Tears Of Life

• Beth Staplehurst, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2018

“No, no, no, why?” she could feel herself shaking “She was okay. She is going to be okay right?” Roni’s mum, Jodie trembled. She has been waiting for the phone call from the police for three years to say that they found her daughter and when the call finally came she dropped everything and came as fast as she could, seeing her daughter made her think about how she could have stopped this from happening
“Ma’am please, exit the area. We didn’t think this was going to happen, but we need to go into emergency surgery. We need you to stay calm, okay? That’s all you can do until she’s out”, the red-haired nurse instructed. Jodie followed behind Roni’s hospital bed and watched in horror as the nurse stared injecting fluids into to her arms, sending her to sleep. Then, she began to pull out utensils and cut open her clothes. The red-haired nurse shut the blinds on the window and Jodie fell to her knees and broke out into tears. It had been 3 years since she’d seen her daughter and so much had happened over the years, but one thing that didn’t change was that she never stopped searching for her and now that she was here with her she just wanted to hold her tight and never let her go. Jodie let her head fall back onto the crusty ripped hospital chairs. She closed her tear full eyes and put her hands back on her forehead.
A few hours had passed, and Jodie was still on the floor until a young man approached Jodie and gave her his hand to help her up. She looked up and saw it was a doctor. He had a file in his hand that he passed over to her. Jodie sat down and prepared herself for what she was about to read. She opened the file and grabbed the paperwork within. On that terrible piece of paper, it held all of the things that horrible man had done to her. When she finished reading, Jodie took a moment to wrap her head around what she just read, but it got worse. “I’m very sorry Mrs. Skye, but Roni has slipped into a coma that might last days, months or even years”. Jodie started waddling like she was about to faint when she fell onto a chair in the corner of Roni’s empty room, and she waited for Roni to return.
Several days had passed and Roni still hadn’t woken up or made any movement whatsoever and Jodie was starting to lose hope. Doctors have told her the chances of her waking up soon are slim but there was still a chance. Jodie had sat in the same chair for several days. She had seen police come and go, nurses check on Roni and leave. But this day was different. Jodie was getting her normal motherly intuition that something was wrong. She moved her chair closer to Roni’s bed and grabbed her hand, letting her head rest on it. A couple of minutes later Roni started to shake and the sound of her heart went wild like a beating of a drum. Nurses and Doctor Nathen rushed in like a fire truck. They all crowded around her and were checking blood rates and IV needles. Suddenly, as quick as they had run in, they all just stopped what they were doing and stepped back. With tears running down his face Doctor Nathen mumbled, “I’m sorry”. Jodie shot up from her seat and ran over to her daughter, now lying lifelessly, “I’m sorry. This is all my fault”. A tear rolled off her face and onto Roni’s cheek.

Beep, beep, beep. She was alive.