Wrestling Against Myself (63 page)

Antonio took his mother's hand into his. “Mom, I appreciate it,” he said tenderly as he squeezed her hand. “I'm good. You could probably go back to work tomorrow, Home Shopping needs you.”

“Tootie can get along fine without me.” Mrs. LaMano wished she could brush back her child's hair, but his head was bandaged. She felt the need to dote on him but was afraid of where she could touch. There were deep, dark, purple and yellow bruises over his arms and though he was covered by a blanket, she knew his legs were even worse. “I was able to take the rest of the week off.”

“I should get back to school though.”

“School can wait. Mr. Fenton paid a visit, but you were out cold.”

“It's this medicine,” Tony said as he fingered the plastic tube that went into his arm. “It knocks me out.”

“It's for the pain.”

“I don't feel any pain.'”

Mrs. LaMano smiled. “That means it's working. I know it's not easy for you, but you need to take it slow. The doctor said next time you take a stroll he's going to tell the cop outside the door to tackle you and shackle you to the bed.”

“He's still here?”

Mrs. LaMano nodded. “You were the victim of a vicious attack. A senseless one at that. They're still trying to round up the entire group.”

“You really think they would come up to the hospital to finish me off?”

“Probably not. A few days ago I would've said no one would gang up on you and beat you with a bat.”

“How's John doing? He's probably upset they arrested him.”

“That's my son, always worried about others. John is fine. He thinks it was the coolest thing ever. They kept him separated from general population, that may be why he had such a grand time. But he isn't mad; he was standing over you with a knife when they rolled up on you.”

“Good thing he showed up. It's nice to know who your friends are.”

“He'll probably visit later on in the week.”

The cop popped his head into the room. “Sorry to bother you folks, but there's someone who would like to visit. pretty little thing by the name of Courtney, says she's his girlfriend.”

Tony brightened up.

“Send her in.,” Mrs. LaMano answered.

Courtney shuffled her feet as she made it in the room, slowly making it to the side of the bed.

“There's a sight for sore eyes,” Tony said as he turned his head towards her direction.

“Are you okay?” Courtney spoke softly. “You look like you're nothing but bumps and bruises.”

“It's all superficial. I'll be fine. They're keeping me here so they can run up the bill.”

Courtney tried to smile, but couldn't. “I'm sorry this happened,” she said on the verge of tears.

“Me too. Some people do really stupid things.”

“I hear they're all going to jail. The cops said for a real long time because it's considered a hate crime.”

Tony frowned. “I don't see how. It's a stupidity crime.”

“A hate crime because of me.”

“Let the cops figure it out. All that matters is that you're here and you're safe.”

“They wanted to kill you.” Tears filled Courtney's eyes. “Because of me they wanted to,” she couldn't finish her sentence.

Mrs. LaMano came behind the girl and rubbed Courtney's shoulder. “It wasn't because of you, dear. It was because of their own fear and hate.”

“Listen to my mom; she's very smart about these things.”

“But.”

“No buts,” Mrs. LaMano interrupted. “No one wanted this to happen and no one caused it to happen other than those five who decided to act upon their hate instead of letting people live and let live. Now, I'll leave you two lovebirds be, but promise me you'll talk about happier things.”

“I promise,” Courtney said.

Tony nodded towards his mother and watched as she left the hospital room.

“I've missed you,” Tony said. “Everything at school okay?”

“It's okay. A lot of rumors going around. A lot of people are mad and upset.”

“I hope they get over it. Let them know I'm fine, that I've already forgiven them for what they done.”

“Do you forgive me too,” Courtney blurted out.

“For what? You did nothing wrong.”

“We both know this was about me. If we weren't dating, none of this would've happened.”

“If it wasn't me, it would've been someone else. Sometimes people look for any excuse to let their hatred out.”

“I wish they would've let it out on me.”

Tony took the girl by the hand. “I'm glad they didn't. I don't know what I would do without you.”

A tear rolled down Courtney's face. “And I don't know what would've happened if I lost you.”

“Everything will be fine. I'll still be able to dance with you at homecoming.”

Courtney gave a faint smile. “I don't deserve you and you don't deserve this.”

“Nonsense,” Tony said as the pain killers started to weigh heavy on his system. “You deserve the best,” he mumbled and though he didn't want to, Tony fell asleep.

Tony began to stir. He didn't know how long he was out, but the darkness outside his window told him it was for a long time. Even with the pain killers being pumped into his system, he could feel the soreness around him as he tried to get feeling back in his legs.

The athlete wanted to walk, he wanted to get on his own two feet and make his way to the bathroom just so he could be sure everything worked. As he pressed down on his leg with a low amount of pressure the pain centers of his brain lit up. He took that as a good sign. He didn't want to tell anyone, but he was afraid that he might never be able to walk again and since he couldn't put that fear to rest by proving himself wrong, he had to take the doctor's word on it.

Off to the side of the bed was a rolling table. Tony looked over and saw that at some point they brought him a meal. He didn't feel hungry, but figured he needed something in his system to keep his strength up and lessen the effect of the medicine in his system.

“Oh, Courtney,” he said as his head cleared and he remembered his visitor was still here when he zoned out. He felt terrible about falling asleep and hoped she understood.

“Excuse me,” Tony called out, knowing by the shadow outside the window in the door that an officer was stationed nearby.

The cop came in. “You need a nurse or something,” he said as he looked upon his charge.

“No. Were you here when my girlfriend came in? Sorry, but I don't remember if it was you or not.”

“It was another officer. But what's up?”

“I was wondering how long Courtney was here before she left.”

The officer reached behind him and grabbed a clip board. “Looks like she stayed two and a half hours.”

“Wow. Hope she wasn't mad I fell asleep.”

“I wouldn't worry about it. The officer said she was pretty upset you were in the hospital and spent a lot of time crying, but that should be expected.”

Tony sighed. “Poor Courtney.”

“That the girl those guys jumped you over.”

Tony nodded. “Kind of stupid, huh?”

“I can't say I understand why a guy like you would go for someone like, em, her.” The officer chose his words carefully. “But it doesn't give anyone the right to do what those thugs did to you.”  

“Thank you officer,” Tony said, not wanting to correct the officer on the 'someone like her comment.'

The officer closed the door behind him and left Tony alone with his own thoughts.

Tony rolled the table over his lap. He was about to remove the pink, hard-plastic lid off his plate when a glint of metal caught his eye. He tentatively lifted up the brass wrestling pin he had given Courtney when they decided to go steady. He knew it was his, the word 'Tiny' was etched in a small box just under the two wrestlers in the referee's position.

“But what does it mean?” he wondered out loud as he stared at the ornament suspiciously.

Visitors came and went all week long as Tony healed in the hospital. Surprisingly, Courtney wasn't one of them and the times he tried to call her house she wasn't available to come to the phone. Tony was worried he really offended the girl when he fell asleep and hoped she would understand he had no control over what the medicine did to him.

In a few hours he was due to be released, but he wanted to give the girl one more call before he left to see if he could visit later that afternoon. He grabbed his
cell phone from the side of the bed and dialed her home phone.

“Hi Tiny,” Mrs. Barnes said in that high voice people use to alert those around them of who's calling.

“Good morning, ma'am,” Tony said hesitantly. “Is Courtney around?”

There was a pause that lasted longer than it should. “I don't see her; she may have gone for a walk.”

Tony sighed in disappointment. “Okay, tell her I called again.”

“Tiny,” Mrs. Barnes said in a hushed whisper.

“Yes, ma'am.”

“We're going to need to have a talk sometime soon. But not here. I wish I could tell you more, but what happened to you has really upset her and she isn't handling things so well.”

“Is this because I fell asleep on her?”

“I wish it was that easy. We'll arrange a time and place to meet. I'm glad you're okay and going home.”

“Me too. Tell Courtney I'll see her at school on Monday.”

“Okay, Tiny.”

Antonio could pick up on the reluctance in the woman's voice and felt ill at ease, but there was nothing he could do about it. On the cell phone he saw the call ended and placed it in a small duffel bag.

“I bet you can't wait to get home?” Mrs. LaMano said as she came into the room.

“It'll be nice to be in my own room around my own stuff.”

“I'm sure it will. You know, you don't have to start going back to school on Monday if you aren't up to it. Mr. Fenton said none of the days are counting against you and you take all the time you need to get your strength back.”

“It's fine. The school needs me and I have a feeling that something is up and I should be there. I wish the hospital would have let me out yesterday so I could have gone to church this morning. It's bad enough that I missed Wednesday's youth group.”

“You would have never made it up those stairs.”

“I would have crawled,” Tony said with a smirk.

“Exactly why the hospital kept you. I'm glad you didn't make them tie you to the bed.”

“Either way, it's time to get back on with life. I need to get my legs back under me for homecoming or Courtney will be disappointed.”

Mrs. LaMano gave a strained grin but kept her mouth shut.

Though Tony wanted to return to school on Monday, his legs were too weak to carry him and he wasn't proficient enough on the crutches to get around. There was a brief discussion about him using a wheelchair, the school was ADA complaint and he would have access to all his classes. That idea was scrubbed at the last minute, people were going to make enough fuss over him as it were,
and he didn't need the added sympathy of being in a wheelchair.