Beautiful Tragedy (A Standalone Romance Novel) by Alycia Taylor Page B

get Debbie.”
    Debbie was our “house-mother” at the dorms. She knew
about my illness, she had to…just in case, my grandma had said. I tried to
protest again, but when I opened my mouth I realized that any motion at all was
going to make me puke. I sat down in the desk chair and leaned forward with my
head close to the metal trash can…just in case, and waited for them to get
back.
    Megan and Debbie were back in five minutes. Debbie was
a good choice for house-mother. She was a senior and very smart, and not prone
to panic at all. She took charge right away, taking me under one arm and
telling Megan to get under the other.
    “Do you have her purse with her I.D. and all that?”
Debbie asked Meggs . Megan grabbed it and, acting as
if they were leading a rag doll, we were on our way. I tried to tell them that
I would be okay, and that I didn’t want to go to the hospital, but they acted
like they couldn’t hear me. For a few seconds I thought maybe I was only saying
it in my head. When we got downstairs, Debbie told Megan to go get the car and
pull it up to the curb. When she had gone, Debbie looked at me and said, “Should
I call Grandma?” I thought about being sarcastic and telling her I didn’t care
if she called her grandma, but she was being nice and there was no reason for
me to be a bitch just because I felt like throwing up and passing out.
    “I’m really fine, Debbie. I don’t think we need to
worry her.”
    Debbie didn’t say anything, but she didn’t look
convinced either. When Megan pulled the car up out front, Debbie tucked me into
the passenger seat and told her, “Take her to the ambulance bay side. There
will be wheelchairs there. If they keep her, even for a few hours, call her
grandmother.”
    Megan said she would and Debbie closed the door. I had
a feeling that once she got inside she was going to decide to call grandma
herself. It was nice of her to worry, but I hated it. I despised being the
center of all of this negative attention. I closed my eyes and lay my head back
against the seat and thought once again… I
just want to be normal .
    When I opened my eyes again, we were at the emergency
entrance of the hospital. Megan parked where the ambulances go, and I was
trying to tell her she wasn’t supposed to park there. She acted like she
couldn’t hear me again and jumped out to grab a wheelchair. She opened the car
door and was going to try and help me out, although I could have done it
myself, when an orderly showed up.
    “You need some help?”
    “No, I can do it myself.”
    “Yes, please,” Megan said.
    Am
I not talking out loud?
    “She’s really weak; I don’t want her to fall.”
    The orderly told Megan where to park the chair and
once again I was treated like Ragged-Ann. He put his hands around my waist and
told me to hold on around his shoulders and then he lifted me into the chair.
It was really way too much of a production and I told Megan so as he pushed me
inside. I guess she must have been able to hear me that time, because she
finally said, “ Shhh , Molly. Hush!” Now my feelings
were hurt. I was sick and she was yelling at me.
    The guy who had helped us pushed me up to the triage
desk and then told Megan she could go move her car. I had to answer a bunch of
questions and while I was doing that the nausea returned and I found myself
staring at the bottom of a Pepto-Bismol pink plastic bucket. I had the dry heaves
a few times, but nothing was coming out. The nurse was taking my vitals now,
and she said that I was running a temperature, my pulse was high and my blood
pressure low. She and I both knew what that meant, I was dehydrated.
    “Have you been drinking water?” she asked.
    “Does coffee count?” I asked her.
    She wasn’t in the mood for humor though. I guess
because of what they see every day, nurses rarely are. I admitted that I may
have forgotten to drink enough but just for the last two days. Otherwise I was
usually really good about it. She