Today, however, I’m unable to close my eyes fast enough.
“How are you feeling, Piper?” Mrs. Payne asks as she steps inside my hospital room.
My dad has returned to work, but as a local pediatrician, his office isn’t far from the hospital. My mom stepped out, claiming to need to make a few calls, but I don’t doubt that she’s growing restless just watching me lie in bed for days on end. I, too, want to escape this place, but the doctors treating me haven’t mentioned a discharge yet.
“I’m okay,” I croak.
“Your mom tells me that you may get out of here in a couple of days.”
I merely nod. What else can I say right now? I want to tell her I’m sorry. I have this gut-turning need to explain what happened. Even as crappy as it would be to place blame on Dalton for grabbing the steering wheel, he’s at least partially responsible for what happened. Had I wrecked just from the vitriol he’d spit in my direction on our way home, he’d still be partially culpable for the end result, honestly.
But her son is clasping on to life, and that doesn’t seem fair.
No doubt Dalton would point fingers and blame in my direction all day long, even if he was one hundred percent responsible, but I just don’t have it in me.
“Do you hurt?” Mrs. Payne asks when my face screws up when I try to re-situate my lower half on the bed.
“I’m okay,” I tell her.
As much as I’d like the physical pain to go away, it’s the torment in my dreams that had prevented me from asking for pain meds today. Plus, the sooner I can get up and move around, the sooner I can go home. I’m tired of the hospital, disgusted by the sterile smells surrounding me. It’s going to take weeks to get the scent of this place off my skin.
“I wanted to apologize for what Dalton did.”
Despite the debilitating pain in my body, my head snaps in her direction. My eyes go fuzzy from the sudden movement, but when my eyes refocus, I find her at my bedside with her head hung low.
“I’m sorry?” It’s a question, not an apology on my part.
Confusion forces my brows together when her shoulders begin to shake with tremors.
“He shouldn’t have been drinking. He shouldn’t have been driving.” Her head lifts, eyes rimmed red and overflowing with tears. “Why did you get in the car with him?”
My head shakes, the back-and-forth motion making it feel like I’m swimming in a murky pond. My confusion before has nothing on how I’m feeling right now.
“I don’t understand,” I manage when it’s clear she still wants answers.
“He’s so strong-willed,” she says, her chin quivering in a way that makes me wish I could reach out and hold her.
Her pain is clear in the forward slump of her shoulders and the wary look in her emotion-filled eyes.
“I know he wouldn’t let anyone drive that stupid car, but I wish you’d have gotten a ride with someone else at the party. At least you could’ve avoided all of this pain and suffering.” She sobs again as she lowers her face into her trembling hands. “I don’t know what I would’ve done if you had…”
She doesn’t complete her sentence, but the intent is clear. Does she think Dalton was driving? I guess it makes sense. Even I was shocked when Dalton climbed into the passenger seat after I insisted he wasn’t going to drive home intoxicated. Someone else driving his car is unheard of, but she doesn’t have a true account of what happened.
I swallow, needing to tell her the truth, but instead of the words leaving my lips, I keep them clenched tight.
I blame my own weakness, my fear of dying in prison if Dalton doesn’t make it, but I know that the guilt that settles in my stomach will eat a hole in it the size of the seventeen-year-old boy that’s hidden somewhere else inside the hospital.
The truth will come out eventually, and I’m a coward for not confessing now, but I have no idea how everyone will react. I don’t want to face this alone without my mom and dad here, even though their own disappointment is something I’ve been avoiding the last couple of days as well.
“How is Dalton?” I ask, rather than answering her questions.
“He’s…” She sobs again, and I wait for her to tell me that his condition is deteriorating. “They’ve weaned him off the drugs that put him in a coma since the majority of the swelling has diminished. He’s woken up a couple of times, but he’s disoriented. He didn’t remember us when he woke the last time. Dr. Columbus is confident that he’ll get his memory back soon, but there are no guarantees.”
As she begins to explain that a specialist has been called in and should arrive sometime tomorrow, I let my mind wander.