Free Second Sight by George D Shuman Page B

on Tuesday—will that satisfy you?”
    “His nurse called to change the appointment. It’s Monday at four, but don’t change your plans. I want to go there myself.”
    “Sherry,” Brigham said sternly.
    “Really,” she said. “I mean it.”
    Brigham looked at her, nodding, thinking she was even more pigheaded with sight.
    “Where are we going for dinner?” she said happily, hoping to lighten the mood.
    “Do you still feel up to it?”
    “I’ve got to get out of this house.”
    “Well, it depends on what you want to eat.”
    “Something red,” she said.
    “Spaghetti?”
    She shook her head, whipping her hair from side to side.
    “Lobster?”
    She clapped her hands. “Yes!”
    “You’ve got to stop grinning like that!” Brigham said. “People will think you’re daft.”
    “I’ll be good, I swear,” she said. “I won’t stare, I won’t ask questions, and I promise not to look surprised by anything.”
    Brigham rolled his eyes. “Promise to wear your glasses.”
    “Not these,” she said. “One of my other pairs.”
    “Fine. We’ll wait till dark, but you must wear something.”
    “Can we watch a movie when we get home? Please, please?”
    “I’ve inherited a five-year-old,” Brigham grumbled, getting to his feet. “I’ll be back for you in a couple of hours. Why don’t you close your eyes and go to sleep?”
    Sherry reached for his hand and he took it and squeezed before continuing on to the door.
    “Did you know my bathroom soap is green?” She giggled.
     
    Sherry knew she had to take it slow. The doctor wanted her to wear eye patches five hours a day—to force her eyes to rest. She was down to two hours, and Brigham was sure she was pushing the envelope, as always. He was worried about her. She was worried that whatever radiation she had been exposed to in New Mexico would affect the already tenuous wiring of her brain.
    Sherry wasn’t sure what to think of the miracle of sight.
    The experience, for better or worse, was a little disconcerting after thirty-two years. There was more to seeing again than just strengthening fibrous muscles that navigated the eyeballs around a crowded street or room. Sherry had to learn how not tobe blind, how to abandon the instincts she had so long ago developed and honed and come to trust. She needed time to get her equilibrium under control. Suddenly she was relying on an entirely new means of navigation and she was tripping and bumping into things that she normally would have avoided. She also needed to practice being skeptical, she’d told herself, not to rely entirely on the presentation of things, on the world as it seemed.
    Dr. Salix had never come right out and said it, but he didn’t have to. It was possible that she would regain her vision in its entirety. It was equally possible, however, that one day she might be drying her hair and look up to find she was no longer in the mirror. There were no guarantees that she would continue to see. There were no guarantees that she would be alive in the morning either. Who knew better than she how quickly things could be taken from you in this world?
    So she didn’t yet dare to accept its permanency. Not yet and perhaps not for some time. It had been thirty-two years, after all, since she’d last seen a thing.
    And that was okay, she told herself. Part of living practically was having the knowledge that whatever happened today was good enough. She would plan for the best and she would be positive, but only by tempering her elations daily. There were no more long-term plans for Sherry Moore.
    Suddenly she thought of the empty shelves in her library. She must get books for that room. She must fill the empty shelves with colorful old books and then she would try to read as many as she could before her eyes went dark or she died.
    She tapped the key on the computer, the screen came to life, and she spoke her name and the date.
    A list came up and she listened to the choices, stopping at last with a