Every Wild Heart Page 8

“No.” Then she hesitated. “Well, I remember brushing Tru, and getting his tack ready . . .”

  “And then?” Dr. Feldman asked.

  Nic shook her head, uncertain. “I—I don’t know. I guess I don’t remember anything else.” She looked at me, and I looked at Dr. Feldman, and he nodded at me.

  “You rode Tru into the woods,” I told her, “and Tru went back to the barn without you sometime later. Denny found you unconscious on the ground by a huge fallen tree. He thinks you tried to jump it and got knocked out of the saddle by a low branch.” I wasn’t sure how I expected Nic to react to this news. A part of me thought she’d deny it, or at least laugh off such a dangerous act as ridiculous, something she’d never do. I didn’t expect her to look so pleased.

  “Whoa,” she said. That twinkle in her eye had returned. Then her smile vanished. “Is Tru okay?”

  “Denny said he’s fine.” I felt a surge of gratitude toward Denny for supplying this information.

  Nic relaxed back against the pillows as though this were all that she needed to know in order to feel perfectly at ease. She looked so pleased with herself that I momentarily forgot about her head injury and felt my temper flare. Why did you ride into the woods when Denny told you it wasn’t safe? Why did you try to jump that tree? I wanted to ask, but managed to restrain myself. Even if I’d asked these questions, she’d have no answers for me. She didn’t remember doing it.

  “Don’t worry too much about not remembering exactly what happened,” Dr. Feldman was telling her. “In time, those memories might return to you. For now, let’s just focus on what you do remember.”

  He began to ask Nic a series of simple questions: the year, the day of the week, her birthday, the name of her school. Nic answered each easily, confidently, every so often flashing that bold, bright smile at me or Dr. Feldman or Stephanie in what seemed like an intentionally egalitarian dispersal of charm. She passed Dr. Feldman’s test, and the many ones that followed through the night, and yet as I listened to my daughter, as I watched her, I could not tell if the shiver that I kept feeling run down my spine was one of relief . . . or fear.

  Chapter 6

  In the morning, the hospital room was bright and held an air of expectation. Nic wondered how many patients had moved in and out of the bed that she lay in. How many had died there. She made a silent wish for all of these people, without quite knowing what it was that she wished for them. It was strange that she should feel affection for this hospital room, but she did. She had the feeling that her mother’s music had somehow seeped into the room’s powder-blue walls. The evening before, when Nic had heard her mother singing and had opened her eyes to meet her mother’s gaze, the room had seemed to pulse with life. It had been strange to awaken in an unfamiliar place, but she had not felt afraid. She’d had the sense that she was missing something more than the memory of the accident, and that, whatever it was, she didn’t need it. She felt lighter without it. The closest she’d ever come to this particular feeling previously was when she’d lost a bracelet that her stepmother, Lonnie, had given her. She’d never liked the bracelet but had worn it every other weekend anyway, knowing that Lonnie fretted over their relationship. For a long time, Nic could envision no end to this situation. And then, one day, the bracelet was gone. Lost. The relief had been so great that Nic had almost cried.

  “Hi, sweetie,” her mother said now from the chair beside her bed. Nic wondered if she’d slept at all. Her auburn hair, usually full of light, hung limply around her shoulders.

  “Good morning.” Nic only remembered her bruises when she moved, and as she sat up she had to clench her teeth to keep from crying out.

  “Do you want something more for your pain?” her mom asked. “Dr. Feldman should be here any minute.”

  Nic shook her head. “I’m fine.” She wanted to ignore her bruised body and the slight headache that pressed at her temples. These minor aches were especially annoying because otherwise she felt full of energy. She spread her fingers wide atop the thin blue blanket that covered her legs. Her mind was crowded with thoughts. When would she be able to return to the barn? Now that she knew that she had tried to jump a fallen tree in the woods, she wanted to try it again. It didn’t seem fair that she had done something remarkable for the first time in her life, and now she couldn’t even remember it.

  Her mother studied her, looking worried. Nic noticed that her mother’s green eyes had the same tiny gold specks in them that her own did. She loved finding echoes of her parents in herself; they made her feel closer to whole, as though each discovery brought with it a twist of a screw, a tightening of her loosely assembled self, making her secure.

  “Has Dad’s plane landed?”

  “Not yet. He should be here this afternoon.”

  There was a knock on the door and then Dr. Feldman walked in. “Good morning,” he said. He pulled a chair over to the bedside and smiled at Nic before looking down at her chart. Nic liked Dr. Feldman. He spoke to her in the same kind, tired, straightforward way that he spoke to her mother and the nurses.

  “How did the night go?” he asked. “Were you able to get some sleep? I see you had quite a few visits from nurses checking on you.”

  She remembered these middle-of-the-night visits only vaguely. “I feel great. Can I go home now?”

  Dr. Feldman’s smile reappeared. “What’s the rush?”

  The “rush” is that I have things to do! she wanted to tell the doctor, but didn’t. How could she explain something that she didn’t understand herself? She only knew that she wanted to leave the hospital. That she felt ready to go. Her fingers tapped against the blanket.

  “I have school . . .” She trailed off. A strange sensation fluttered through her, making her head throb.

  “You have your doctor’s permission to miss school. In fact, he insists on it,” said Dr. Feldman. “Let’s talk a little more about how you’re feeling. Any nausea or dizziness?”

  Nic shook her head.

  “Headache?”

  Her mother watched her closely. Dr. Feldman’s pen hovered above his notepad, waiting. The pain in Nic’s head didn’t worry Nic. It was nothing. She’d ridden Tru through countless clouds of colds and flus, and even once, strep throat! She would never let this little headache keep her from her horse.

  “Nope,” she said.

  Dr. Feldman’s pen scribbled against the page. “Have you remembered anything else about the accident?”

  Nic felt funny every time she tried to remember riding Tru. The rest of that day was so perfectly clear to her. She thought of talking to Lucas Holt that afternoon and running from him, crying. Oddly, the recollection didn’t make her want to cringe. There was a gap in her memory, a dark ravine that she had crossed with much effort (her current whereabouts were testament to this), and the conversation with Lucas Holt was on the far side of that gap, the side that lay safely behind her.

  But it did feel odd to not remember the accident. How could she not remember something that she had done just one day earlier? Searching her existing memories was like pressing a finger into a wound—it only seemed to make things worse. Nic suspected that if she stopped trying so hard, the memory would eventually surface on its own.

  “No,” she said. “I still don’t remember riding Tru.” As the doctor began to make note of this, she quickly added, “But I remember walking into the barn. I remember the tack room smelled good.” She shook her head. This memory didn’t seem sufficient; the tack room always smelled good. She should try to be specific. “I gave an apple to Peach, the super bitchy mare across from . . .” She faltered. Had she just used the word “bitchy”? Her mother’s sharp glance from her to Dr. Feldman confirmed that she had.

  “Don’t let it worry you,” Dr. Feldman said. When he spoke his thick black eyebrows moved very slightly, like boats bobbing on calm water. “Sometimes our brains work to protect us from remembering scary things, such as falling from a horse when you are otherwise alone in the woods.”

  Nic no
dded, but something about his words did not ring true to her. She didn’t need her brain to protect her. And shouldn’t her own brain know this? How could it work against her?

  Dr. Feldman leafed through her chart and said that all of her test results continued to look fine. “I’m optimistic that you should be able to return home this afternoon or evening,” he told Nic. “But cognitive rest is key to your recovery. That means going easy on your brain. No school tomorrow or Friday. Take the weekend to rest, too. Stay off your phone and computer for the next few days. Minimal television. Check in with yourself and if anything you’re doing triggers symptoms—headache, nausea, dizziness, fatigue, irritability—stop.”

  “And then I can go back to school on Monday?” Nic asked.

  “Nic . . .” her mother began.

  “If you’re feeling up for it, yes.” Dr. Feldman turned toward her mother. “Isolation isn’t good for recovery either. Everything in moderation.”

  “When can I ride?” Nic asked.

  Dr. Feldman clasped his hands on top of her chart. “Brain injuries are cumulative. Once you’ve had one, it’s easier to get another, and each injury carries more risk of long-term damage than the last.”

  Nic swung her gaze to her mother. “I’m not going to stop riding.”

  “Let’s just see how your recovery goes,” her mother said, taking her hand. “Give yourself a little time.”

  “No!” Nic’s voice emerged louder than she’d intended. That strange sensation fluttered through her again, that feeling that she was missing something, that feeling of relief.

  “Sweetie, this isn’t a broken bone. We’re talking about your brain.”

  “I’m not going to fall off again. I’ll be careful.”

  “I’m sorry, Nic. I know how much riding means to you—”

  “No, you don’t!” Her mother obviously did not know how much riding meant to her, or she wouldn’t tell her she shouldn’t do it. Take away something else, Nic silently begged her. Anything else.

  “I do know,” her mother insisted. “And I’m sorry. But it’s not a risk worth taking. A bump to your head—even a small one—could have much worse consequences next time.”

  “Then I won’t ride. I’ll work Tru from the ground using a lunge line. He needs to exercise.”

  “I’m more worried about you than Tru,” her mother said. “Anyway, when Denny called to check on you last night, he promised me that he would take good care of Tru while you recover.”

  Denny had called her mother? This seemed to Nic like a bear picking up the phone to call a lion.

  “You see,” said Dr. Feldman. “Your horse will be just fine.”

  “Tru may be fine,” Nic answered. “But I won’t be until I ride again.” Her words emerged smoothly, but she could tell by the way that her mother and the doctor blinked at her, the sudden swell of quiet in the room, that the resolve in her voice had startled them. It was in that moment that Nic realized what else was missing besides the memory of the accident: the stuttering child that she’d carried within her for so many years.

  That girl, it seemed, was gone.

  Chapter 7

  I spotted Tyler in the waiting room, staring out at the parking lot, chewing his lower lip. Nic chewed on her lip when she was lost in thought, but Tyler chewed on his lip only when he was anxious, which meant—since being unflappable was one of his defining characteristics—he did it rarely.

  That catch thing happened in my chest. It happened whenever I saw Tyler, whether we were college classmates or lovers or spouses or forty-and-divorced-and-connected-only-by-our-hospitalized-daughter.

  I stood very still and studied his profile, telling myself that I was cataloguing the physical traits that he had passed down to our daughter. Dark hair. Long face. Long nose. Long legs. Austere eyebrows. Tyler must have sensed me watching him, because he turned and looked at me and after a beat of time that felt like it held every moment of our shared history, he crossed the room and gathered me in his arms.

  He smelled different than he had when we were married, but his body felt the same. I let myself relax for a moment, comforted. I couldn’t remember the last time he’d really hugged me. It must have been years. Years of phone calls and emails and text messages about Nic—her behavior, her speech therapy, her grades (always mediocre despite her clear intelligence). Years of polite conversation when he dropped off Nic after the weekends they spent together. Tyler didn’t love me anymore—he loved his wife, Lonnie, who was perfect for him, and their two young sons (and what a strange relief it had been to learn that their children were sons and that Nic would continue to be her father’s only daughter)—but he would always love Nic. He was a good man. Really, his main fault was glaringly easy to identify: he didn’t love me.

  We’d been divorced for nine years. Nine years! We’d only been married for seven. This didn’t seem possible. In my memory, our married years stretched on and on like a rubber band pulled taut; the years since had felt like the snap of that rubber band, released.

  Tyler stepped back from our embrace and I quickly wiped the tears from my eyes.

  “How is she?” he asked.

  I tried to think of how to describe Nic’s current state to Tyler. “It’s very strange. She doesn’t remember the actual accident, but she remembers everything else. She’s smiling a lot. She’s happy. She’s been chatting with the nurses like she’s known them her whole life. Everyone who works here is completely charmed by her. If the hospital ran a contest for most popular patient, our daughter would leave here wearing a crown.”

  “Leave here? Is she ready to leave already?”

  It was just like Tyler to latch onto the most positive thing I’d said. “Dr. Feldman said that as long as she continues to show improvement, we can bring her home later today. But you’re not listening to me. Nic isn’t acting like herself.”

  Tyler looked confused. “You said she’s smiling and happy. That sounds like our Nic.”

  “Exactly! That’s our Nic. But ever since she woke up from the coma, she’s smiling and happy with everyone. She’s not self-conscious at all. She’s different.”

  His brow furrowed. “What does her doctor say?”

  “He said that a traumatic brain injury like Nic’s can cause behavioral changes and lowered inhibitions. He said that in some of these cases, people become reckless, violent, or sometimes just rude. They can’t control their impulses. But Nic isn’t acting like that, so he isn’t worried. He thinks her symptoms are mild.”

  Tyler’s expression relaxed.

  “But Nic is different,” I insisted. “She may not be violent, but she isn’t the way she was before the accident. I keep trying to explain that to Dr. Feldman, but he just repeats what he’s already said. Now I’m convinced that he’s instructed one of his nurses to page him after he’s spent two minutes talking to me.”

  “Giving the doc hell, eh, G.G.?” Tyler asked, smiling.

  “Apparently hospitalizing my daughter brings out the beast in me.”

  “I think perhaps life brings out the beast in you.” Tyler was still smiling, but his head was cocked as though he were imagining the bullet he’d dodged by divorcing me. If I hadn’t been so focused on Nic, I would have taken the opportunity to remind him that he’d adored the beast in me right up until the moment he’d decided he didn’t. The bullet dodged had been the one he’d aimed at me, not the other way around.

  “Stay on subject,” I told him. “Nic wants to go to school. Our Nic wants to go to school. She also wants to get back to the barn to ride Tru, but that’s no surprise. Dr. Feldman explained that a second brain injury could be much worse than the first, and when he told her that riding wasn’t a good idea, Nic became really angry.” It had seemed to me that the entire hospital had fallen silent for a beat of time after Nic had raised her voice during that conversation, everything shifting off-kilter before righting itself again. “I tried to explain to Dr. Feldman that she never yells like that, and he said I should consider mysel
f lucky. I got the impression that his own teenage daughter hasn’t stopped yelling in three years.”

  Tyler laughed. “I’m sort of looking forward to meeting this Dr. Feldman.”

  “He also said it might not be the worst idea to let Nic visit Tru.”

  Tyler’s face fell. “No.”

  “That’s how I felt at first. But he thinks it could help her regain her full memory. And, at the very least, that it would give her comfort to see with her own eyes that Tru is okay. Honestly, I hate the idea of her ever getting near another horse, but maybe on this particular subject Dr. Feldman is onto something.”

  Tyler said he wanted to think about it. I walked him to Nic’s room, stopping when we reached the door. “I’ll be in the waiting room, okay? Nic will love having you all to herself, and I could use a moment to check in with work.”

  But now Tyler was only half-listening, nodding and offering a vague wave before pushing open Nic’s door and stepping into her room. It occurred to me that he probably felt the same way that I had felt when I first arrived at the hospital; some part of him was convinced that everything would be okay once he was physically reunited with his daughter, because she was the love of his life, too, or one of them (he had so many loves now), and how could she not be okay once they were together?

  Love turned us all into fools.

  I SANK HEAVILY into a chair in the waiting room and checked the voice messages on my phone. There was one from Richard Hylan, Nic’s English teacher. “Nic is bright,” he said, “but quite shy, as I’m sure you’re aware. I’d love to chat with you about a few ideas for cracking her shell.” Usually I felt a flash of protective fury when I received one of these calls from yet another teacher who would not accept my daughter for who she was, but in that moment I felt disconsolate. The shell is already cracked, I thought, feeling worried for my daughter in brand-new ways.

  Next, there was a message from Simone, wondering how Nic was doing, and letting me know everything had gone smoothly at the studio the night before. And then a message from Martin Jansen, Talk960’s program director, tripping over himself to let me know how sorry he was to hear about Nic’s accident, that I should take all the time I needed, that the studio would support me in any way it could. Martin always became increasingly solicitous as I neared a contract renewal date—I didn’t think it was likely that he’d caught wind of the interest from ZoneTV, but he must have known that other radio stations were always circling.