I close my eyes and yank the blanket off. I squint, but then my eyes fly open and I gasp, bringing my hands up to my face. "OH MY GOD, DAD! This is amazing! Oh my god, where did you get it? It's perfect!"
It's a new compound light microscope. Gleaming in its cover, I'm scared to touch it. It's too perfect, I'm tearing up.
"I'm guessing you like it?" my dad is beaming. "I found it at the convention I went to last month. Thought you might like it to help with your big independent study project?" he raises his eyebrows. I haven't told anyone except Linny what my project is, but my parents know it's huge. And important.
"Dad, thank you. This will help so much! Um, are we just going to keep it in the garage?"
"Well," my dad rubs his face. "Yeah, yeah this is about the only place-"
"Don't even worry about that, Dad. It's fine, it really is, it's perfect."
He smiles. "...I'm proud of you, Hunter," he says randomly. He walks back inside the house.
Excitedly, I take the cover off the microscope and plug in the cord. The light glows. I find a package of clean slides and slide covers next to the microscope. I can't stop smiling. I prick my finger, smear a bit of the blood on a slide, and put a cover on, sucking my finger. I carefully place the slide on the stage and adjust the focuses. Right.
I can see about 20 blood cells in the sample. There are maybe six white blood cells; they're bigger than anything else and look kinda like dragon fruit. I see a couple platelets, tiny little things, and about ten normal red blood cells. Through the microscope, they just look like circles. The most interesting, or deadly depending on how you look at it, things though, are the sickled cells I can see. They're long and thin, shaped like a flat crescent moon. They're the ones that get stuck in mine and Linny's blood vessels and cause all kinds of ... bad stuff to happen, to put it nicely.
I need to find a cure. That what Linny wants. I want it too of course, but I can't let her down. I need to find a cure, not just the stupid "treatments" we use, but an actual freaking cure. Because if I don't, we're both gonna die, no questions asked, before we're considered old.
YOU ARE READING
All the Slivers of Red
Teen FictionHunter, who has sickle cell disease, has been sheltered all his life. As he and his friend Linny know, there is no cure for their rare and serious illness. That is, until Hunter makes a discovery and a new friend, and his life is changed forever.
