Brothers Forever

Jonny woke up the next morning with an obnoxious ringing in his ears a consistent pulse of pain coming from both his head and back. Then, he realized that he wasn’t staring at his dorm room ceiling. He was back at his home in Blaine, Minnesota. The event of last night hit him hard as he felt his stomach start to churn and his mouth filled with spit that tasted like bile. Something rose into the back of his throat.

Trying to get out of bed quickly, Jonny found himself unable to sit himself up and get to the bathroom. Panicking, he simply forced himself on to his side and emptied his stomach on to the floor. Unable to move his back, the convulsions caused the room to start to spin and a new form stinging pain to run from his back.
Michael woke up to the sound of his brother vomiting. Taking a few precious moments, to gather himself and clearing his throat he said, “You good Jonny?”

But, Jonny was to absorbed in the amount of pain being created from his head, back, and now his burning throat that all he could focus on was not vomiting on himself. Hearing no response except some more dry-heaving from his brother, Michael got out of bed to see Jonny’s situation. As Michael got closer to Jonny, he crinkled his nose at smell of the bile that had been emitted from Jonny’s stomach.

In a transitory moment of no throwing up, Jonny looked up at his approaching brother’s concerned face. After another tense moment of dry heaving, Jonny found himself gasping for air, Michael supporting his shoulder to keep him from falling back onto his back. “You done?” Michael asked.

Taking another few deep breaths Jonny said, “Yeah, I think so.” His voice was raspy, his breathing sounding like he had just run a marathon. But then he felt his stomach start to churn again and he leaned over to try to comfort his stomach, “Just kidding”

“C’mon, let’s get you to the bathroom, and then I’ll grab you some water okay?” Michael said.

Jonny gently nodded his head closing his eyes letting Michael guide him to his unsteady feet and then to the bathroom. Michael pushed him down on to the cold tile floor, letting Jonny get in a comfortable position on the cold tile floor. Once he knew that Jon was okay, Michael ran into the kitchen filling a cup of ice water and then woke up his mother.

When Michael told Kathy, she took a few seconds to re-orient herself before sprinting to the bathroom. Michael followed closely behind, as his mom immediately went to console her eldest child. After a few moments, Jonny’s head fell onto his mother’s shoulder his eyes squished tight in pain. Kathy rubbed his arm for a few moments before Michael left to go clean up his brother’s mess from earlier.

Later that day, Michael had been left at home watching over Jon, while the rest of the family went over to Bryce’s mighty mite’s hockey game. Currently, Michael was watching one of boring fishing sows on TV waiting for the two hours timer dinged for when he needed to check up on Jonny again.

Raising his head as he heard the familiar creak of his bedroom door, Michael turned to see Jonny, wearing his glasses heavy bags still under his eyes, slowly and painfully make his way into the kitchen. Michael sighed, muting the TV and followed to see if his brother needed anything. “Hey bro, how ya feeling?”

“I’m better, better than this morning.” Jonny took a seat at the kitchen table, “Where is everyone else?”

“Bryce had a game. Are you hungry? You haven’t eaten anything since last night. And I’m pretty sure anything you had left on your stomach ended up on out bedroom floor” Michael laughed.

Jonny smiled, grimacing as he felt his back twinge as he leaned back into the chair. “Umm, yeah, I can grab it.” He hated feeling helpless, but being honest with himself, every time he moved his back felt like someone was stabbing it, while the room started spinning.

“No Jonny, you aren’t supposed to be moving around for the first couple days” Michael said walking into the kitchen, looking through the fridge and the pantry, “What you hungry for?”

“Something light? I’m not sure what my stomach is going to handle” Jonny buried his head into his hands, massaging how temples, hoping to will away the continuous pain that continually consumed his body.

Michael rummaged in the pantry for a few minutes, until he finally found a sealed package a saltine crackers. “I have some crackers, do you want something to drink?” He looked to see his brother hunched, well as hunched as he could be with his back brace, over in pain on the kitchen table. “Jonny?”

“Hmm?” Jonny said picking his head up out of his hands, “Ohh, umm, yeah I’m good, do we have any ginger ale? Otherwise water would be fine.” He took a paused as Michael put a bowl of crackers into a dish then ran downstairs to find Ginger Ale. As Michael placed the can of opened ginger ale in front of him Jonny asked,
“Did the doc by chance give you any pain meds yesterday?”

“Yeah, But they aren’t very strong because of your concussion.” Michael grabbed a bottle of pills, still the prescription bag. “And you can’t take any until you can keep food in your stomach, which unfortunately is a side effect of your concussion”

Jonny sighed, nibbling on a saltine cracker before washing it down with a sip of ginger ale. “This beyond sucks.”

Michael gave Jonny a sympathetic smile, laying his hand on his shoulder. This was Michael’s only way he could telll his brother that things were going to get better and that he was there to help. They stayed frozen in this position for a few minutes until Jonny broke his stare from his hands, and moved to eat another cracker.

Knowing the silence completed the necessary gesture, Michael began making his way back into the family room, “I’ll be in the family room if you need anything.”