Chapter 41

“Charlie! Charlie, can you hear me?” a voice was saying above me, although I was having trouble focusing on it at all. “Someone call an ambulance!”

I felt a hand on my shoulder, followed by pain from the bruised muscle where the bat had hit, and then things slipped into black again.

I think I may have woken up a few more times, although they were mostly just flashes and impressions. I think someone picked me up and sat me on something flat and hard, although softer than the concrete I had been laying on. I could feel hands putting something around my neck. I remember a fuzzy white ceiling, really close to my body, the bench or bed I was on rocking slightly.

I remember going through double doors, people talking in calm but quick voices, although I couldn’t make out what they were saying. I remember things getting poked into my arms and a mask going over my face, and then everything blacked out again.

When I came to the next time, everything was a little clearer. Nothing really hurt anymore, but I felt really nauseous. I opened my eyes and could tell I was in a hospital. It might have been night, since the lights were dimmed, and it wasn’t the emergency room, with each bed separated by curtains. I was in my own room. My first thought was that Mom was going to have a heart attack when she saw the bill for all this. We had insurance, but the deductibles were sky high, and well above what we would be able to pay, even with the money I’d been bringing in playing.

My second thought was I was about to vomit.

“You’re awake,” a calm voice said, as a nurse’s face suddenly loomed over me.

“Bucket,” was all I got out, as I was holding back.

This was probably not that unusual of an occurrence, and she put something plastic in front of my face right before I let go into it.

“Let me go get the doctor,” she said when I finished and she took it away, handing me a cloth to wipe my face.

I tried to sit up and sagged back down instantly. It wasn’t that everything hurt so much as my body wasn’t really reacting that well to my commands. My left arm was in some kind of splint and had some IVs going into it, but my right arm was working enough to get it to my face so I could clean myself off.

The doctor showed up and was all business. He wouldn’t answer any questions, and instead asked all kinds while shining a light in my eyes. He had questions about what day it was, who the President was, what my name was, and so on, and he said he was a little concerned that I had a concussion, which could cause nausea and vomiting. While I did have a slight one, we’d later find out the nausea was apparently a reaction I had to narcotic pain killers, which made me wildly sick. Of course, we learned this when I tried to take a pain killer and ended up puking all over the side of a toilet.

They dealt with it at the hospital by giving me an anti-nausea medication, which knocked me straight out again. I think Mom might have come into the room about that time, but everything was so foggy I couldn’t be sure of anything.

The nurse woke me up about an hour later to check my vitals and have a huge guy in scrubs wheel me down to get a cat scan. The pain killers must have been wearing off, because my side and arm were hurting again, this time accompanied by a new pain in my leg that I hadn’t noticed before. I pulled up the hem of the hospital gown someone had switched me into and saw the beginnings of a nasty bruise. I hadn’t even realized they’d hit me that low, but it must have been when I tried to curl up into the fetal position to protect myself.

I tried to ask the nurse why I was getting a cat scan, but she said I’d need to talk to the doctor about it. Of course, the doctor wasn’t anywhere to be seen. The thing I really wanted to ask about was when I could get out of here. I had no idea what time it was, except that it was dark outside the window, which meant I’d missed practice and our set tonight. We were supposed to have an extended practice the next day and I really didn’t want to miss it. We were mostly ready after our last practice, but the one I’d missed today and the long practice tomorrow was when we were going to put everything together. Mr. French had even said Rowan might be in the area and try to swing around, which was the kind of help you couldn’t, or at least I couldn’t, pay for.

Thankfully, the doctor was in my room when I got back, as was Mom.

“What’s happening? When can I get out of here? I have a big day tomorrow and I need to get home and get some sleep,” I said, rambling as I tried to push myself up on the bed the orderly was wheeling and look at them.

Instead, as soon as I put weight on my arm, I almost collapsed on my side. It didn’t feel like when my foot got broken, but it still hurt like hell as soon as I put any pressure on that arm.

“I was just talking to your mother about that,” he said. “We’re going to keep you overnight for observation. We’re concerned about the nausea you’re still having and you’re blacking out after the whack to the back of the head. Whatever hit you left a serious welt and gave you some pretty nasty lacerations. We’re going to wait on the CAT scan results to come back and I might have a colleague take a look at them, just to make sure there’s no serious damage.”

“I hit my head on the concrete trying to get my face out of the way of a baseball bat,” I told him, filling in the gaps on what happened.

“I’m guessing that’s what broke your nose.”

“Yeah,” I said, reaching up at the mention to touch it.

I brought my hand back instantly as what felt like electricity ran up my sinus cavity as I touched it.

“Will he need to have any kind of surgery for his nose?” My mom asked, the expression she had when she looked at it is telling me just how terrible it must have looked.

Thankfully, the doctor said, “No. We set it back in place. He’ll have to leave that splint on it for a week or so, but it should heal okay. You might have a crook in it that wasn’t there before, but the sinus cavity looks good.”

“So, he can go home tomorrow?”

“That depends on what we see on the CAT scan, but if it’s clear, then probably. We’ve taped his ribs, which is just about all we can do for them. Luckily, the x-ray doesn’t show any breaks, just some bruising around the bone. They’ll hurt pretty badly for a few weeks, but they should heal okay. Everything else is confined to the soft tissue, although the damage there was a lot worse than it should have been. There was a fair amount of unhealed bruising that amplified the damage done during the attack. It’s difficult to tell with soft tissue injuries like this, but there doesn’t seem to be anything that should be permanent. There will be swelling for a few days and it will look terrible, but with proper bed rest, it should all heal all the way back. It’s important you get bed rest though. Without it, the damage could be aggravated and become something more long-term.”

“Thank goodness,” Mom said, letting out a breath she must have been holding since she heard I was hurt.

I could see the stress visibly leaving her body as she sagged in relief.

“Can I stay with him?

“Visiting hours are over, but I think it’ll be okay for a few minutes. I’m going to put in these orders and we’re going to scale the pain meds down a bit now that we know there isn’t any major damage, but I want him to get some rest.”

“Okay. Thank you, Doctor,” she said, and waited for him to leave. “How are you feeling?”

“Just really sore, although it really hurts if I put any weight on my arms. Do you think I’ll be able to make it to practice tomorrow afternoon?”

“Baby, I don’t think you’ll be able to play at all this weekend. The doctor said you’ve got bruising all the way down to the bone, and you just saw that you couldn’t even push yourself up. How are you going to handle a guitar?”

“But the audition?” I said, the realization of what was happening suddenly setting in.

“I know. I’ll call Chef in a few hours when it’s not so early and see if there’s anything they can do. Do you really think you’ll be able to give a good enough performance, in the condition you’re in?”

She was right, of course. The more the pain meds wore off, the more I could feel the pain all over my body. It hurt to move at all, and I hadn’t even tried standing up yet. Even if I did get up on stage, the performance would be far from my best, which meant everything that I’d worked for was gone, just like that. I shut my eyes tight and tried to hold it in, but I fell apart as the first sob escaped my throat.

I wasn’t a crier normally. Hell, I’d barely shed a tear when I heard Dad was going to prison, but this was different. I’d done everything right and still had my dream snatched away from me. I was bubbling over with emotion. Sad, in pain, and furious all at the same time.

Mom leaned over and gently hugged me. Even that hurt like hell and just proved the point that there was no way I was getting on a stage this weekend.

Eventually, Mom had to leave and they lowered the lights so I could get some rest. Part of me wanted to stay up, angry at the world and just wanting to be difficult for the sake of it, but my body let me down. Once the tears dried up, I felt hollowed out and just exhausted.

When I woke up again, it was well into the morning. The sun was shining brightly through the slatted plastic curtains and Hanna was sitting in a chair next to the bed. Even though I still felt kind of empty and sad, I felt a small smile cross my lips as I remembered this is how I met her the first time, me in the hospital bed and her in a chair next to it.

“Hey,” I said.

She looked up, startled, and put her book down.

“You’re awake. Should I go get the nurse?”

The last part was in reaction to me wincing as I tried to turn a little bit to look at her better and felt pain shoot through my body again.