She left, and I sat there in the quiet room alone, finally letting myself think about how much this concussion sucked ass. I knew what was going to happen. They were going to make me sit out of practice, and at least one game depending on what the doctor suggested and what the Pipers’ trainer decided.
I would have hung my head low except I knew it would be painful. Sure I didn’t want to die; I understood how important it was to put my health first. But when it came down to it, this was the last thing I freaking needed. Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. Ugh.
One minute of wallowing was what I usually allowed myself. I made the most of it.
As soon as the sixty seconds were over, I took a deep breath and reminded myself that I was lucky my injury wasn’t worse. I could have died, right? In the end, this concussion wasn’t the end of the world.
Then I reached over and grabbed the phone next to the bed, even though it made me a little dizzy; I dialed my mom’s number first. When she didn’t answer, I left her a voicemail, and then called my dad who I knew would have been watching the game at home. Dad could have been in church and still found a way to watch my game. He always did.
“Hello?” he practically shouted into the phone.
“Dad, it’s me, Sal.”
That time he did yell, away from the phone at least, saying something that sounded like “It’s her!” in Spanish. “Are you okay?” he asked in that worried tone only fathers were capable of.
“Yeah, I’m okay. It’s just a concussion,” I assured him.
He spat out some more curse words in Spanish, and I could faintly hear my mom in the background telling him to control himself. “I almost fainted, you can ask your mom,” he exaggerated. “You’re really okay? No brain damage?”
“No brain damage, I promise I’m all right. I wanted to call and tell you before you booked a plane ticket here. I’ll survive.”
Dad let out an audible exhale. “Gracias a Dios. You get that hardhead from your mother—“
Mom screeched something in the background, and I had to fight the urge to laugh.
“Save your jokes for tomorrow. I don’t have my phone on me, but I’ll make sure to call you as soon as I get my things back. If you need anything, I’m staying at the…” I looked around and gave him the name of the hospital printed on the whiteboard in front of the bed. “I really am okay though, so don’t worry, and tell Mom I tried to call her but she didn’t answer.”
“Si, esta bien. Call me as soon as they release you. I love you. If you need me, I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
I smiled on the other end. “Thanks, Dad. Love you. Bye.”
My dad said goodbye in return and we hung up.
With nothing else to do, I turned on the television and watched what was left of a movie about house-sized tarantulas. About an hour later, a few knocks tapped at the door before I heard who could only be Harlow and Jenny arguing on the other side. They, and by ‘they’ I meant Harlow, didn’t wait for me to welcome them inside. The defender pushed the door open and strolled in the room, followed by Jenny and three of my other teammates.
Har looked around the room. “This is fancy.”
“Hi, Har, Jenny.” I greeted the other girls that came along with them too.
Jenny came to sit on the bed with big bright eyes. “You scared the devil out of me.” She grabbed my hand gently. “I thought you were dead.”
Harlow chuffed as she sat by my feet and let the other girls take the chairs. “I knew you were fine.”
“They told us you have a concussion,” one of the girls said.
“A moderate one,” I told them.
The wince was visible around the room. They all knew what it meant and none of them tried to feed me kind words. The situation sucked.
“Yeah, it blows.” I sighed. “I’m not even going to bother asking if I’m playing the next game, it’ll just piss me off when they tell me, ‘no’ to my face.”
Jenny squeezed my hand. “What matters is that you’re okay. Did they make sure you don’t have any hemorrhaging?”
How could you not smile at that?
The girls stayed for almost an hour, making me smile and fight back laughs as we joked around about random things that had nothing to do with the Pipers. They finally promised to see me the next day, if I was on time for the flight, and Jenny assured me she had taken my things back to our room. As they got up and started to head out, Harlow leaned in and whispered, “You want me to do something about Mel?”
Oh dear God.
I patted her cheek and totally lost it. “No, Har. It’s all right. Thank you.”