Nothing to Lose

Chapter Seven

May 15th was my brother's tenth birthday. My mother, who hadn't left the hospital since my arrival, called him that morning to say she was sorry to miss the unwrapping of his "I-know-this-is-overkill-but-I'm-missing-your-birthday-so-I-felt-super-guilty" iPad, and that she loved him and couldn't wait to hear all about his day when he got home from school. Much like any other ten year old, my brother was absolutely insulted that anything, even a deteriorating sister, would distract even the slightest amount of attention away from his special day.

"You're missing my BIRTHDAY." He said with a guilt-inducing mix of hurt and preteen boy entitlement through the garbled speakerphone.

"I know, buddy. I'm sorry. Did you see the cookies I asked Miss Laura to bake you to take to class? And the sign Miss Susan made? Wasn't that nice of them? And Miss Liane wrapped the gift for you...And you can come see us this weekend. You can show Maris your iPad!" My mother looked like she was going to cry. One kid laying in a hospital bed with more cords stuck onto her chest than a robot, the other two hours away celebrating his birthday with only a less-than-celebratory dad whose idea of festivity was a single Safeway balloon left on the kitchen counter. She shoved the phone into my hand with a pleading smile for me to correct the situation.

"Hey...Nolan...happy birthday." What was I supposed to say? Sorry I got hospitalized and fucked up your tenth birthday? On one hand, apologizing seemed prudent, but on the other, I was still feeling rather sorry for myself for spending the last month of school locked away from civilization.

"Thanks." The disdain in his voice was thinly veiled.

"So uhm...sorry I'm missing your birthday." 

"I have to go to school."

"Cool. Right. Have fun." Click.

And just like that, the seeds of resentment my brother would hold for me for years to come, were planted.

It was quiet then, save for the rythmic and neverendingly-annoying EKG machine's beeping. It was a moral dilemma for my mother- torn between the guilt of missing the birthday of one kid and the concern over the health of the other. There was no way to be the perfect mom here, no simple solution that would please everyone. She had no car here to drive home even if she wanted to, but the anxiety of leaving my alone in a hospital was too much for her to even consider it. The fact that she hadn't left the ward at all was an anomaly. Most parents had jobs they couldn't afford to take time off of, or were single parents with no one else to watch the remaining children at home, and some simply didn't want to be bothered to stay. Others were flown in from around the country, and could only afford to pay the airfare of the patient. I hadn't realized how lucky I was to only be a few hours away from the world-renowned specialized CCP Ward of Lucille Packard. 

I'm not going to lie and say that I adored having my mother present all the time. If there's something to be said about hitting rock bottom, it's that you don't want other people to see you hit rock bottom. Even your mom. Perhaps, in fact, especially your mom. I was a failure in the most pathetic way- incapable of simply taking care of  myself. I could do lots of things, some things pretty well. I had straight As and a passion for reading and writing. I'd been the recipient of a handful of bullshitty awards for things like "Self-Discipline" and "Student Rolemodeling", but none of that meant anything when I couldn't even properly feed myself. 

So having my mother watch me get a lecture about the proper way to chew my food was, needless to say, a little embarassing. I felt like a child, one that couldn't be trusted to do anything right. Being pushed around in a wheelchair was humiliating, although it would have been way cool if I could have actually pushed myself and learned some neat tricks and made a viral YouTube video about it. But instead, I was resined to the life of a ninety year old woman in a nursing home- not allowed to do anything but eat, be wheeled around, and complain. 

It was quiet between my mother and I until breakfast time. I was wheeled into the dining hall to see the nurses standing around a guitarist who'd come to raise our spirits with the gift of his sprited but somewhat lacking guitar-skills. The other girls were already sitting around the table, arguing about what song they wanted to request.

"A Whole New World!" Demanded Natalie, who was supposed to star in her school's production of Aladdin before she passed out on stage and promptly landed herself in the CCP.

"No way, I don't do that Disney shit." Said Dulce, hardly glancing up from her phone.

"Why not Rehab?" I snorted.

 "That is hilarious." Natalie, always on stage, lit up. "I don't have the time, but my daddy thinks I'm fine..."

In what was a perfect movie moment, the guitarist picked up on his cue, strumming the chords to the Amy Winehouse song. Soon enough, the other girls chimed in, finding the irony of the song absolutely hilarious in only a way we could. 

"They tried to make me go to rehab, but I said 'no, no, no'!"

"Alright, alright, enough of that." Said the forever-dissaproving Janice. "Time to eat." 

I lifted my lid and groaned. "Peanut butter toast. Again. Joyous."

"Hey, at least they let you be a veg-head." Natalie said, poking her food with a fork suspiciously. "This sausage looks like it's been eaten before."

"No negative food talk!" 

We all rolled our eyes, but resigned ourselves to packing in more food than we really could fit in our shunken stomachs. The fascinating thing about eating disorders is the way your body adapts to a lack of food. It quickly became clear to our digestive system that not much was being put in, so it decided to save some energy and simply shrink our organs. This, of course, presented a problem once we started eating again- especially considering the volume of food. So once the meal was over, we all suffled, more bloated and stuffed than a herd of pregnant cows, into was was deemed the "Digestion Room". The point of the room was to be distracted while we digested our mammoth meals, so as to not be triggered to freak the fuck out if we actually thought about the fact that food was literally inside of us at that very moment.

The Digestion Room was outfitted with the saddest pair of beanbag chairs I had ever seen, a TV that was outfitted with what must have been the very first VHS player ever invented, and endless amounts of boardgames that we couldn't play because pieces instrumental to the game were, without failure, always missing. I silently promised myself that I would totally steal Colonel Mustard from the Clue boardgame before I left, for no apparent reason other than to express my distain for the lackluster distractions.

"What do you ladies want to do?" Asked Levy, the best nurse on staff who'd come to babysit us for the day. Levy was everyone's favorite for four reasons: 1) She had dreadlocks. 2) She had a robotic leg. 3) She didn't bullshit you. 4) She was absolutely hilarious.

"Apples to Apples?" Suggested Kaylee, who had strange and passionate love for the game.

"Someone stole it last week, remember?"

"Oh. Right." 

"We could do a craft." Levy said, digging through the cupboards for inspiration. She reemerged with a box of string. "Friendship bracelets?"

"No one knows how to make them, remember? We were gonna do that last week."

"I know how." I said, still feeling like I needed to earn my way into the tribe. I needed to have an ability that would make me worthwhile, so perhaps five years of Girl Scouts finally paid off. We laid out a blanket on the floor and I showed them the steps to making them- make a four, loop it through, knot it twice, next string. They picked up pretty quickly, considering it was an acitivty designed for little girls, but something about the whole scenario was pleasant. For that time, we weren't institutionalized crazy people, we were just teenage girls hanging out. It was, in effect, the world's most sterile slumber party to ever take place at ten in the morning behind an alarmed and locked door.