Page 109 of Something Rad
“No,” Robbie replies, his voice low. “That’s why I brought her here.”
Dr. Summers ignores Robbie’s comment, scooting even closer to me and raising an eye exam tool with a light up to his face. “Let’s take a look, shall we?” I try my best not to flinch away from his touch as he reaches for my hurt eye, gently pulling up on the lid. It feels like sandpaper, and I immediately try to close it again, but Dr. Summers keeps a firm hold on me. “There, there. Just a second.”
He spends a few more seconds examining my eye before he lets my eyelid go, standing up from his chair and walking over the trash can to remove his gloves.
“It’s just a minor corneal abrasion,” he says, grabbing a notepad from the counter next to him and scribbling something down.
“A…what?” I ask.
“A scratched eye,” he replies without looking up.
“So, I was right?” Robbie asks.
His dad ignores him. “It should heal on its own in one to three days. I’ll send you home with some saline solution to rinse it out with during that time.” He walks over to my side, tearing the top paper from the notepad and handing it to me. “Show this to Doris on your way out. She’ll get you what you need.”
“Um, thank you,” I say, taking the paper from him, “Dr. Summers.”
“It’s what I do,” he nods. “Now, Robert, how about you get this young woman back to school?” Robbie reaches out a hand to help me out of the chair. I fumble for it, accepting his help, standing up next to him. We start to turn away, but Robbie’s dad speaks up again. “And, son?”
Robbie slowly spins back to face him. “Yes?”
“Next time, maybe just save yourself some time and come straight here.” He smiles tightly at Robbie, reaching up and roughly ruffling his hair. I see Robbie’s jaw flex at the same moment mine comes unhinged. “So good to see you, son.”
Robbie’s hair is a complete mess, but he doesn’t make any move to fix it. “Right,” he grits. “Thanks, Dad.”
Robbie scoots us both out the door before Dr. Summers has a chance to say anything further, but we don’t make it far, running directly into another variation of Robbie on our first step into the hallway.
“Whoa,” the man stops in his tracks, eyeing me and Robbie, and then my hand in Robbie’s. He’s about an inch shorter than Robbie and his hair has a bit sandier of a hue to it. His eyes are also a darker shade of brown. “What do we have here?” he questions. “Hi, Dr. Summers,” he says, holding a hand out and winking at me. He gives me a smirk, and as confident as he seems to be in it, it just doesn’t have the same effect as his little brother. I shake his hand limply.
“Um, hi,” I mutter. “Sara.”
The moment thesecondDr. Summers drops my hand, he immediately moves to muss Robbie’s hair further. My eyes narrow in response. “Hi, Bobbie,” he grins. “I didn’t know you were here, little brother.”
“Well, Steven, it doesn't really matter,” Robbie grits. “Because we’re leaving right now.”
And without another word, Robbie drags me into the lobby, snatching the paper silently from my hand and handing it to Doris. She gives us a tight smile as she hands Robbie the saline solution and he mutters his thanks before hauling me out to his car, almost physically putting me into the passenger seat and buckling me in before I snap him out of his robotic trance, telling him I can do it.
He doesn’t say anything to me the entire ride back to school or the rest of the day, and I don’t ask anything of him, both of us wordlessly agreeing to temporarily lay down our weapons.
I think we’ve both had more than enough for today.
twenty-two
ROBBIE
I watch as Cooper turns over a book to read its library label, and my stomach sinks when I see her squint her left eye to read it.
It’s been three days sincethe incident, as Cooper and I have settled on calling it, since she doesn’t want to talk about what happened at the pep rally and I don’t care to talk about what followed it. I know she’s embarrassed about what happened to her, which is completely ridiculous, since it wasn’t her fault whatsoever. I know because I watched the whole thing unfold.
As much as I tried to avoid looking her way at the pep rally, Cooper’s fiery head of hair was the only thing I could manage to keep my eyes on from the moment I walked in the gym.
She had no idea, I’m sure, hard at work, taking all of her newspaper pictures like it was the most important task in the world. Since she was too busy to notice me, I know she was also too busy to notice Denise conspiring with Ginger from the second she stepped through the doors.
Denise had that look in her eye, a look I know all too well. She was out for blood. I just have no idea why. What I do know though, was that nothing was going to end well the moment she started sauntering over to Cooper, her blonde ponytail bouncing behind her. I tried to stay out of it. I tried to just focus on the conversation with Paul and Brad and my other friends sitting around me that I felt like I hadn’t talked to in ages, but I couldn’t look away. And let me tell you, I’m glad I didn’t.
The moment that confetti popper went off right in Cooper’s eye, I thought I was gonna lose my shit. I’m not sure my feet have ever moved so fast. The basketball team is certainly going to be expecting a whole lot more from me this season after seeing the way I sprinted over to her.
I saw red. I was so angry with Denise for being so childish and petty. I wish I would’ve given her more of a mouthful, but I was too distracted by Cooper bent over in pain.
