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CHAPTER 7
STELLA
“Just give me ten minutes,”
I say, shutting the door and leaving Will and
Poe out in the hallway.
I look around his room as my app downloads onto his phone, seeing the note
I slipped under his door this morning sitting on top of his bed.
“Text me when you have the med cart. (718) 555 3295. I will be over this
afternoon to set everything up.”
I knew that one would be tricky, especially because Will and Barb are clearly
not on the best of terms, so she wouldn’t advocate for him, but he went above
her head and managed to charm Dr. Hamid. I pick up the note, noticing he’s
drawn a tiny cartoon along the edge, of an angry Barb in her signature colorful
scrubs, pushing a med cart and screaming, “DON’T MAKE ME REGRET
THIS!”
I shake my head, a smile slipping onto my lips as I put the note back down
and walk over to the actual med cart. I rearrange a few pill bottles, making sure
one more time that everything is in the same chronological order as what I
programmed into the app after cross-referencing his Donkey Kong–covered
regimen.
I double-check his laptop to see how much longer for the download to be
complete from the link I sent him, trying not to breathe more than I have to in
this B. cepacia–laden room.
Eighty-eight percent complete.
My heart jumps as I hear noise outside the doorway, and I yank my hand
away from the keyboard, worried we’ve been caught.
Please don’t be Barb. Please
don’t be Barb.
She should be on her lunch break, but if she’s back already, getting
a jump on her Monday-afternoon rounds, she’ll murder me.
Will’s footsteps echo back and forth, back and forth, in front of the doorway,
and I tiptoe to the door, almost pressing my ear up against it. But I’m relieved to
hear only the two of their voices.
“You wiped everything down, right?” Poe says.
“Of course I did. Twice, just to be safe,” Will shoots back. “I mean, clearly,
this wasn’t my idea, you know.”
I adjust the isolation gown over the top of my disposable scrubs, and yank
open the door, squinting at them through my goggles.
Poe spins around on his skateboard to face me. “Man, Stella. Did I tell you
how fiiine you look today?”
He and Will break out into laughter for the third time over my makeshift
hazmat suit. I glare at them before glancing down the hallway.
“Still clear?”
He pushes off on his skateboard and slowly rolls past the nurses’ station,
peering over the desk.
He shoots a thumbs-up in my direction. “Just hurry up.”
“I’m almost done!” I say, ducking back into the room and closing the door.
I eye the med cart, breathing a sigh of contentment over how meticulously
organized it is. But then I see the desk his laptop is sitting on, which is so . . .
not. I march over and grab a handful of colored pencils, putting them safely
back in the pencil holder they belong in. I straighten up the magazines and
sketchbooks, making sure they are in order by size, and as I do, a piece of paper
falls out.
It’s a cartoon boy who looks a lot like Will holding a pair of balloons and
forcing air into deflated-looking lungs, his face red from the effort. I grin,
reading the caption under it: “Just breathe.”
It’s really good.
Reaching out, I gently trace Will’s lungs, like I do with Abby’s drawing. My
gloved fingertips land on the small cartoon of Will, his sharp jawline, his unruly
hair, his blue eyes, and the same burgundy sweatshirt he was wearing on the
roof.
All that’s missing is the smile.
I look up at the wall, noticing he has only an old cartoon hung up right above
his bed. Grabbing a tack from a small jar, I hang his cartoon on the wall below
it.
The laptop dings and I blink, quickly pulling my hand away. Upload
complete. I spin around, walking to his desk and unplugging his phone.
Scooping everything up, I pull open the door and hold out the phone to the
noncartoon Will.
He stretches to take it from me, fixing his face mask with the other hand.
“I built an app for chronic illnesses. Med charts, schedules.” I shrug casually.
“It’ll alert you when you need to take your pills or do a treat—”
“You
built
an app? Like, built it, built it?” he cuts me off, looking from the
phone to me in surprise, his blue eyes wide.
“Newsflash. Girls can code.”
His phone chirps and I see the animated pill bottle appear on his screen.
“Ivacaftor. A hundred and fifty milligrams,” I tell him. Damn, I already feel
better.
I raise my eyebrows at Will, who is giving me a look that’s not mocking for
once. He’s impressed. Good. “My app is so simple even boys can figure it out.”
I saunter off, swaying my nonexistent hips confidently, cheeks warm as I
head straight to the public bathroom on the other side of the floor that no one
uses.
The light flickers on as I lock the door behind me. I rip off my gloves and
grab some disinfectant wipes from a round bin by the door, scrubbing my hands
down three times. Exhaling slowly, I rip everything I’m wearing off; the booties
and the cap and the face mask and the scrubs and the gown. I shove them all
into the bin, pushing them down and closing the lid before running to the sink.
My skin is crawling, like I can feel the B. cepacia looking for a way to slip
inside and eat away at me.
I go to the sink and turn the handle, hot water pouring loudly out of the tap.
I grip the smooth porcelain, looking at myself in the mirror, standing there in
my bra and underwear. The handful of raised scars lining my chest and stomach
from surgery after surgery, my ribs pushing through my skin when I breathe, the
sharp angle of my collarbone made sharper by the dim lighting of the bathroom.
The redness around my G-tube is worsening, an infection definitely starting to
form.
I’m too thin, too scarred, too . . . I meet my hazel eyes in the mirror.
Why would Will want to draw me?
His voice echoes in my head, calling me beautiful.
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