past perfection || r.s.l + r5 | IN EDITING

chapter fifteen - heartbeat

My arm was healing with no sign of infection so the doctors sent me home the next day, despite my persistence in staying with Katie. I didn't want to leave her here alone. 

We'd developed a pretty good communication system over the last four days since she still hadn't gotten her voice back.

I looked up from the keyboard as she held the whiteboard up to her chest.

'Can't stop this room from spinning 'round?'

"That's good." I frowned, finding my place back on the keys. "I'm floating high, high off the ground. Can't stop this room from spinning 'round'."

She glanced down at my notebook with a frown and shook her head, scribbling down her next critique on the board.

'Flip them'

"Uhhh..." I paused. "With the second line?"

She nodded.

"Okay... Which way is up? Which way is down? Can't stop this room from spinning 'round. I'm floating high, high off the ground. Caught in my head, can't get you out."

She gave me a wide smile and held out her hand. I gave her a fist bump and then swapped to a high five.

"Rocky's gonna love this." I chuckled, hitting the chords again.

The doctors had started letting me come in earlier than the allotted visiting hours since Katie had a lot of mental recovery to do and they thought I would be a huge help. I would sit with her every morning, her Mom would visit her in the afternoon then I would come back with Raini in the evening after she closed the store.

Each morning we sat and wrote songs, ate breakfast together or I would read her a book. She's been going crazy over The Summer I Turned Pretty recently, which I kind of enjoyed too. During the evening, we would all do something a little quieter like watch a movie or play card games.

On the first day, I brought Riker's bass with me so we could finish Ain't No Way since it was her favourite, but we were immediately told off by the staff. Plus, my arm still felt like it was on fire. I don't know what I was thinking. Now I just bring in my mini keyboard and we share a set of earphones. That's more manageable to play with one hand.

"Our turn!" I peered over my shoulder to see Rydel, Riker and Ratliff in the doorway.

Katie's face lit up as she waved them over.

"Hey, beautiful!" Rydel smiled, planting a quick kiss on the top of her head.

'Hi Del!' She wrote.

"How are you feeling today?" Riker asked, pulling a few chairs over to her bed.

She smiled and gave him a thumbs-up. 'Still on vocal rest'

I laughed and unplugged the headphones from my keyboard. "You guys wanna hear the bridge we just wrote?"

"Yeah, let's hear it!" Ratliff replied.

── ⋆⋅☆ katie pov ☆ ·⋆ ──

I'm not sure how to convince Ross that I'm okay and he doesn't need to come in to see me every day. I love his company, of course, but I just can't think straight with the amount of morphine I'm getting pumped through my system.

He gets so excited to see me every morning and wants to do heaps of fun things then he comes back again in the evening. It's just too much. Plus, he won't admit he still needs to rest his arm.

"Hey, guys!" My Mom smiled, walking into the room.

It's been really nice to see her over the past few days, especially out of her uniform. This is the most time we've spent together in a while.