Our Secret Summer(86)

I’m too stunned to speak. My dad never loses his cool, usually the counterbalance for my mom’s temper. Though right now, the dynamics between us have shifted out of whack, and my mom doesn’t come to my aid. She keeps her distance on the other side of the hospital bed. I have no ally. Winnie is gone. Lita—my accomplice this summer—is resting. She looks too frail and breakable. It’s frightening to see her wearing a hospital gown that drowns her. A splint holds her right arm at a forty-five-degree angle. I wonder how badly it hurt when she fell.

“I’m going to go see if I can speak with the doctor,” my mom says, leaving me.

When the door shuts behind her, I’m frozen for a moment. The smell of the hospital room, the methodical beeps of the lifesaving machines drag me back to my last days with Winnie. I shudder and step closer to Lita so I can gently lift her left hand. Her skin is cold and papery thin. I whisper my apologies for not being with her when I should have been, and I cry the tears I’ve been holding in since my mom called me last night.

Has it only been that long?

Once I received that phone call, Cristiano immediately helped me dress and drove me back to my apartment. He came up and quickly helped me pack my belongings.

“All of it,” I told him when he asked what I wanted to take.

He didn’t argue, though I could tell there were things he wished he could say.

Simone wasn’t there while I stuffed my duffel bag full, and I was glad for it. Better not to wake her up or worry her. Cristiano caught me staring at her bed and promised he would update my friends, and I left it at that, too tired to worry about any logistics beyond booking the first flight to Marseille.

“I could come with you.”

I felt his gaze on me as I stared out the window while he drove me to the airport. Then and now, I’m as fragile as a house of cards. I could only shake my head, no. He didn’t understand the maelstrom I was walking into. The anger in my mom’s voice—the accusations and blame—were already making me feel nauseous with guilt.

“It’s better if I go alone.”

I study Lita’s hand now, memorizing the network of pale veins. My tears are starting to dry up, and I sniffle.

“You got a tattoo?” she suddenly asks, her voice scratchy and gruff.

My heart soars as I glance up and see that Lita’s awake and smiling shakily at me.

“Lita.”

I try not to pounce on her, but it’s hard not to. I lean in and kiss her cheeks, squeezing her as gently as I can, inhaling her scent.

“Don’t change the subject,” she scolds weakly. “You got a tattoo?”

I laugh and sniffle. “It’s a little one.”

“Not so little from here. How wild of you. I always wanted one. Hold it up so I can see it better. I don’t have my glasses.”

I do as she says, explaining to her what it means. She pats my arm then my cheek, her arm shaking with the effort. “Beautiful, mi ni?a. You’re so beautiful. You know, you’ve never looked more Spanish. The sun has highlighted your hair and brought out your freckles.” She traces my chin with her finger while she studies me. “Your eyes have never looked more green. Impresionante.”

I hold her hand where it cradles my cheek.

She frowns. “Why are you crying?”

I shake my head, trying to work through the knot of emotion stuck in my throat. “I’m sorry.”

Her mouth turns down even more.

“You’re sorry? For what?” It’s like she only now registers her circumstances, where she is, the bandage on her head, the splint on her arm. “This? This is nothing, Isabel. A fall. I’m fine.”

“I should have been there.”

“No,” she snaps sharply enough that I startle.

The door to her hospital room opens and my dad rushes back in. “I thought I heard talking. You’re awake. Thank god. How are you feeling?”

Lita tsks and tries to brush aside his concern, and then her eyes widen when she sees my mom step into the room as well. “What are you doing here? Both of you? Oh, how silly. I’m fine!”

For two days, Lita heals at the hospital while my parents and I dance around each other. I don’t leave her side and they don’t leave mine. The tension in the room is palpable. My parents aren’t going to forgive me for what I’ve done. The more they ask about it and the more I share, the angrier they get. The fact that I kept it a secret, that I lied to them over and over again—it feels like a personal betrayal even when I try to explain it wasn’t meant to be. How can I share that I wanted a summer on Ibiza as Elle rather than living one more second as Isabel? That I wanted to escape from a life most people would beg for?

I know it was selfish. I wanted freedom and now I understand the full consequences of that decision. Had I been in Marseille with Lita all summer like we planned, I would have been there the day she fell. I could have helped her. Had my parents known Lita was on her own, maybe they would have checked on her more often. Maybe she would have been taken to the hospital sooner.

I apologize for all of this and more, but my dad is too concerned with Lita’s condition to listen, and my mom is swept up in making arrangements for Lita’s care. I endure my parents’ disappointment and anger in the confines of that hospital room until finally Lita is discharged and we take her home. There, I endure the same disappointment and anger, just in a new setting.