The Other Side of Tomorrow

I glance in the mirror and frown at my messy hair. It’s beyond help and I hope I can play off the whole messy bohemian look or something. Shoving my feet into a pair of white Converse I grab my purse, the book that got me in trouble, and dash down the stairs nearly tripping on my untied shoelaces.nbsp;

“Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go,” my mom chants, clapping her hands for good measure and ushering the two of us to her car.

Harlow darts past me and screams, “Shotgun.”

“Fine by me.” I slide into the back of the car and stretch my legs out on the black leather seats. I open my book and hold onto my bookmark, planning to read on the drive.nbsp;

My mom slides into the driver’s seat, grumbling about our lateness, traffic, and God knows what else.

Harlow and I wisely choose to stay quiet.

Twenty minutes into the drive my phone buzzes and I grab it from my purse, finding a text from Jasper.

Jasper: Working at the coffee shop this morning—surfing later?

Willa: Can’t, sorry. I have a doc appt. today. We’ll be gone most of the day.

Jasper: Everything ok?

Willa: Yeah, they keep a close check.

Jasper: How about this weekend? Let’s go to the pier.

Willa: Sounds fun.

Jasper: It’s a date.

My cheeks flush with his last three words. It feels weird the way he so casually uses the word date. I guess with my inexperience it feels like such a big thing, and mostly, I never in a million years believed a guy like him would be interested in someone like me. That’s probably everyone’s biggest mistake—we always undervalue our own worth.nbsp;

I put my phone back and return to reading my book while my mom grumbles about traffic, the weather, and probably aliens but at this point I’m not listening to her. Even Harlow has stuck her earphones in and is currently bobbing her head along to whatever she’s listening to.

When we arrive at the hospital

my mom parks in the parking garage and then ushers us quickly inside like we’re small unruly children holding onto her legs and begging not to go.

I sign in and answer the same questions I always do about insurance, employment, and all that fun stuff. You’d think when you’re here practically all the time they wouldn’t have to ask these same questions, but they do.

Once the question and answer session is done I sit down with my mom and Harlow in the waiting room.

Looking around at the periwinkle blue walls, navy plastic couches and chairs, and numerous magazines littering the laminate coffee tables, I can’t help but remember back to the first time I had to come here for a consultation to apply for the deceased donor waiting list.

I remember the way my heart beat too fast but too slow at the same time. How my palms grew damp and sweat prickled my forehead. I remember the fear, the fear of the doctors I’d yet to meet, the fear of the process, but mostly the fear of the unknown. I’d been thrust into this strange new reality where nothing made sense but was suddenly my whole life. I felt swallowed by it, completely suffocated; everywhere I looked there was a reminder of my failure. Of my body’s failure to sustain my life, and how from now on my life would never be the same, and neither would my family’s since I’d unwittingly dragged them into this with me. I didn’t ask for this to happen, who would want this to happen, but I couldn’t help feeling guilty that they were sucked into this with me. By the time they called my name at that first appointment, I was nearly ready to faint. I remember going through the whole appointment, meeting the nurse, social worker, dietician, surgeon—the whole team—and feeling like I was in a daze. I was there, processing information and asking questions, but it was also like I was watching it play out from someone else’s perspective. As if, by detaching myself, I could somehow pretend this wasn’t happening to me—that maybe I was watching a movie, because surely this wasn’t real life. But it was real then, and it’s real now, and it’ll be real twenty years from now. This stuff happens all the time. To your friend, to your neighbor, to that person suffering silently in the grocery store that you pass by and don’t even know how much they’re hurting.nbsp;

“Willa Hansen?”

The call of my name breaks me out of my thoughts and the three of us stand, heading to the door that leads us into the hallway.

After getting my blood pressure and weight, we’re taken to a room with a table, four chairs, and your standard doctor’s examination table.

I sit at the table, refusing to get on the exam table until I have to.

Even now, I always choose to have a few moments, sometimes even seconds, to pretend I’m normal—to pretend I’m not the one here to sit on that table, that I don’t have someone else’s organ in my body.

“You’ve been feeling okay, right?” my mom asks. “Taking your medicine like you’re supposed to?” She licks her top lip, a habit I’ve learned she only does when she’s nervous.

“Yes, of course,” I say, mildly offended she’d assume otherwise, but I also know she gets like this every time we’re here, panicking that something is going to be seriously wrong with me. I’m sure, for her, having witnessed how sick I was in the beginning, it’s got to be scary thinking about me being like that again.

She rifles through her purse and pulls out a piece of gum—another sign she’s nervous. She pops it into her mouth and chews madly, staring at the diagram on the wall showing how a kidney is transplanted.nbsp;