Two Of A Kind

Chapter Nineteen

This look was different. Completely different. Some may even say unrecognizable. But to me, it was desperate and not a choice. I had swapped my regular glimmering Sole Mate pumps, with bland post-op shoes, that sink with every step I took. My preppy skirts, and trendy jeans that vibrated my look, were pushed away and had been replaced by a long johnny gown that dangled as low as my ankles. My hair, carelessly tied into a bun, was muddled and had numerous strands let lose making their way into my eyes as I swatted them away constantly not to fall as I walked.

Around my eyes clung a bracelet. Yet not the ordinary bracelet a friend or parent would have bought you for a birthday, but a white bracelet with a tube plucked behind penetrating its way out of my skin, as it hang-glides down a glucose stand that I was holding onto like a cane as I paddled down the halls of the infirmary.

I looked nothing like Sadie Princeton, student body president and cheer captain of Clarison High. I was an average girl, at a hospital, after having had a seizure at school.

My parents, were in my room, who'd quickly rushed in after having hear of the situation, from the principal herself. They were somewhat upset that I wasn't as careful as I should have been, but also worried and scared. Mother had even shed a small tear, as she'd seen me lying motionless on the hospital bed. She brought me a thermos of hot tea, and a basket of cookies Mrs. Mills had made just for me. Father, very hesitant at first, but had decided he needed to see me instead, had flown back from New York, even when I had told him it wasn't worth it. He too, stood wide awake, waiting for my eyes to have fluttered open.

I appreciated the gesture, but all this act of kindness had just overwhelmed me even more. People know about it, and there was no going back.

I'd opened my eyes, and took a breath, and suddenly didn't want to be alive anymore. The constant cycle of, be perfect, random people sabotaging my life, accidental seizure, again be perfect was too much for a seventeen year old high school teenager whose greatest emotional trauma should be when her favorite retails store ends closes down too early on a Saturday night, or when he prom dress was accidentally washed with all sort of colors. Did someone of my kind really had to go through the five stages of life all in four years of high school?

I excused myself from bed, after taking my morning meds with a cup of orange juice the nurse had provided me prior to me awakening, saying that I had to go use the bathroom. Which I really did need. Father had slept on my Mother's shoulders and I'd left them still as I propped myself slowly out of bed, and into the halls of where I stood now.

Seeing people enter and leave this place was very if not sad then depressing. Some who looked nothing above ten years old, with hands stuffed in their mothers' pockets afraid of seeing the needle the doctor would pull out once they were isolated into the rooms. Some who dropped off a loved one, with cancer, as they share tears during departure. Some who were much older than me, older than my parents, who have been here longer than anyone, stood looking out their window, longing the outside world.

I stood staring at the old woman, who didn't even pay any responsiveness to the nurse who'd called her name twice, explaining she needed to eat her meal or she couldn't take her prescriptions. But the old woman in the white gown, and the post-op shoes ignored it starting blankly at the overlarge window that exposed a beautiful garden wedged with a hill over it. It was a view for sure, but for her it was indispensable.

The nurse sighed, and left a small reminding note by her bed post, and left her room, not even bothering to close her door. Out of complete curiosity, I'd stopped my expedition towards the restroom, taking a peek towards her room. She sat in a wooden chair that rocked every second. Her wrists too, plucked by a syringe. Her hair a short streak of white and grey.