Even now, two weeks later, he spent a great deal of his time in bed, for he was still weak and tired easily. To his dismay, Dr. Johansson had told him it could take up to two months for him to recover completely. Two months... that would take him past Christmas, New Year’s, and even his birthday. February seemed centuries away.
But, slow as it seemed, he was healing. The incisions were closing up nicely, although he would always have scars. A large one that stretched across his side, starting at his chest and wrapping around to his back, where they had opened him up during surgery. And below that, a much smaller one, where the chest tube had been put in. He tried not to think too much about them. They were just two more marks to show what he had been through, two more signs of his imperfection.
Minor ones though, compared to the obvious, he realized as he slowly sat up, his eyes sweeping over the flat bedcovers beneath which his left leg should have rested. He was used to the sight by now, used to the void. New Year’s Day would mark the nine-month anniversary of the amputation, and after nine months, he had come to accept it. It was as much a part of him now as his leg had once been. Hair grew back, and scars thinned and faded, but no matter how much time passed, he was never going to get his real leg back. The stump that stopped just above the knee was a constant reminder of that, a permanent battle scar remnant of the war he’d been fighting for nearly two years.
Part of him wished he was not in the public eye because it might have been fun to invent some wild tale of how he’d lost his leg. An animal attack maybe – like a shark or a tiger or maybe even a rabid moose. Or perhaps some kind of crash – he could say his leg had been severed by the tail rotor of a helicopter while he was busting some kind of kick-ass Neo-like Matrix kung fu move on the roof of a building, or that it had been crushed by a tank randomly rolling through the streets of a major U.S. city.
The real story seemed kind of lame in comparison, he thought as he chuckled softly, wincing as pain tore through his chest. He stretched his arm out, his hand flailing blindly across the night table beside his bed. His fingers found what he was looking for and curled around it. Popping open the childproof lid of the orange pill bottle, Nick shook out one of his prescribed pain pills and downed it with a swig from his water bottle.
No sooner had he eased himself back down against his pillows to wait for the medicate kick in than there came a light knock on his door. A thin beam of light brightened the room as the door opened a crack, and Claire stuck her head in.
“Nick?” she called him softly.
“Hey, I’m awake,” he said, his voice low and throaty from sleep.
“Oh good,” she said, coming into the room. “It’s almost eight; the concert’s going to start.”
“Eight?” he repeated in disbelief, shaking his head. “Man, was I really out that long?”
“Yeah. More than just a power nap, huh?”
“I guess,” he muttered.
“So do you want to watch it in here or go out to the living room?”
“Living room,” Nick replied quickly. “I’m sick of being in bed.”
“Okay.” She helped him get out of bed and waited while he put his leg on. Then she took his hand and walked slowly alongside him as he made his way out of the room. He was slow-moving these days, for each step robbed him of energy and breath. By the time he sank down onto the couch in between Claire and Brian, he felt exhausted.
“It should start in a couple of minutes,” said Kevin, checking the time and changing the channel to CBS, the station that was airing their charity concert. The concert was expected to have high ratings, especially in the wake of Nick’s surgery. Not a word had been leaked to the press until after the surgery, and then a press conference was held, although many details were withheld, and the seriousness of the matter was downplayed. As with Brian’s heart surgery in 1998, they had stressed the words “elective” and “routine,” not wanting to upset the fans any more than they had to.
“Elective, my ass,” Nick had scoffed later. “It was either have the surgery or die, basically. Some choice.”
Kevin, Howie, Brian, and AJ had stayed in town the past two weeks, helping to deal with the press and see that Nick was taken care of. Since he had been discharged from the hospital, they had stuck around the house with him. Tonight they would all watch the concert together. And tomorrow, they would leave, all but Howie. Brian would fly home to Georgia, and Kevin and AJ to California, while Howie would remain with Nick so that he could drive between Nick’s house in Tampa and his own Orlando home. Claire had been spending a lot of time at Nick’s house as well and would continue to do so after the guys left.
“And don’t you dare try to push me away because this time, I’m here to stay,” she’d told him firmly one day. “You need someone to be with you, and I want to be with you. That’s what friends are for.”
He’d agreed without hesitation to that one, although he couldn’t help but wonder if it was just coincidence, or if she had finally gotten the idea of what had happened that summer. Of course, he had no recollection of the conversation that had occurred between her and Brian while he was still coming out of the anesthesia.
“Shh, it’s starting,” Kevin shushed AJ, who had apparently been talking about something, though Nick hadn’t heard a word he said. They all fell silent and focused on the television as the concert they’d performed not even three weeks earlier began. It was so strange, Nick thought, to see himself up on stage singing, looking vibrant and enthused, and to know that two hours after that footage had been taped, he had been strapped to a gurney in an ambulance, on his way to the emergency room. That whole night was a blur to him, and it felt like it had all happened ages ago, the concert especially.
But as he watched the performance now, his heart swelled with pride. He hadn’t been well that night – in fact, he’d been much sicker than even he had realized – but it was almost impossible to tell. Maybe the adrenaline surging through his body at the time had kept his symptoms from showing themselves, or maybe he had just done an exceptional job of masking his illness, but he thought he looked and sounded fine. Just a little breathy, sometimes a little shaky, and flat on a few notes... but in general, he thought he’d done well. The group as a whole sounded wonderful, and Nick was glad. They had talked about releasing this concert on DVD, with part of the proceeds going to benefit cancer research. If the concert did well on TV that night, it would surely be put out on DVD.
Nick was glad when they got to the solo performances. Sitting there with Claire, he couldn’t wait for “Open Arms.” He hoped that she would get it, that she would figure out the song was for her.
The audience’s applause for Kevin’s piano solo was cut short, as the intro to “Open Arms” began to play. Beside him, Claire drew in a breath. “You sang this song?” she asked delightedly, looking over at him. “I love this song.”
“I know,” he smiled and reached for her hand. Then he turned back to the TV, but every now and then he would steal a glance at her. At first, she stared at the screen, as if mesmerized, but when he reached the end of the first chorus, she turned and met his eyes, looking at him in wonder. He couldn’t help but smile, and as soon as he did, she did too, a pink blush creeping up her cheeks.
“Nick... was that... were you-?”
He nodded slightly, squeezing her hand. She squeezed back and scooted closer to him, snuggling up against him to watch him sing the rest of the song. “I love you,” she murmured when the song ended, her voice so soft that only he could hear it. He smiled broadly and ran his hand up and down her arm before pulling her even closer to him.
“I love you too,” he whispered back, just as softly, just as secretly.
“Didn’t I tell you, D?” AJ said loudly, startling Nick, who looked up to find AJ grinning at Claire and him like the Cheshire cat.
“Tell me what, J?” asked Howie, whose grin looked identical to AJ’s.
“Didn’t I tell you that sooner or later, those two were going to end up together?”
Howie chuckled, sending a wink in Nick’s direction. “Yes, you did, J. Yes, you did.”
***
