Page 25 of Starve
“You shouldn’t have sent her to that place!” Her righteous indignation is impressive as she marches in, followed by a doctor who was unprepared for her temper. He slouches a little, shoulders hunched, and glances at the nurse plaintively for help as he stays in my mother’s shadow. “She told me about tha-that hospital! Blueridge or whatever it is. And you!” She whirls suddenly on the doctor and I watch, impressed, without much pity for anyone here.
“You had her see a doctoron an iPadwho deemed my daughter unfit to go home. What a joke.” She’s not normally this upset, and I can’t help but wonder how much of it is for my wellbeing, and how much of it is just for the situation. After all, I’m sure this is even more of an inconvenience for her than it was to sit with me in the hospital for a few hours last week.
“How long have I been here?” I ask, interrupting the start of another tirade.
“Two days,” the nurse tells me, also seeming pleased to ignore my mother. “Give or take a few hours.”
“Which we will not be paying for,” my mother is quick to cut in as she glowers at the doctor again. “How long does she have to stay? Last I heard, her shoulder didn’t need stitches, and once she woke up, she would be fine to leave. Is that still the case?”
He’s nodding before he can really answer, and the doctor takes a nervous breath. “Yes, umm. I’d like to keep her here untilthe morning.” A quick glance at the clock shows me it’s almost eight. And if it’s been two days, that would make today Tuesday, I think. Which I confirm when I see the digital clock has a date on it as well, thankfully answering my questions so that I don’t have to ask them. Well, at least I can start working as soon as I get home, since there are always freelance jobs to get done for my agency.
I have to pay that mortgage, after all.
“And the police want to speak with her,” the doctor adds, nervous as he looks between me and my mother. “They want to ask her about what happened since she’s the only…” But he trails off, and I lay back down against the white sheets, listening to the steady beat of my heart on the monitor.
To my surprise, my mother comes to me instead of getting into his face, and tangles her fingers with mine in a way that could almost be called comforting. “Fine,” she says, her attention fixed on me. “But I want to be here.”
“Mom—”
“No, noMom,no arguments.” Her voice is firm, and when I look at her, I can see a glimmer of worry in her face that makes me wonder and hope that maybe I’ve been too hard on her. That perhaps she cares more than I’ve given her credit for.
Tentatively, I wrap my fingers back around hers, and give her a very small, very tired smile. “I want her to stay,” I agree, barely glancing at the doctor. “I’ll talk to whoever, but I want my mom to stay with me. That’s okay, right?”
Honestly, I don’t think the doctor could say no, even if it wasn’t. Not with the way my mom is looking at him as if she’s just waiting for a reason to fully go off and make his day worse.
He makes his escape quickly after assuring my mom she can stay, and in his absence and once the nurse departs, Mom pulls up a chair to the bed, though the sound of it scraping across the floor makes me wince.
“How do you feel?” Mom asks, her voice quieter and kinder now that no one else is in the room. She gives me an almost genuine smile, though it feels a little distracted.
Just like she usually is.
“Like crap,” I mutter, closing my eyes. “Mom, I don’t know what to tell the police.”
“Do you remember what happened? If you don’t, we can tell them that. We can just say—” But the door opens, allowing her time to just grip my hand a little tighter as two officers dressed in uniform come in, both of them looking like they’d rather be anywhere but here.
Honestly, they can just join the club at this point. Distantly, I dream of my damn bed, my clothes, and the way I can control the noise and what’s going on at my house. If I want quiet, I can have quiet. Or I can have the TV on, or music, or whatever.
And I don’t have to deal with people when I don’t want to. Unlike now, and the last several days.
I take a breath as the cops both sit, introducing themselves as they do, but it’s just white noise to me. I’m tired, though I won’t admit it, and as I answer their questions and repeat what I remember of what happened, I leave out one very important, probably life-changing detail.
That the things that had killed everyone were monsters.
I really don’t want to end up right back at some kind of sanitarium after going through everything I did just to get out of Bluebone Ridge alive.
The cops seem disappointed when they leave, and they seem to know that I’m not quite being honest with them. I barely sleep that night, even though I was given meds and my mom stays with me and promises me I can.
By the time I finally get back to my house the next afternoon and I convince my mom that I’m okay, that I really am fine, it’s night and everything is quiet.
But it’s not everything I’d hoped for. Even curled up on my couch with the television on just enough to be a source of white noise, it’s not…right.
Nothing is right now that it’s all sinking in.
Nothing is how it should be.
My mind races with the memory of the night at Bluebone clear and heavy in my head, no matter how many times I relive it or try to push it away.
I have no idea what’s on the TV.
