Behind the Scenes by Dahlia Adler

Author:Dahlia Adler [Adler, Dahlia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781939392985
Publisher: Spencer Hill Press
Published: 2014-06-24T00:00:00+00:00

16

THE NEXT DAY, THOUGH, was entirely about my dad. I showed up at the hospital bright and early—well, relatively bright, considering I was still pre-coffee, and relatively early, given that Van and I had both passed out on the couch and overslept—and parked myself in the chair right next to his hospital bed with a bag full of textbooks.

“You’re looking cheerful,” he observed as he watched me settle in, his own eyes tired. Then he hiccupped.

“Still doing that, huh?”

“Unfor-hic-tunately. Not as frequent. How’s your break going?”

“Not bad. Van actually came over last night to watch a movie. Well, sort of watch a movie. Lucy kept asking her questions every five seconds, including a zillion about Liam.”

He laughed weakly, which brought on another round of hiccups. It was his fifth day of that stretch in the hospital, which meant he’d had a crap-ton of drugs pumped into his system. His body was always shot by this point, and it was harder to pretend everything was normal. “How is your sister?”

“She’s good. She misses you a lot.” I felt a twinge in my gut when I thought of my last real one-on-one conversation with her; I’d never actually answered her question, and I still didn’t know how. But I did know that keeping her fully in the dark while he was in the hospital didn’t help. “I wish you and Mom would let her visit.”

There was a rasping sound in response, and I quickly brought him some water. “I’ll probably be home tomorrow,” he said after taking a sip. “My creatinine levels are high. I’m not sure I’ll get another dose today.”

The defeat in his voice broke my heart, the way it always did when he was nearing the end of a course of treatment. It was for his own good that the stopping point in each cycle was dependent on his kidney function, and I knew from reading up on statistics that he tolerated more than most, but he still seemed to take it as a personal failing every time his levels hit the magic number that had him packing up his hospital pajamas.

“You did great,” I assured him, even though I knew it was falling on deaf ears, on top of the fact that he was drifting off to sleep.

He waved a hand dismissively, just as I knew he would.

I sighed. There was no point in fighting that battle, but I still wanted to fight Lucy’s. “You need to let her visit during your next round. It drives her crazy, sitting at home and wondering what you look like in here. I’ll bring her and stay with her the whole time, I promise.”

“I’ll talk it—hic—over with your mother,” he mumbled, but he was already half-asleep. I settled back into the reclining chair my mother had slept in the night before and pulled out my Calculus textbook.

I got no more than a few pages in when I drifted off right along with him; apparently my night on the couch with Van hadn’t been all that restful, and Calculus wasn’t exactly mind-whirling.

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