If I Stay

I find them hiding out on the trauma floor, several halls away from the ICU. They’re trying to look casual as they test out the doors to various supply closets. When they finally find an unlocked one, they sneak inside. They fumble around in the dark for a light switch. I hate to break it to them, but it’s actually back out in the hall.

“I’m not sure this kind of thing works outside of the movies,” Kim tells Adam as she feels along the wall.

“Every fiction has its base in fact,” he tells her.

“You don’t really look like the doctor type,” she says.

“I was hoping for orderly. Or maybe janitor.”

“Why would a janitor be in the ICU?” Kim asks. She’s a stickler for these kinds of details.

“Broken lightbulb. I don’t know. It’s all in how you pull it off.”

“I still don’t understand why you don’t just go to her family?” asks Kim, pragmatic as ever. “I’m sure her grandparents could explain, could get you in to see Mia.”

Adam shakes his head. “You know, when the nurse threatened to call security, my first thought was ‘I’ll just call Mia’s parents to fix this.’” Adam stops, takes a few breaths. “It just keeps walloping me over and over, and it’s like it’s the first time every time,” he says in a husky voice.

“I know,” Kim replies in a whisper.

“Anyhow,” Adam says, resuming his search for the light switch, “I can’t go to her grandparents. I can’t add anything more to their burden. This is something I have to do for myself.”

I’m sure my grandparents would actually be happy to help Adam. They’ve met him a bunch of times, and they like him a lot. On Christmas, Gran is always sure to make maple fudge for him because he once mentioned how much he liked it.

But I also know that sometimes Adam needs to do things the dramatic way. He is fond of the Grand Gesture. Like saving up two weeks of pizza-delivery tips to take me to Yo-Yo Ma instead of just asking me out on a regular date. Like decorating my windowsill with flowers every day for a week when I was contagious with the chicken pox.

Now I can see that Adam is concentrating on the new task at hand. I’m not sure what exactly he has in mind, but whatever the plan, I’m grateful for it, if only because it’s pulled him out of his emotional stupor I saw in the hallway outside the ICU. I’ve seen him get like this before, when he’s writing a new song or is trying to convince me to do something I won’t want to do—like go camping with him—and nothing, not a meteorite crashing into the planet, not even a girlfriend in the ICU, can dissuade him.

Besides, it’s the girlfriend in the ICU that’s necessitating Adam’s ruse to begin with. And from what I can guess, it’s the oldest hospital trick in the book, taken straight from that movie The Fugitive, which Mom and I recently watched on TNT. I have my doubts about it. So does Kim.

“Don’t you think that nurse might recognize you?” Kim asks. “You did yell at her.”

“She won’t have to recognize me if she doesn’t see me. Now I get why you and Mia are such peas in a pod. A pair of Cassandras.”

Adam has never met Mrs. Schein, so he doesn’t get that implying that Kim is a worrywart is fighting words. Kim scowls, but then I can see her give in. “Maybe this retarded plan of yours would work better if we could actually see what we’re doing.” She fumbles around in her bag and pulls out the cell phone her mother made her start carrying when she was ten—child LoJack, Kim called it—and turned on the monitor. A square of light softens the darkness.

“Now, that’s more like the brilliant girl Mia brags about,” Adam says. He turns on his own cell phone and now the room is illuminated by a dull glow.

Unfortunately, the glow shows that the tiny broom closet is full of brooms, a bucket, and a pair of mops, but is lacking any of the disguises that Adam was hoping for. If I could, I would inform them that the hospital has locker rooms, where the doctors and nurses can stow their street clothes and where they change into their scrubs or their lab coats. The only generic hospital garb sitting around are those embarrassing gowns that they put the patients in. Adam probably could throw on a gown and cruise the hallways in a wheelchair with no one the wiser, but such a getup would still not get him into the ICU.

“Shit,” Adam says.

“We can keep trying,” Kim says, suddenly the cheer-leader. “There are like ten floors in this place. I’m sure there are other unlocked closets.”

Adam sinks to the floor. “Nah. You’re right. This is stupid. We need to come up with a better plan.”

“You could fake a drug overdose or something so you wind up in the ICU,” Kim says.

“This is Portland. You’re lucky if a drug overdose gets you into the ER,” Adam replies. “No, I was thinking more like a distraction. You know, like making the fire alarm go off so the nurses all come running out.”

“Do you really think sprinklers and panicked nurses are good for Mia?” Kim asks.

“Well, not that exactly, but something so that they all look away for half a second and I stealthily sneak in.”