Far From You

10

THREE AND A HALF YEARS AGO (FOURTEEN YEARS OLD)

The morphine has worn off. The pain is all over, a sharp edge that relentlessly carves through me.

“Push,” I say between cracked lips. I move my hand, the unbroken one, trying to find the button for the morphine drip.

“Here.” Warm fingers close over mine, placing the pump in my palm. I push the button and wait.

Slowly, the pain retreats. For now.

“Your dad went to get coffee,” Trev says. He’s in a chair next to my bed, his hand still covering mine. “Want me to find him?”

I shake my head. “You’re here.” The morphine makes my brain fuzzy. Sometimes I say stupid stuff, I forget things, but I’m almost positive he hasn’t visited before.

“I’m here,” he says.

“Mina?” I breathe.

“She’s at school. I got out early. Wanted to see you.”

“You okay?” I ask. There’s a fading bruise on his temple. He’s sitting in a weird position, his leg straightened out like it’s in a cast. But I can’t prop myself up enough to see how bad he’s hurt. Mina has a cast on her arm, I remember suddenly. The nurses and my mom had to force her to leave last night; she hadn’t wanted to go.

“I’m fine.” He strokes my fingers. They’re pretty much the only part of me that isn’t bruised or broken or stitched together.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “Sophie, I’m so sorry.”

He buries his face in the sheets next to me, and I don’t have the strength to lift my hand to touch him.

“’S’okay,” I whisper. My eyes droop as the morphine kicks in further. “Not your fault.”

Later, they’ll tell me that it was his fault. That he ran a stop sign and we got T-boned by an SUV going twenty above the speed limit. The doctors will explain that I flatlined on the operating table for almost two minutes before they got my heart started again. That my right leg was crushed and I now have titanium rods screwed into what little bone remains. That I’ll have to spend almost a year walking with a cane. That I’ll have months of physical therapy, handfuls of pills I have to take. That I’ll have a permanent limp, and my back will cause me problems for the rest of my life.

Later, I’ll finally have enough and cross that line. I’ll crush up four pills and snort them with a straw, floating away in the temporary numbness.

But right now, I don’t know about what’s ahead for us, him and me and Mina. So I try to comfort him. I fight against the numbness instead of drowning myself in it. And he says my name, over and over, begging for the forgiveness I’ve already given.