The rest of the afternoon passed slowly. Nobody came into the room except a nurse shortly after three o'clock with some food. Cameron left shortly around half an hour later to go to the hospital's cafeteria and get some food for himself, but other than that he stayed by my side the entire day.
I barely touched the food the nurse brought me—a sandwich and some fruit. Everything felt strangely dreamlike, as if I would wake up in my bed any time now and go across the hall to find Maddie and Clare sleeping peacefully in their room. Maybe, if I went downstairs, I would even see Mom in the kitchen making breakfast and Dad getting ready for a day at work.
When Cameron returned at four, I had nibbled off of my sandwich and then set the plate, still nearly full, on the nightstand. He was carrying a bouquet of red roses in a glass vase, which he set beside my plate of almost untouched food. Then he sat down on the edge of my bed.
"Feeling all right?" he asked, reaching out tentatively and brushing some of my hair away from my face. It was likely knotted and dirty, but I didn't bother getting up to check my reflection in the mirror. I hadn't looked at myself for over a day.
"I'm fine," I said, choosing instead to look outside the window. The opaque curtains let in only a little bit of light. When I stood and crossed the room to open them, my hospital gown tucked tight around me, I could see that the window overlooked an empty field.
I left the curtains open even as the sky grew dark. Around dinner time, the nurse brought in more food and Cameron went back down to the cafeteria for another meal. Since I was actually beginning to feel myself getting hungry, I ate more of my dinner, but still left some of it on the plate.
By the time I was finished, Cameron still hadn't returned, so I lay down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. I remembered reading about an artist who was paralyzed so that she had to paint with the easel on top of her, staring up at it. That made me think of my dandelion drawing sitting on the drying rack back in the school's art room. Would I ever go back to it?
Just then, the door opened and Cameron stepped inside. He gingerly shut the door behind him and then went to close the curtains, blocking out the cloudy night.
"Try and get some sleep, okay, Evelyn?" he asked me, coming over and resting his hand against my cheek. "You need to get your rest so that you can take care of your sisters—especially Clare once she wakes up."
Even though the room was already dark, I closed my eyes as if I were trying to block out what I was seeing. I felt the covers being pulled up around me and Cameron's warm arm around me, and when I opened my eyes, I could see shadows dancing on the ceiling.
The machines in the corner of the room weren't beeping anymore, and I found that now that they were gone I missed their reassuring constancy. All I could hear now was faint noises of the bustling hospital behind the closed door.
What if Clare was taking her last breaths right now, and I had no way of knowing?
"Evelyn?" asked Cameron, as I literally felt my heartbeat increasing until it was pounding and my breaths becoming ragged, "Try and calm down a little, okay? You need sleep more than anything right now."
I rolled over so that I could rest my head on his chest and so that I was facing the window. Though the curtains were closed, I could still see a small sliver of moonlight poking out from behind the clouds.
I experimented by closing my eyes for a few seconds, but all I could hear were tires skidding and cars colliding. I opened them wide again, staring into the incomprehensible darkness instead.
"Cameron?" I finally asked, tilting my head upwards so that I could see the shadowy form of his face, "How long did you suspect?"
There was silence for a few seconds; then, he began rubbing my back slowly, as if he were thinking. "I think maybe a week after I started tutoring you," he said. "You kept saying your dad was coming home, but he never was, was he?"
"I didn't know what else to say," I whispered.
He rubbed my back harder, his fingers warm. "You don't have to apologize," he said. "You were trying to do what was best. What matters now is that everything is out in the open and things can only get better from here."
I shook my head miserably, another tear slipping down my cheek. I was sick of crying, sick of feeling weak, but I couldn't seem to do anything to stop it. "This is all my fault," I said. "Cameron, if it weren't for me, we wouldn't be in the hospital right now, and I'd know I'd wake up in the morning in my own bed with my two sisters alive and well." My breath caught and I nearly choked. "And if it weren't for me, my parents would still be here."
"Don't say that," he commanded, taking my chin almost harshly in his hand and turning my face so that he could look at me. "Don't you dare blame yourself for what happened. You couldn't help your mother's car crashing, and you couldn't help what happened tonight, either." His voice softened until he sounded almost distant. "Sometimes what happens is out of our control, Evelyn."
I didn't say anything after that, just tried to suck back the rest of the tears that were threatening to overflow on my cheeks. Cameron didn't understand—everything was my fault.
Then I remembered, and I turned to look at him again. "Do you sometimes think it's your fault?" I asked quietly. "What happened to your parents?"
His hand fell slack against the sheets. "Yes," he said. "All the time. I have to keep reminding myself that it was truly an accident, but it doesn't always help. I know what it feels like Evelyn. It's not something I like living with, and it's not something I want you to live with. Do you think you told those drivers tonight to get in their cars and go thirty miles an hour above the speed limit and hit a car of kids?"
"No," I muttered.
"Do you think you told the car that hit your mom to get out of its lane and crash?"
"No."
I couldn't tell him, though, what my father had told me in the hospital. He had said it had been my fault, and I had believed him. But I didn't believe anything he had said anymore—it had all turned out to be a lie. Who was to say those words weren't falsehoods, too?
We were quiet for a few minutes, and if I closed my eyes, I could faintly smell the roses sitting on the bedside table and Cameron's fading cologne. Had we really been at the bird park yesterday, dancing under the fountain without a care in the world?
Cameron's arm came back up around me and he kissed the top of my head before adjusting his pillow. Moments later, his breathing became slow and constant, his chest rising and falling peacefully. I continued to stare into the curtains, agonizing thoughts coming over me in waves.
It must have been hours before my eyes finally won the battle against my mind and I drifted off into a painful sleep.
~*~*~
I awoke with a start the next morning, and I must have jumped because I awoke Cameron, too. My sleep had somehow turned peaceful, but when my thoughts had subconsciously turned to Clare, I had startled.
"You okay?" asked Cameron as I kicked off the covers and made my way towards the door to the room.
I turned to him—he still looked exhausted, as if he had spent most of the night worrying. I wondered if he'd woken up after I'd fallen asleep and had stayed awake since then. "I'm fine," I said. "I've got to visit Clare."
"Don't you want to change out of your hospital gown first?" he asked. "Your clothes are on the chair."
I went and grabbed my clothes and he went down to get breakfast from the cafeteria, still looking half asleep. I changed quickly, then grabbed my phone and checked a sign just outside my room for the way to the front desk.
While I was down at the front desk, I was told that I was to return back up to my room to get a final check before I was officially released. I spent most of the short exam twisting my hair wildly around my fingers, my thoughts obsessing around my sister.
Finally, I was released, and the nurse who conducted my exam led me up an elevator and to a small, white room where Clare's bed was. When I stepped inside the room, my heart stopped.
My little sister was laying, still and silent as death, in the bed, her hair spread out on the pillow and machines attached to nearly every part of her. A doctor hovered at her bedside, making notes and checking the readings on the machines. She looked up when I entered and nodded.
"She's still in a coma," she said as I numbly crossed the room and came to a stop beside my sister. "Her condition hasn't changed much. We're still uncertain about the future, but she has as good a chance as any of awakening."
I nodded silently and reached out a hand to gently brush Clare's cold cheek. Her eyes were closed, her lashes thick and dark against her cheekbone. She looked so pale in her bright white hospital gown—not at all spunky and full of life like I knew she was.
"We're unsure whether she is aware of what's going on right now," said the doctor. "You might want to talk to her a little." Smiling kindly at me, she wrote down a final note and then left the room, shutting the door carefully and quietly behind her.
I bent down so that I could kiss Clare on the cheek, then said, "Well, it's me, Evelyn." I noticed she had bandages on her head from where she had been injured from the crash. "It's your stupid big sister. I finally got wise and told the truth. I'm sorry I lied all this time. Look, we're going to get an awesome new home with a mom and a dad when you wake up, so you might want to do that as soon as possible."
My voice choked. I didn't know if anything I was saying was true, but I would lie over and over again just do get my sister to open her eyes.
"You need to go back to school so you can show everyone how smart you are," I said, taking her hand and holding it tightly. It was limp in my grip. "Remember how you wanted to be an inventor? Well I think you'd make the best inventor ever."
Two tears began slipping down my cheeks. They dripped down onto the sheets and left identical wet spots.
"I need you so much, Clare. I don't think you even know how much I love you. My life would be empty without you. You need to wake up, Clare. Please, wake up. I don't care how comfortable it is wherever you are, you need to come back to me."
I grabbed her arm harder, my silent cries turning into wracking sobs. "Clare, I love you so much it hurts. You have a future ahead of you. Imagine graduating middle school, falling in love, having your first kiss, going to college, getting married—Clare, you have so much ahead of you. Don't let it go." My voice cracked, and suddenly I felt drained. I collapsed onto the floor, her hand slipping out of my grasp.
I sat against the wall with my knees pressed up against my chest, crying, for what felt like hours. Finally, I was interrupted by a short knock on the door.
"Come in," I said, nearly choking over my breath.
The door opened and Clare's nurse entered, her brow furrowed. "Evelyn?" she asked. "There's a man standing just outside this door. I wasn't sure whether or not I should let him in. He claims to be your father."