"Life Under" - A Short Story [✔]

Chapter 10

We walked upstairs, then out of the cabin, starting towards the motel building. Wyatt grabbed his backpack that was leaned up against the large rock from earlier. Nick answered all of Wyatt's questions about my mother as I sobbed in disbelief.

It took us about forty-five minutes to walk back to the main area, which Nick was unfamiliar with. I wiped my tears and put on a face when we walked into the small building that had only five hospital rooms. If all of the rooms were occupied, they would reject helping you. Meaning you'd have to wait until a room was empty, however long that would take.

I was so nervous when we walked in and when the nurse walked us to our room. If we told them his lungs are damaged because he was above ground, they'd figure out that we snuck through the government's secret tunnel. We could get in so much trouble. I was willing to help Nick no matter what though anyways.

The nurse did a chest x-ray on Nick in the x-ray room and when they came back, she had a shocked expression on her face. She was very confused about how his lungs were so dark instead of the usual pink.

We tried to tell her anything but the truth. She told us treatment would take a while. It turns out his lung condition is very similar to smokers' lungs. It could take about one month for his lungs to actually start improving, as long as he would breathe in clean air. His lung function and lung capacity would start to improve, the lungs would start to heal and there would be much less coughing and shortness of breath.

Nick was very happy when he heard all of this news. He was so happy he'd survive and be able to recover. Throughout this whole journey, he'd been so hopeful and determined to live, and that's why he's still alive.

More nurses and doctors started his treatment immediately but they told us we could not be there throughout his entire recovery journey.