When the Petals Fall

Daniel
Hospital Bed

Sun light drifts into my room as I open my eyes. I look at the clock on the stand. It reads: 7 A.M. Cursing, I lay there helplessly wanting it to be 9 already so I can get my meds.

The sun’s rays stop right on the flowers next to my bed. They were daisy’s that Lauren, my girlfriend, gave me right before I broke up with her. The scene of the break up replays in my head and it is almost like it was yesterday that it happened even though I know that it was months ago.

“Hey Danny! How are you? I came to give you these, they’re really beautiful and I just thought they would brighten up your day.” Lauren smiled and placed the flowers on the stand next to my bed. I inhaled the aroma and smiled weakly at her.

“I’m fine. Thanks, they do. Hey I wanna talk to you about something.” She sat down at the foot of the bed and I tried to avoid her eyes as much as possible. “You know how I might not make it through this? I was thinking because it will be easier for you, if we…”

Her eyes fell and she quietly interrupted, “You’re going to make it through Danny. You’re stronger than this.”

“If I don’t make it, I don’t want to leave you hanging, feeling committed to me.” I slowly said. Her eyes are watery and I take her hands. I softly told her, “You will find someone better than me. I mean look, my hair is falling out and my hands are dry no matter how much lotion I put on them.”

She stared at me in despair. “Like I actually care how you look. I don’t care if you look hideously deformed; I’ll still love you because of what’s inside of you.”

I shook my head and said, “But you deserve better than what I can give you. I don’t want you to wait around for me to get better. I want you to go out there and live your life.”

“There is no better because you’re the best. What if you do get better? What will happen then?” Lauren looked into my eyes deeply and I knew that the hardest part of this is leaving her. We are meant to be together, but my time is almost up.

“If I get better, we’ll get married, but for now, I think that we should go our separate ways.” I looked out the window. The heat is rose from the roof tops on that hot June day. Tears dropped on my hands and I removed them from hers. My arms fitted nicely around her body and her shampoo was all that I could smell.

“Can’t we stay together a bit longer?” She whispered in between sobs.

I kissed her forehead fondly and told her, “No, my dear. I’ll be gone by the time the last petal falls. If we break-up now, it’ll give us more time to heal.”

Lauren lifted her head just enough to show her big, blue eyes filled with the world’s sadness. I tried to stay strong for the both of us. The rest of the conversation wasn’t really important for me. I just wish I could remember the rest. I remember her final words though.

She got up slowly, hugging her side as if she would collapse at any moment. As she got to the door way, she leaned against the frame and asked, “Do you still love me?”

A smile twisted on my face and I replied, “I’ll love you forever. Do you still love me?”

Her eyes had shut for a brief moment and flashed open. Quiet enough so no one, but us would hear she said, “Forever.”

And with that she left.

I replay that scene over and over again. A week later, she died in a car crash. A week later, I stopped caring if I died or not; I actually kind of wanted death. They said some drunk driver t-boned her into a tree. I read it in the newspaper, but didn’t believe it. The next day, somehow I found enough strength to get up out of bed to go to her funeral.

A knock comes from my door way and there stands my sis. She’s wearing jeans and a tank top. A suspicious smile plays across her lips.

“What are you so happy about?” I cough out. She comes over and pours water for me. I take a big sip and clear my throat. Pulling around her purse, she takes out chap stick and hands it to me. I apply it thoroughly until my lips feel normal again.

Handing it back to her, she takes out my favorite sunglasses and exclaims, “We’re going to the beach! I asked Dr. Henderson and he said we might as well.”

The beach? She offers me the sunglasses but I just shove them back into her hand. “I don’t think so. I don’t want to go out in public looking like this.”

She laughs and asks, “When have you ever cared about how you look?”
She’s right; I don’t care. I met Lauren at the beach though and I’d rather stay away from there. Then again, the beach may remove death from my mind. Maybe this means she gave up on wanting to donate a lung to me.

“You’re right. I don’t have anything to wear; that’s why I don’t want to go.” I smile a bit until she pulls out a swim shorts. “I can’t go swimming you know.”

“Oh come on Daniel. Go get dressed.” She hands me the shots and leaves the room. I sigh and call for the nurse to take out my IV and tubes.

In what feels like it could have been half the day already, I am ready to go to the damn beach. I look in the bathroom mirror and murmur, “You have got to be kidding me.”

The guy in the mirror is hardly recognizable. The guy looking at me is definitely not the Daniel Robert Linder I know. In his place stands a scrawny guy with an almost translucent complexion. His eyes are a bit sunken and where there use to be gorgeous locks of black hair there is a bold head. Putting my hand on my chest, I feel the scars of the surgeries I’ve went through to try and take out the cancer.

“Daniel!” Adrianna pounds on the door. “Come on! It’s almost 2 P.M.! We’ve gotta hit the road if we want any time in the sun.”

I groan quietly and unlock the bathroom door. Outside stands an annoying short girl. I frown down at her severely. We may be twins, but she didn’t get the height gene. When we were little she was taller than me, but I passed her at age 13.

“I’m here, let’s go.” I say dryly and head for the door.

“Looking good, bro!” She says and winks playfully at me. She adds, “Girls will be dying to tap that.”

Sometimes Adrianna can be so insensitive. She knows how I feel about dating now. The only one I want is Lauren.

Rolling my eyes, I walk more swiftly out of the hospital. Ms. Brookes smiles at me and says, “Have fun!”

I nod in appreciation to her, but I’m really thinking, “Don’t count on it.”

*~*

Adrianna
In the Car
“Aren’t you excited?” I ask. For the first time in a long time I’m excited to be out and going somewhere.

“No.” Daniel says coldly. I look at him and sigh. When I finally decide that it’s okay that he won’t let me donate a kidney, he becomes unpleasant. “What’s your deal anyways? You’re starting to freak me out a bit.”

I scoff. “My deal? What’s your deal? Why are all excepting death and everything? It’s a bit scary.”

“Lauren.” Oh. That’s why. If had remembered than I might not have pushed it.

I look at him empathetically. I softly surrender. “We don’t have to go to the beach if you don’t want to. I’m sorry for pressuring you like this. I just wanted to have fun with you like old times.”

He looks out the window into the distance. Sometimes I think that he knows more than he leads on to. For a boy, he’s pretty level headed and he’s very understanding.

“Nah. Let’s go to the beach.” He says coolly. “I need a tan anyways.”

There’s the old Danny I love. For the rest of the time I focus on the road; Driving isn’t one of my best skills.

After a while we arrive at the beach. I grab two towels, sunglasses, my purse, and a hat and we head for the sandy shores. When we were little, Danny and I would walk here every weekend from our house. It’s only about a half a mile away. We stopped coming when dad died though. After he died, it always felt like we were too busy to have fun.

I lay the beach towels on the sand and smooth them out. Danny sits down almost immediately and I put the sun hat on him.

Scowling at me he says, “Are you really going to make me look even worse than I already am?”

Laughing I reply, “Oh come on Danny. You look cute!”

A few minutes past and I decide to pull out my magazine. I wasn’t ready to go into the water and besides, I’d rather spend as much time with Danny as I could.

I hear foot steps coming towards us. Looking up casually, I notice a girl in a scrawny bathing suit walking towards my brother. Her brown hair falls until her mid back and she’s not that bad looking I must say.

“Hey, I’m having a party tonight. Do you guys want to come?” She asks sweetly. I look at her and try to remember if I grew up with her, but I don’t remember a lot of people these days. These days, it’s just Daniel and I.

“Sure. We’ll stop by after I get my final dose of chemo, but by then I might already be dead so I’m not sure if I’ll be able to make it.” Danny bitterly replies.

The girl turns bright red and apologizes quietly then walks away. I look at Danny with dismay.

“You don’t have to be rude you know. She was only trying to be nice.” I roll my eyes. Sometimes I don’t know if Danny is actually rude or is just trying to put off rudeness. Either way, it’s kind of annoying sometimes.

Before he can answer, my cell phone rings in my purse. Deciding to ignore it, I turn back to Daniel only to see him frowning at the sand. Why is he all bitter all of the sudden? I mean, I’m the bitter one.

My phone finally stops ringing, but then starts again. I sigh and look at the caller ID. Mom. Hesitantly, I pick up the phone.

“YOU TOOK YOUR DYING BROTHER TO THE BEACH???? HOW COULD YOU DO THAT TO HIM?” She screeches from the other side of the phone.

“It’s not like you care. You wouldn’t let me save him.” I angrily reply.

“Hey, don’t back talk me young lady! You are in so much trouble. Bring him back into this hospital RIGHT NOW!” And with that she hangs up on me. Isn’t she just the best mother on the earth?

Turning to Daniel, who is making a sand castle right now, I inform him, “Mom’s pissed. I think we have to go.”

He sighs and gets up slowly. We pack up and hurry to the hospital where mom is anxiously awaiting us in his room, which is filled with a lot more people than there should be.

Dr. Henderson meets us at the door. There were dark circles under his eyes and a wary expression. “All the rooms were occupied and we had an emergency. We had to give your room away, but we’re going to put another bed in here so both of you can stay here.”

Daniel nods and mom’s the next one to meet us at the door. She walks up to me and scrutinizes me with intense eyes. In a cold voice she says, “My boss called and needs me ASAP; we’ll talk later.”

With that, she stomps out of here and hurries to her car. I’m pretty glad we didn’t have to talk in the hospital. Our fights always manage to be screaming matches by the end of our conversation.

Danny decides to take a nap in the wheeled-in bed. I just sit out the window and watch as clouds overlap the sun and rain drops begin to fall.

Daniel
Hospital bed

I wake up from my nap and see the nurse carrying my flowers out of the room.

“Don’t touch those!” I yell at her in panic. She turns around startled and looks at me oddly. “Those were a gift, could you bring them over here by me.”

The nurse nods and brings them over to me and gently places them in my hands. I take a breath and can hardly smell their sweet scent anymore. Only one flower remands and it’s already withered and wrinkling. A few petals still remand though.

“Who gave you those?” A little girl’s voice says.

I look over to the bed next to mine. A young girl, not older than 10 was sitting up in her bed reading a book. She puts a bookmark in the book and pushes it to the side.

“A friend.” I shortly reply. “What’s wrong with you? Everyone was making a big fuss about you when we walked in.”

“I have a bad heart and I need a new one or else I’ll die.” She replies very bluntly.

How can someone so small be so…unemotional about death? No one her age should accept the fact or even be in the position to receive it as their future.

“Did you find a donor yet?” I ask dryly.

“Nope. I have a rare blood type. It’s O negative I think.” She says with little concern.

My heart goes out to her. I think she doesn’t care because there is no other way around it. She’s given up hope, like I have.

I pull out my chart from the end of my bed. Scanning it carefully, I find the words I need to see. I look to the window where Adrianna should have been, but she wasn’t there. She’s probably in the bathroom or something.

“What’s wrong with you?” She asks nonchalantly.

“Lung cancer. I’m supposed to die any day now, but you are not going to die.” I hand her my chart and point out my blood type: O negative.