“No!” I hit the call button on the bed.

Not two seconds later a doctor comes in with a clipboard.

“Ms. Cowan. Lily. Here are your discharge instructions. We’re sending you home on oral antibiotics, but remember, you’ve also got a follow-up appointment in one week here at the hospital.”

She sets everything on the counter by the little metal sink and my pink water jug.

“If you’ll just sign here? And I’ll have a nurse come in and get that IV out for you, and you’ll be good to go.”

I look over at Mom—her mouth is still open with all her unsaid argument behind it, but she moves to sign, and I’ve bought myself just a little more time.

11 Pageants and Court Cases

Spring snuck in while I was sleeping. Daffodils and crocuses shoot up underneath the empty trees. I can see green, too, on some of the bushes outside the bedroom window.

I don’t think I realized just how terrible it is not to be able to move. I mean, I know. Of course I know. But at least with my chair, I can get around if not move around, if you know what I mean.

I’ve been sitting in this bed and staring at the wood panels running up the walls for five days now. It’s almost March and outside the sun is showing off. But I’m stuck in here listening to the squirrels and watching reruns of Cupcake Wars on my iPad. I can’t practice for the Bake-Off. I can’t do much of anything. But I did get Bert to text me homework, and I’m already caught up. Mom sees me doing it and doesn’t say anything. She hasn’t brought up going home again, but that doesn’t mean she’s changed her mind. Mom never changes her mind.

Unluckily for her, I don’t either.

I turn onto my side and grab the stretchy bands Hutch brought over yesterday. Apparently, he’s the one who found me in the gym and called the ambulance, which is so humiliating—that image of me slumped over in the chair, probably with puke on my chin. I wrap a green band under my foot and pull. All those days in the hospital ate away what little muscle I had. I look down at my legs, skinnier than ever, like scraggly tree branches, and pull harder.

My phone buzzes.

ellie stop ignoring me

im sorry

i didn’t mean it

ur my best friend

ok fine

im txting until u txt back

txt

txt

txt

And then she sends every emoji in the list.

I turn off my phone. I haven’t talked to Coralee since that day in the cafeteria. It’s not that I’m mad. Okay, I am mad, but she’s also right.

I’m not normal.