Selling Scarlett

chapter Four

~ELIZABETH~

"I already told you, I'm his sister." I look the evil nurse right in the eye and lock my jaw, like I mean business, because I do.

"Mr. Carlson doesn't have a sister," she says after glancing at her clipboard.

I reach into my worn Coach bag and grab a fifty, shamelessly sliding it across the high-gloss counter. If I had more, I'd offer it all to her. But the only rehab I could get Mom into this time is seriously pricey, eating up our meager allowance from the DeVille Trust, and my fellowship money only goes so far. If Suri didn't let me live at Crestwood Place with her for free, I'd never make ends meet.

The nurse raises her right eyebrow and looks from my money to me, and I cross my arms in front of my chest. "How many visitors?"

"Excuse me?"

I meet her pale brown eyes and hold her gaze. "How many visitors has he had since I came Monday?"

Her lipsticked mouth twists, and her eyes flicker down the hardwood hall, toward Cross's spacious, private room. "Thirty minutes," she says, shoving the fifty back at me. "That's all you're getting. And I know you're not his sister."

I slide the fifty into the pocket of my pea coat, where my iPod Mini is, and hold my contraband-filled purse close to my side. I walk quickly to Cross's room, the way I always do, because I truly am eager to see him, coma or not.

For the first four weeks, it was medically induced, but when he began healing from his skull and leg surgeries, they decreased the sedatives so he could wake up. But he hasn't. I think I might know why, and I can't stand how much that knowledge hurts. But Cross's complicated secrets are safe with me.

As I push through the door and lemon-scented Lysol fills my nose, I'm angry, knowing I'm the only one who comes here more than once a week. Suri came the first two weeks, but she had to stop. All she can do when she sits in Cross's room is sob, and the nurses think he can hear us. Cross's parents—I could skin them both alive. They got him his swanky room at Napa Valley Involved Rehab, but neither Cross's mom nor his dad has visited since the first twenty-four hours.

It makes me queasy remembering that first day. How I couldn't sleep at all and how I itched to be here by him. I even bought a fake ID with the surname 'Carlson' so I could slip into the ICU with him, holding his hand and stroking his dark hair.

For those first few weeks, he looked a lot different. One of the saddest things about right now is that he looks like Cross again.

Today the top half of his railed bed is raised. His head is propped between two pillows. As always, he looks peaceful. Beautiful. His almost-black hair is short—they shaved it for his surgery—and his long, dark lashes make his face seem pale as porcelain. The awful tube that once went down his throat has been removed, because he's breathing on his own. A tube that feeds extra oxygen into his nose is taped to his cheeks, and I know that under his gown, snaking into his abdomen, is a feeding tube. Sometimes I peek because I want to understand what's going on with him. I wish I was his next of kin, so I could truly get all the information, but there's a nurse who likes me—Nanette—and she's told me they think his brain is fine. He sometimes squeezes my hand, and once when I kissed his forehead, he moaned. He just won't wake up. Not yet.

As soon as I make it across the fluffy, olive-colored rug and over to his bed, I grab his wrists and squeeze his hands. They smell like Betadine and are striped with tape that holds IV lines in place, but I don't care.

I lay one of his hands back on his blankets, but keep the other one sealed in mine. I force myself to look at his still face and smile as if he's really here.

"Hi, C. How's it going?"

I imagine him answering, because otherwise having a conversation with myself is just too weird. I kiss him on the cheek and sit down beside him in the cream wing-backed chair I've come to think of as mine.

"When I called the other day, Nanette told me you opened your eyes for a few minutes. I can't believe I missed that! I had a test that day. You'll be glad to know I passed." The machines around him hum their response, and for a second, I get tripped up. It's been two months now, but sometimes it's still too strange to see Cross like this. "So...what else is there? Suri and Adam might be having problems, but she keeps it quiet. I think she likes to pretend they're okay. Probably because she wants them to be. You know she loves her decorating stuff in San Fran and I think Adam is pushing her to move to New York with him again. It is the place for literary people I guess, but it's just not Suri. I think she's coming here tomorrow. If she gives you the scoop, I want to know."

I babble some about classes. In the time since Cross's accident, the new year has come and gone and I've started the last semester of my second year of grad school. I search my mind for other updates, skipping over Mom (still in rehab), pop culture (Cross wouldn’t care), and my non-existent dating life. I look down at my jeans. "I've been on the caveman diet. I've lost some weight. I feel good, so I might keep going."

I tell him more, sharing everything with him except for Hunter. Not that there's anything to tell. I haven't seen him since that night, and my thoughts about him pull me in two directions. The main one, though, is interest. I still want him, more than ever, and more and more I'm coming to understand that there is something seriously wrong with me. I'm not sure I want a real relationship, and for me, Hunter is just a fantasy. I think about his soft kiss on my mouth and I want to tell Cross, "He wouldn't treat me like he treats the other women. I'm different."

Except, of course, that's stupid.

Putting Hunter out of my mind, I let Cross hear some Neil Young and Grateful Dead on the iPod and then I use a straw to dip a little Sunkist into his mouth. He loves Sunkist, and I firmly believe that he can taste it. I put some strawberry lip balm on his lips and tuck the covers around his broad shoulders. The sheets and blankets are all mine. I wanted him to have things that smelled familiar.

When I get up to leave, fifteen minutes after the arbitrary deadline assigned by Nurse Bitchface, I kiss him on the cheek. It's selfish to play on the feelings he might have had for me, but I need him to wake up.

"I've got to go and read some Victor Hugo, but I'll try to come back tomorrow. I want to hear about your next N-therapy session." N-therapy is where they use some big, swanky machine this hospital patented to stimulate Cross's brain. They talk to him while they wave a wand around his head, and supposedly that helps. It must, because people with brain injures come from all over the place to get treated here. In my mind, this is the very least his awful parents can do.

I stuff my hands into the pockets of my coat, feeling sad again. "I don't want to pressure you, Cross, but I really do need you back. I miss you." Tears fill my eyes, and on impulse, I lean down and kiss his cheek again.

When his eyes flutter, I think I'm seeing things. As soon as I realize those are really his blue eyes, I feel my throat constrict, like I'm going to get sick or cry.

"Cross?" My wide eyes cling to his, and I just can't believe it.

I almost faint as Cross blinks. His eyes tear, and he makes a face like he's tasting something really sour. I feel something tickle my abs, and I realize he's grabbing my shirt. I back up, gaping at him. Laughing. "Oh my God, Cross. Hi."

His mouth lolls, and I can see he's trying to speak. I look down at myself and start to cry as I watch him white-knuckling my shirt. My heart is beating so fast as I clasp his hand. I look into his eyes.

"Are you okay?" I would do anything on Earth to take that lost look off of his face. "Do you want me to call someone?"

His eyes squeeze shut, and his chest makes a rumbling noise. "No."

"You don't?" I whisper through my tears.

He shakes his head just a little and mumbles something. His lids drift lower, and I grab his cheek, frantic he is falling back asleep. Instead, his eyes peek up at me again, and he mumbles, "...ch of a headache. And..."

He swallows, and I squeeze his hand. "What was that?"

His eyes shut, and I bite my lip—but again, they flutter open. The blue of his irises looks faded. "I'm sorry," he rasps.

"For what?" My voice cracks, so I have to swallow. "You don't have anything to be sorry for."

His eyes roll back slightly, but his arm is tugging me closer. Still sweating and hardly able to breathe from shock, I lean down and wrap my arms around his shoulders.

"It's okay," I whisper against his cheek. I'm rubbing his back, wanting to be sure that he knows someone loves him. Someone misses him. "I'm sorry, too. We're friends again. You're my best friend. Stay here with me, please."

I hear him swallow. Then his eyes are fluttering again, his eyelashes like butterflies against my face. They're closing as he says, "Stay…”

The soft word is the last thing that I hear before a nurse bursts into the room, and Cross is gone again.



*



The rest of the week passes slowly. I'm spending a lot of my time in mandatory group study sessions, which I definitely don't need in order to understand and apply our class material. If I wanted to spend all my time with other people, I'd have joined a think tank, not signed on to become an Ethics professor.

I'm grouchy and tired when I come home from campus Friday afternoon, toting a little brass scale for a presentation my Plato & Aristotle group is making to a high school honors class next Wednesday. The project is twenty percent of our grade, and I'm already looking forward to talking to the little twerps.

The driveway at Crestwood Place is almost half a mile long, taking me through a beautiful apple orchard and then around several fields where horses graze. The horses belong to Suri's parents, who are so seriously amazing, at times I pretend they are my own. Trent Dalton is the most modest big-wig computer software dude you could ever meet, and Gretchen is an elementary school counselor, working every day of the work week entirely pro bono. Suri has two sisters, Rachel and Edith, and I spot Edith's white horse, Samson, as I pull into the circle drive directly in front of the house.

I toss my leather pack over my left arm and scoop the scale up in my right. The columned brick home has a wide, stone staircase, and it takes me forever to drag my tired self up it. I press my thumb against the keyless entry and the door pops open immediately—so quickly, in fact, I worry that it wasn't locked. Which is strange since Suri always uses the kitchen door.

I wiggle my cell phone out of the pocket of my baggy Lucky jeans and quickly pull up the emergency services phone number, conveniently stored as No. 2, in honor of the bullshit usually going down with Mom when I have to use it. I'm not sure what scares me most as I slowly step inside: the idea of Crestwood being burglarized like the Dalton's city home has been a time or two, or the images that resurrect themselves inside my mind: visions of my mom lying in a broken heap at the bottom of the stairs or passed out in a pile of Oxy.

Thinking of Oxy—or any drug, for that matter—makes me think of Cross, which makes my heart ache. Really, it's a sharp pain, like I imagine a knife stab would feel like.

After the miracle of Wednesday, I skipped my classes Thursday to be at the hospital with him, convinced he would finally wake up. He squeezed my hand when I asked if he was glad to see me, but that was all. This morning when I called, Nanette sounded weird. When I prodded her about what was up, she said he'd had another N-therapy session and during it, he said my name.

Amazing.

I'm wondering if I can slip in during Nanette's shift tonight when the scent of cinnamon rolls hits my nose.

I race through the foyer, past the spiral staircase, through the formal dining room, and into the massive kitchen like a kid hot off the school bus.

I come to a stop on the rug that spans most of the kitchen with a satisfied smile. Suri, in a pink and green paisley apron, has her back to me. Her curly brown hair is locked away in pigtails, and she looks like she just stepped out of Martha Stewart Living.

My smile disappears when she turns to me.

I hold up my hands, trying to ignore the sinking feeling in my stomach. "Remember what we said last time with Mom. Just spit it out, Sur. No sugar coating, ‘cause that makes it worse."

I bite down on my lip when Suri's eyes tear and she steps over, closer to me, fiddling with the oven mitt and meeting my eyes with a deep frown. "You're going to be so upset, Lizzy. I am, too."

"Suri, spit it out!"

She wrings her hands and starts speaking on fast-forward. "My mother told me today. She heard from their new housekeeper—she cleans Cross's family's house, too." My stomach takes a nose-dive. "They've dropped him off their insurance. They're not going to pay for his healthcare anymore. They've moved him, Lizzy. This morning, to a state-run place in L.A."

"What?"

Suri's eyes are wet. "Sunshine Acres Assisted Living. It's part of the Los Angeles County Public Hospital System."

"Is that the one my mom went to when she was sentenced for violating her parole? The one with no visiting hours and those shitty double rooms and that bad pee smell?"

Suri bites her lip. "I looked up the hours. Noon to three p.m. Except on Saturday." I feel like I've been punched. Suri sniffs. “It’s closed Saturdays.”