Chapter Forty Five
Ellie had been anticipating my return during the entire six-hours the operation had taken the day before. Apparently she had been wondering why I hadn’t come back the night before, until I explained that my heart had stopped during recovery and that the doctors had to keep a “close eye” on me.
Her eyes widened as she sat at the end of my bed. “Really?”
I nodded. “That’s why they put these suction things back on me.” The heart monitoring devices had been attached to the machine inside my room, and the clear bag of fluids had been wheeled beside my bed from the operating room, so the I.V. needle remained in my arm.
“How does your leg feel?” she asked.
I shrugged. “I can’t really feel my leg. I think they’re planning on putting a cast on it later on.”
Ellie smiled. “It’s good to see you again,” she laughed.
“You too.” How ironic.
“Is there a date set for when you can leave?”
I looked at her with a sudden realization. My mother wasn’t in the condition to be taking care of a child; she was on life support, and odds are, she probably wouldn’t be recovering from her coma for months or even years. “No . . . not really.”
She looked at me curiously. “Something wrong?”
I looked up at her and grinned. “Nope. I’m just glad I got that surgery over with.”
The next day, a nurse I had not seen before came into the room, handing us plates of food. She placed a couple extra pillows under the leg that had been operated on, propping it upwards into an uncomfortable position.
She didn’t say anything, though she bore a huge grin as she did each of her tasks. Using a small, gray clicker, she brought up the second half of my bed, gradually bringing me to a sitting position. I grabbed a fork and began digging into the heap of pancakes.
I hadn’t realized how hungry I had been.
Dr. Richmond came in for a few minutes to check up on me, along with a couple other doctors who replaced my chest with new suction cups. I would be wearing them for the next couple weeks, after all.
After they left, the nurse who had brought our food walked in. “You have a visitor, Darrel.”
I looked up at her from my plate and knit my brows. “Visitor?” Who did I know in New York that would actually come to visit me in the hospital?”
The nurse nodded and looked out into the hallway. “He says he’s your father.”
