Unsuspecting Blessing.

vii

vii

Not having the emotional intelligence to comprehend Julia's wicked shock, Brian smiled and introduced himself, "Hi Julia, my name is Brian Peters—"

"I know who you are," Julia split Brian's sentence, "we attend the same college."

All of the mystery surrounding Julia, or at least her familiarity, seemed to die off in that very instance. Brian's neurons reconstructed many occasions of her name being called for role in his History class, as well as seeing her lush hair from behind a handful of times. His ignorance punched him in the chest, and his voice felt swollen as he tried to speak after trying to acquaint himself with someone whom he was already acquainted with. Then another blow came from the unpleasantness in her voice which was like an older sibling talking down to a younger one; one of blatant superiority in the situation. It was her hospital room, and her injury, and Brian had a grudging feeling of his fantasy of getting to know Julia was collapsing before the journey began.

"I'm sorry—about, well about," Brian collected himself, "I wanted to assure myself that you were okay after I realized you were gone this morning and—" he stopped once again, to turn around and fetch the items from the cafeteria, "and to give you these, this milk and applesauce that I thought you would want after a probably long morning." He sounded hurried when speaking, and all of his words bumped into each other's back ends like a traffic jam accident.

Julia's face looked astonished at this college student crumbling before her, and decided that she would accept his offering of sustenance. She smiled, and chuckled though it came out more scoff-like than she intended.

"Brian," Doctor Foster interrupted, "could you please help me help Julia back into her bed—you are going to need to learn how to after all." The last part added itself quietly enough to where it did not hold space in the room.

He nodded, and put the applesauce and milk on the table beside the bed. Doctor Foster wheeled Julia over to the side of the hospital bed, and placed her hands underneath Julia's armpits like holding a doll. Brian knew that meant he had to support the bottom half of Julia, and felt worried and embarrassed at the fact; especially since Julia seemed to be covered in thorns head-to-toe and he did not want to face ridicule on his first day. Be that as it may, he placed his hands underneath her hamstrings, making sure to not put pressure on her broken leg, and lifted upwards with a puff of air—the two of them put Julia soundly on the hospital bed, and Brian wondered how the hell he was supposed to do that by himself.

Doctor Foster took Brian out in the hallway momentarily after Julia had been settled.

"She had stitches done this morning," Doctor Foster explained, "and will be needing

months of physical therapy. She will hopefully be out of the hospital and back to her home in roughly a week. Are you able to handle all of that and possibly—most likely—more to come?"

Brian scratched at the back of his head, and came to a conclusion. "Yes," he said, "I can." After their conversation, Doctor Foster left, and would be gone until Julia's next checkup. Brian reentered the room.

Julia looked at him plainly with no expression on her face but the paleness of her skin. "Did you forget something?" she asked.

"Here's the thing, Julia, I am here to stay." Brian's words were sincere, but they held no substance to Julia.

"What do you mean?" she asked, "To stay in the hospital? Are you injured too?"

Brian could tell she knew what he meant, but reluctance surrounded her words like she did not want to believe the fact. "In this hospital room," he said, practically spelling it out, "with you."

Julia's head fell forward like a possessed ragdoll and blatant fury dawned on her face, "With me? You didn't even know I knew who you were up until ten minutes ago, and now you're saying that you are going to be staying in a hospital room with me?"

"I can tell you're upset, but—" Brian rebutted.

"Upset? Yeah I am a little upset, why are you staying with me? You are practically a stranger to me!"

"Because," he said, his voice gaining sternness, "the hospital says that your insurance will not cover having someone be with you twenty-four-seven, and that you have no relatives that can do the job, so I will have to stay with you here and," his voice lost his sternness and became mumbled, "at your house."

"What?" Julia's head lunged forward again, and her hands started to do more talking than her mouth, "What was that last part?"

Not wanting to repeat himself, Brian paused, but hesitantly he echoed: "At your house."

"At my house?" She paused between her words, as her voice grew louder every time her hands jumped with each word, like she was getting ready to shadowbox. "What makes you think you can go into my house?"

"Well I was hoping we would be friends by the time that came around," Brian sounded more submissive than he did stern now.

Julia scoffed and laid back as far as she could in her hospital bed. She shook her head.

"Who else would take care of you?" Brian asked, muted.

"Do you think I can't take care of myself?" her voice became more fiery than any time before. "Do you think that?"

"No, I don't think that, I just wanted to make sure that—"

"Make sure of what!?"

"That you would make a good recovery!"

Julia's argument ceased. She merely looked at Brian.

He did not make eye contact with her. "I already told the hospital that I would do this, I can't take it back now."

"You told them without my permission."

"You're right, I'm sorry," Brian sounded defeated. "I should have waited until you were awake so you could tell me that you didn't want my help."

Julia's face looked reserved after Brian said that, and she seemed to retract into herself; folding her arms in the process.

Brian sat down in the green chair, and felt something sharp prick him in his pocket. He remembered the hair clip the Doctor had found in Julia's hand when inputting her IV, and decided not to return it to her right then.

Julia sighed, and it made Brian perk up to face her. "It was nice of you to do what you did, I just feel like my opinion on what should be done with me was second-rate, and I don't like feeling not in control of my own life. You're welcome to stay," she paused, "but only if we get along." Then she added: "And if you get my assignments from my classes; I have four of them."

Brian did not know what to say. He simply nodded his head in agreement, but also in thankfulness. He would experience what he dreamed about the night before. He would know Julia Greenwood.