Fix My Feet When They're Stumblin'

Chapter 21

    After several minutes of crying on each other's shoulders, overwhelmed and exhausted by the events of the last few days, Brandon had fallen asleep on Tana's shoulder. She found herself unable to tear her gaze away from her husband's face, relaxed and peaceful in sleep, but eventually, she sighed and looked to the red-haired nurse for help - at some point, the other nurse who had been trying to convince Brandon to eat breakfast had slipped out. "Sorry, I don't know your name, but could you please help me...get out? I don't want to wake him."

    "Mandy," the nurse whispered, holding a pillow near Tana's shoulder with one hand and gently bracing Brandon's head with the other. "Okay, you can get off the bed."

    Tana wiggled away and slid down from the bed, watching as Mandy expertly lowered Brandon's head onto the pillow and then to the mattress, checking the staples embedded in his scalp as she did so. She carefully arranged him on his side with his injured arm resting inside its sling on a pillow, with a third pillow behind his back and slightly underneath his body, forcing him to stay in that position so he couldn't roll onto his broken shoulder in his sleep. She glanced at Tana and smiled, crinkling the corners of her eyes and drawing attention to the bruise underneath her left eye and spreading across her nose. "Normally people with TBIs sleep pretty heavily the first few months, because their brains are healing, so he probably won't be very easy to wake up for a while."

    Tana's heart jumped into her throat. "Months? How - how long does this last?" She asked, waving a hand around the room.

    Mandy sighed and shrugged, not meeting Tana's eyes. "Honestly, we never know with any of our patients. We'll send him to rehab or home once he's stable, should be soon but there's gonna be assessments and scans and stuff before then. There's just no way for us to tell how much or how quickly they'll recover or even really what their symptoms will be, the parts of the brain that were injured is just a guide. It's brain damage, it's not...it's difficult to treat. A lot of these things, you'll all just have to learn how to live with. You'll only find out if something's temporary after it eventually goes away. He might even develop new symptoms once he's home, or after a few weeks."

    The nurse looked past Tana to Brandon, sleeping behind her. "I can tell you that usually people make a lot of progress in the first few weeks and months, and I can tell you that based on how much time he was unconscious for and how quickly he came out of the post-traumatic amnesia, it's somewhere in the middle of the spectrum as far as severity. We just don't know much more, but the neuropsychologist will be meeting with you soon here to give you a crash course in what to expect and how to help, everything. He's probably gonna need to go to a rehab facility for a while, there are gonna be some assessments now that he's awake so we can figure that out."

    "...Oh." So much to think about...so much unknown. Tana touched her own face where Brandon had hit Mandy the day before. "I never said, but I'm so sorry that he - "

    Mandy scoffed quietly, waving a hand in the air dismissively, sweeping away her attempt at an apology. "Don't worry about it, things like that happen kind of a lot in this unit, unfortunately. He didn't know what he was doing, please don't be upset with him. I know he isn't quite himself right now either, but he seems like a sweet guy. Just such a shame you guys have to deal with all of this." She took a few steps toward the door, then turned back. "Would you like us to let you know when he's ready for visitors again so your kids can see him? I know you've gotta go sit with them."

    "Please," Tana sighed, trailing her fingers gently along the back of Brandon's hand in farewell and following Mandy to the door.

    -    -    -    -    -

    Nearly four hours passed, during which the whole group gradually returned to the waiting room. The uncertain, anxious silence of the past few days had been replaced with an excited buzz, everyone elated at the news that Brandon had improved.

    Jeremy came in bearing several cups of coffee in to-go trays, passing them out among the crew, then sat across from Tana and Ronnie. "Hey, we need to talk about the album and the tour, decisions need to be made. Do you want us to talk about it with Brandon, Tana, or do you think we should just kind of...do it for him and make an executive decision?"

    Tana bit her lip, answering slowly. "Well...I don't think Brandon's in any condition to be making decisions on anything, especially the band...and really, I think it would just upset him if we tried...he's very emotional right now. I think Ronnie's the only boss - for now," she added with a smile, elbowing him gently.

    "I'll try not to get used to it, I get the message," Ronnie chuckled. "But, um, I don't think there's any question about the tour, we've got to cancel it. Down the line when things are better, maybe we can start thinking about rescheduling it. The album...I don't know, can we just release it anyway? I'd hate to not give the fans anything, you know? Maybe that will tide them over for a few months til we figure things out. I'll come up with a statement or something, explain what's going on...try not to freak out the fans too much."

    Plans made, the little group lapsed into silence, except for giggles and quiet conversation between the children as they leafed through several spiralbound notebooks, tearing out certain pages and piling them carefully on an empty chair between them.

    Footsteps echoed down the hall and Mandy appeared, her ginger hair more disheveled than it had been that morning, falling out of its braid and framing her face. "Hey, who wants to be Mr. Flowers' next visitor? He's ready!" She announced brightly.

    All three of the Flowers' children's hands shot into the air, and the nurse laughed. "I'm not supposed to, but..." She looked around surreptitiously, then held a finger to her lips with a smile and beckoned them forward.

    Muffled giggles and whispers - "Shut up, Henry, she said to be quiet!" - could be heard as the trio followed Mandy, nearly running through the halls behind her, unable to contain their excitement.