Sharon was surprised, the next morning, to get a text from Ryan. Partly because she knew he wasn't allowed to have his phone, and partly because George had let them know how bad the previous day had been. When she opened it, she involuntarily groaned, because what it said was, "They want me to go to another hospital. I'm going home. Tell them to let me go home so I can get better and come back to recording." The staff in the production office looked at her curiously.
"It's from Ryan," she said. "I don't know how he got hold of his phone." Everyone started to crowd around her, wanting to see what he'd said, but she quickly blanked the screen and simply said, "He's giving out about being in the hospital. Wants to go home."
"Typical guy," Angie said with a grin. "Worst patients in the world."
Sharon excused herself, knowing that she needed to follow this up with a call - but not to Ryan immediately. She called his father instead.
"John, it's Sharon," she said. "I just got a text from Ryan telling me he's going home instead of to another hospital, and wanting me to back him up. What's going on, and how did he get his phone?"
Mr. Kelly sighed. "He convinced Raymond to bring it to him. Ray has it back again, though, he only let him have it for a few minutes. Anyway, Dr. Reilly is sending Ryan to a specialty brain injury rehabilitation center where they can really assess everything and find out exactly where he is in recovery terms. Ryan's been arguing with him and us since yesterday, he's convinced he just needs to go home and get his strength back and he'll be fine."
"That explains yesterday, then," Sharon said. "When he was so stressed he couldn't talk."
"Yes. We can't get him to see that there's more going on than just weakness. That's all he's focused on at the moment. He's not even understanding that the fact that he can't talk when he gets upset is anything to worry about. All he sees is that he can only sit or stand up for a few minutes and he can hardly walk even a few steps."
"Well, I suppose I'll have to be the bad guy again and tell him what's what," Sharon sighed. "I'm not letting him come back until we know exactly what he can and can't handle - I'll have to know that to be able to adjust things for him. Is now a good time to talk to him?"
"Best you're likely to get, I suppose," Mr. Kelly said. "He just had a pretty good physical therapy session, he managed to walk about 10 feet holding onto the parallel bars so he thinks he's ready to run again. Not really, but he's on an upswing at the moment."
"Well, that's good news anyway, he is getting stronger," Sharon said. "OK, let me talk to him." She mentally prepared herself for what might be a very disturbing discussion on both ends.
"Hey, Sharon!" Ryan said, sounding more like himself than any time Sharon had talked to him since he'd woken up. "Da didn't give away my good news, did he?"
Sharon hoped he meant the walking and not that he thought he was going home. "What news, Ryan?"
"I just walked the whole parallel bars by myself!" He sounded almost like an excited child announcing that he'd just ridden his bike for the first time on his own.
"That's fantastic, Ryan! You're getting a lot stronger, it's good to hear. So what's next?"
Ryan's voice flipped from happy to grumpy instantly. "They want to send me to another hospital. I just want to go home so I can get better. I don't need to be in the hospital anymore. I want to be back with you guys."
"I know," Sharon said carefully. "We'd like nothing more than to have you back with us tomorrow, but you're not ready for that yet, and it's still a few weeks until we'll be home anyway - and a few weeks past that before we start rehearsing. Why not go to this other hospital while you're waiting for us to get back?"
"I told you, I don't need to!" Ryan's temper was starting to rise again. Sharon knew she had to be careful.
"Ryan, you do still need to be there. You still can't walk or take care of yourself alone yet. The other hospital will help you do that. And before you come back to us, I need to know exactly what you can do - how strong you are, how you're going to hold up in rehearsals, how much break time you might need, even if it's going to take you longer to learn your songs and choreography. I told you I'd make changes if we need to for you to come back to us, but I can't do that until I know exactly what you need." She was afraid she'd gone too far and he was about to explode, and held her breath waiting for an answer.
Ryan swore, something Sharon had almost never heard from him. Then she heard Mr. Kelly's voice in the background saying sternly, "Ryan, don't you dare throw my phone! Give it to me." Then she heard a loud bang and another curse. She heard quiet voices for a minute and then what sounded like muffled crying. Finally Mr. Kelly came back on the line. "He kicked the bed rail," he said. "But once he got that out of his system, he just said, 'She's right, I know she's right, she always is. I'll go.' But he's curled up crying again, I think probably because he had to admit to himself that he's not as well as he wants to be."
"God, John, I'm sorry, this has to be so hard on you all. I wish I could do more for you."
"Sharon, don't you dare get down on yourself. You did exactly what we needed, you got him to listen to reason. I wasn't fancying having to sedate him or something to get him into the ambulance to take him to the center tomorrow morning; I'd rather he have his tantrum now and get it out of his system." Mr. Kelly sounded quite relieved, actually. "I'm almost glad he's crying, he's been bottling everything up for the last few days."
Sharon suddenly spotted Neil and Keith coming down the hallway. "Neil and Keith are here, would he like to talk to them? Tell them his big news?"
"I'll ask." Sharon heard Mr. Kelly talking and then he came back on. "He does, but he wants to talk to you first. Here he is."
"Sharon?" Ryan's voice was emotional again, as it had been the first time he'd spoken to them after he'd woken up.
"I'm here, Ryan." She grinned as she saw both Neil and Keith look up at her quickly, eager anticipation on their faces.
"I'm sorry for swearing at you. You're right. You haven't steered me wrong yet, even when I haven't listened to you before you've turned out to be right."
"It's fine, Ryan, don't worry about it. I think Keith and Neil are going to have to share the phone, neither one of them seems to want to let the other one talk first! I'm putting it on speaker for them."
"Hey, Ryan, how's it going? Better than yesterday?" Neil said. At the same time, Keith said, "Doing better today, man?"
Ryan's voice came through the speaker, sounding considerably happier than he had a moment ago. "Big news, lads," he said. "I walked the whole set of parallel bars by myself this morning, no help at all!" Sharon threw her hands over her ears just in time as Keith's "YEEEEOOOWWW!" echoed through the halls and brought people running from every direction, knowing that it had to be good news from Ryan to set him off into that yell.