I told Nurse Cathy and Doctor Patel I’d stay in bed. To get strong. Get better. I still hate hospitals, but I realize the reason I’m alive is because of this place. And these people.
I wish Charlie had gotten this chance.
In the rubble he told me we’d get out and find a nice hospital where people would fix us up. I didn’t want to go. He’s the one who deserves to be here.
He deserves to have a better story.
I know the way his family will have to push through the murky waters of healing. Feeling guilty about the things they’d said or the things they wish they would’ve said. I want to meet them. Say how brave he was. How hard he fought to live.
I want to live.
Really live.
The way my mom says my dad did.
I want to shove aside all the petty things that were weighing me down when I walked into the laundromat last Friday. I want my mom to be happy. I want her to be happy with Coach. It doesn’t matter if it’s weird or if Mila makes fun of me. None of that matters anymore. Because I’ve spent the last six days fighting to stay alive.
That’s way bigger than anything else. The most important thing in this world, the only one that matters, is being with the people you love.
Like the woman in the yellow shirt across the pod. She’s here because the person in that bed is important to her. Every person in this hospital is another person’s person. All of them going in and out, visiting other people in other rooms with their hands and faces clenched tight with worry. Covered in dust and blood and stitches.
I have to find my mom. It repeats like a mantra.
I imagine getting up out of this bed, pulling the tubes out of my arms, and pushing through the sliding glass doors of my room.
I won’t falter this time.
I’ll stay coherent.
I won’t slip into the dark.
I will wave goodbye to the pod people in their spaceship workstation and walk away. They’ll wish me luck because I will be confident in my leaving. I will pull on my sweatshirt and feel like myself again. Familiar. Comfortable. I don’t care if it’s dirty. I won’t even care if my hospital gown pops open behind me. I will push forward down the hallway, moving toward the stairwell door, with Charlie’s journal in my arms. Down I’ll go to the front doors of the hospital. I will exit through them and drag cool air into my lungs. I will breathe in the fresh, bright smell of the big, wide world. I will search every inch of that big, wide world until I find my mom.
I will find her.
She will be okay.
I am her daughter. I need her. She needs me. We’ll be reunited. And then we’ll go home and live our life.
Coach Sanchez can come, too.
If that’s what’s meant to be.
I will appreciate the sunshine and smaller mundane things. I will eat burritos. Swim in the ocean. Read good books. Travel. Hug Leo. Leave flowers on graves. Let my mom love Coach.
And I’ll never stop paying attention to the big things. Telling people that I love them. Trying to help Mila. Fighting for what I believe in.
Because we’re all just trying to survive. Day to day. Year by year. In big ways and small.
I will remember and honor Charlie. Live a life of truth. Let go of blame. I wish I could’ve known him. I wish he could’ve been a part of my life forever.
Nurse Cathy walks in as I’m swiping at my tears with my bedsheets.
She hurries to my side. “What’s wrong, honey?”
“I’m thinking about my friend. Charlie.” I knot the sheets in my hand like a tissue.
She sits on the edge of my bed. “Tell me about your friend.”