metanoia

Chapter Eight

The night went by slowly. They gave Evie stitches and stuck her with an IV she didn't even feel. She laid there motionless, her eyes closed. I cried beside her bed. I found out that the house she lived in was previously an abandoned one her parents owned. How she managed to pay bills I will never know. She laid there for a long time, but eventually her brown eyes opened wide. The color was slowly returning to her skin and her face.

"Hi..." she said softly.

"Evie, baby!" I said, resting my hand on top of hers. "How do you feel?"

"Cleansed. What did they do to me?"

"They just stitched you up and gave you IVs." I watched her carefully for any signs of problems.

"Hmm. Wow. Well, that's cool. I bet when they know I'm up they'll feed me a box of cookies and a gallon of orange juice." She smiled. "I don't eat much."

"I noticed." I said, still stroking her hand. "You have to eat for them, okay?" I made a point of putting emphasis on the 'have to'.

"Okay, I guess..." she said.

"No. No guess. I will feed you cookies if I have to."

She giggled. "I'll eat, okay?"

"Okay, okay." I said, fighting a smile. Her laughter was so nice to hear. She seemed back to normal. Just as I was about to get up to ask for a nurse, one came in.

"Hello, Evangeline." She said. Her nametag read 'Macy'.

"Hi. You can call me Evie, by the way. I know Evangeline is a long name."

Macy smiled. "Okay, Evie. We're gonna have you drink this juice," she said as she slid a tall glass of purplish-pink juice across the little table by Evie's bed, "and some lunch a little later. Okay? We're also thinking about signing you up for some therapy sessions. Is that okay?" Macy touched Evie's hand gingerly.

"Sure, I guess." Evie replied reluctantly.

"I know it sounds like no fun, but we can't just blow off the fact that you did what you did." Macy explained, gesturing slightly towards the layers of gauze wrapped tightly around Evangeline's thin wrist.

"I didn't mean to..." Evie said, her eyes glistening with new tears.

"You'll have to talk that through with your therapist, honey. I'm no good at the mental stuff, only physical." Macy have a thin smile and a sympathetic look to Evie and me before she patted Evie's non-bandaged wrist and left.

"I hate this, Michael. Michael. Get me out of here. Please." Evie pleaded. Her tears were spilling over now, but I couldn't change my mind.

"Evie, you need to listen to me. You need help. I'm sorry, but it's true. Maybe your therapy can make you feel better. Maybe you'll stop getting pleasure from mutilating yourself." This time it was me who grabbed her hand.

"I don't need help! How could you say that?" Evie turned away.

"Evie, come on..."

"No! I don't need help!"

"Come on. Think of it as a new, fresh start. You can become a pure and clean version of you. A new Evie." I tapped her shoulder. She relaxed, but didn't turn towards me.

"New Evie..." I heard her whisper, as if she were turning the words over and over in her head, trying to decide if that sounded good or bad. "New Evie, new Evie..."

"New Evie. Fresh, clean, pure, reborn. A clean slate."

She turned towards me.

"How do I do it?" she asked, taking my free hand in her bandaged one.

"Go to your therapy. Throw away your blades. Surround yourself in happiness. Go light on the vodka." I stroked her thumbs with mine. "It'll be good for you."

She sighed, but nodded. "Okay, Michael. If that's what you want."

"No," I said, "it's about you. It's about what you need. I want what's best for you."

She nodded. "I know."

We were both quiet for a minute, and then Evie said, "Can we look up how to change on the internet?"

I nodded and handed her my phone. In a few minutes she was reading an excerpt of an article aloud to me.

"... chosen by those who feel they are 'stuck in a rut', the process of metanoia is a long and tough but rewarding experience." she looked up at me. "Metanoia. Metanoia. Isn't that pretty?"

"Metanoia." it felt nice on my tongue. Clean and crisp. "Maybe that's what you can call your journey. Evie's metanoia." I smiled, and so did she.

"Okay. Evie's own little metanoia."