Autumn Leaves

Chapter Three- Hospital

AUTUMN

Lots of days of my life had been bad days, but I don't think there could ever be a day worse than September 29th. I was sleeping cozily under my fluffy blue blanket until I woke up. I was drenched in sweat even though I was freezing. I began to have a hard time breathing, I started to panic.

I started to walk to the bathroom to calm myself down but when I tried to get out of my bed my legs were so sore. I didn't understand why, I hadn't had basketball practice since the week before. Times like these happened  occasionally but none of them had ever been this bad. The pain in my legs started to become worse. I was getting really scared.

I yelled for my Mom. She eventually walked through the door of my room in her tee shirt and pajama pants, half asleep. It took her a second to fully wake up but when she did, she stared at me with the most worried face I'd ever seen her make.

I told her what was wrong and she quickly took my temperature. She said it was way above my average temperature. She told me to get into the car as fast as I could, I tried to get up once again but it hurt so bad I just shrieked out in pain. So instead she just carried me all the way to the car. A headache began to start. We were going to the hospital. I was confused. What was happening to me?

As soon as we got to the hospital we had to sit and wait for what seemed like hours. My mom just hugged me and said that I would be alright. I had no clue what she was talking about. This always happened to me, but I guess she thought it was a lot worse this time. I looked into her eyes, she looked like she was about to break down, she was thinking very deeply about something.

I asked her what was wrong. I begged her until she told me everything. She explained that this same thing had happened to my Dad before he was diagnosed with cancer. But she said not to worry because she was positive there was something else wrong with me. But I could still see the worry in her eyes.

I could barely remember my Dad. Everyone seemed to like him and so did I even though I only knew him for 2 years of my life. People always told me I looked just like him, but I couldn't even remember him, the only way I could see him again was through pictures in our photo albums. I would never get to experience having a Dad.

After thinking about my Dad and worrying about myself, the Doctor finally called for us. I tried to walk again and the pain wasn't as bad. I walked and tried to be strong even though I could feel the pain in my legs creeping just around the corner.

I looked at his nametag, Dr. Willis. Willis sounded familiar and then it hit me, Mr. Willis, my math teacher. I was supposed to be at school. Oh no, Cassie was probably wondering what was wrong. Noooo, the school dance was that night and I promised Cassie that we'd have so much fun together, I was going to curl her hair and paint her nails. And now she wouldn't have anyone to talk to. I was a terrible friend.

After thinking of all my worries my Mom had already explained everything that had happened to me with the doctor. He then said that he would be giving me a physical exam to see if he could notice anything abnormal. He noticed some bruises on my leg and he asked me where I thought they had came from. At first I thought maybe basketball but my last practice was about a week ago. So I told him I honestly didn't really know.

He put all of this information into consideration, including my previous symptoms. He told me that is was possible that I had leukemia based on all of my symptoms. It took me a while to process these words in my head. How was it possible that I had cancer? When I finally understood, I started crying like crazy.

He told me that I'd have to get a CT Scan later that day. And I would have to stay in the hospital until they figured out what was wrong. I just looked at my Mom who was trying to hold in her tears, and ran to her and just sat there and hugged her until my Mom told me that we would have to go to our room.

Everything had changed.