“Oh, that one. Sorry, kiddo, I never finalized them before we left. Didn’t think you’d need it until today…”
My jaw dropped open. I began to tremble. She hadn’t finalized my insurance papers! Which meant the insurance was never granted. Which meant that…
“I’m on my own,” I mumbled. “But…then how can I pay for my surgery and my stay here and all the other fees?” I said, trying and failing to control the growing angst in my voice.
Simone sighed into the receiver. I could almost see her eyes rolling from the other side of the phone.
“Listen, Elly. That, you’re going to have to figure out on your own. Right now, you’ve left me in my mess. You kinda botched my whole summer schedule and now I have to get back to the States and focus on my more promising leads. Nothing personal, of course. You get it, right?”
Not only did my agent not go through with my insurance papers, she was leaving me here…stranded. Literally unable to walk away. I was frozen in shock, dumbfounded.
“Hello? Hello? Right, I don’t have time for this. Uh…call if you need anything and uh…get well soon.” Simone’s voice suddenly died off as she hung up the phone.
She was abandoning me here and she hadn’t even apologized.
I set my phone on the bedside table and laid back down, still staring at the phone. This device was supposed to connect you to millions of people from across the world. Anyone you could think of.
And yet, there was nobody I could think of who I could call to help me. No one in the whole wide world.
CHAPTER12
ELLY
There was a knock on the door.
“Are you awake,querida?” A woman in a green nurse’s outfit poked her head in.
I opened my eyes. How long had I been lying like that, eyes closed but far from sleeping? My mind hadn’t stopped buzzing with dangerous thoughts.
“What time is it?” I asked, my voice scratchy. When was the last time I had drunk some water? I couldn’t remember. Just before the match?Was that today, or was that yesterday?
“It’s six thirty p.m.” The nurse entered the room. She was young, with a fresh face and a full mouth that wouldn’t stop smiling. It made me want to smile even though I had nothing to smile about. She pulled opened the curtains slightly.
“Oh,” I mumbled.When did I arrive here? How long has it been?
I propped myself on my arms and groaned. The pain was back. Sharp jolts swept through my body. The painkillers must’ve worn off.
“Does it hurt?” The nurse approached me, pointing at my knee.
I nodded, fresh tears in my eyes. The nurse nodded once and adjusted my IV catheter before injecting it with another fluid. Almost instantly, I felt my body relax as the drugs started working.
“There, that’s better. Now drink this,” the nurse said, offering me a water bottle that she had stacked on the tray she’d been carrying. I took the bottle and began to drink. And drink. And drink.
The nurse tutted. “Slowly, or you’ll make yourself sick. Careful, careful.”
I lowered the bottle and replaced the cap. The nurse nodded, smiling wider now.
“You have a visitor,” she said.
At this, my ears pricked up. A visitor?Is it Simone come to say she made a mistake and did actually file the insurance papers after all? Surely not…but who else could it be?Mom would never be allowed to take the trip and Sarah would refuse to leave Mom. So, who? It had to be Simone.
I was a little too eager in my reply to the nurse. “Please let her in.”
The nurse gave me an odd look and then walked out of the hospital room. I could hear her padding down the hall.
I waited. And waited. There was a knock. A loud, cracking knock that was a far cry from Simone’s typical incessanttap tap tap tap. The door swung open. I raised my body halfway, ready for my agent to come bursting in, her unreasonably high heels clicking against the linoleum.
But Simone never appeared. Instead, the face that burst through the door was the last face I expected to see. Or wanted to see at that very moment. As soon as our eyes met, my smile vanished and was replaced by a hard line. A grimace.