Chapter 3

Life often hits you hard, so hard you go stumbling onto the ground. Maybe its the realization that your mother is an alcoholic, or being fired from your dream job, but whatever it is, you remember the exact moment you heard it. Some people become numb for a few minutes, others lash out and another group, like me, just deny it and try to squish it to the back of our minds. Most people, luckily, only go through this once in a lifetime. I've gone through it twice in twenty four hours. First being hit by the truck and now, finding out I'd likely never wake up.

So, when the doctor left with my parents, I sat on the couch beside Kent and Izzy. Izzy was fiddling around with her hair, while Kent watched her. She was still holding the marigolds she bought from the hospital shop. I glanced at Kent. The blank look in his eyes had disappeared, replaced by a certain wariness and fear. There was no way he'd imagined his day ending up like this. It felt like something had stomped on our happy ending, killing it instantly.

After a few minutes, I couldn't stand it anymore. Sitting there while neither of them acknowledged me. I needed to do something other than see my boyfriend and little sister wondering if I would die. The doctor had said I was out of surgery, hadn't he? I wanted to find my body.

My mind made up, I stood up. I glanced at Izzy, who was playing with the marigolds, looking sad and miserable. Kent was staring at the wall.

Neither of them were looking at me, but I still wanted to say something. Pretend they were just ignoring me instead of being actually incapable of seeing me, "I'm going to find myself. So, goodbye," Still no reaction, not that I was surprised. I turned to Kent, "Make sure Izzy isn't too sad. I want her to be happy," then I walked to the directory.

Coma patients, it read, floor two, room seven. I glanced back one more time at Kent and Izzy, who were now joking around with each other, before walking down the corridor, trying to find the staircase.

The hallway in the second floor was, like the rest of the hospital, painted a boring light blue and reeked of a sterile scent. The coma ward was right in front of me. While the rest of the hospital was bustling with activity, doctors running around, frantic families trying to find their relative and nurses grabbing medications and sheets to deliver them to patients, the coma ward was dead. Six beds were lined up, three on each side, a person in each bed, lying still. The only life came from the machines beeping regularly. It was terrifying.

I made my way into the room, resisting the urge to tiptoe as I reminded myself that these people were in a coma and being woken up by noise would actually be the best thing that could happen to them. Then again, no one was able to actually hear me. For a second, I wondered if any of the coma patients were like me, walking around the hospital, unsure of what was happening, but I beat the thought out of my mind. It was too creepy.

I spotted my own bed quickly. It was at the back of the room to the left. A lone window was above my bed, casting light on my face. I barely recognized myself. My face was black and blue, with multiple cuts on my cheeks. It was swollen and half covered in bandages. It was disgusting. I was glad the rest of my body was under blankets.

I glanced at the bed beside mine. A middle aged redheaded woman, whose name was, according to the helpful chart on the table, Louise. Apart from a long scar stretching from her hairline to her eyebrow, she looked flawless. No cuts, no bruises, just skin. How long had she been in here? Had she been a teenager like me when she was first admitted and grew old? Was that what was going to happen to me? Doctor Caldmen's words floated back to me. If I even survived that long, at least.

Footsteps echoed through the room as people came in. I turned, expecting a nurse or maybe a doctor, but instead it was my parents. Seeing my mother with tear tracks and my father with tear tracks made me almost as uncomfortable as seeing my own body. It's unnatural to see parents when they aren't being strong.

The two of them get to my bed. My mother gasps when she sees me and my father looks as horrified as I feel. I wonder what Dr. Caldmen had told them to make them so scared? Mom bended down to stoke my hair. She hasn't done that to me since I was eleven and had the worst flu of my entire life.

Dad stared at me in disbelief, "Geez, she looks…" he trails off, but I know what he wants to say. She looks dead already. It stings, but I can't blame him. Even I think I look dead.

Mom shook her head, "No, no, no. Remember what the doctor said? She might be able to hear us." Dad nodded and took a deep breath. Suddenly, both of them were wearing masks again, hiding how devastated they were. It was reassuring.

"Hey Sam. You're going to be fine, you know that right?" Dad tells me. It looks like he's trying to convince himself.

"Yeah. This time next week you'll be complaining about waking up at six thirty for school," Mom adds in, cracking a small smile. I wince. Or I'll still be in the coma ward. Maybe a casket if I'm really unlucky. Mom drops her smile when I becomes clear I won't wake up or laugh at it. She backs away from me, as if understanding what a coma means for the first time. I can see how freaked out and scared she is.

"Hey, why don't you bring Izzy up here. She'll be happy to see Sam," Dad tells her.

Mom nods, glad for an opportunity to leave. I don't blame her. It must be horrifying to see your own daughter on the brink of death. She leaves the coma ward after shooting one last smile at my body.

Dad leans in closer to me, like he's about to tell me a secret. "Sam, I know this is hard. And you don't deserve what happened to you. You're only a teenager." He's right. I'm not even finished high school yet, but here I am, stuck in a coma after a week repeating the day I died. What did I do to deserve this? Why wasn't I allowed to just be a normal teenager, like I had been before February twelfth. "But," he continued, "You need to fight. For me, your Mom and Izzy." Dad closes his eyes for a second and bites his lip, "The doctor. He said we should consider shutting down the life support, look into being an organ donor, but we'll never do that Sam. Not while there's a chance you'll wake up, understand? Even if it takes a dozen years, half a century even, we'll always be here, ready and waiting for you to open your eyes again, okay? And that's why we need you to fight. To prove the doctors wrong, because you need to graduate. Marry, have kids. Get a job you love and then retire. I don't know what your mother and Izzy will do if you die. And that's why you can't, because I don't knowhow we'll survive without you. You need to see Izzy live a good life, make sure your mother and I get the best retirement home. I believe in you, Sam. I know you'll make it."

Suddenly, life had hit me so hard I stumbled for the third time in twenty four hours. It felt like I couldn't breath, like my lungs refused to open up and my heart refused to beat. Take me off life support? That would mean I'd die. A few hours ago, I was waiting for death to take me, but now I wasn't so sure. How could I force my family to go through the pain of burying me? Spend every February twelfth and thirteenth in mourning, remembering me. I couldn't do that to them. I'll stay alive, even if I have to wonder a hospital for the rest of my life to make sure they won't have to go through any more pain.

Alright, so chapter three finished. Hope you all had a nice read.

Anyways, so turns out Before I Fall the movie doesn't actually come out in my country, which makes me pretty annoyed. Ugh. So I'm stuck waiting for it to come out on dvd or something. Yay.