If Not for You (Completed)

Chapter 5: Kale

5 Kale

No one came for me. Not that I'd expected them to, but to be in so much pain, and be abandoned just wasn't fair. What had I done to deserve the hand I'd been dealt? My stomach turned, and mind-blowing pain shot through me with every twitch I made. Tears fell from my eyes as I cradled my arm to my chest and used my left hand to put my journal back in my backpack, then walked away from the school.

I only made it as far as Mo's before the pain nearly made me black out. Soon as I came through the door Mo ran around the counter and grabbed my shoulders just as I started to fall. I leaned heavily against him as he guided me to the back room and sat me on the worn loveseat. He offered me a bottle of water, and I drank slowly until I felt less faint, then he crouched in front of me.

"Tell me what happened." He said, and I did.

I was able to stop him from calling the police again, but only because I'd made it clear that my arm was a result of the first call made. At least inadvertently. With his lips pursed, he helped me out of my jacket, and I whined as he slid up the sleeve of my sweater, saw my arm bloated and turning purple. Mo slid a hand back through his hair, muttered half a dozen Indian curse words, then picked up his keys from the desk drawer and turned off the OPEN sign.

He locked the store up early, texted everyone on the schedule to take the day off, then drove me to the hospital. He stayed with me all day until he had gotten hold of Meg and waited until she came before he went home to his family. I'd never be able to thank him enough.

Meg was livid. My arm was broken in two places and was going to have to have a rod and pins inserted to hold it back together. She paced the floor as we waited for the orderly to pick me up for surgery, growling a string of curses and threats that didn't bear repeating.

I watched her from where I reclined on the bed, floating through a comforting numb from the massive dose of narcotics I'd been given. Meg's anger was so alive it was almost a visible wave floating around her.

"I'm gonna kill him. I'm gonna grab his throat, and I'm gonna break his motherfu—"

"Meg?" I interrupted, and she pulled herself together just long enough to approach me.

"Yeah, sweetie?"

"Can you shut up for a while, please?"

She pursed her lips and slid her hand back through my hair. "I'm sorry. I'm just so infuriated that they would do this to you. You should have let Mo press charges again."

I shrugged. "It would only be worse next time if he did."

"You have a broken arm, Kale. That punk would be in jail. There would be no next time."

I shrugged again, knowing I could never take that chance. Not again. "It's okay. I'm not mad, so you shouldn't be either."

She gaped. "Not mad? You should be furious, you should be—"

I laid a finger over my lips and she growled, but I heard her let out a defeated sigh and sink into the chair a minute later as my eyes closed.

I was excused from school for Friday and the following week. It was both a blessing and a curse. While I would be able to escape my fan club, I'd also fall behind in class. Meg promised to go to the school in the morning and pick up my assignments for the next week, but I didn't know how I'd complete them without the use of my right hand, and I couldn't even draw a straight line with my left.

Every little twitch of my fingers sent scorching pain up my arm. It'd been bound in a dark blue cast that Meg and my other roommates had decorated with a silver metallic Sharpie and had to stay hung up in a sling for at least a week. Damn thing hurt more than I could put into words, but without insurance, I couldn't afford the script I'd been given for painkillers. So, when I got home from the hospital, I went to sleep and stayed asleep. It was all I could do to stave off the pain.