Dr. Tate nods, like she understands. “You can take her home. Get her back to her routines, and the things she’s used to doing. Surround her with the familiar.”
“She can come home? When?” my mom asks, like she doesn’t believe it. Then her brows furrow. “Are you sure? That seems awfully fast, especially with her . . . with this.”
“She’s made it through the most critical part of her recovery, is stable, and healing. Our job is to get her back to her life now. I’d like to keep her here tonight, but tomorrow morning you can bring her home,” Dr. Tate says.
She looks at all of us and smiles, like that should be great news.
My mom takes a deep breath and nods like she’s telling herself that it’ll be okay. My dad comes to the head of my bed and puts his hand on my shoulder and squeezes. I sit there, terrified. I don’t know what my life even is. I don’t know what it looks like now. I want to go home to my own room, and bed, and things, but I don’t know if I’ll even recognize them as mine. I don’t know what will be there, and what will be missing.
So far, I’ve found out it’s a lot.
I know my family, and my little beach town. I have fond and not-so-fond memories of being a kid. I remember Sydney, our golden retriever, and how much I loved her, and how sad I was when we had to put her to sleep. I remember the bike I got for my tenth birthday, and the day I fell off it and broke my arm. I remember slumber parties and family vacations. My best friends and my first kiss. I remember who I was. But all those memories are just the edge pieces of the puzzle.
I’m missing the pieces that make up the picture in the middle. The pieces of who I am now.
Today I learned that I’m eighteen years old, but the last birthday I can remember celebrating is my fourteenth. I graduated high school a month ago, but I’ve never been. I’ve stopped hanging out with one of my best friends in the whole world and I have no idea why. And I have a boyfriend—Matt—who I’m head over heels in love with, but who I only just met today. He’s a victim of the accident in more ways than one. A stranger.
Or maybe I’m the stranger. That’s what it feels like, and it makes me afraid—that I won’t know how to go home. Or know what to do when I get there. That I won’t know how to be me.
“Well, that’s great news,” my dad says.
Dr. Tate nods. “We’ll continue to monitor her progress. I’ve already booked her first appointment with our neuropsychologist. She’ll need to continue her course of antibiotics to rule out any infections, and we’ll send you home with some pain medication, though judging by last night and today, I don’t think she’ll need it.” She looks at me now. “Of course, you’ll need to take it easy for a while. Listen to what your body’s telling you, pain-wise. It’s okay to walk around, but those ribs will be sore for some time, so take it slow. For the next few weeks, you may be more tired than usual, so rest. Okay?”
I just nod, as I try to take in what she’s telling me. The only thing I can think is that I don’t know what my usual is. And that somehow, they think it’s okay for me to go home like this.
SIX
DISCHARGE DAY. AFTER I’ve demonstrated that I can swallow breakfast, which is a few spoonfuls of oatmeal, and my vitals have all been checked for the last time, my IVs are removed, my bracelets are cut off, and I’m given the change of clothes my mom has brought for me.
I still don’t believe they’re going to let me go home, even as she helps me dress. We move slowly, carefully, because even small movements send pain radiating through my rib cage. I watch in the mirror as she sweeps my hair up into a messy bun, since I can’t raise my arms over my head to do it myself.
“Your hair is so thick,” she says, struggling with the rubber band. It snaps, and my dirty hair falls back over my shoulders. I stare at the long tangles. Start to cry.
“Oh, honey,” she says, meeting my eyes in the mirror. “Don’t cry. It’s okay. I don’t know why I was trying to put it up. You always wear it down, anyway.”
“I do?” I ask her, trying to hold back more tears. I don’t even know this about myself anymore.
“Yeah.” She seems to consider the question for a moment. “Well, let’s see. You put it up for volleyball, of course. And when you’re doing your homework. And at night after you’ve washed your face.” She smiles at me now. “But when you go to school, or out with Matt, or anywhere else, you wear it long and loose, and it’s beautiful that way.”
I stare at my reflection, trying to picture it. Trying to see past the oily hair and bruises to the me she’s talking about, but I can’t see her there.
“Tell you what. Later tonight, if you’re feeling up to it, I’ll wash your hair for you, and you can see for yourself. How’s that?”
I nod. “Okay.”
“Good. For now, let’s just get you home.”
At the nurse’s station, she fills out the last of the paperwork for me to be officially discharged, and when I see my dad pull up outside, I’m relieved that it’s in our old Suburban that I remember. He gets out and helps me into the front seat, clicks the seat belt over me, and then pauses before he closes the door.
“My girl,” he says, and his eyes start to well up. He smiles and shakes it off. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Me too,” I answer, though I don’t feel like I am.
He closes the door gently, and my mom puts a hand on my shoulder from where she shares the backseat with all the flowers and cards from my room. I breathe in as deep as my chest will allow, and we pull out of the hospital parking lot and head home on a road I remember, through the town I’ve lived in my entire life.
“You okay?” my mom asks.
I am standing in the doorway of my bedroom. “Yeah.” I nod. “I’m okay.” I’m trying to be, at least. I can feel her watching me take it in.
“Anything coming back? Now that we’re home?”
I shake my head.
Her eyes run over me, and then the room. “It looks different than you remember, doesn’t it?”
I nod. It does and doesn’t look like the room I remember.
“That’s because we redid it two years ago. Before you started your junior year. You’d been asking for a while, but you convinced me how important it was to you with a very persuasive essay, complete with a design plan and everything.”
“An essay?” I say with a smile. “That worked again?” I’d done the same thing when I was ten years old and wanted a hamster.