Read Online All the Days of Her Life by Lurlene McDaniel - Free Book Online Page B

wakefulness, hear their beeping and wonder,
Where are the people? Why aren’t there any people?
    Finally, however, Lacey was able to free herself from the snakelike arms of the unnatural sleep that held her and floated into complete wakefulness. A bright light was shining in her eyes, and her uncle’s voice said, “Welcome back.”
    “Where—?” Her voice was wobbly and strange-sounding to her ears. And her throat hurt.
    “ICU,” her uncle answered. “You’ve been here two full days and three nights.
    The news shocked. Over two days of her life were missing and all she knew about them were pale glimpses of reality. “What’s wrong? My throat—”
    “The soreness is due to the gastro tube we put in because you were vomiting. You’ve been in a diabetic coma. We’ve got you stabilized, but I still don’t know
why
it happened. There are no secondary infections, nothing medical that might have caused it. I’m baffled, Lacey. So I thought that as soon as you woke up, I’d ask you why. Any ideas how this could have happened?”
    She didn’t want or need a lecture from him, so she avoided a direct answer. She said, “I’m tired.”
    “Your parents will want to see you,” he said, not forcing the issue of her collapse. “They’ve been here day and night and they’re worried sick.”
    “You mean they’ve stayed in the same room together without fighting?”
    A smile curved Uncle Nelson’s lips. “Extraordinary, huh? Nevertheless, they’ve put aside their differences for now. I’ll send them in. Later, I’ll have you transferred to a private room.”
    “I am going to be okay, aren’t I?”
    He eyed her with a cool medical calm that made her glance away. She was scared, but didn’t want to show it.
    “We’ve got to get to the root of this problem. Diabetes is serious and can cause severe complications over time. But you’ve been a diabetic for years, Lacey. You know the basic facts.”
    She knew, but had glossed over them. Complications were for “other people,” not sixteen-year-old girls such as herself. “You can send my parents in,” she told her uncle.
    Her mother and father looked ready to explode with relief when they entered the cubicle. “Oh, baby! We’ve been so worried about you.” Her mother’s eyes shone with unshed tears.
    “Lacey, it’s wonderful to see you alert. How do you feel?” Her dad needed a shave, further evidence of his concern. He was
always
clean-shaven.
    “How did this happen, Lacey?” her mother wanted to know. “I thought you were doing so well. It’s because you skipped your appointments, isn’t it? I should have kept a closer check on you. I blame myself.”
    Lacey was in no mood to listen to her mother’sself-recriminations. “Nagging me wouldn’t have made a difference, Mom.”
    “But why? How could this have happened?”
    “No need to bombard her, Sandra,” Lacey’s father said.
    “Alan, I’m not bombarding her. I’m simply asking what went wrong. How could she have allowed herself to lose total control of her illness.”
    “Maybe she didn’t lose control. Maybe something else is going on.”
    Listening to them made Lacey’s stomach constrict. “Has anybody from school called?” she asked, interrupting their argument.
    Her parents turned toward her. “A girl named Terri,” her mother said.
    “No one else?”
    “Your friend Katie called twice from Michigan. She’s pretty upset and wants you to call her as soon as you’re able.”
    “Uncle Nelson says I’ll be moved out of ICU later today. I’ll call Katie and Terri then. And anybody else who’s asking about me. I’ll be going home soon anyway.”
    Her parents exchanged glances. “Hasn’t your uncle talked to you?”
    “About what?”
    “About your hospitalization.”
    Lacey experienced a sensation of cold foreboding. “What about it?”
    “You’re going to be here awhile,” her father said. “Maybe a couple of weeks. They want you to undergo evaluation by a diabetes