All was Lost

Chapter 5

I awoke after what seemed like a second but was probably days, lying in bed in the middle of a dark room, with a bandage around my head. I tried to sit up, but I was too weak, so instead I looked around the room. There was some medical equipment beside me, and I could feel a drowsy pain in my head. I looked outside the window, and saw what at first glance looked like snow falling, but then I realized it was ash. Suddenly, my eyes flew wide open, as I remembered. The volcano! Suddenly, my door creaked open, and my family walked in, with Debbie trailing behind them. I could see that mum had been crying. “Mum” I murmured, my voice cracked. “You’re awake!” Mum exclaimed, running to my bed. Dad stopped her before she could wrap her arms around me. “Lisa” he said softly, his eyes moist, “Don’t forget about her head”. Mum nodded, slowly retreating back to where Lily and Mary were standing, unsure of what to do. “What about my head?” I asked nervously. Mum looked at me, her eyes full of sorrow. “Don’t you remember?” she queried “you were hit on the head by a falling rock”. Suddenly it all came flashing back. The pain, the terror, the blackness. I tried to reach up and touch my head, but Dad put a restricting hand on my arm before I could. “It needed stitches” he sighed, “The doctor said to leave it be”.

Suddenly a tall man dressed in white peered around the door. “Seems like the patients awake” he chuckled as he pushed his way in. “Um… who are you?” I stammered as I tried to look up at his tall figure without my head hurting. “I’m Dr. Harrington” he said as he adjusted the bandages on my head. I nodded politely, and then didn’t say anything else as he feed me some foul medicine, checked my pulse and walked out of the room. As soon as he was gone, I turned to Mum and Dad, and asked for the full story, so reluctantly, they began.

After I passed out, everyone as in a scene of panic. There was ash leaking through the whole in the roof, rocks falling around us and my wound wouldn’t stop bleeding. Dad donated his cloth that was meant to be his protection from the ash to serve as my bandage, and he continued on for another hour until the rocks had stopped falling, and we had reached Helensville, where there was a hospital of which they took me to immediately. I had to have stitches and the doctor had to put some donated blood into my blood stream, as I had lost a lot in the car. Debbie was very helpful and kind and stayed by me with my family throughout the hard nights of which I was unconscious. “Thank you Debbie” I stammered. She smiled at me widely, and after that she was like a second Gran.

 

The weeks that followed were hard ones. We had to live in the town hall along with the other refugees until Aunt Lidia came and took us to her house in Wellington. We held a funeral for Gran, but with no body to bury. I never cried so hard in my life, as now that the terror was over, we could really think about the loss of our Gran, with no distractions or volcanoes erupting nearby. The ash fell for 3 weeks before it stopped, and after that there was a lot of cleaning to be done. Debbie stuck with us like glue, as she had no other family and her home was also destroyed by the volcano. But that was fine by us, as she had become part of the family. There are few things that bring people together like that, and escaping a volcano is one of them.