Summer I Found You (18 page)

I have her under one arm, but I’m only holding her up because she’s pressed into my side.
What the hell just happened?
I’m trying to walk, and she’s trying to walk the three steps back to the car door, but her legs keep buckling, and each time they do, she slides farther down my side, and I’m losing my grip.

I can’t lose my grip.

“I…ospital…sho-ot…foo…” Her voice sounds like she’s talking through syrup. Sinking dread hits me in another wave. I don’t know what to do. What’s
wrong
with her?

“Can you grab me? At all?” Oh, shit.
I’m not going to be able to do this with one hand.
My head is nothing but fuzz. There’s no thinking. Just anger and frustration. I
have
to do this faster. Get her in the car faster. I scan the parking lot, which was awesomely empty a few moments ago. Now I’m pissed that a few clouds are keeping people away.

Her fingers feebly pinch my shirt as she pushes into me, trying to help me hold on.

“What’s happening, Kate?
What do I do?
”

She’s trying to form words, but nothing’s coming out right.

We’re to the door, but I don’t know how to get her in. She’s a near rag-doll right now. I lean her against the car, using my body against hers to keep her from falling over, and pull open the door.

If she hits the ground, I’m not sure if I could lift her with one arm. She slumps farther just as I get my arm back around her. “Kate.
Kate!
”

Each second pushes me further and further into frantic mode. I know I need to call 911, but I can’t let go of her.

I use my leg and my arm together, trying to balance her body. I need my other damn arm! I need to call 911!

“Fuck!”

I manage to slide her in the seat, using my arm, my leg, and my body, even though I’m shaking. She helps only slightly, and now she’s in, but limp, and just blinking a bit, like she’s fighting to keep her eyes open. I push her leg inside with my foot before closing the door, pulling out my phone, dialing 911. Now I have to set the damn thing on speaker so I can drive and talk. I’m shaking. This is like the nightmares; I can’t help, only
way
too real. I leap in the car and tear out of the parking lot. We’re headed back to town at about ninety when 911 answers. Kate’s breathing, but almost completely unresponsive. Her eyes half blink a few more times. I can’t lose her.
Can’t
.

“Nine-one-one. Please state your emergency.” A woman’s voice answers.

“My girlfriend passed out. I don’t know why. I’m in the car. She said something about a shot. I think.” Kate. Shot? My heart’s pounding so hard I’m worried I won’t be able to hear the woman at the other end.

“Is she using drugs?”

“No!” I yell.

“Are you sure?”

“I—” Shit. I don’t know anything. “
Just help her!
”

“I need you to pull over until an ambulance can get to you.”

Fuck that. “I’m ten minutes away, tops.” My foot’s hard on the floor. Kate’s eyelids are still twitching.

“I need you to check for a pulse. Is she still breathing?”

Holy shit this is all too real. “She’s breathing.” I can’t believe I’m saying these words.

“Can you check her wrists for a bracelet or a necklace that might indicate a medical condition?”

“What?” No. I can’t. “I only have one arm and I’m using it to drive.” Tears are streaming down my face, and I’ve never been more frantic and angry about my handicap than I am now. I jerk on the steering wheel a few times. “Shit!”

“I need you to calm down.” This woman’s calm voice is pissing me off. “I need you to pull off the side of the road. We’ll find you.”

“I’m not stopping the damn car!”

“Do you have her full name and date of birth?” The woman’s voice stays calm.

“Kate Walker, and…
fuck, I don’t know!
”

“I need you to breathe, okay? Where are you now?”

“Five minutes away, tops.” But I still can’t control my breathing. I don’t even care about crying.
I just need my other arm.
I want to touch her. Touch her hair. Her arm. Feel her breathe. Check for some bracelet or something.

Can’t be, though. She can’t have some medical condition. Kate would have said something.

Would she? Maybe she was just using you, Aidan. You know this started out as you using her for distraction.

No! But I’m shaking. Right now anything and everything feels possible.

“I’ve warned the hospital you’re coming,” the woman says.

“
What do I do?
” I’m now weaving through traffic, and the hospital’s in sight. I keep glancing over at Kate, but I’m afraid to steer with my knee to touch her when I’m driving this fast.

As I screech to a stop in front of the ER, they’re waiting for me. Two guys, both with
two
arms, pull her out, set her on a bed, and run her inside. I want to go in with her, but I’m yelled at to move my car so I jump in, my body tensed and shaking.

I dial Jen on my way inside and try to tell her what happened, but my voice keeps quivering as the shock of the situation this me again and again.

“Kate’s really bad about staying on top of it,” Jen says. “I’ll call her parents.”

“On top of what?” I yell.

Silence.

“Dammit, Jen! I’ve just had one of the shittiest experiences of my life. What the fuck is going on!”

“She’s diabetic. Takes shots. All of it. If she passed out, maybe she did her shot at home guessing what you guys were going to eat, and messed it up. She’s not very good at—”

I hang up. Numbness sweeps through me just before disbelief, and then my insides shatter.

The nurse comes out and asks me a million questions I can’t answer. When did Kate last have a shot? When did she eat? Do I have any information that’ll help? All I get to do is relive watching her face go slack, her voice get funny, and the weight of her in my arms, and me feeling desperate to help her, having no idea how to do it with only one arm.

My body’s heavy, exhausted, filled with disbelief.

“When can I see her?” I ask the nurse, half ready to bolt around her and start checking rooms.

“Are you family?” The nurse looks over her glasses.

“I, no, but I brought her in.” That’s got to count for
something
.

“Sorry. Family only.” She shakes her head and turns away. “You can have a seat and wait.”

Wait.

Wait.

I still can’t stop the damn tears. Kate’s so close.
So close.
But I can’t talk to anyone. Can’t see her. Can’t touch her.

And how the hell did she think it was okay not to tell me this?

She has to do
shots
. It’s not something that slipped her mind. It’s something she kept from me. Had to
plan
to keep from me.

I stare at a fake fire in the waiting room for what feels like an eternity.

Kate’s parents come in, and I jog toward them, hoping for answers.

Her dad puts his arm around me. “She’ll be fine. Come on.”

I barely know the guy, but he’s about to get me in to maybe see her, or to at least know what’s going on. “Thanks.”

“Aidan. Thank you. You have no idea.” His voice shakes, and his hand pats my back once before letting me go.

We’re ushered to a waiting room where I’m pelted with the same questions from her father as I got from the nurse. He explains that she took her insulin before leaving the house, and then when she didn’t eat soon enough, her blood sugar dropped. Like Jen guessed. He’s been on the phone with the doctor at the hospital and Kate will be fine. Her low isn’t as dangerous as a high, but is still a big deal. All I can think is how she hid this from me. How I could’ve talked with her. I’d understand probably better than most people she knows, and she didn’t trust me with it. It doesn’t make sense.

Her dad stands up and talks quietly with a doctor then disappears into Kate’s room at the end of the hall.

Deena sits next to me. She puts her hand on my good shoulder and speaks barely above a whisper.

I’m still trying not to shake.

She tells me about Kate getting her diagnosis, and how she’s fought against it every step of the way. But Kate’s version of fighting is trying to ignore it, which has landed her in the ER more than once. Deena tells me about how Kate might be stuck here next year, and how her parents want her on an insulin pump. Why she should do it, and why she hates the idea so much.

“You can tell Kate I told you everything,” Deena says quietly. “I’ve never seen her fall for someone the way she’s fallen for you.”

I’m not sure if I’m happy about that, or if it makes me angrier.

“Thanks. For telling me, I mean.” I try a smile that I know completely fails.

“Sorry she’s so stubborn.” The corner of Deena’s mouth twitches in a partial smile.

I nod again because I’m still sort of in shock. I’m in the hospital. For Kate.

Her dad waves her mom inside. I’m still waiting with Deena, but now we sit in silence. I don’t have anything to say. Maybe one thing. “I like your sister way more than I expected to.”

Deena chuckles. “Kate’s funny that way.”

Funny. And now I’m starting to wonder—what the hell is she doing with me? A one-armed guy who has no idea what to do with his life, a crazy family life, and a past he doesn’t want to face.

At the same time—what the hell am I doing with her? She only tells me half-truths, and is just too young to be involved with someone who has my issues. Well, and she obviously doesn’t care about me knowing her.

I’m weak now. The adrenaline’s gone, and exhaustion is taking over. Kate’s mom steps out of her room, making eye contact with me, and holding the door open so I can step in.

No one speaks.

Maybe I look that pissed. Maybe I’m more afraid than I want to be and they can see it on my face. It doesn’t matter why we’re quiet.

Her dad steps out. Her mom gives me a weak smile.

I leap out of my chair and go into Kate’s room.

Kate’s in a hospital gown with an IV in her arm, and dark circles under her eyes. I want to cry, and punch my fist through something, and scream. But I stand at the foot of her bed. Still. And wait for her to talk.

A
IDEN’S FACE IS PALE.
And he’s too still.

This is definitely not a good way for him to learn about my diabetes. I’m re-playing all the millions of times that I could have said something and didn’t. How much I like him, am starting to
more
than like him, and how I screwed this up so badly. I have to lighten this. Make him see that it’s not a huge deal.

“I know this is all very dramatic and whatever…” I roll my eyes.

“Don’t,” he says as his jaw clenches and his head starts to shake.

His breathing fills the room, and I’m terrified of what he’s going to say next.

“Don’t joke about this. I was scared as hell, Kate. I didn’t know what to do. It took everything I had to get you in my car.” He rubs his hand down his face, and I swear his chin pulls like mine does just before I cry.

He can’t cry. Aidan crying would be worse than either of my parents.

I’m so
stupid
. “I was pretty out of it,” I whisper. He did so well. I mean, I sort of remember him helping me into his car, and some yelling on the phone…

He does this way-too-slow breathe in. And then a breathe out. I know that if this were my dad, it would be a huge deal. “I don’t even mind that, Kate. If it helped you, I’d learn all about your diabetes, and what you needed or whatever. But you never gave me the chance. Hell, I might have known what better to do. Stick a candy in your mouth or made sure you got your food or something, but you never said anything.”

“I asked you this earlier. Wouldn’t you hide the loss of your arm if you could?”

“No!” He throws his arm in the air. “I wouldn’t. Because like it or not, it’s part of who I am now, just like whether you like it or not, being diabetic is part of who you are. And it’s something you should’ve trusted me with.”

I’m frantic now, but I’m stuck here with a needle in my arm. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for passing out on you like that, and—”

“Don’t you get it? It’s not about you
passing out
. You know me, Kate! And you never gave me the chance to know you!” Once again his breathing fills the room, and my heart starts to break at the knowledge that I made him feel this way.

I want him to know me. I just want him to like what he sees. There’s already so many annoying things—my blurts of honesty, my age, the fact that I still have to ask my parents if we want to go out…Maybe I was afraid that the diabetes would be too much.

“But I trust you, Aidan. I trusted that you could take care of me, and you got me here.” I’m trying to smile, but his scared, pale face is scaring me. Making my heart flutter, and my chest tight.

“Kate. That’s insane. You could have gone into a coma or something in the car. It was luck that got us here on time! And you
don’t
trust me or you would have said something forever ago!”

My chest sinks further. No, no. “But I—”

“No! I know plenty of people who are disfigured, hurt, killed, and you, by not doing everything you can to keep yourself healthy, are going to end up the same way. And when you’re ready to handle this for real, and take care of yourself,
then
we’ll talk about trust, but I can’t be around someone who lies to me and doesn’t care enough about themselves to stay on top of a disease like this.” His face has gone hard, and my heart’s starting to break. “You have a choice.”

“I’m so sorry.” My cheeks are wet, and I’m trying to smear my tears away, but there are too many. “I just don’t want this. It’s like if I can ignore it, or set it aside—”

“Deal with it! You’re in a fucking hospital. And from what I’ve learned from your sister, if you keep this up, this not maintaining or whatever, it could
kill you
.”

His eyes are hard on me.

I swallow a few times, trying to find the words to tell him that I
want
him to know me. Want him to be with me. Wish that he’d forgive me.

“Look around, Kate. You don’t need to be here.” His voice has turned this eerie fake calm. “I know plenty of people who died in circumstances out of their control. You’re making yourself a victim when you don’t need to.”