23 Days Until Heaven

Day 21

I wake up, but in a different room than I am used to being in. I look around slowly with just my eyes, realizing that I have so many tubes and ivs running around my head that I can barely move it.

I look out the window in the door, and see a sign on the wall labeled ICU. Oh, great. Another day, another health scare.

Just then, I remember. I don't want to remember, but my brain just goes off.

Suddenly, I feel my heart thumping hard in my chest, knowing that my dad could be just outside that door in the same waiting room as my brother. I need to see Blake. 

"Screw all this sickness BS." I whisper to myself.

Like the snap of a finger, my brain goes off on a tangent. An alternate universe where Blake was sick and not me. I was being abused and not him. I'd rather it be me. I hate my lif-

I hear a knock at my door. In bursts in a overly happy looking nurse. I thought it was weird that've never seen her before. He dark brown hair was pulled back slick into a bun, and her shoes were so clean that they squeaked when she walked.

"I'm Angie, I'm a nurse in the ICU. I heard you had a scare when you tried to get out of bed. I'm here so you don't do that again and get hurt." She says, eyes sparkling as if she actually cares. 

But I don't care. I've dealt with my share of nurses that could care less about me and more about their paycheck.

I almost drift off to sleep as she starts checking my vitals and administrating my medicine through the long chain of ivs. But I don't fall asleep, because she reminds me that it's shower day. We use the term shower very loosely. It is mostly me getting wiped down with washcloths and shampooing my lack of hair.

***

As the nurse settles me back in after my "shower", she slips me a candy bar. We lock eyes and she says playfully, "Shhh...remember, what happens in the hospital room stays in the hospital room. Enjoy your snack!"

Yeah. What happens in the hospital room stays in the hospital room, I think, sending shivers down my spine. All I canthink of right now is how loopy I am from the men's and my brothers bruised chest sitting next to my drunken dad.