Between Here and Forever - Elizabeth Scott [42]
“You don’t like broccoli?” Eli says, and Tess doesn’t move at all.
“No, she does,” I say. “Weird, right? When you wake up, Tess, I’ll make a whole bunch of it for you and bring it in. You and Eli can eat it.”
“Sorry, I can’t eat broccoli even for you,” Eli says, and I finally glance at him, knowing I should be happy he’s caught up in learning about Tess, that he’s talking to her like she’s here, like she’s going to wake up. I’m not, though. Not like I should be.
And when I look at him, he isn’t looking at Tess. He’s looking at me. He’s talking to me.
“Tess can be very persuasive,” I say, but my voice comes out faint, all flustered-sounding, and when a nurse walks in I let out a breath I hadn’t known I was holding and squeak out, “Hi, how are you?”
“I need to check on a machine,” the nurse says, pointing at a monitor near Eli. “I think that it’s—oh, damn. We need to get a new one of these in here now, and you two need to—” She makes a sweeping motion toward the door.
“What is it?” I say, looking at Tess, trying to see if something’s changed, if she looks worse. “Is something wrong?”
“No, no,” the nurse says, her voice curt. “I just need to get a new machine in here, and I need you out of here to do it.”
I get up, and Eli does too.
“Did I—did I break it?” he asks, but the nurse doesn’t reply, is too busy fiddling with the display and gesturing for another nurse to join her.
For all that they sometimes drive me crazy, the nurses here really are pretty impressive, because in just a few seconds me and Eli are maneuvered out of Tess’s room and they are clustered around her, faces calm as they move in an intricate dance involving wires and machines and IVs and Tess’s still body.
“Well, we can try going back in a while,” I say, heading out into the waiting room and flopping onto one of the chairs. There’s an old guy sitting in the one closest to the television, head listing to one side as he snores loudly.
I turn to ask Eli if he wants to go somewhere else and see something is wrong with him. Really, really wrong.
He’s sitting down too, but his hands are tapping against the chair so fast it’s like he’s—I don’t know. Trying to push his fingers into the chair, or something. And the look on his face … it’s like he’s going to run away screaming, or throw up. Or maybe both.
“Are you all right?” I say, and then remember his question to the nurse. “Hey, you know—you know you didn’t mess up that machine, right?”
He nods, but it’s stiff, jerky-looking, and then he bolts for the door. I hear what I think might be “Be back,” or “Bye,” but whatever it is comes out in a rush and is barely audible over the old guy’s snoring.
Weird. Maybe he’s sick. Or sad. He was just talking about his dog dying, and it hurt me to hear that. Should I try to find him, make sure he’s okay?
No. If I do anything, I should find Clement and tell him what’s going on. I don’t want to get all worked up over what could be wrong with Eli because he’s just a guy. He isn’t special to me in any way.
Except he is, because I’m an idiot. A full-blown idiot who should know better—and does—but yet still goes looking for Eli anyway.
It doesn’t take me long to find him. I head into the stairwell and he’s right there, sitting on the step in front of me.
“Hey,” I say. “Do you—do you want me to get Clement?”
“No,” he says, so strongly it’s almost like a shout. “I mean, no. I’m okay.”
I know I should say, “All right, see you later,” and leave, but I don’t.
I stay.
I say, “Are you sure?” and sit down next to him.
“Yeah,” he says. “I just—we didn’t get buzzed out like we’re supposed to, and I started thinking about how I might have taken my first step out of the unit on my right foot and not my left, and then I couldn’t stop thinking about how something terrible was going to happen even though I’ve been trying really hard to not think like that, and—”
“Wait, what?” I say, totally confused.
“I—I have this thing,” Eli says. “I … sometimes