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She was pretty sure she’d heard him leave, but only pretty sure, and when it came to Mr. Grouchypants, Laura felt it was much better to be safe than sorry. She crept down the rest of the hallway as quietly and as sneakily as she could, and when she saw that the door was still open she carefully peeked inside, trying not to make a single itty-bitty noise, and—
“Laura?”
Oh crud. So much for being sneaky.
Slowly, inch by inch, she pushed the door open the rest of the way, keeping her eyes peeled for any sign of You-Know-Who. He wasn’t in the corner…wasn’t by the window…wasn’t by the nightstand…and that was when she let go of the breath she’d been holding onto.
“I thought that was you…” Stiff sheets and blankets rustled as Mary worked to prop herself up against her pillows, and though it wasn’t exactly an easy job for her those days, she couldn’t help but smile as Laura shut the door and plodded over to her bedside. She did her best to swallow back the sounds of effort it took to get her sitting upright and carefully passed the heels of her hands across her cheeks to get rid of any tears she might’ve missed. “If I’d’ve known you were coming, I would’ve baked us a cake.”
“A cake?” Laura laughed, sounding just as incredulous as she was delighted. “How would you bake a cake in here?”
As though the thought hadn’t occurred to her, Mary assumed her most convincing frown, placing her fists gingerly on her own hips as she slowly looked from one end of the hospital room to the other, quietly humming “Hmmm…” when her search turned up nary an oven nor pantry. “Well shoot. Guess it’s a good thing I didn’t know you were coming then, huh?” She was helpless to keep from beaming when Laura smiled up at her with those big, innocent eyes, and despite how difficult the morning had been, she found herself scooting over to make room for her.
It didn’t take her even a second to clamber up beside Mary, tucking herself happily between her and the rickety guardrail of the hospital bed. This was what she’d been hoping for, after all, and what she’d been afraid of missing out on when she’d heard from one of the sisters that Mary’d had company that morning. She hated the hospital so much—she hated the doctors and the nurses and the needles and the food and especially the sisters—but Mary made all that icky stuff almost worth it. Maybe even more than almost.
“Let’s say I had baked you a cake…what kind would it have been?”
Laura screwed her eyes shut tight as she concentrated, being of an age where the promise of cake was nearly as good as the real thing and demanded just as much respect. “Uh…chocolate!”
“Oh, I love chocolate cake.”
“Yeah! The kind with lots and lots of frosting.”
“Of course!”
“And strawberries on top. And rainbow sprinkles!”
“Oooh…and strawberries and sprinkles on top,” Mary agreed.
“Rainbow sprinkles.”
“Rainbow sprinkles, sorry, sorry!” It was impossible to keep from giggling at the intensity of Laura’s voice, but Mary was forced to tamp her laughter down when she felt it threaten to become a full-blown coughing fit. She hated to let Laura see that, hated to let her know how sick she actually was. Maybe she couldn’t protect James from seeing that side of her, but Laura? “Now that…” she began instead, giving the tip of Laura’s nose a playful little tap, “Would be a tasty, tasty cake.” And when Laura looked up at her again, she turned her own gaze away ever so slightly, feigning deep thought. “Maybe that’s the kind I’ll have to get you for your birthday.”
“You don’t have to do thaaat…” But inside, Laura felt like bursting into confetti. Mary remembered her birthday was coming up! How had she remembered that? Had one of the nurses told her? Laura had only mentioned it once herself, and there was no way she’d remember from one time…was there?
One of Mary’s arms pulled her into a gentle side-hug. She rested her cheek against the top of Laura’s head, resisting the urge to drop a kiss into her hair. It was hard, though…harder than she might’ve expected. Though it wasn’t much of a replacement, she settled for tucking a flyaway piece of hair behind her ear. “Well we have to celebrate somehow. It’s not every day that you turn eight years old, you know. It’s kind of a big deal.”
“It is,” she said with a sagely nod, all too happy to snuggle up against Mary’s side. The nightgown she wore was scratchy at her cheek, but that was fine—her mind was racing with thoughts of cake and presents and parties, all the things that normal kids got but she never thought she’d be able to have. She wondered if it would be too rude to tell Mary not to invite James. Maybe she’d mention it to one of the nurses instead.
“It’s been a long, long time since I was eight,” and really, nothing reminded her of that fact more than the heaviness in her limbs or the way her skin felt like it was splitting against her bones wherever they touched, “But I remember it being a big deal. Know what happens when you turn eight?” She felt Laura shift at her side, and raised her eyebrows when their eyes met. “When you turn eight, you stop running away when it’s time for your shots.”
Laura’s eyes went the size of dinner plates, and that time there was no stopping it: Mary had to laugh. She covered her mouth with her other hand, doing what she could to cover up the worst of the coughs that followed.
Feeling her cheeks burning pink, Laura moved away from the hug, if only to fold her arms across her chest with a huff. That would show her. “I wasn’t running away!”
“Oh no?” Mary cleared her throat once, twice, and tested her voice again. “You sure?”
“Nooo! I just thought…I thought I’d visit you, that’s all!”
She took to stroking Laura’s hair gently as she backpedaled; ah, the delicate sensibilities of a seven-and-a-half-year-old. “Oh, well never mind then. I guess I should’ve known better than to think you were scared.”
“I’m not scared! I just…don’t like it! But that doesn’t mean that I’m scared. Geez Mary, I’m not a baby.”
She couldn’t help but smile at that. “Of course you’re not,” she assured her before setting her head down against hers again, her fingers carding softly through her hair. “But it’s not just babies that get scared, you know. Or at least I hope it’s not, because between you and me? Just our little secret? I get scared all the time when I have to get my medicine.”
Laura didn’t pull away to look up at her that time, but her voice was much softer when, after a moment, she asked, “…you do?”
“I do! In fact, lots of things scare me.” Giving her ear a joking little tug, Mary craned her head down just a bit to get a better look at her. “You want to know what I do to make myself less scared?” She said a silent prayer to any god that might be listening (capital-G or otherwise) that her smile held up, that nothing about her face would give away how much she already regretted having to leave Laura alone. There was a voice in the back of her head, quiet but insistent and horrendously matter-of-fact, that told her this was probably one of the last times they’d be able to talk like this. She hoped she could make it count. “I close my eyes…and I tell myself a story.”
Her doubt was obvious. Laura watched Mary for a second as if trying to figure out whether she was being serious, and then slowly, cautiously, she clenched her eyes shut.
“Don’t squeeze them shut like that, silly!” With her index finger, she gave Laura’s side a little poke, sending the girl into a giggling fit. “You’re not playing hide-and-seek, you’re just going to be using your imagination, okay?”
“Okay, okay!” Settling back at Mary’s side, she let her hands drop onto her lap and stretched her legs out as far as they could go, wiggling her slipper-socked toes impatiently. “What kind of story is it?”
“A nice story—a happy one! That’s how I get through the biggest, scariest times, by thinking of all the things that make me happy. You just have to picture your own special place where nothing scary can get you, and then you’re safe from everything.” It was a little easier to talk like that once Laura had her eyes shut. Mary didn’t have to worry about what her face was doing, she could just focus on the warmth of the girl’s cheek against her arm, the vaguely flowery smell of the hospital’s shampoo in her hair.
Her heart ached for Laura, for the life they might’ve had together if things had been different…if things had been fair.
“Once upon a time,” Mary began, remembering all the best stories from her own childhood, “There was a quiet, beautiful town by a quiet, beautiful lake. It was the kind of place where the sun was always shining but the air always smelled like it was going to rain. And in that quiet, beautiful town lived a beautiful princess—” she paused just long enough to lower her hand and brush Laura’s cheek with her thumb, “—who spent every day exploring. Some days she’d walk through the park and pick the prettiest flowers she could find…some days she’d sit by the lake and dip her toes in the cool water…some days she’d make herself a picnic and just lay in the sun while licking peanut butter and jelly from her fingers…and some days she stayed up so late watching the fireflies dance that she’d fall asleep wherever she’d been sitting.”
A quiet rap on the door interrupted the comfortable sense of peace that had settled between them, and not even a moment later, it swung open with a squeak.
“Mrs. Sunderla—I, er, Mary? You haven’t seen—” In the doorway appeared a young woman, her nametag turned the wrong way on its clip, her mousy brown hair threatening to spring loose from its haphazard bun, everything about her appearing overworked and overtired. As her eyes fell on the two of them though, Mary sitting up in bed, Laura propped snugly against her arm, her posture changed completely. “There you are,” she sighed, her body going slack with relief. “Now, you know you can’t just run off like that without telling anyone, Laura! I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”
As far as St. Jerome’s nursing staff went, Rachel was…well, she was just fine. Laura liked her way better than the sisters and their long-winded lectures, that much was for sure, but it was hard to really like someone whose job it was to stick you with needles and make you swallow cups of nasty-tasting medicine. And for what it was worth, Mary quite liked Rachel too; having someone her own age to talk to had been a blessing and a half most days…but only most. There were times where it struck her how completely, totally, utterly unfair it was that there they were, two young women born only a year or so apart, but while Rachel’s life was just beginning, Mary’s was…
Well.
Suffice it to say they were both well on their way down very different paths.
Laura’s tiny body went rigid with frustration beside Mary. “We’re in the middle of a stooory, Rachel!” she groaned, shoulders slumping. “You’re ruining it!”
From over Laura’s head, Mary shot the nurse an amused (if tired) smile. “We’re almost at the end of a story, Rachel,” she gently corrected, and not without a trace of laughter in her voice. “Can we have just a few more minutes?”
Clasping her hands together tightly, Laura pooched her lower lip out into what had to be the most impressive pout either of the women had seen in their lives. It worked, too—Rachel didn’t say anything but she smiled, leaning in the doorway with her arms folded.
And while she wouldn’t say as much out loud, Mary was glad Rachel had decided to stick around. She had something she needed to give her…once Laura headed back to her own room, of course. “And the princess,” she continued, unable to keep from smiling when, a true story connoisseur, Laura’s eyes fell closed once more, “Never felt safer or happier than she did when she was in that town, because even when she thought she was alone, even when she felt like there was no one else there with her…she knew deep down inside that the people who loved her the most were always right there, walking beside her. No matter what.”
When Laura opened her eyes that time, she knew Mary had been right—she felt too happy to worry about what was waiting for her back in her room. Still, she couldn’t help but look between her and Rachel for a moment before asking, “What about the prince?”
Mary’s eyebrows shot up. “The prince?”
“Aren’t you a little young to be thinking about handsome princes?” Rachel teased from the doorway, sticking her tongue out at Laura when she stuck hers out first.
“There’s always a prince in stories like that,” she pointed out. “Isn’t there?”
“Well…” She could feel Rachel’s eyes on her, watching her in that soft, pitying way she sometimes had when James’s visits ended and she was left alone again, waiting silently, patiently, miserably, until the next. “Sometimes the prince gets a little lost along the way, that’s all.”
Laura hummed as though that made perfect sense to her. “The princess is probably better off without him anyway. Why even bother if he’s gonna be late?” She smiled when both women laughed, proud that they’d found that funny. Then, sensing there’d be no escaping, she gave Mary one last hug, tight as she could make it, before carefully climbing down out of her bed.
“You’re gonna be okay now, right, Laura?” Mary asked, secretly thankful that she’d be able to lie down again. Already she could feel fatigue weighing heavily at her eyelids, even making the air seem harder to breathe. It had been such a long day. “No more running away?”
“Of course I’ll be okay—I’m almost eight! And you know what happens when you turn eight.” She turned around to offer Rachel a wise look and a nod as she continued, “You stop running away when it’s time for your shots.”
A quick flick of her eyes to Mary’s and Rachel nodded as well, leaning over with her hands on her thighs to return Laura’s nod. “Very true. Now c’mon, the doctor’s been waiting for you so long he probably has a whole beard by now.”
And just like that, Laura started back down the hall she’d crept along before, half-skipping with the thought of Mary’s story and the thought of chocolate cake (with gobs of icing and strawberries and rainbow sprinkles, of course) fresh in her mind. If Mary could think about her special place and be brave, then so could she! Not that she’d actually been scared…or worried…or even anything like that. As long as she knew Mary was there waiting for her, she thought she could get through just about anything. In fact…she was sure of it.