Eduard lived and breathed school. Some people craved sports, some prom dates. Eduard sought good grades, teacher recommendations, all-nighters, six page essays. The day he asked for his college transcript was the second happiest in his life. The day his college acceptance letter came was the first.
It had been snowing but Eduard didn't care. How could he? Eighteen years he had been working for that slip of paper, and now he had it. He wasn't sure where he was going—he had a test tomorrow to study for—but hell, he had earned a quick drive.
Ha. A quick drive.
The Church Street stop sign approached, and Eduard hit the brakes. And he kept sliding. And sliding. He should have guessed there would be a giant truck just happening to be passing by. It hit his car. For a moment, Eduard imagined the eighteen-wheeler pushing him down the road. Then his head hit the window.
It's funny; out of every stupid knickknack they recovered from the wreck, they never found the letter.
The debate team had sent a card. When the doctors came in and talked too fast, Eduard watched the card. He had no idea what it said but it was better than asking the doctor to repeat himself five times.
Brain damage.
It was the only word Eduard could understand. His mother explained to him that it wasn't permanent. Eduard wished he could explain that it didn't matter. Nothing mattered. He wished he could tell the debate team to save their breath; he sure as hell wasn't going to be doing anymore talking.
His tongue felt like a foreign object in his mouth, not willing to cooperate. After the third day of Eduard stuttering, his doctor gave him a white erase board. It joined the card on the table.
There wasn't much to do in a hospital when you had brain damage. The people on the television talked too quickly, the words on the page thatmust be there might just as well been Japanese. Eduard wandered up and down the wing of his hospital, growing more and more adept at using his crutches. And then he sat in bed. And sat.
"Uh, hello."
Eduard ripped his eyes away from the window. What the hell was a boy doing in his room? He couldn't have been much older than a freshman. But there he was, wearing scrubs and a nervous smile.
"Eduard, right?"
At least he could understand this one. Eduard nodded, sitting up higher in his bed.
"I'm Raivis. I sort of work here." The boy laughed, slowly edging further into the room. "Um. Are you busy? I guess not, it's sort of why they sent me up here. To…" Raivis coughed, motioning at a nearby chair.
Eduard was… Well, a bit of a snob. He wasn't mean—in fact, had you asked some of his classmates, they would tell you he was quite friendly—but he didn't exactly enjoy talking just any student. Had they met under different circumstances, Eduard would have brushed Raivis off.
As it was, Eduard grabbed the white erase board.
He drew a stick figure with its arm raised. Then, he drew a chair. It took longer than Eduard would have liked but it was better than sitting in unwilling silence. Raivis took a seat, scooting his chair closer.
"Uh, hi, again!" Another nervous smile, Raivis' eyes flicking from his hands back up to Eduard. "Are you in college yet? You have a lot of text books, and your mother was talking… Oh, well, neither am I."
Raivis couldn't make eye contact with Eduard if it killed him.
"That's a nice card. What's debate team like?"
Amazing. Intellectual.
Eduard drew circles, giving both an set of eyebrows and frowns.
It was strange not to do all the talking. Eduard felt as if someone had cut off his arm and asked him to do a cartwheel. The more questions Raivis asked, the messier the drawings became. Eventually, Eduard just replaced the board back on the desk.
Raivis squawked an awkward apology, tripping over himself to leave the room.
The next afternoon, Eduard caught sight of the freshmen. A tall man—one of the doctors who ghosted in and out of rooms constantly—stood by Raivis, hand on his head. The boy looked at his feet. What could they be talking about? Maybe Raivis wasn't supposed to be here.
Eduard waited for the doctor to finish scolding Raivis, leaning against the wall and nodding when he spotted a familiar nurse. Finally, Raivis scampered away from the doctor, nearly running into Eduard.
"Oh, sorry! I was just, I was just," Raivis threw a nervous glance over his shoulder.
He spoke too quickly for Eduard to understand. Sure, he caught a word every now and again, but the overall meaning was lost. After a minute of utter meaningless noise, Eduard continued on his journey.
Ridiculous. Raivis called an apology after him. Sorry, that's what the truck driver had said. Over and over again. Everyone was sorry.
The next time Raivis visited, Eduard was slowly, systematically ripping every page out of a book his mother had gotten him. What was the point? He couldn't even talk, let along read or write or take a damned test. It felt good to destroy something that he used to enjoy.
"Eduard?" Raivis stood nearby, swaying lightly. "I'm sorry if I upset you. Dr. Braginski… He can be…" He sat in a chair, nearly missing and falling to the floor. "My shift's over, but…" He motioned at the mountain of paper.
Eduard ripped another page and then shut the book. There was something off about Raivis. He met Eduard's eye, but he looked as though he wasn't aware he was doing so. And Raivis' head kept dipping forward.
He was high.
"I found your…" Raivis pressed his palms into his eyes. "You play piano?"
After that, Eduard found something to focus on. Raivis swiped pills, and did so rather efficiently. There was a certain grace to it. Legally, Raivis wasn't able to administer prescriptions; he relied on the nurses' exhaustion, their trust. Eduard watched, always a few feet behind, and counted.
No one suspected Dr. Braginski's obedient ward to snitch whole bottles of painkillers from the pharmacy. Only bottles when he wasn't going to be volunteering for few days.
A side effect of following around Raivis was listening to whatever the boy had to say. When he was high, he talked about his distant cousins, aunts, father. Dr. Braginski and his strict rules and inspections. And there were hints of something else, something darker. Something that made Raivis' fingers shake even when he was sober.
Polite questions all the times Raivis wasn't on something. Eduard found he had to deal with this these if he was to observe Raivis.
Piano, blog, school. These were the things that made Eduard.
Pills, apologies, Braginski. These were the things that made Raivis.
"What do you do to relax?" Raivis asked one evening, eyes glassy and bright.
Eduard looked up from the debate team's card. There was a long moment of silence, before finally, finally, "Book."
"Tearing them up?"
And then Raivis started crying. Eduard drew back like he had been stung. Hot tears dripped down Raivis' cheeks while he wiped them away impatiently. God, why was he crying? Without anything else to do, Eduard grabbed the white board and drew an oval.
"You don't understand," Raivis shook his head, curling into his seat.
Yes, Eduard couldn't understand. He couldn't understand how to form his thoughts into words. He couldn't understand when the doctors told him about the new speech therapist he was going to.
Fuck—Eduard could understand Raivis. Pills or that hulking doctor, whatever it was. Words were beyond him now, but Eduard could grasp something as simple as bullying. Couldn't he?
Eduard watched in silent desperation when Raivis stole a bottle.
His mother couldn't understand Eduard's reluctance to leave the hospital two days later. Surely, one more day couldn't hurt? Just so Eduard could know, give Raivis his number, not recoil the next time the boy cried.