Splitting Up

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Happy New Year!!!

*TWO WEEKS LATER*

Anna's POV:

I'm gonna miss this girl.

Our management is sending everyone home- Eva and Sab to heal, the rest of us to be with our families while they figure out what to do. The house is pretty much destroyed, they were able to salvage a few things but really nothing of importance. My wardrobe, everything I brought from home, it's all gone. I've had to buy new clothes, a new phone, etc. But as much as thinking of everything we lost hurts, the most important thing is that everyone is okay.

Sab's been released from the hospital for a few days now, with strict instructions to not exert herself, mainly use a wheelchair, and drink a lot of water. Eva's still there, they wanted her burns to heal more before letting her go. I visit her every single day and we spend hours just talking or sitting in a comfortable silence.

Now her parents are here to take her back to her home, all the way up in Canada. And I'm flying back to Michigan. We're gonna be hours away. Eva makes me so happy... I'm gonna be so lonely without her.

Eva's POV:

I'm going home today! Finally getting out of this hospital. It's been over two weeks in the same frickin room. I've seen my parents a couple of times now and it was really emotional. They both broke down crying at the sight of me. It was four or five days after I woke up that I was allowed to see what I looked like... and I haven't wanted to look since. I'm disgusting.

Burns all over my body. My skin is bright red in some spots, and maybe it's healed more since then, but I can't bear to look. It's embarrassing. I'm so ugly now.

Anna comes to sit with me every single day and she reassures me that I'm still pretty but I know she's lying. How could I be pretty like this?

There's a knock at my door and I say, "Come in." My voice has been getting better. It doesn't hurt too much to talk now and I can speak pretty clearly. It's still a little raspy, but nowhere near as bad as it was in the beginning.

My mom and dad walk into the room.

"Hey, honey," my dad says.

"Hi, dad."

"You all ready to go? We've got to be at the airport in a couple of hours." Wait- airport? Aw hell no, I'm not flying looking like this. My dad must see the fear on my face, because he quickly elaborates. "No, not a commercial plane. NACH and the community gathered money to get us a private jet to get you home. You can lie down, be more comfortable. And we figured you wouldn't want to be around a whole bunch of people."

"Yeah. Wow, thanks. Tell everyone I say thank you?"

"You can tell them yourself," he says, grinning. Oh jeez. What does he have planned?

A couple of nurses walk into the room with a wheelchair.

"You ready to try this, Eva?" one asks. Ha, no, but I guess I don't really have a choice. The nurses come on each side of me and gently place their hands underneath my shoulders. "Alright, we're gonna lift in 3, 2, 1." They slowly sit me up and I let out a groan. Shit, that hurts. The skin on my arms feel like it's stretched tight, and every movement sends a shooting pain through me. "You're doing good, that's good. Okay, now we're gonna slide you over."

We slowly move to the edge of the bed and my dad positions the wheelchair right next to me.

"Mr. Cudmore, can you help pick her up? We want to lift straight up and then just set her down in the chair." He nods in assent and together the three of them lift me up into the air. I close my eyes and grit my teeth, a tear escaping. They finally get me situated in the wheelchair and the weakened muscles in my body simultaneously relaxing and tightening. I haven't sat up in weeks.

The nurses try to slip a sweatshirt over my hospital gown but I scream in pain and they don't try again. I'm wheeled out of my room, through the halls, and into the elevator. We ascend all the way down and my dad makes a weird face. Oh jeez, what did he plan? There are nurses all around the main entrance room, congratulating me on my recovery- I'm not fully recovered... but ok. It's a sweet gesture. When we near the door, my dad tells me to close my eyes and I hesitantly do so.

Anna's POV:

We're all outside together, waiting for her to come out. I mean, everyone is here. Dozens of people I vaguely know and dozens more than I've never met or heard of. It's a whole crowd- the way everyone came together for Eva is so powerful. Our managers sent out invitations to every social media house, every person they knew, inviting them to come celebrate my girl's recovery. No- not my girl, my best friend. We're not even gonna see each other now.
I focus back on the surging crowd. We've been told to stay quiet so Eva doesn't know what's happening. My phone beeps and I see it's a text from Lance.

Lance - probs about 5 minutes. mr cudmore said they'd be out at 2.

I text him back,

Anna - alright bet, thanks

I look all around me, trying to figure out where Katie and the girls went. I can't see them, so I start making my way through the crowd, apologizing to people as I shoulder my way past them. There- I catch a glimpse of Katie and call out her name. She spins around and waves me over. When I reach her, I ask,

"Well this is something, isn't it?"

"Hell yeah, this is insane!" We make our way over to where the rest of the girls are sitting with Sab in her wheelchair. I grin at her and bend down to say something but then the doors open with a clang and huge cheers rise up from the crowd.

Eva's POV:

    I hear them open the doors and a huge cheer assaults my ears. My eyes snap open and I don't know what I was expecting but it wasn't this. There's a whole crowd of people here, cheering for- for me? Holy shit.

    There's so many faces that I recognize here, but so many that I don't. Gosh, they all came for me? I wave to them awkwardly, feeling like a celebrity.
   
    Then I see my favorite face all the way to the left, and when we make eye contact, she sprints forward, shoving through the bodies, eyes locked on mine and a huge smile on your face. When she reaches me, the sight of my bandaged arms and legs dims the smile a bit but then she kneels next to me, whispering in my ear,

    "Look at you, bro, already out of the hospital."

    "It feels good to be out of that damn room," I reply, laughing.

    "C'mon, let's enjoy ourselves before we split up."

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