Keeping Up With the Wind: A 'Burban Tale by Suleyma Moon

25.

It didn't even occur to me that I was inside the hospital until I found myself right outside the door that led to the one person who I had always considered my safe haven, my shelter from every storm.

When my hand touched the knob to Faith's room, though, I snatched it away as if the thing had burned me and fell against the wall to catch my breath.    

            What was I doing here? I started to leave, but before I had the chance to go, the door flew open. Immediately, I tensed up and expected to see Faith standing there, eyes all sunken in and face all shriveled up like she had been dead for a long, long time.

            "What happened to you?" Spider exclaimed, laughing. "You look like you just saw a ghost." 

            I shook my head again and started to walk right past him.

            "Don't you want to see Faith?" he asked, coming after me and closing the door behind him.

            "No."

            "Then why did you come?"

            Good question. "I don't know."

            I wanted more than anything right then for things to be back the way they were. I wanted Shadow back. I wanted Ace and Blaze back. I especially wanted Whisper back. I wanted Faith to get better and for Spider, who once was the freest spirit that anyone could ever know, not to look like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. I wanted all of us to be back at Shadow's house, like we were when the summer first began.

I realized that when I was up on that cliff with Tommy, it was the first time ever that not one of my friends had come to my rescue just in the nick of time. Even Li'l Jay, Blaze and Faith had been there for me when we were very little kids. How had they all vanished from my world so quickly?

            Spider and I were walking together toward the lobby when he stopped short. "I forgot something."

            "What?"

            "Li'l Jay," he answered matter-of-factly.

            Spider always knew exactly what to say to put a smile on my face. I remembered that he was leaving that day, too, and my smile quickly turned into a frown. I waited in the hallway while he went to go back and get "something."

            I heard Faith call to Spider as they left the room, "Tell Thunder that maybe she can make it all the way in the room next time."

            I looked accusingly at Spider and hissed, "You told her!"

            "No I didn't. She heard you out here talking." He came over to me. "She was proud of you for making it this far, though." He put his arm around me and gave me a squeeze. "Maybe next time you'll even make it through the door."

            Li'l Jay came out of Faith's room and ran over to me. "Hey! I figured that Faith would probably want to talk to Whisper, too, so we called her from the hospital room."

            "Oh." He didn't need to explain anything to me.

            We walked together back to Spider's house, he and Li'l Jay telling the same silly jokes that they always had, only this time they meant a whole lot more. It would probably be the last time that they would ever get to be this silly together, or with anyone, really, ever again. I wasn't listening to either of them, but when they both looked at me and started giggling, it caught my attention. I tried to tune them back out, like I usually did, but I was too suspicious.