Icarus

9

I can remember Felix's face over me, shaking my shoulders and screaming something I couldn't hear. Joshua stood crying, yelling into his phone in the corner.

I can remember red and blue lights like fireworks swaddling me.

I can remember doctors yelling weird things down the halls.

I can remember waking up the first time at night, Felix's fingers barely touching mine, Mom and Dad sharing a recliner, Joshua in a plastic chair by the door.

I can remember blackness like a depthless fissure, numb and silent.

↢ ↣

The last time I woke up, the final time, it was the middle of the day. Joshua had hooked up his game console to the hospital television, and Felix was watching him play. Mom was talking quietly to someone on the phone, and Dad was pacing in front of the hallway window. Everything had a blurry vignette around it, making everything seem surreal. IVs pumped a weird, clear liquid into my veins.

"I didn't mean to," I whispered, my voice raspy. Felix was the first one to hear, sitting right beside me.

"Gem, hey. You're awake," he said, grabbing my hand. My parents turned around, my mom ending her phone call.

"Hang on, dude. Almost done with the level," Joshua called, furiously working his controller. We watched as he crossed the finish line and the winners line-up scrolled from the bottom. "Alright, I'm all yours."

"Thanks, Josh. So glad to know you care," I laughed quietly, more a wheeze than anything. The somber mood took hold again, becoming evident in my parents creased foreheads, Joshua's falling smile, and Felix's hand tightening on mine.

"I wasn't trying to kill myself," I said, a bit stronger this time. "I wasn't thinking straight." Felix helped me sit up, but didn't let go of my hand, like he needed to make sure I was still there, still sitting next to him. "I remember taking the appetite suppressants and the Ibuprofen and going to sleep."

"I saw the video of you screaming at those girls on Instagram. You were going viral. I called Felix because I knew he could calm you down," Joshua filled in.

Felix continued. "I knocked on the door for a few minutes before kicking it in. By the time I got upstairs to you, you were asleep." He paused, looking down at our hands. "I thought you were dead."

"I got there as Felix was trying to wake you up, and I called an ambulance, and then I called Mom and Dad." Joshua picked up where Felix left off.

"We got to the hospital as they were pumping your stomach," Dad said. "They kept you in a medically induced coma for two days, you slept on your own for one, and now we're here."

I looked around at my family, at the flowers that cluttered the windowsill. One bouquet of white daisies sat on the table beside my bed. "From you?" I asked Felix. He finally looked up from our hands and nodded.

"The rest are from your grandparents, some of your soccer friends, and some people named Kate, Chase, and Daren?" He sounded curious about the last three.

"Those are the people I did the AE photo shoot with. I guess they heard what happened."

"Everyone did," Joshua said before he could think better of it. "Like I said, there isn't a teen alive that hasn't seen the clip of you standing up for yourself."

"Do they know what's happened now?"

"Some do."

"You have to understand I didn't mean to do it." No one answered.

Mom finally weighed in. "We can talk about that later. Right now, let's just focus on getting you well enough to get out of here."

"If I have to eat another one of your jello cups the nurse keeps leaving in here, I might scream," Joshua said, turning back to his game.

"You ate my jello cups?"

"You weren't awake to eat them, princess. They were fair game."

"Did you at least share with Felix?"

"Felix, do you want dibs on the next one?"

Felix smiled at our sibling banter. "No, you can have it."

Joshua laughed and leaned over for a fistbumb. "That's true love right there, man. True love."

I wanted to talk to Felix about that last time we spoke, but I couldn't with doctors coming in and adjusting things, and Mom and Dad hovering over me.

I stayed for three more days in the hospital. My family eventually went home and showered and slept in their own beds, promising to be here in the morning. Violet came and stayed for and hour or so, bringing me a plush soccer ball. But through it all, Felix stayed. He never went home.

I was able to dream while I slept now that the medically induced fog had cleared from my mind. That meant nightmares when I was actually able to sleep at all. Everytime I woke up, Felix would hold my hand and whisper sing until I fell back asleep. Eventually, he made himself a place among the wires and tubes next to me in the bed, and I slept in his arms until the nurses woke us up.

He stayed when I went home, making a pallet in my bedroom floor. Eventually, he ditched that as well, in favor of the other side of my bed.

↢ ↣

And now we're here.