I Wish

Chapter 49

There was ringing in my ears when I got off the phone. I wasn’t doing so well when I got on the phone to Candice, but having our conversation cut off by a seizure? Yeah, by the way that happened. Phone clattering to the floor, machines beeping, and people yelling and screaming in the distance. My brain was doing it’s best to remove every little record of that, in fact I may drink. I had emergency alcohol, and this was starting to look like a morning for a liquid breakfast. It turned out we’d been talking about my girl problems while she was sitting in a hospital bed. Her mum picked up the phone and tearfully explained that she’d been having them for a couple weeks. More than they could count, but she hadn’t been telling anyone. They were thinking it could be epilepsy. I kind of just sat there horrified, and let what she’d suggested sink in. That maybe the reason I was fighting so hard was because I couldn’t understand why Ivy would be so gone on me. It didn’t sound right, at first. It wasn’t like I had a self-esteem issue, or confidence problems. It was just so much, so extreme, and I hadn’t felt like I had earned it. Maybe if I had it wouldn’t be so hard.

“Are you okay sweetheart?” Mum asked when I drifted into the kitchen like a zombie.

“I called Candice,” I told her hollowly, “It was a good chat, long one too. She literally had to have a seizure to get me off the phone. Apparently she’s been having them for a couple of weeks now, they think it’s epilepsy.” Her face crumpled as the words left my mouth, because this was the girl she had watched grow up right alongside me. What we’d already jokingly referred to as my sis from another miss. If there was some way to fight this, or blame someone for this… oooh, she would be there with bells on to redefine the meaning of the words hellspawned nightmare. She’s look at Candice’s mum and say, “Danni, watch the f*****g kids. I’ll be back.”

“Oh my god,” my mother said, covering her face with her hand over her mouth. Her eyes welled with furious tears, but they did not fall. Instead she pulled me into a hug, and I wrapped my arms around her waist. The comforting sugary smell of her perfume helped with the need to pitch a raging b***h-fit over the injustice of it all, well that and the bone deep tiredness that refused to leave me. This sucked, Candice deserved way better than this. Somewhat selfishly, I also acknowledged in a tiny and dark shadowy part of my brain, in a small voice, that I really didn’t need this right now. “What do you need?” she asked me, and I sobbed. Just once, before pulling them back in.

“I don’t know. I think I just need time to rewind… and try again. This timeline is cooked, start over,” I said in a watery voice, “I need things to go back to how they were, and they’re… never going to do that.” It was very telling that someone I’ve never known to not have an opinion on something was suspiciously silent. Giving her one last squeeze, I pulled away. I’m not sure what my mum would be doing with this information if she didn’t feel the need to take care of me, for just a little longer at least. Make a phone call, rave at dad, go someplace where we couldn’t see that so she could allow herself to be as emotional as she is upset? Could have been anything, but she contained herself. Making me feel like I was the most important thing in the world, because she was shelving her s**t because I was her priority right now.

“Candy will be okay,” she soothes, and there is a distinct lack of promise. 

“Nobody calls her Candy anymore. We hit like eleven, and then kids started making hooker jokes. You know, because we all go through a stage of being snot-nosed little brats that think we’re cleverer than we are,” I said in lieu of anything else to add to that. “Go make your phone call,” I said after an awkward moment where she looked like she might snap and go full mother-hen on me.

“Her mother must be terrified right now,” she said quietly, and I didn’t like that. It looked like an awful lot like that for one hot minute she was imagining what she’d do if that happened to one of her children. Shuffling her was a lot easier after that, but she refused to leave without making me something to eat. I let her, not because I was hungry but because nothing had gone in my stomach in longer than I should leave it. I didn’t even wind up drinking that coffee that I made earlier. It was still sitting full on my dresser, and I winced just thinking about it. It didn’t matter how justified mum thought my sadness was, the cup was going to have to move before she sees it or I am definitely in trouble.

“I’m making scrambled eggs,” I was informed, and I didn’t say no because mum makes them with cheese, spinach and bacon and it’s delicious. It’s quiet as she did so, and that left me time to think. Candice had a point. Worst case scenario I was being lined up with someone that I actually like, to have one shot at happiness. Magically made literally, but I didn’t explain that because I didn’t want to sound like a crazy person. Anyway, she said that if she was me, and this was Candice’s one shot at happiness she’d gun it for all it was worth. She also admitted that she’d go full tilt for so much as the chance at happiness right now, so there is that. With her lying in a hospital bed it left me inclined to try and do what she didn’t have the option of, purely to say that I didn’t waste it. Her biggest piece of advice was to stop overthinking. To stop trying to find some small part of this I could control, because I couldn’t. If I was going to jump, jump, but don’t just sit here talking about it. 

“Thank you,” I told mum as she set the food down in front of me. She gave my shoulder one last squeeze and melted away, somehow secure in the fact that I would be fine now. The food didn’t smell particularly appetizing. I figured that it was all in my head, nobody wants to eat when they feel like this. That or it takes the concept and runs with it in the other direction. I picked the fork up and prodded it like it might bite me, before scooping some up and shoving it in my mouth. This, clearly, was a mistake. It tasted like ash, felt like I was chewing on air, and did its level best to stick in my throat like choking me was it’s personal business. I took another bite, just to be sure. The same thing happened. It was numb, and somewhat hysterical, that I got up and reached for a cookie. It slipped between my fingers as I spat it into the bin. My thought train was a little hard to follow after that. It seemed to be stuck on a loop, while I stood there shaking so bad that you could hear my teeth chatter painfully. It went along the lines of this:

Ah…. Uh…. I…. Damn it Ivy! What… What the hell did you do?