Underneath the Sycamore Tree(83)

“We’re going to get you help,” he promises, opening the back door.

Kaiden offers to sit in the back with me, but Dad practically barks at him to drive. I only then realize that Kaiden is in gray sweatpants and a black hoodie with no shoes or socks on.

He and Cam take the front, while Dad holds me in the backseat. It’s probably a funny image, a man his size squeezed back here. He brushes his hand across my cheek as he stares at me intently, his eyes glassy until…they’re emerald.

“Da—” I try again, but the word slurs.

“Shh. Try resting.”

My lids grow heavy. “Tire…”

“Rest,” is the last thing I hear.





Chapter Forty





My ears throb with the noise of high-pitched beeping coming from somewhere close by. It echoes in my skull, causing me to wince and whimper until something tightens around my arm.

Where…?

“Henry!” a different high-pitched voice calls out. It’s a mixture of desperation and relief and…fear?

My eyes crack open to darkness. The large rectangular light above me is off, which I’m grateful for based on the pulsing pain in my temples. A sharpness in the back of my eyes has them watering as I try moving.

“Sit still,” Cam insists. She doesn’t have to push me down because my body never lifted. There’s no willpower, no energy, to even fight off the unfamiliarity of my surroundings.

The words are there, circling my mind. I can taste them on my lips, but nothing comes out. I try opening my mouth…and nothing. Instead, I focus on Cam, on the room, on anything that could tell me where I am and what’s happening.

Her light hair and kind eyes greet me with the slightest comfort, though not enough to feel like I’ve made it out of the woods. I may not know what’s happening, but after a long moment I’m familiar with the feel of a firm mattress and scratchy sheets. The thin white one covering me is no better. The material is rough not soft and hurts the skin that isn’t covered by the hideous paper-thin blue gown.

Glancing down at myself, I see wires upon wires hooked to me everywhere. There are two different needles in my arms, a monitor attached to my finger, and black cuffs on one of my arms and legs. Something is coursing through my veins, a potent drug that eases a majority of the pain I’m almost certain I should be feeling. It leaves me warm and tingly, eased but not eased enough so I’m unaware.

My heart goes haywire with anxiety trying to piece everything together. How long have I been asleep? How long have I been here?

Dad rushes in and pales when he sees me, his expensive cellphone almost falling from his hands. That’s when I know something is happening, because he lives on that. “Baby.” His voice is thick with worry as he replaces Cam by my bedside. “The doctors are going to come in here and explain everything to you that they told me, okay?”

“D-Da…?” His face is more wrinkled, more aged, than I’ve ever seen. I did that to him. My slurred words and unknown state broke him.

I look around the room slowly, blinking past the tears that I know is because of more than just the headache blossoming. “W-Where…is…K-Kaid?”

Swallowing past the lump in my throat, I try internalizing why my tongue feels so heavy. It’s weighing in my mouth, drowning every syllable that tries escaping my thin lips.

Cam peeks her head around Dad’s shoulder and gives me a small smile. “He’s waiting in the lounge outside. The ICU doesn’t allow more than two people in here.”

My eyes widen. “I’m in the…ICU?”

I’ve never been here before. All the times I’ve been admitted, it’s always been in the Inpatient Center where I had to share a room with angry old people who complained about the food or the television not having anything good on to pick from.

Dad kneels beside me, his throat bobbing and eyes a shade of green I’m not accustomed to seeing. “Emery, you’re very, very sick. At some point during the night you had a stroke. It’s honestly a miracle you didn’t choke on your vomit when you got sick, because the function on your right side is minimal. And that’s…” He chokes on his words. “That’s not all, baby girl.”

My eyes go to the hand he’s holding.

My left hand.

I stare at my right arm for too long, which has a needle in the vein on the side of my wrist that I can’t feel. “S-Stroke?”

He nods.

I’ve heard about strokes. Old people had them whenever a call came over the police scanner at Mama’s house. John Doe age sixty-three. Stroke. Jane Doe age seventy-one. Stroke.

Not eighteen-year-olds. Not me.

Cam’s eyes water, and hers don’t turn any other color. Not in the darkness. Not from the tears. They’re the same as always. “Your mother has been called, sweetie. She and your grandmother are already on their way.”

I swipe my dry lips with my tongue. It feels lighter, but the weight in my chest hasn’t eased as much. “K-Kaiden? He must…be worried. Plea—”

A doctor walks in, opening and closing the squealing door behind him. I know Kaiden. He must be pacing the waiting room, his hair a mess, and cursing out anyone who asks if he needs anything. Is he still barefoot? Did someone get him shoes? Hospital booties? A cup of coffee?