Fireflies - By David Morrell Page 0,23

he let go of Matt. The IV stand started wobbling. David grabbed for it. Matt wavered so fiercely that David couldn’t possibly expect him to try to edge toward the button that would summon a nurse.

The oxygen prongs fell out of Matt’s nostrils. The tube that drained blood from Matt’s huge incision stretched taught as Matt wobbled.

“Matt, I don’t have the strength to hold your IV stand with one hand and use my other hand to lift you onto the bed.”

“I can’t stand any longer.”

Why did I let myself listen to him? Twenty-four hours out of major surgery, and he’s out of bed, clutching me, the two of us wavering like two drunks trying to dance. How could I have been so stupid?

“Dad, that chair.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Can you reach the chair?”

“But why?”

“Do it.” Matthew wheezed. “Pull it over here. I think if I can stand on it …”

That’s when David knew he wasn’t as smart as his son.

“Yes!”

David frantically released his hold on the IV stand. He grabbed the chair, jerked it toward him, and desperately regrabbed the IV stand just before it toppled, all the while using his left hand to hold up Matt.

“Do you really think you …?”

“Just keep holding me, Dad.”

Matt strained. Gasping, he raised a foot to the chair. David eased him up.

With a greater gasp, Matthew raised his other foot to the chair. David eased him higher.

Matt’s hips were now level with the bed. He sat, clutched David’s shoulders, and with the most terrible groan David had ever heard, lay back in bed.

David quickly reattached the oxygen prongs to Matthew’s nostrils.

“So cold,” Matthew said.

At that moment, as David pulled a sheet and blanket over his shivering son, the door to the room swung open. The surgeon stepped in, followed by Donna, Sarie, and a nurse.

“The call I had to return wasn’t important,” the surgeon said. “But your mother and sister and I had a good chance to talk. As I was saying, Matt, I hate to do this. Nonetheless, I need to keep being tough on you. As soon as you’re able, in a day or so, you’ve got to get out of bed. More important, you’ve got to make your bladder work.”

Through his pain, Matt grinned. “It’s already taken care of.”

“What?”

“Here,” David said. He stooped and handed the surgeon the plastic bottle of urine.

The surgeon looked baffled. “But how did you …?”

“Well”—David glanced with love toward Matthew—“you might say we went dancing. I think the bed could be a little lower.”

“Wait a second. You don’t mean …?”

“You wanted him on his feet as soon as possible.” David directed another loving glance toward Matthew, who kept grinning through his pain. “I promised you. My son’s as tough as any patient you ever had.”

8

Tough doesn’t describe it. What do you say to a fifteen-year-old boy, who stood only five-feet tall and weighed only a hundred pounds and was totally hairless, whose cancer and chemotherapy had made his skin translucent … what do you say when he recovers from his mind-disorienting sedation after major surgery and realizes the extent of what’s been done to him?

“Four ribs? A third of my lung?” Matt’s eyes became panicked. His next question, though, so avoided the crucial issue that David’s breath escaped him, pushed out by pity.

“Then I won’t be able to play the guitar again?” Matt’s voice broke. “I won’t be able to keep up my—”

“Music?” David said. “The surgeon took some muscle tissue from your back and grafted in onto your chest where your ribs used to be. With some physical therapy, you ought to be able to have the strength to hold your guitar. Later, when you’ve stopped growing”—if, David thought, if you get the chance to be old enough to stop growing—“you’ll have another operation, not as serious, to put a support brace into your chest, to replace the ribs you lost. You won’t have a gap there. No deformity. You’ll stand straight. As far as your lung’s concerned, if you’d lost it completely, you wouldn’t be able to breathe sufficiently to play on stage with a band. But you only lost a third of your lung. You won’t run any hundred-yard dashes. You won’t charge up a dozen flights of stairs. But you’ll be able to walk as easily, with as little effort, as you did before. If you don’t try to be Bruce Springsteen and sprint around the stage, you still have a chance to be a musician.”

“Still have a chance?” Matthew sensed the implication.