Page 134 of Things I Read About
Sadie laughs. “I’ll try to think of something poetic about us for you all by tomorrow. G’night, Sal.” She kisses my head.
“Not to be dramatic,” Sam says, crying. Everyone starts sniffing and chuckling at the same time. “I feel like you took a bullet for me. Even though we all know it was for Nate, it was also kinda for me. So, thank you. I mean, you kind of saved my life.”
“Not to be dramatic, though,” Skye teases, also teary.
We all laugh as I hug Sam and then Skye and their husbands.
Kat is next. She leans down by my ear. “Hey, you know who jumps in front of a bullet for the man they love?” She pulls back to look at me. “Main effin' characters, Sal. The. Main. Fucking. Character.” She smiles wide, and proud, her eyes wet on the edges.
I nod, crying a bit harder now.
“Shoo,” Susan whispers. “Whatever you’re saying is getting her all worked up. She needs to sleep.”
“All right, all right.” Kat waves as she backs away.
Susan stands between me and my view of the door as everyone files out except for my nurse.
“Okay.” My sister hovers over me. “You need anything before you try to sleep? Do you think you can eat?”
I shake my head. I do not think I can eat.
“Well, I’m right here in this chair they’re trying to pass off as a recliner. If you wake up just, well, actually you don’t have to do anything, do you? You so much as sniff and I’ll be all up in your business.” Susan laughs at herself, and I smile.
“Good,” I say. She sits and as I’m about to close my eyes I can only think of one thing. “Suze?” She stands up so fast she loses her balance. “I do need something. I need to know how he is, okay? Not just that he’s in the ICU, I want details.”
“Okay, I’ll text Shep. As soon as he gets any updates, he’ll let us know.”
“And you’ll wake me?”
She winces.
I grab her arm where she’s leaning on my bed. “You’ll tell me as soon as I wake up?”
“Fine, yes. Now sleep.”
I close my eyes, but I don’t know if I will actually fall right to sleep. I hear a clicking sound nearby as the nurse murmurs something to Susan.
The nurse leaves and Susan sits. Pain reliever. In my veins.
Whoaaaaaa
That feels so craz…
_____
I hear shushing.
“Don’t you all need to get back to New York? Honestly.”
Giggling.
“C’mon Suze, snoring is cute. You were out cold,” Sam tries to whisper. She’s not really capable of whispering, though.
“Dead asleep yet still white knuckling the side of her bed somehow. Amazing. And how did your own snoring not wake you? Or her?” Skye laughs.
“For the fiftieth time, I was in a weird position. That’s all. I do not snore.”
“I didn’t hear you, Susan,” I grunt.
