Free Will & I by Clay Byars

in parchment paper, as if this were merely another day to be gotten through. Something about her determined obliviousness instantly put me on guard. The night sitter was leaning back in the recliner my father had bought for Candy. She sat up and started putting away her knitting. My mother stopped at the foot of the bed and tried to contain her proud smile.
    â€œGuess who I talked to last night?” She looked at the night sitter and winked. “She wants to come see you this Friday, too. I said I knew you couldn’t wait.”
    My heart sank. How could she have done this?
    â€œIt’s Elin-ah,” she said, and looked at me with a now uncertain smile. “That’s okay, isn’t it?”
    I didn’t respond.
    â€œI have to get the house cleaned before they get here. It’s literally a pigsty right now.”
    I was too distraught at the time to wonder who “they” were, so I didn’t spell out the question. It quickly became the only thing I could think about, however. Was it Eleanor and her boyfriend? And if so, was it the same boyfriend she’d had before, the one we’d cheated on? I assumed so. That had been only a few months ago.
    When later that day I found out my intuition was right, a queasiness set in that rolled around in my gut, gathering intensity as the weekend approached. Eleanor’s boyfriend had a relative that was getting married in Atlanta, and “they” had decided to come to Birmingham first. I knew she hadn’t told him about us, about our having messed around. Was bringing him here some weird attempt to expunge her guilt? She’d forgotten about him then, so she would put him in my face now, and show him in the process that she and I were just friends. I was thinking all these thoughts and at the same time yearning to see her. Still, he wasn’t actually going to come down to the hospital with her, was he?
    When Friday arrived, I couldn’t concentrate on my therapy all that morning. Since hearing about her visit, the same hopelessness that had accompanied my ambulance ride had edged all my activity. The fairly funny physical therapist who always wore a lab coat even said something after a while. He asked if I had to be somewhere else. Because, he said, he could hurry it up if I did. When I didn’t squint in laughter along with him, he became serious and asked if I felt okay. I typed out the gist of the situation. “Oh, sorry,” he said. “Let me see you raise your hip twenty more times and we’ll call it a day.”
    By the time I saw Eleanor’s head peek out from behind the door, I was nauseatedly numb. Will had gone to pick her up at the motel where she was staying. He waited out in the hall with Candy. Eleanor’s boyfriend had stayed back.
    â€œHey, there,” she whispered. In my head, I automatically returned the greeting. But I didn’t even have the clicker yet—I was still on the letterboard—and couldn’t communicate with her. I suppose I could have, if she’d offered to use the letterboard, but did I really want that? It would only make things seem that much more different than before. She eased around the door, leaving it cracked, and said softly, “It’s good to see you again.”
    I lowered my eyes in response. The constant suck-tick of the machine pumping oxygen into my neck was the only reason she couldn’t hear my heart beating.
    â€œThis isn’t quite like we planned, is it?” She now spoke in her normal voice and smiled to ease the air. I tried to return the mood. I could see it dawn on her that she was going to be doing all the talking, and I could see her getting uncomfortable because of this.
    â€œI finally heard back from UVM,” she quickly said, her words almost shaking. “I got in. Yay!” She playfully pumped her fist. “And my brother got engaged. My dog Samantha—you remember, the pug—had this growth on her