They hadn’t changed. I walked purposefully past moaning rooms and crying rooms and scarily silent rooms, past the rooms where half a dozen family members forced loud laughter, past many of rooms with only a TV blaring. It was all so familiar, but removed. Like walking through a dream.
Since I hadn’t bothered to pick a destination, my feet took me to pediatric oncology out of habit. Mina would be meeting with Dr. Brown in his office, so I turned toward the residents’ floor instead.
Once there, my purposeful walk slowed. A few kids hung out in the rec room area watching TV or playing board games. I looked for familiar faces out of habit, but of course there wouldn’t be any; I hadn’t visited in two years, and the kids I remembered would be out by now, like Mina, or dead.
A child stepped in front of me. With the shaved head, I couldn’t tell if it was a boy or girl, and though he (she?) looked around ten, I knew in this place she (he?) was probably a couple years older than that. My age when I started coming here with Mina.
“You don’t belong here,” the kid said.
“Yeah? How do you know?”
“You don’t look sick.”
“How do you know I’m not visiting someone?”
“Are you?”
I shrugged. “How do you know I’m not a super hot young doctor?”
She looked at me skeptically. (I had decided she was a she.) “Where’s your doctor coat?”
“I don’t wear one.”
“Where’d you go to med school?”
“Northwestern.”
“What kind of cancer do I have?”
I looked at her. She was wearing plain green pajamas, long pants and long sleeves. I couldn’t see any scars. It was almost impossible to tell by looking at someone what they had. That was one of the scary things about cancer. You could be walking around, happy, and inside cells were mutating, growing. I suddenly thought of Mina, alone in Dr. Brown’s office down the hall, and felt a faint pang.
“Leukemia,” I said, because that was a good shot, percentage-wise.
“Nice try. Hepatocellular carcinoma.”
I had never heard of that before, but I recognized part of the word. “Ah. The liver,” I said, and nodded in a doctorly way.
The girl laughed, a short bark. A couple of the TV-watching kids looked up at us. “I like you,” she said. “I’m Hana. If you get caught, you can say you’re visiting me.”
Cold washed over me, and I took a step back. This was too familiar. I’d been here before, bantering with someone who might or might not get better. “You don’t like me. You don’t even know me.”
Her expression folded in on itself. I noticed this with Mina, too: without hair, emotions lived closer to the surface. “Don’t be weird.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Good luck with your hepatocellular carcinoma.”
“Hey—where are you going? Wait!”
I didn’t look back, and she couldn’t catch me.
My heart pounded against my ribs as I made my way back to the ER. Talking to Hana, I’d fallen into an old role. I didn’t want to be that girl anymore—the one who cheers you up when you’re sick. The one who has nothing better to do than visit day or night. The one whose entire purpose in life was to support you and help you get better. The one who was left behind. And I wasn’t her. At least, I didn’t have to be. I could walk away.
But as soon as I reached the ER, I thought about where I was.
Paramedics were wheeling in a young guy with a splint around his leg. He had dark hair and for a second I thought Cal and then I thought Diana and Ari and not here no not here I’m leaving I promise I’m leaving I’m leaving now!
It was like the Whirlpool only much worse. It wouldn’t be hard at all for the spell to arrange for them to bump into me at an ER.
My fingernails bit into my palms as I struggled not to panic. But maybe panic was the right reaction.
I ran for the automatic doors, ducking and weaving around sick people and their friends and family, completely abandoning the rules of remaining invisible. A shout came from the intake desk but I didn’t stop running until I reached Mina’s car in our spot in the lot.
Mina was waiting for me.
“Where were you?” she asked.
“In the ER,” I said. I couldn’t think of anything else to say. My heart was pounding so hard my vision pulsed.
“Why?”
“It doesn’t matter. Can we get out of here? Please?”
Mina played with the studded leather cuff around her forearm.
“Dr. Brown says I’m fine. No sign of the cancer. If you care.”
“Oh. Good. Let’s go.”
Mina half laughed without amusement and didn’t look at me as she turned on the car and pulled out of the lot.
The pounding in my chest lessened. I could breathe.
Cal and Diana and Ari hadn’t shown up in the ER. Maybe the hook had some sense. Maybe it wasn’t as dangerous as I’d thought.
And I was no longer the girl who sat patiently in a visitor’s chair and imitated doctors. Hana would forget me before the end of the day. Mina didn’t need me. She was fine.
Mina pulled onto the highway, checking her blind spots carefully. She caught my eye. “What’s wrong with you, Katelyn?”
“Nothing,” I said, grinning for the first time all day. “Actually, everything’s perfect.”