Alice walked into the
fast food franchise with her mother, Lorna.
They stopped long enough to give their order and pick up their food
before making their way to a table. The
minute they’d sat down, Lorna took out her cell phone and started texting.
Alice’s smile lit up her
face and her blond curls bounced as she looked up at her mother. “Mommy, guess what we did today? We went to the wood park and pretended it was
a castle. Jimmy Joe pretended he was the
dragon, and Sarah Jane got to be the princess in the tower.”
The woman absently
nodded.
“Millicent got a new
baby doll that wets when you feed it. It’s
heavy too, just like a real baby.”
The woman’s eyes were
still glued to the cell phone in her hand.
There was silence for a
couple of minutes while she ate her chicken fingers, then she tried once more
to talk to her mother. “We are going to
the zoo for a class fun day. Cara’s mom
and Brittany’s dad are coming. You can
come with me if you want, Mommy.”
An unintelligible noise
was her only response.
Looking around, a woman
sitting at the next table caught her eye and she smiled up at her.
The woman returned her
smile and asked, “Are those chicken fingers good?”
She nodded her head.
Lorna looked up long
enough to look at the stranger intruding on her time with her daughter before
returning her gaze back to her phone.
Alice was quiet for a
while and then looked up at her mother once again. “I love you, Mommy.”
Without taking her gaze
off of the cell phone, and with no inflection of affection in her tone at all,
Lorna replied, “I love you too.”
She finished her meal in
silence and a after a few more minutes, Lorna set her phone in her bag to
gather up their trash and throw it away.
She pressed a button on the phone and lifted it to her ear as they made
their way out of the restaurant.
Lorna reached the car
first and opened the back door, then she turned to see what was keeping
Alice. As she saw her skipping toward
the car, a large truck came out of nowhere and swerved into the child’s
path. The squeal of brakes was loud in
the otherwise still day, and the sound of a thud as a ton of metal met a small
form sounded overloud to those who were present.
Lorna’s phone fell from
her hand as she rushed to the too still form of her little girl.
There was a doctor in
the crowd who hurried forward and asked for permission to treat the child.
Lorna nodded numbly.
Lainey had watched that
same scene for the past two weeks. Ever
since the transplant that saved her life.
Just a year ago she’d been on top of the world at graduation. When she’d taken the physical to join the
Navy, everything changed. She’d found
out about a heart defect that would rapidly zap her of her strength.
She felt the tears on
her cheeks as a soft light went on. The
sound of a wheelchair nearing the bed had her turning her head toward the
sound.
Mark had come to her
every night for the past two weeks. It
was as if he knew her demons and wanted to help her through a difficult
time. His hand reached out and took hold
of hers.
She felt the heat and
tried to smile as she said, “I’m sorry if I woke you.”
He grinned. “Nah.
I was battling my own demons.”
Her grip tightened on
his hand. “Does it ever go away?”
He looked off in the
distance before giving a shrug and saying, “I don’t think it ever goes away,
but we learn to adapt. Why don’t you
tell me about it? Maybe it will help
you.”
“They said it’s not
real. I’m just dreaming it because I
read the file. But the dream came
first. I have this feeling like I’m
supposed to do something, but I don’t know what it is.”
Mark drew closer to the
bed. “Sometimes people explain things
away because they don’t understand the truth.”
Lainey looked up into
warm brown eyes. “What about your
demons? Won’t they get jealous if you
take on mine too?”
Her thoughts went to the
little bits of information Mark had given her on his nightly visits. He’d been stationed in Afghanistan and during
a routine mission his team had run into an IED.
Mark was the only one to make it out alive. He was here because the eye that had been
injured in the blast had developed complications and it was necessary for it to
be removed. He’d come into the hospital
on the same day that she had. Although
there was a patch over his right eye, the bandages would be coming off soon so
the doctors could see how his new eye was working.
She scooted over so that
she could place her head on his shoulder.
She liked when Mark came to visit.
She felt safe. At twenty three,
Mark was just four years older than she was.
He made all of this less scary, and made her feel like she wasn’t alone
in the world anymore.
He winked. “Why don’t we take them on together?”
She closed her eyes
before giving a nod as she said, “They don’t stand a chance against the two of
us.”
Your hard work paid off! :)
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for your help. I acknowledged you on the Victory Dance and forgot here. I'll fix that though.
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