walks in, all business, and she wordlessly takes in the scene: Colin in bed with cuts and bruises that cover pretty much everything not hidden by the cotton gown. Joe trying to avoid yelling by chatting incessantly. The beeping monitors on a cart near the bed.
“Colin,” is all she says.
“Hey, boss.”
“Dot’s going to stay until you’re asleep for the night. All
right?” Joe’s forehead pinches into about a hundred wrinkles, and for the first time ever, it occurs to Colin that the man who took his first sick day when he fell through his porch might actually be done in by a punk kid giving him a heart attack. “I need to go back and make sure the students are off the lake.”
Colin’s stomach cramps with guilt. “Okay,” he mumbles. In an uncharacteristic gesture of physical affection, Joe bends and kisses his forehead. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
He turns and leaves, his old blue coat folded neatly over his arm. Colin looks to Dot the second Joe’s out the door. “Where’s my bike?” he asks, but his voice turns to air on the last two words.
“Lost in the lake is my guess,” she answers, patting his arm gently. Anyone else might be full of I told you so’s, but instead, he can see the apology all over her face. He’s in the infirmary, suffering from the effects of hypothermia because he was horsing around on a lake in December—somewhere he shouldn’t have even been. He won’t be able to work for who knows how long. And Dot gets that it kills him that his favorite bike is gone.
“I know we haven’t talked in a couple weeks, but you’d tell me if something was going on, right? Something driving you to do crazy stunts on a frozen lake?”
He can tell that she’s barely suppressing the need to chew him out, and he nods, smile tight.
Her face registers that he hasn’t really answered. “Think you’re up for another visitor?”
Almost as soon as Colin nods, Jay walks in, stands at the foot of the bed, and looks at Colin like he’s seen a ghost. “You scared the crap out of me, Col. I didn’t think you were going to make it.”
“Thanks for pulling me out.”
“Lucy pulled you out,” he says, and Colin feels his eyes go wide. Lucy? The girl who can barely handle his kiss pulled his unconscious body from a lake? Jay’s already nodding, a grin pulling at the edge of his mouth as if they’re both imagining Lucy opening that beer bottle with her teeth. “Right? It was awesome. I basically punched the hell out of your chest to get you breathing.” His eyes narrow, and Colin can see the traces of another smile. It’s a struggle for Jay to stay serious for long, but for Dot’s sake, he works to keep it somber.
Colin knows Dot is probably putting the pieces together, but he can’t think about that right now. She’s unable to look at either of them, her wide eyes trained on the shape of Colin’s legs under the pile of blankets.
“That explains the bruises on my sternum,” Colin says.
“Really?” Jay sounds kind of impressed.
Colin pulls open the top of his hospital gown to show him the blue fist marks blooming across his chest. Jay laughs and turns it into a cough when Dot shoots him a sharp look. There are some Dot moods even Jay’s charm can’t penetrate, and one of those is Protective Dot. “Hey, do you know where Lucy is?”
Jay’s eyes slide to Dot again, probably sensing the tense set to her shoulders, and then back to Colin before mouthing the word, “Here.”
She stayed.
When the moon fills the window and spills across the floor, Colin actually starts to feel awake. Dot has left, and the far side of the room is empty but for the vaguely geometric shadows of medical equipment. Everything around him looks oddly . . . plain. Even the shadows here lack the dimension of those hovering alongside the strange trail.
Maggie pads into the room for another check of his vitals. “Feeling okay?”
He shrugs and gives her a pain score when she points to the faces on the wall. “It’s about a six.”
She pulls a packet of pills from her pocket and offers a cup with water. “Will she try to come back?”
He looks up at her. Maggie’s eyes are shadowed in the dark room, and she’s making a note on his chart, but he knows she’s not asking about Dot.
“Probably. Why wouldn’t you let her in?”
She sighs and straightens the blankets over his legs. “I’ll tell you the same thing I told her: Nothing good can come of this.”
“How did you know what she is?”
“How did you?”
“She told me,” he says. “But she didn’t have to tell you. You just knew.”
Maggie nods and meets his eyes. “She was killed just after I started here. I never knew her, but her face was plastered all over the news.” She pauses, studying him as her eyes fill with pain. “But that’s not what you’re asking, is it? Yes, I’ve seen her kind before around here.”
Colin swallows, but the question he wants to ask her isn’t forming quickly enough.
“Tell me,” Maggie says. “When she told you she was dead, did you decide it didn’t matter how strange she was, didn’t matter that when you kiss her she doesn’t feel like any other girl?” She leans closer, resting her hand on the side of the bed. “Did she feel like she was put back on this planet just for you?”
It feels too intimate, what she’s saying. It feels like she’s looking underneath his skin. And he hates the echo of her words: You’re going to break that boy’s heart. Or worse. He tugs the blankets up around his shoulders.
“Well.” Maggie sighs, picking up her clipboard and tucking it under her arm. “I’ve been in your shoes, Colin. That girl needs something, and nothin’s gonna stop her from taking it. You think about that.” She turns to leave, stopping in front of the door. “And maybe she was put here just for you. You’ll give and give until you hollow yourself out. But when that girl disappears without warning, without a trace, you ask yourself how long she can be gone before you break.”
“Well, look who’s awake.”
Colin turns his attention to Maggie as she begins adjusting his tubes, checking the monitors. He wants to ask her what happened with Lucy, how she knows that Lucy is a ghost, and what she meant by “haunting.” He wants to ask her if he hallucinated the world of light and shadow, silver fire from Lucy’s touch. His heart squeezes painfully at the thought that it wasn’t real. But when he meets Maggie’s eyes, he realizes she’s waiting for him to say something.
“Sorry, what?” he asks.
“I asked you how your pain is, honey.”
He stretches his arms. They hurt. His head hurts. His legs hurt. “I’m a little rough,” he manages.
“Can you give me a number?” She points to a series of cartoon faces on a poster, ranging from smiling to crying with a score below each.
“Um . . . I’d say eight?” His skin screams ten. It feels like it’s peeling away, from his fingertips to his torso.
Nodding, she pushes the contents of a syringe into his IV. “That’s what I thought.”
Colin watches the clear fluid disappear into his arm. He remembers the burning cold, the colors, the girl. “What did you give me?” he asks. Whatever it was, he wants more.
“Don’t worry, sweetness. It’s fentanyl. You were screaming when you came in. Should have taken you to the hospital.”
“Can you let me see her? Lucy?”
Colin wonders if he’s imagining the way she seems to stiffen. “You need to rest now, sweet boy. Joe went to get some dinner and will be back soon.”
He doesn’t stay awake long enough to see Maggie leave the room.
Opening his eyes feels more challenging than lifting a car. The weight of sleep is unbelievable, and it’s only the sound of Joe walking into the room with Maggie that convinces Colin to struggle against the pull to return to sleep and memories of Lucy and her luminous world.
Joe tells him what Colin has already remembered: He fell into the lake, and the low temperature caused his heart to slow. Luckily, the exposure was minimal, and being young and fit enough means there should be no lasting effects.
Apparently, word of the accident has spread across campus, and some of the braver students have begun venturing out on the ice to see the scene of the crime for themselves. Joe’s rambling fades out when Dot walks in, all business, and she wordlessly takes in the scene: Colin in bed with cuts and bruises that cover pretty much everything not hidden by the cotton gown. Joe trying to avoid yelling by chatting incessantly. The beeping monitors on a cart near the bed.
“Colin,” is all she says.
“Hey, boss.”
“Dot’s going to stay until you’re asleep for the night. All
right?” Joe’s forehead pinches into about a hundred wrinkles, and for the first time ever, it occurs to Colin that the man who took his first sick day when he fell through his porch might actually be done in by a punk kid giving him a heart attack. “I need to go back and make sure the students are off the lake.”
Colin’s stomach cramps with guilt. “Okay,” he mumbles. In an uncharacteristic gesture of physical affection, Joe bends and kisses his forehead. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
He turns and leaves, his old blue coat folded neatly over his arm. Colin looks to Dot the second Joe’s out the door. “Where’s my bike?” he asks, but his voice turns to air on the last two words.
“Lost in the lake is my guess,” she answers, patting his arm gently. Anyone else might be full of I told you so’s, but instead, he can see the apology all over her face. He’s in the infirmary, suffering from the effects of hypothermia because he was horsing around on a lake in December—somewhere he shouldn’t have even been. He won’t be able to work for who knows how long. And Dot gets that it kills him that his favorite bike is gone.
“I know we haven’t talked in a couple weeks, but you’d tell me if something was going on, right? Something driving you to do crazy stunts on a frozen lake?”
He can tell that she’s barely suppressing the need to chew him out, and he nods, smile tight.
Her face registers that he hasn’t really answered. “Think you’re up for another visitor?”
Almost as soon as Colin nods, Jay walks in, stands at the foot of the bed, and looks at Colin like he’s seen a ghost. “You scared the crap out of me, Col. I didn’t think you were going to make it.”
“Thanks for pulling me out.”
“Lucy pulled you out,” he says, and Colin feels his eyes go wide. Lucy? The girl who can barely handle his kiss pulled his unconscious body from a lake? Jay’s already nodding, a grin pulling at the edge of his mouth as if they’re both imagining Lucy opening that beer bottle with her teeth. “Right? It was awesome. I basically punched the hell out of your chest to get you breathing.” His eyes narrow, and Colin can see the traces of another smile. It’s a struggle for Jay to stay serious for long, but for Dot’s sake, he works to keep it somber.
Colin knows Dot is probably putting the pieces together, but he can’t think about that right now. She’s unable to look at either of them, her wide eyes trained on the shape of Colin’s legs under the pile of blankets.
“That explains the bruises on my sternum,” Colin says.
“Really?” Jay sounds kind of impressed.
Colin pulls open the top of his hospital gown to show him the blue fist marks blooming across his chest. Jay laughs and turns it into a cough when Dot shoots him a sharp look. There are some Dot moods even Jay’s charm can’t penetrate, and one of those is Protective Dot. “Hey, do you know where Lucy is?”
Jay’s eyes slide to Dot again, probably sensing the tense set to her shoulders, and then back to Colin before mouthing the word, “Here.”
She stayed.
When the moon fills the window and spills across the floor, Colin actually starts to feel awake. Dot has left, and the far side of the room is empty but for the vaguely geometric shadows of medical equipment. Everything around him looks oddly . . . plain. Even the shadows here lack the dimension of those hovering alongside the strange trail.
Maggie pads into the room for another check of his vitals. “Feeling okay?”
He shrugs and gives her a pain score when she points to the faces on the wall. “It’s about a six.”
She pulls a packet of pills from her pocket and offers a cup with water. “Will she try to come back?”
He looks up at her. Maggie’s eyes are shadowed in the dark room, and she’s making a note on his chart, but he knows she’s not asking about Dot.
“Probably. Why wouldn’t you let her in?”
She sighs and straightens the blankets over his legs. “I’ll tell you the same thing I told her: Nothing good can come of this.”
“How did you know what she is?”
“How did you?”
“She told me,” he says. “But she didn’t have to tell you. You just knew.”
Maggie nods and meets his eyes. “She was killed just after I started here. I never knew her, but her face was plastered all over the news.” She pauses, studying him as her eyes fill with pain. “But that’s not what you’re asking, is it? Yes, I’ve seen her kind before around here.”
Colin swallows, but the question he wants to ask her isn’t forming quickly enough.
“Tell me,” Maggie says. “When she told you she was dead, did you decide it didn’t matter how strange she was, didn’t matter that when you kiss her she doesn’t feel like any other girl?” She leans closer, resting her hand on the side of the bed. “Did she feel like she was put back on this planet just for you?”
It feels too intimate, what she’s saying. It feels like she’s looking underneath his skin. And he hates the echo of her words: You’re going to break that boy’s heart. Or worse. He tugs the blankets up around his shoulders.
“Well.” Maggie sighs, picking up her clipboard and tucking it under her arm. “I’ve been in your shoes, Colin. That girl needs something, and nothin’s gonna stop her from taking it. You think about that.” She turns to leave, stopping in front of the door. “And maybe she was put here just for you. You’ll give and give until you hollow yourself out. But when that girl disappears without warning, without a trace, you ask yourself how long she can be gone before you break.”
