The week passed agonizingly slowly for Arlo. He sat up all night, hugging his knees and watching the door. He did the same during the day, hardly moving. When he did, it was to wheel himself around the hospital, looking for any glimpse of Thea. He couldn't find her, anywhere. When he asked his nurses, they told him they didn't know; they didn't tend to her.
If he asked other nurses, they said it was confidential. No one could tell him what had happened, if she had left the hospital or...
He told himself that it was fine. Thea was just...
Arlo didn't know. She'd mentioned nothing, just disappeared. The only logical thing that could have happened was something he didn't want to think about.
But still, it entered his mind. And stayed. He found himself thinking. How could she be dead? Thea, alive and cheerful and vibrant... It didn't make sense. They were in a cancer ward, a hospital, but he just couldn't imagine her being dead.
Eventually, though, he had to. It felt like a stone in his chest, constricting his lungs. He didn't cry. Arlo couldn't cry. He tried to keep hope, she might be alive. She might be okay. There was some hope, if he could call it that. He requested every newspaper that they could find, scanning each memorial. No mention of Thea, no photographs even resembling her.
The thought of his own upcoming surgery had never slipped from his mind. Even though he hardly paid attention at the doctor's meetings he had, nodding when he was spoken to, it stayed in his mind. He knew what was going to happen, it had happened before, he didn't need to listen. It was nothing new. He'd accepted his fate when he saw his parents sign the papers, when they handed them to him to sign himself. He did so after a minute or two of hesitation.
At least they were being... more present. It wasn't much comfort, but it was better than being alone in the room. His mother spoke to him often, saying that she was so happy that he was going to be fine, and that he was going to live, and that she was never going to get him go.
Arlo did his best to listen. Honestly, he did. He tried to listen to the comfort she offered, saying how Jessie had missed him. Speaking to her for the first time, he said bleakly, "Why didn't you bring her to see me, then?"
Seeming flustered, his mother quickly responded, "Well, it's a very long ride for her, and we didn't want to risk her getting sick in the hospital or anything, and..." She trailed off.
It didn't take a genius to figure out what she left unsaid. We didn't want to let her see you to you because you might die, and she would be upset because she would have seen you recently.
Arlo didn't speak after that. He just kept looking at the door to the room, eyes blank. If they noticed his staring, they didn't comment. They left eventually. He hardly noticed their coming and going any more.
Eventually, the date of his surgery came around. That was the one thing he paid attention to, the one date that stuck out in his mind. It was early morning when he was supposed to be woken up. It didn't happen, however, because he was already awake when the nurse came in.
With no hesitation, he got up, finding the clothing he was to wear. Due to his sleeplessness, Arlo felt like a zombie. He moved like a robot, changing into the surgery gown and then sitting in his wheel chair. He was long past feeling embarrassed about his stump of a leg. The time with Thea in the room made him sort of lose that element of shame. Besides, he was about to have another, wasn't he?
The thought brought a sudden bout of anxiety around him. Trying to keep himself calm, Arlo tilted his head back in his chair, swallowing and taking a slow breath of air.
It was final now. No backing out, no escaping. All chances gone. Panicking would do him no good. Thinking positive was his ally, if he could manage it. Arlo knew he wouldn't be able to, but the thought was something he should hold in his mind.
His leg gone. He knew where it was going to be amputated, the place where his leg would end. It made him ache inside. He'd already lost so much of himself, and now, more was going to be gone. But he would live, wouldn't he? Somehow, he thought of living now as a good thing. He wanted to see if Thea was...
Arlo's parents showed up. Though his father was cold and distant as ever, his mother was all over him, saying how brave he was. He ignored that comment. It wasn't bravery if he couldn't do anything to stop it. Arlo was silent as he was wheeled to the surgery room, staring at the floor as he noticed the sheer amount of doctors and nurses.
He was laid out on a table, and an anesthesiologist explained what was going to happen to him. He shut his eyes, taking slow, forced breathes as a needle was stuck in his vein, injecting him with the anesthesia. He wouldn't be awake for any of the surgery.
It felt like a few minutes before he finally dropped off, but by the time he did, his perception had become so strange and fogged that he couldn't comprehend anything. Voices sounded like they had been bent, waving in his ear like the ocean. The light above him bent wildly with the shadows of the doctors. And then it was.. gone. He was floating in nothing, water that had no texture. Everything was black, gone.
And then, so was he.
