Love, Stacy

Beep… Beep… Beep…

         Those were the sounds I heard in my ears for the past three weeks. I heard footsteps; crying, pity in people’s voices. “Oh he’s so young”, they would say. News flash I’m not dead why do people keep acting as if I am? Maybe I should just stop and forget about them all, because I'm going to be dead soon anyways. My mother just left the room earlier lecturing me about how I couldn’t even get out of bed without permission. They won’t even let me put sugar in my ice tea… it’s so bland.

         The door in my private hospital room opened up so I assumed it was a nurse, maybe my mom or dad, but no it was… laughter. I haven’t heard anyone laugh as gleefully as she did. She trotted into my room and said, “Hey, it's nice to meet you. I’m Stacy." I waved at her and she smiled at me as she jumped on the bed. “What’s your name?”

         “My name?” I questioned her, and she nodded as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “It’s Kaiden-Grey, but you just can just call me Kaid-“

         “So you're Kaiden!” she said cheerily. “I’ve wanted to meet you. Can we be friends?” she asked me. I couldn’t help but laugh at her innocence.

         “I don’t see any reason why not,” I replied. She tackled me in a hug. My nurse for the day came with my lunch in her hand. When she looked at them, her eyes widened.

         “Stacy Merlyn!” She placed my food down on the table and snatched the little girl up. “You need to be in your room, your father was so worried.”

         Even though the nurse was babbling on, Stacy seemed… so free and careless. She didn’t care if the nurse was yelling at her and in fact Stacy called to me smiling, “Thanks Kaiden, I’ll see you again." That was the first time I met her…

...the girl who changed my life forever.

         The next day she was back by my bedside, grinning at me. “So what are you here for?” she asked sitting by my feet and grabbing the remote attached to the bed.

         She began switching TV channels, and settled on what appeared to be Disney Channel. “I’m in here because I’ve had a weak heart, and it hasn’t been in top condition lately. So, I’ve been here for three weeks,” she replied with her eyes glued to the TV. I cleared my throat and said, “Anyways, how’d you know about me?”

         “Huh?” She turned around to face me.

         “When you first came here you said ‘so you’re Kaiden!’” I imitated her voice, making her and I laugh. Her laugh was unique; it was soft, and – she coughed severely. Her coughing fit caught me by surprise, so I sat up in attempt to help her. She held her hand up then slowly came to a stop as she cleared her throat. “Are you okay?”, I asked her.

         “I’m fine,” she said. She saw my cup of water and asked for it so of course I let her drink it. When she was done she sighed and smiled at me. “Thanks for that.” She wiped her mouth on her pink robe sleeve. “You asked how I knew?”, she asked. I nodded and she continued. “I got here a few days ago, and of course I didn’t want to be here. I’d rather be with my friends and be a normal middle school student…” She paused as if she was contemplating against telling me something. “When I got here it smelled to me, and it was… depressing because no one was happy. Everyone seemed like either they had given up hope or were worried and hoping. No one seemed super confident or happy; do you get where I'm coming from?”

         My throat felt parched so I let out a dry, “Yeah.” What she said had felt completely opposite of what I believed because I knew I was going to die soon.