Five Feet Apart(31)
She nods, her face thoughtful. “You’re right. I don’t.” She takes a deep breath, meeting my anxious gaze. “It’s risky. I won’t say it’s not. But sepsis is a far bigger and far more likely monster.”
Fear creeps up my neck and wraps itself around my entire body. But she’s right.
Dr. Hamid picks up the panda sitting next to me, looking at it and smiling faintly. “You’re a fighter, Stella. You always have been.”
Holding out the bear to me, she looks into my eyes. “Tomorrow morning, then?”
I reach out, taking the panda, nodding. “Tomorrow morning.”
“I’m going to call your parents and let them know,” she says, and I freeze, a wave of dread hitting me.
“Can you give it a few minutes so I can break the news to them? It’ll be easier coming from me.”
She nods, giving my shoulder a tight squeeze before leaving. I lie back, clinging to Patches, anxiety filling me as I think about the calls I have to make. I keep hearing my mom in the cafeteria, her voice weaving circles around my head.
I don’t know what I’d do without you.
I don’t know what I’d do without you.
I don’t know what I’d do without you.
I hear a noise outside my door and turn my head to see an envelope sliding underneath. I watch the light trickling in from under the door as a pair of feet stand there for a moment before slowly turning and walking away.
I stand carefully and bend down to pick up the envelope. Opening it, I pull out a cartoon drawing, the colors sad and dull. It’s a picture of a frowning Will, a wilted bouquet of flowers in his hand, a bubble caption underneath it reading “Sorry.”
I lie back down on my bed, holding the drawing to my chest and closing my eyes tightly.
Dr. Hamid said I was a fighter.
But I really don’t know that I am anymore.
CHAPTER 12
WILL
I messed up bad. I know that.
I sneak out of our wing and around the east lobby of the hospital after dropping off the drawing, my phone clutched in my hand as I wait for something. A text, a FaceTime call, anything.
She must have seen the drawing by now, right? Her light was on. But it’s been radio silence since our fight.
What should I do? She won’t even talk to me, I text Jason, grimacing at myself. I can see him getting a real kick over me hung up on someone enough to ask his advice.
Just give her some time, man, he replies.
I sigh loudly, frustrated. Time. All this waiting is agony.
I plop down on a bench, watching people pass by as they go through the sliding doors of the hospital. Young kids, nervously clutching the hands of their parents. Nurses, rubbing their eyes sleepily as they finally get to leave. Visitors, eagerly pulling on their jackets as they head home for the night. For the first time in a few days I wish I were one of them.
My stomach growls noisily and I decide to head to the cafeteria to distract myself with some food. Walking toward the elevator, I freeze when I hear a familiar voice pouring out of a room nearby.
“No envíe dinero, no puede pagarlo,” the voice says, the tone somber, sad. Dinero. Money. I took two years of Spanish in high school and can say only a handful of phrases, but I recognize that word. I peek my head inside to see it’s a chapel, with big stained-glass windows and classic wooden pews. The old, churchy look is so different from the rest of the hospital’s modern, sleek design.
My eyes land on Poe, sitting in the front row, his elbows resting on his knees as he talks to someone over FaceTime.
“Yo también te extra?o,” he says. “Lo sé. Te amo, Mamá.”
He hangs up the phone, putting his head in his hands. I pull the heavy door open a bit wider, the hinges creaking loudly as I do.
He turns around in surprise.
“The chapel?” I ask, my voice echoing too loud off the walls of the wide space as I make my way down the aisle toward him.
He looks around, smiling faintly. “My mom likes to see me in here. I’m Catholic, but she’s Catholic.”
He sighs, leaning his head against the pew. “I haven’t seen her in two years. She wants me to come visit her.”
My eyes widen in surprise and I sit down across the aisle, a safe distance away. That’s a really long time. “You haven’t seen your mom in two years? What did she do to you?”
He shakes his head, his dark eyes filled with sadness. “It’s not like that. They got deported back to Colombia. But I was born here and they didn’t want to take me away from my doctors. I’m a ‘ward of the state’ until I’m eighteen.”
Shit. I can’t even imagine what that was like. How could they deport the parents of someone with CF? The parents of someone terminal.
“That’s fucked up,” I say.
Poe nods. “I miss them. So much.”
I frown, running my fingers through my hair. “Poe, you have to go! You have to visit them.”
He sighs, fixing his eyes on the large wooden cross sitting behind the pulpit, and I remember what I overheard. Dinero. “It’s pricey. She wants to send money, but she can’t really afford it. And I’m certainly not going to take food off her table—”
“Listen, if it’s money, I can help. Seriously. I’m not trying to be a privileged dick, but it’s not an issue—” But before I even finish, I know it’s a no go.