Short Stories (bxb)

Twenty-Four Hours Pt.2: Dragons, Volcanoes, Antartica

Every day, Ethan felt excited all over again to go see Mikey at the hospital. True, Mikey wasn't always there; sometimes he was home with his family, and Ethan found the chance of seeing him sort of like a gamble. He was ecstatic when he saw Mikey sitting in the playroom, and disappointed when he didn't.

     Whenever Mikey was there, the two boys got closer. Ethan would bring something new each time, whether it was a book or a toy or a story or a game—Mikey turned out to be really good at scrabble.

Days turned into weeks. They were best friends. Mikey's parents loved Ethan, and he saw them a lot more after they found an apartment to rent, then a lot less again after they found jobs. Ethan's mom had met Mikey a few times, and she thought he was adorable. On the days that she didn't have work, the two boys missed each other's company like they never imagined they would. On the days that she did work, Ethan found him cancelling plans with friends to go with her to the hospital, and Mikey welcomed him with his timid smile every time. Everything was, to put it as simply as possible, awesome.

     After a few weeks, things started changing.

     Mikey would disappear more often for check ups. Sometimes he'd get what he called "medicine," but Ethan was pretty sure it wasn't normal medicine, because normal medicine didn't take two hours to take.

     He was even more tired. They spent only half of their time in the playroom, half in his hospital room because he was bordering on sleep or feeling too sick to get up.

    Ethan got used to seeing him with bandage wrapped around his elbow—Ethan remembered having something similar one time when he got his blood drawn, and it made him wonder just how often Mikey got his blood drawn.

      Mikey would rub his temples whenever he thought Ethan wasn't looking. "Do you have a headache?" "No, I'm fine."

      And Mikey would get this pained look on his face sometimes. He'd clutch his stomach and try to ignore what he was feeling, but eventually he would shoot up, say "I have to go to the bathroom," and dash out of the playroom. He would come back sometimes five, sometimes thirty minutes later, chewing gum and smelling of toothpaste. "Is everything okay?" "Yeah, I'm fine."

      One day, when Mikey dashed out, Ethan followed him. Mikey did go to the bathroom, but he was far from fine. The stall door was open just a crack, and through it Ethan could hear vomiting.

     "Mikey?" He called softly. The noise stopped abruptly.

      "Ethan! Why are you—" But Mikey was cut off as his body took over once again. Ethan pushed open the door and, though he'd been expecting what he saw, it still squeezed painfully at his heart. Mikey, bent over the toilet, coughing and choking and hurling.

     "I'll go get help," was Ethan's first instinct.

     "No, it's okay," Mikey coughed. He stood up as if he were about to leave, before hunching over again and heaving.

     Ethan was torn between getting someone and staying to make sure Mikey was okay. He decided to look for help, because a professional would know what to do better than he would.

     So he ran from the bathroom to the nursing station where he quickly spotted Luisa, Mikey's nurse. "Luisa!" He called.