Someone placed oxygen under my nose.
Another person checked the IV taped to my wrist.
The doctor kept asking questions I could answer only with my eyes.
Pain?
One blink.
Numbness?
Two.
Could I feel pressure?
One.
Could I move anything at all?
Two.
Every answer seemed to make him move faster.
They took me for an urgent scan.
The machine was louder than I expected.
Mechanical knocking surrounded me while I lay motionless, my head supported so I wouldn’t have to move it.
I remember staring at one tiny scratch inside the scanner and thinking how ridiculous it was that a scratch could become the center of your universe when you were terrified you might never walk again.
I couldn’t ask what they were seeing.
I couldn’t ask whether this was permanent.
I couldn’t ask whether I would go back to school, drive a car, dance badly in my bedroom, or complain about hospital Jell-O.
So I counted noises.
Twenty-three knocks.
A pause.
Eleven knocks.
Another pause.
Then the table moved.
When they pulled me out, the doctor’s expression told me the scan had shown something.
He stood beside another physician, both staring at images on a screen angled away from me.
My parents had been allowed back into the corridor.
Mom clutched Dad’s arm so tightly her fingers had gone white.
The doctor approached them.
“The scan shows a collection of blood pressing on the spinal canal near the surgical area,” he said.
“A postoperative hematoma.
It’s compressing the nerves.”
Mom stared at him.
“Can you fix it?”
“We need to take her back to the operating room and relieve the pressure immediately.”
Immediately.
Dad’s voice cracked.
“Will she walk again?”
The doctor looked at me before he answered.
“The fact that she’s awake, can feel touch, and we’re identifying the compression quickly are encouraging signs.
But I cannot promise an outcome.
Time matters.”
He handed my father a consent form.
Dad looked down at it but didn’t seem able to read.
His hands shook.
That was when my mother came to the side of my bed.
Her face was wet.
“Ella.”
I looked at her.
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.
I knew what she wanted to say.
I’m sorry.
She couldn’t say it yet.
Neither could I.
The doctor tapped the paper.
