Adopted

Chapter 21

"She's very sweet," I heard Grace saying in the kitchen. "But I don't understand why you would adopt a child who is so sick.  Unless it's for some sort of publicity gimmick."

"That's exactly what it is, Mom. A publicity gimmick. We adopted a dying kid because we wanted the publicity," Brendon said. I was shocked. All this time I thought they'd adopted me because they wanted to. That's what they kept saying.

Brendon looked out the kitchen door and saw me standing on the bottom step.  He opened his mouth and turned towards me, but I didn't want to hear what he had to say. I shook my head and ran down the stairs and out the front door into the rain. I didn't care. I just needed to get away.  I'd find my way back to the orphanage. Make them take me back. My new parents were nothing but fakes. 

I ran out the gate and up the street. I took the shortcut they'd shown me towards the library and kept running. When I got to the library, I didn't know where to go from there. I realized I only knew the route from the house to the library, and I had no idea which bus I would even take to try to get back to the orphanage. 

The library was closed, so I couldn't even go in there to dry off.  The rain just kept falling harder and harder, and it was getting cold out.  I started coughing and my chest burned a little bit. I didn't know what to do, but I figured if I could find a somewhat dry place, I could wait until morning, go into the library and find a phone book and call Matron and tell her what happened. She'd have to come to get me. 

I looked for somewhere out of the way that might be a good place to stay the night.  I decided under the eaves of the library would be as good as I'd be able to get.  I stayed under there, away from the lights of the path.  I started crying, thinking about how stupid I'd been thinking someone would actually want to adopt stupid me. 

I started getting colder and colder and really tired.  I put my head down on my arms. My cough was getting worse. 

"She's over here!" I heard someone yelling. I lifted my head and saw a figure coming towards me. 

"Jess?" someone said. I looked up, but I couldn't make out who was coming. Everything was blurry and spinny. "Kala, call Brendon.  Tell him we found Jessica."

Kala? The voice must have been Zack, then. I could sort of make out that it was him as he got closer. 

"Jess? Hey, you okay, kiddo?" he asked, bending down in front of me.  Kala came over, too, and was on her phone. 

"Hey B. We found her.  She's at the library.  She looks okay. She's drenched, but she's okay, I think. Zack's got her now."

I felt myself get picked up. 

"She's burning up," Zack said. Kala came over and put her hand on my forehead. It was so cool and comfortable. 

"Sarah, she's burning up," I heard Kala say from the other side of a tunnel. "And her breathing doesn't sound so good."

I coughed and kept coughing.  I couldn't catch my breath. 

"Sarah, we're calling an ambulance.  She's having trouble breathing and she's burning up."

I heard Zack say something before I succumbed to deep darkness. 

----

"Hey, kid, can you hear me? What's her name?" a voice said. 

"Jessica," I heard Zack say. 

"Jessica? Can you hear me?" someone was shaking my shoulder. 

I opened my eyes a bit, but the rain got in them. 

"Okay, good. She opened her eyes," the voice said. 

"Jess? Jessie?" I heard what sounded like Sarah's voice. "Let me through. That's my daughter!" 

"Jess?" I heard Brendon say. 

Someone placed an oxygen mask over my face and something on my finger.  There was a bunch of activity around me and I felt as I was lifted and placed on a softer surface. 

"One of you can ride with us," the voice said. 

"Sarah, you go. I need to have a word with my parents," I heard Brendon say. 

"Sarah, we'll meet you at the hospital," I heard Kala say. 

I was loaded into the back of the ambulance and saw tears streaming down Sarah's face as she held my hand. I rolled my eyes before closing them again. 

"Jess, please be okay. Please Jess," I heard as I drifted off into unconsciousness. 

----

The next time I opened my eyes, I was being taken out of the ambulance and wheeled through the doors to an emergency room.  I was surrounded by doctors and nurses calling out a bunch of different things that I couldn't understand. I saw them push Sarah back as they wheeled me through a set of doors. It was getting hard to stay awake. 

----

I opened my eyes again and I was in a white room.  I looked around and saw pictures of Winnie the Pooh and Christopher Robin on the walls.  There was an IV pole over my head and something was beeping.  The oxygen mask was still on my face and I could see out the window that the sun was up. I looked around the room some more and turned my head to my left.  Sarah was sitting in a chair, her feet up against the bed rail, and she was sleeping.  I felt heavy and tired.  I looked at my hands and saw I had an IV in my left hand.  I figured out I was in a hospital room. Which would be obvious, if I hadn't been so out of it the night - was it only one night? - before.  

A nurse came into my room and smiled when she saw me awake. 

"Hi, there!" she said brightly. "You gave your parents quite a scare."

The nurse woke Sarah up with her talking. 

"Jess? Oh! Jess! You're awake! We were so worried!" 

I glared at her and rolled my eyes. I looked back at the nurse. 

"I'm just here to check your vitals. Blood pressure, temperature, pulse. All that fun stuff. Even though the monitors tell us what's going on, we like to double-check," she explained. "And breakfast will be here in about fifteen minutes."

She went about checking my vitals and making notes. 

"Okay, young lady. You rest and relax. The doctor will be in a little later to check on you, and I'll be back in a few hours to check your vitals again.  If you need me, just press that blue button on the side of your bedrail, okay?" she pointed to a blue button with the picture of a nurse on it. I nodded. 

I turned my head away from Sarah and looked out the window. 

"Jessica. I'm so so sorry."

"I'll bet you are," I snarked. "Sorry that your secret got out, huh?"

"What secret?" she asked. 

I looked at her and glared. 

"The secret that you really only adopted me as a publicity gimmick. I heard Brendon in the kitchen last night. I was so stupid to think anyone would want to adopt the dying 13-year-old for any other reason."

"Jessica," Sarah said, taking my hand. I pulled it away. "Jess, that's not true at all."

"I heard Brendon say exactly that to his mom. In the kitchen. After dinner."

"Honey, he was being sarcastic. Grace was out of line, and Brendon was being sarcastic. When you ran out the door, he started to chase after you. Zack and Kala arrived just then, and they took off after you. Brendon came back into the house and he tore a strip off his mother. Sweetie, we didn't adopt you as a publicity gimmick.  We told you the truth from the day we adopted you.  We adopted you because we want you. We want to give you a good home and a good family. Especially because of your illness. You don't deserve to be alone in a hospital when you're sick. You deserve a family. And Brendon and I want to be that family."

I looked away and took a deep breath from my oxygen mask.  It led me into a coughing fit, which tired me out. I dozed off, still not sure whether or not to believe Sarah.