We didn’t go straight to the emergency room. I had forgotten that Rusty was supposed to fly home. Or at least that we were going to pretend to send her on her way.
“Drop us off at our place, and Eric and I can take Rusty to the airport,” Fawn said.
“I wish you were coming too,” Rusty said to me.
I tried to look disappointed. “Me too. I should be back home in Fresno soon though. They can’t really make me work too much with this messed-up hand.”
“I hope it’s not broken.”
I tried to make a fist with it, but my fingers wouldn’t move. “I think it is.”
“That’s your throwing hand.”
“Thankfully the season’s over.”
Flip leaned over the back seat and cut into our conversation. “Man, practically everyone in this car is on the disabled list.”
We dropped Rusty and Fawn off at the Stevens’ resort. Everyone hugged Rusty and said good-bye like they weren’t going to see her for a long time. Dad and Brady had to be back from the airport with her dad by now. I wished I could go in and watch Rusty’s reaction, but Chuck squealed the tires and tore out toward the hospital before I got a chance to ask if I could.
The ride to the hospital was short, as is every car ride with Chuck. I think I sort of fell asleep, because even though I felt like talking, my mouth wouldn’t work. I could hear Matt telling Chuck about what happened on the river, and I tried to force myself to dream about something else. I think for a minute I dreamed about those sparkly cowboy boots, but then my throbbing hand woke me up.
“We’re here!” Chuck pulled right up to the entrance of the ER. “I wonder if Diane’s workin’.” He opened the door and pulled me out and carried me in like a little baby. How embarrassing. I was still wrapped up in my towels from the river. Moving from the warm car to the cool emergency room gave me the shivers.
Matt and Mom went to check in while Flip and Chuck sat next to me on a cushy bench. I couldn’t stop my teeth from chattering.
“You poor little thing! I’m gonna go find you a blanket.” Chuck clomped off in his nonsparkly cowboy boots.
Flip moved over and sat next to me. He had his camera with him, and he was fiddling with it.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Investigating.”
“You sound like my mom.”
“You want to see your cannonball?”
“Sure.”
Flip handed me the camera. The display on the back showed a close-up of my face as I cannonballed down the Get-Out-Now waterfall.
“My mouth’s wide open. That’s attractive.”
“I think it’s an amazing shot,” Flip said. “Too bad we can’t use it.”
“Why not?”
“The shoes aren’t in focus.”
“Oh that’s right. It’s all about the shoes.”
He smiled and elbowed me. “Well, it kinda is.”
He grabbed the camera back and clicked to another picture. “Now this one we’ll use.”
It was a picture of the tube suck. When I was climbing up the back of the raft to try to bounce it off rock number three. Somehow, Flip got a close-up of just me, stretching upward to grab Mom’s hand, with the bottom of one of the shoes showing off the Riley Mae logo.
“That’s a crazy picture,” I said.
“I know. You have an awesome genius for a photographer.”
Matt and Mom seemed to have disappeared forever. And where was Chuck with that blanket? I continued to chatter away on my teeth as Flip clicked through the pictures.
“How many pictures did you take, anyway?”
Flip didn’t answer.
“Flip?”
Nothing.
I looked over at him. His mouth was hanging open.
“Are you okay?” He still didn’t answer.
Just then, Chuck came around the corner with a big fuzzy blue blanket — and nurse Diane. “Check it out, I found the best two things in this here hospital.”
Flip looked up from his camera. “And I think I just found our volleyball net.”