In Search of Tomorrow ✓

Twenty-Eight

The rest of the afternoon passed slowly. Nobody came into the room except a nurse shortly after three o'clock with some food. Cameron left shortly around half an hour later to go to the hospital's cafeteria and get some food for himself, but other than that he stayed by my side the entire day.

I barely touched the food the nurse brought me—a sandwich and some fruit. Everything felt strangely dreamlike, as if I would wake up in my bed any time now and go across the hall to find Maddie and Clare sleeping peacefully in their room. Maybe, if I went downstairs, I would even see Mom in the kitchen making breakfast and Dad getting ready for a day at work.

When Cameron returned at four, I had nibbled off of my sandwich and then set the plate, still nearly full, on the nightstand. He was carrying a bouquet of red roses in a glass vase, which he set beside my plate of almost untouched food. Then he sat down on the edge of my bed.

"Feeling all right?" he asked, reaching out tentatively and brushing some of my hair away from my face. It was likely knotted and dirty, but I didn't bother getting up to check my reflection in the mirror. I hadn't looked at myself for over a day.

"I'm fine," I said, choosing instead to look outside the window. The opaque curtains let in only a little bit of light. When I stood and crossed the room to open them, my hospital gown tucked tight around me, I could see that the window overlooked an empty field.

I left the curtains open even as the sky grew dark. Around dinner time, the nurse brought in more food and Cameron went back down to the cafeteria for another meal. Since I was actually beginning to feel myself getting hungry, I ate more of my dinner, but still left some of it on the plate.

By the time I was finished, Cameron still hadn't returned, so I lay down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. I remembered reading about an artist who was paralyzed so that she had to paint with the easel on top of her, staring up at it. That made me think of my dandelion drawing sitting on the drying rack back in the school's art room. Would I ever go back to it?

Just then, the door opened and Cameron stepped inside. He gingerly shut the door behind him and then went to close the curtains, blocking out the cloudy night.

"Try and get some sleep, okay, Evelyn?" he asked me, coming over and resting his hand against my cheek. "You need to get your rest so that you can take care of your sisters—especially Clare once she wakes up."

Even though the room was already dark, I closed my eyes as if I were trying to block out what I was seeing. I felt the covers being pulled up around me and Cameron's warm arm around me, and when I opened my eyes, I could see shadows dancing on the ceiling.

The machines in the corner of the room weren't beeping anymore, and I found that now that they were gone I missed their reassuring constancy. All I could hear now was faint noises of the bustling hospital behind the closed door.

What if Clare was taking her last breaths right now, and I had no way of knowing?

"Evelyn?" asked Cameron, as I literally felt my heartbeat increasing until it was pounding and my breaths becoming ragged, "Try and calm down a little, okay? You need sleep more than anything right now."

I rolled over so that I could rest my head on his chest and so that I was facing the window. Though the curtains were closed, I could still see a small sliver of moonlight poking out from behind the clouds.

I experimented by closing my eyes for a few seconds, but all I could hear were tires skidding and cars colliding. I opened them wide again, staring into the incomprehensible darkness instead.