hi everybody!

               “Move the f*** out of the way!” Beck yelled.  His words triggered in my brain the thought to run, and I just went with it. Unfortunately, I was the only one who ran, and I soon learned that I should have just stayed in one spot…

                …As I came slowly out of the blank nothingness I took a look around, and above me I saw a blonde-haired, medical-looking man. I knew he had something to do with medicine because of the stethoscope he had hanging around his neck.

                “Heather, I need you to talk to me. My name is Jason. Do you remember anything that happened?”

                I gazed into his sea-green eyes with a fuzzy blink. My brain was buzzing and my eyes were drooping, threatening to snap shut.

                “No.” I tried to utter more but my brain was shutting down. As I drifted back into a deep sleep my eyes took in a hazy view of the ambulance, which was soon forgotten in my clueless daze.

                What felt like thirty seconds later, I distantly heard a voice repeating my name. Groggily, I pried open my eyes and stared towards the source of the voice, unable to focus.

                “Do you remember my name?”

                “Um, Josh?” I pulled the name out of my semi-consciousness.

                “Close enough,” I heard him say as I drifted off into the blackness of my dreamless sleep, until once again he was calling me to wake me up and asking me if I remembered his name.

                “No, I can’t,” I replied with a mutter.

                “That’s alright. I’m just asking to make sure you would be able to come back to consciousness. You’re safe. We are in Marquette at the hospital. You had an accident; we are moving you from Keweenaw Memorial to Marquette General because you may have a head injury. We need to lift you onto the gurney now, are you ready?” Jason or Josh asked me.

                “I think so,” I answered him, the world around me still fuzzy.

                Ku-thump! Ku-thump! I could feel my body being carefully moved from the ambulance to the gurney. I wasn’t really taking anything in; just more or less observing from, what felt like, some far-away place.

                Later, I opened my eyes. My head felt like an axe is sticking out of it. I saw my mom’s face hovering over me, with a look of distress and relief in her eyes, and tears shimmering on her cheeks.

                “Oh, baby! How are you? What hurts? Can you see okay? How is your head?” Hugging me as gently as possible in her frantic state, my mother bombarded me with questions.
                “I don’t know, Mom. My head is pounding.”

                “Okay, stay still, I will get the doctor!” She sprinted off in the direction of the door.

                I looked over and saw my ex-boyfriend, Jodi, sitting in a chair. “Hi,” I said to him.

                “Hey. Your mom went to get the doctor. You should rest until they get back,” I turned my head the other way, too exhausted to argue.

                I laid there for what felt like hours until I heard someone coming in and saw a man walk in wearing green scrubs and a surgical mask, my mom lagged behind him wearing a worried look on her face.

                “Heather, I need you to tell me how many stairs you fell down at Crystal’s house,” the doctor told me abruptly.

                “What stairs? I don’t remember stairs,” I glanced over at Jodi with a questioning look. It was all coming back to me. I remembered the camping trip; we were going to go party before we had to go to graduation practice the next morning. I wasn’t planning on drinking because I didn’t want to be tired in the morning. I remembered that I had driven there with Rock in his truck; we met Jodi, Danny and Beck there. Curtis was going to come later. I remembered sitting around the fire, talking to Danny while Beck and Rock cut down a tree for firewood. Jodi was sitting somewhere in his own little world. I remembered sitting there and hearing Beck yell…

                “Alright, I will try to ask later when she’s more aware of what’s going on,” I heard the doctor telling my mom as they both exited the room.

                “Jodi, when did we go to Crystal’s house? I don’t remember that.”

                “We didn’t go to Crystal’s, I had to tell them that because I didn’t want Beck to get into trouble for hitting you with the tree,” he told me, looking wary.

                “Jodi, I need you to tell me what happened, I don’t remember anything,” I tried to focus on my own words.

                “Do you remember camping? And Beck cutting down the tree?” when I nodded he continues, “Well, when he cut it, the tree hit you square in the head and knocked you right to the ground. I heard Danny yell, ‘Heather, where the hell did you go? Get off the beach!’ but you weren’t on the beach and I saw you on the ground so I ran to you as fast as I could, you weren’t moving so I shook you. When you finally woke up you started puking everywhere. We needed to get you to the hospital and Rock’s truck was closest to the trail so we put you in there. You puked all over the inside of his truck. We brought you to the hospital and the doctors there said that they couldn’t do much and they had to rush you to Marquette General. We were all so scared that you wouldn’t make it… But they say that you should be okay. You’re going to be fine, Heather,” he told me with a sincere voice.

                I laid in the hospital, the next four days were a blur with visitors rushing in and out, doctors coming and going, cards sprawled all over the table. Everything happened so fast and I couldn’t take it all in at once. Everyone was so helpful; rubbing my back when I vomited, visiting from two hours away even if they couldn’t get in to see me, making me cards and calling me, just to tell me they loved me. It was the scariest experience of my life, but also the most memorable one. Everyone was so loving and caring. They took care of me while I was in the hospital, and when I went home my house was filled with people every day for the next four weeks I was forced to stay in my house.

                My friend, Rock, committed suicide the day after I got out of the hospital. He came to visit me to make sure I was doing alright, then later that night he went home and shot himself. Sometimes I blame myself for that, wondering that if I wasn’t sick I could have done something to stop it, even though I know there was nothing I could have done. I still think about him at the oddest times. I always wonder if he is regretting what he did or if he is happy wherever he is.

                It was the hardest month of my life:  the accident, missing graduation and most of my friends’ graduation parties, losing Rock, losing fifteen pounds, and having to regain most of my mobility from the weakness it all caused me; but everyone was so amazing through it all. I was never alone for a minute, even when I was sleeping there was someone in the room with me. I will never forget it; well, I will never forget the parts I remember, where all of my friends and family were all there supporting me. I pushed through it, everyone tells me how lucky I am to be alive, and I know that. I’m grateful to be here, alive and well.