Paper Stars

Chapter 38

 38

Missing Pieces

________________

I blinked, shifted and cringed. My body was sore, my mind was cloudy and everything throbbed, especially my feet and arms. I blinked a few more times. Goodness, my eyelids were heavy and my wrists itched—and how scratchy the blanket upon my chest was! I took in a deep breath and tried to get past the blurriness.  

“It looks like we have a survivor.”

Upon turning my head, I saw a white coat standing beside me. Above it was a stethoscope, assorted pens stuffed inside a pocket, a clean-shaven chin and dark eyes. I opened my mouth, but closed it again quickly, as my tongue was dry and I didn’t feel like talking, anyway. My mind felt muffled, as though stuffed with cotton, and it took a very long time for me to put two and two together. It was only when I saw the cloth bandages and bloodstained gauze wrapped round my wrists that it sunk in. Horror and shame filled me at once. Impulsively, I sat up quickly and defensively, though both a rush faint-headedness and the doctor’s hand upon my shoulder bore me back down once more.

“Sich verlangsamen, kleiner Kämpfer!” he scolded with faint amusement. “Slow down, little fighter! You are weak, yet.” Reluctantly, I settled back down against the pillow, and he smiled at me. “So, my dear girl, how are you feeling, then?”

“How am I feeling?” I repeated, and my old temper was stirred by the absurdity of such a question. “Oh yes: I feel lovely, du hirnlose Wesen! –Humph, a doctor, indeed!”

He chuckled as though he was called a brainless creature every day, and shortly thereafter exhaustion overcame me and I fell to sleep once more.

When I awoke once more later in the evening, I immediately recognised the scent of Aunt Jo’s perfume. She was sitting in the bedside chair, her body swathed in a lovely black dress that I had never seen before. Daniel was sitting asleep beside her, his slumbering face still crinkled in worry as he lay against her shoulder. I watched them both for a moment, and Jo must have felt my eyes upon her, for she turned to me and met my gaze.

            “Don’t bother telling me to go away, because I won’t,” she told me then. I nodded slightly, and there we remained for a long time. I could see the sun setting through the hospital window and the room soon fell to darkness, and still my mother’s sister sat by my side, filling my room with her presence. It took me awhile, but I was finally able to gather the energy to speak.

“Why?” I asked her. “Why do people die? Why do they go so young?”

“It depends on who those people are,” she said quietly.

I couldn’t bring myself to mention Saul, so I chose the other gaping holes within me. “Good people. People like Benjamin and Hanna.”

My aunt was silent for a moment—she had looked away again, her attention focused intently upon the window. “We’re put on this earth to learn,” she said at last. “We learn to be kind, to understand, to see things as more than they seem. We learn how to love courageously, and when we learn how to do all these things, we have fulfilled our purpose—we have done all that life asks of us. I think that some people learn to be good earlier than others, and they don’t have to hang around as long as the rest of us.” She turned to me, and there were tears in her eyes. “That is the thing about good people: sometimes they just can’t stay.”

ad

I came home several days later, though I was put under close supervision: I wasn’t allowed to be in the house on my own, and Jo or Nora or Danny had to enter my room almost every hour upon the hour to make sure I wasn’t attempting suicide again. Still, it was unnecessary at that point: I had accepted that my life wouldn’t be ending any time soon; despite the daunting prospect of facing my losses and moving on, I was surprisingly grateful for my survival.