Recuperation and Reconciliation
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Chrissy’s dad came home from his trip on Wednesday. He and my dad dragged everyone home that night for showers and meals and nights in beds.
That was the command, anyway. Dad woke in the morning to find me sleeping on the sofa, Electra held close to my chest.
“What the Hell are you doing down here?” he asked.
“She didn’t want to be alone right now,” I said. “And it’s against the rules for her to sleep in my bed with me, so…”
He snorted, then shook his head. “Well, brush your teeth, both of you, I’ll drive you to the hospital.”
Thursday, Chip was in good enough condition to read more of Wuthering Heights.
They actually finished the reading on Friday morning. The surgeon came by and allowed him to walk out that day, too!
Well, for ‘walk’ read ‘transported by wheelchair from the bed to the car,’ but he got into the car all by himself.
No one ever asked why he was three miles out of his way, going home from Chrissy’s house by way of the cul-de-sac we lived on.
Mrs. Obrien just gave me and Chrissy a hug on Friday, thanking the Good Lord Above that friends had been near in this time of crisis. And she blew a kiss at Electra!
The jocks didn’t completely abandon him. They collected his missed school work and passed around one of those 3-foot tall get well cards for signatures. They showed up at his house during his recuperation.
They were bringing in his completed school work every day. I wondered how they took to him dictating a book REVIEW of Wuthering Heights?
Or maybe Chrissy helped him with that. I never asked. I took the part of writing Electra’s REVIEW at a useful scale.
Not a word was said about my disinterest in the book, or the review. We actually stopped during her dictation and had a couple of discussions.
When I finished recording her dictation, I put it carefully in a folder and looked down at her.
“Okay. No more secrets.”
“What?” she asked uncomfortably.
“Part of the problem the night of the accident was that I was thinking of something to surprise you with. And I should have just told you.”
“Oh. YOUR secrets. Okay. Yeah,” she agreed. “No more of your secrets.”
“What did you think I was talking about?”
“Nothing.” She shrugged.
“Oh, your focus? No, I’d need MOM in on agreeing to reveal that secret.”
“And you were going to surprise me?” she reminded me.
So I dragged the footlocker over by the table. I opened the lid, careful to align it so that she couldn’t look inside from where she was.
I brought up an overstuffed leather couch, sylph-scale. I set it on the table.
“Oh, Conrad. That looks perfect!” she admired.
“Sit on it,” I suggested. Pleaded.
She did, sinking down into the foam cushion. “Oh, it’s so SOFT!”
“Yay,” I said. “I tried so hard to find the right texture for the foam.”
“It’s perfect. If I close my eyes, I would think I was on a real sofa.”
I did not shout, ‘it is a real sofa!’ See? Conrad CAN learn to shut up. Sometimes.
I just brought out half of the set. She heard it coming and opened her eyes. I set it down behind her and picked the couch up, setting it carefully in the living room.
“Oh. Wow, this is a decent scale model of your living room!”
“Our living room,” I said softly. I turned on the Christmas lights that started to flash in the fireplace. The red mylar scattered the light like flickering flames.
“Cool,” she said. She started to stand up. “I wanna see what it looks like full-on.”
“Hang on,” I said. I brought up the rest and snapped it into place. Now she was surrounded by the room, with bookshelves, lamps, windows and shades, a door, the fireplace and a framed painting on the wall (Van Gogh’s Starry Night on Postage Stamp).
She glanced up, a stunned look on her face, as I lowered the ceiling into place. The light was wired to the same battery as the fireplace.
She walked around the room, staring at things, touching them, to see what was real, what wasn’t.
She paused and stared at the window for the camera. She waved one hand slowly.
“Yes, I can see you,” I said softly.
“You sneaky bastard,” she said.
“Yes.”
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Index
44. Room for Waiting
46. Crippling Phobia