When I got home the house was empty, as usual. Both my parents worked now. They had crummy jobs and there never seemed to be enough money. So what else was new? At least it was quiet.
In my empty house, I sat down and tried to watch TV. The soaps were on. Peggy just found out that she had been cheated out of her inheritance and she was crying. I switched it off in disgust. What crap! People crying because they were no longer rich. That’s just the way everybody was. They cared about garbage. Nobody cared about what was really important.
I was angry at the way things were going. And I was so confused too. There was so much about Kurt’s problem that I didn’t understand. Bennington made it sound unlikely that they would find a liver for Kurt. “We’re doing as much as we can,” he had said. “Unless a donor comes forward, there’s not much we can do except continue to take good care of Kurt.” The big trouble, I knew, was that the liver donor had to be dead first.
Whatever they were doing at the hospital, it wasn’t enough. I was angry and I was very tired. I dozed into a fitful sleep on the sofa.
Then the doorbell rang. I shook the sleep off and opened the door.
“Who do you think you are spreading rumors about Kurt’s condition around school?” Kurt’s mother snapped at me as soon as I opened the door. Behind her Mr. Richards looked upset and uncomfortable.
“What are you talking about?”
“I heard from Mrs. Leach that you were scouting around for blood for transfusions or some such thing. That’s none of your business. Ever since I met you, little girl, you’ve been so pushy. Always trying to influence Kurt … the wrong way.”
“Where are your parents?” Mr. Richards interjected, with a shade more cool in his voice.
“They’re not here,” I said. “And you’re wrong. I’m trying to help.”
“You’re just a kid!” Kurt’s father shouted at me. “We’ve got doctors there, some of the best trained men in the country.” He said the word men like that was what counted. Men could handle these things. Not women. And especially not girls.
“If we don’t do everything we possibly can, Kurt could die!” I screamed at them.
“Who told you that?” Mrs. Richards screamed back. “Who told you that? It’s not true.” She leaned back against her husband and started to cry.
Mr. Richards looked at me and, almost whispering, said, “How did you know?”
“I overheard it. I was there when the specialist came. I know that it’s not just the rare blood type. He needs a transplant too. It’s true, isn’t it?”
Mrs. Richards was lost in her tears. For a brief flash it was all too weird to be real. I thought I had fallen asleep in the middle of a soap opera and was dreaming.
But Mr. Richards nodded his head without speaking. I knew then that it was all too real.
“We don’t know what we’re going to do,” he said, choking back his own tears.
The phone rang. I looked at it just so that I didn’t have to look at them. But I let it ring nine times before I moved to answer it.
“Hello?”
“Tina. It’s Dr. Bennington at the hospital. Do you know where Kurt is? Is he with you?”
“I don’t understand. No, of course he’s not here.”
“He’s not in his room. He’s just …well— he’s gone. I tried his parents’ house, but there was no answer. We had your name and address from the blood clinic. I thought maybe you had concocted some scheme with Kurt…”
I cut him off. “I didn’t concoct some scheme,” I told him. But I thought about what Kurt had said the other day. He said he felt it was the hospital that was keeping him down, that if he left, he’d get better. I thought maybe he was trying to prove something to himself. “What will happen to him without …without all the tubes and stuff?” I didn’t have the right words, but I knew that without the bottles and the equipment, he could be in trouble.
“I don’t know. He might pass out, go into shock. He might die.”
I slammed down the phone. Kurt’s parents knew immediately what had happened. “He said yesterday that he had to get out of the hospital,” Mr. Richards said. “It was driving him crazy. I didn’t think he’d do it like this.”
Mrs. Richards said nothing. She didn’t have to. Her expression said it for her: It’s all your fault, Tina.