All We Know of Heaven Read Online Free PDF

can’t rule out . . .”
    “A hemothorax . . . Blood in there, so we need an X-ray.” A tech had already trundled in the portable X-ray ma chine.
    “And would either of you . . . No, I’m going to place this

    subclavian line . . . to . . .”
    “Monitor blood pressure,” said Dr. Daater, and then felt the idiot. A premed would have said such a thing.
    “Right. Now we can see bone here at the side of her head. And I want to say there’s a good chance we have a big subdural hematoma. If we have to put in a drain, well, that’s another thing for the plastic surgeons. . . . We have to assume, doctors, that her neck is broken until we know otherwise. So even when we move her tongue, we want this C spine stable, ” Katz said, and silently slid in the line, just below Bridget’s collarbone. They all checked the monitors. Dr. Katz laid his hand on her wrist: Bridget’s pulse was rac ing. “She’s in pain, and that could be the reason for this pulse being up there; but at least it’s nice and full now, not thready.” Her pressure wasn’t bad either, and her nail beds were pale but pink. They were going to need to order blood in any event, for fixing her cheek and arm and, if neces sary, whatever else they could not see.
    What they could not see was usually worse than what they could. And when the X-rays came back, even Doctor Katz cussed.

    She made her mouth move. On her own.
    She decided to make it happen, instead of just feeling it happen. She thought (it was like climbing the rope in second grade when she was fat and weak) about it for a long time.

    Then she tried to make the “tick tick” sound that she used to call Rag Mop, her Yorkie.
    She could do it.
    Why could she move her mouth? If she was dead?
    She moved her mouth wide open.
    Whoa! Suddenly her head hurt. Hurt like a clock exploding inside. Exploding with wires and shards of glass and little clocker knocker chimes. Hurt? Her head hurt like a punching bag. Her chest hurt. Her leg was on fire! And her thigh muscle . . . but she had pulled it, at the last practice. Practice! She wasn’t in heaven, or even in purgatory, where the souls just moped around praying and hoping for the best. She was somewhere else. The smells, metal and alcohol andsomekindofreeky sweet stuff thatmadeher want to hurl. This was bad, all very, very bad.

    what child is this? ‌

    In the following days, the hospital staff tried to limit the number of people who came to see Bridget in the pediatric intensive care unit. It was useless in the end. Somebody always took pity on someone who was family, but not im mediate family, or on one of the kids from school.
    And Danny. He always got in. He was so grateful.
    His parents and his brothers, and even his best friend, Evan Brock, were honestly scared for him the first night— as if he would ever kill himself. He was no pussy. And he knew that if Bridget woke up, it would be for him. With all they’d been through in four years, she would come back for him.

    He knew it; the Flannerys knew it, too.
    Even Coach O’Malley knew it. Coach, suffering the way he was, still came back to work after two weeks. Danny was the first one he came up to.
    “You were always Maury’s good friend,” he said. “I want to thank you for that, son. You keep Bridget going for all of us. As long as she’s alive, Danny, a little part of my girl is, too.”
    Danny almost started bawling right there in the weight room.
    Maureen’s funeral was the saddest thing he had ever seen in his life.
    Over a thousand people came. Some stood outside the church in a tent with speakers and space heaters.
    Grandma’s funeral was sad, because seventy-six wasn’t really that old; and she was in the peak of health before she got sick with flu last year. But it was nothing like Maury’s.
    It was a terrible moment at the funeral when all the cheerleaders came in their uniforms. They lined up be side the coffin and did the Bulldog Salute—putting one stiff arm out to the