"What happens next?" Crystal leaned toward her oldest brother when he paused from his reading.
"Just listen and you'll find out, Chrissy," Mikey replied before he continued to read.
{"I'll rescue her!" he cried, leaping at his weapons. As he leapt he thought of something he could do to please her. He could take his medicine.
His hand closed on the fatal draught.
"No!" shrieked Tinker Bell, who had heard Hook mutter about his deed as he sped through the forest.
"Why not?"
"It is poisoned."
"Poisoned? Who could have poisoned it?"
"Hook."
"Don't be silly. How could Hook have got down here?"
Alas, Tinker Bell could not explain this, for even she did not know the dark secret of Slightly's tree. Nevertheless Hook's words had left no room for doubt. The cup was poisoned.
"Besides," said Peter, quite believing himself "I never fell asleep."
He raised the cup. No time for words now; time for deeds; and with one of her lightning movements Tink got between his lips and the draught, and drained it to the dregs.
"Why, Tink, how dare you drink my medicine?"
But she did not answer. Already she was reeling in the air.
"What is the matter with you?" cried Peter, suddenly afraid.
"It was poisoned, Peter," she told him softly; "and now I am going to be dead."
"O Tink, did you drink it to save me?"
"Yes."
"But why, Tink?"
Her wings would scarcely carry her now, but in reply she alighted on his shoulder and gave his nose a loving bite. She whispered in his ear "You silly ass,"}
Three children could be heard giggling as the last word was read. It was a word that they were never permitted to say yet it was there in their children's book. Mikey passed the book over to his brother since he couldn't stop giggling to continue to read to their sister and mother. He wondered if his father remembered that the word was in their book.
Jay continued the reading while they waited for their father to return from speaking with their Aunt Kim and some of the other doctors regarding their mother. He knew that anything that they didn't want the kids to hear would be discussed during their visits where the boys were encouraged to read to their mother. Aunt Kim had said that it would help to wake her up but so far, she didn't seem to be doing anything of the sort.
Jay finished the chapter and closed the book to the dismay of his little sister. He and Mikey would read one chapter together during each visit. Today was the thirteenth day that they'd been reading to their mother. He wondered if she'd still be asleep when they finished the book. After all, there were only four more chapters in the book.
"Can't we read some more?" Crystal asked her brothers as they put the book back on the side table next to their mother's bed. "I want to hear what happens next."
"No, Chrissy. You know we only read one chapter. We'll be back tomorrow to read some more." Mikey insisted as he walked over to the door to peek out to see if their father was nearby. After their visit to the hospital, they were to go back to the farm to try to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner. When he stuck his head out, he saw his father returning from down the hallway. "Looks like it's time to go."
Each of the children, along with their father, told Kira goodbye and left. Afterwards the room was left in silence once more. The only sound left in the wake of the family's departure were the sounds of the monitors that kept watch over the Duke's life signs. Twice during the day after the children and Jebb had left a nurse checked in on the patient. During each visit the nurse would rotate the patient from one side to the next, giving a brief stretch session for her muscles and ligaments to keep them flexible. Otherwise, there was no movement in the room at all.
As evening approached the sound of a cart being rolled into Kira's room could be heard. Bo decided that there was one tradition that he and Kira had kept since she'd first come to town that he intended to keep it: even if she couldn't fully participate in it tonight. He had requested a television to be taken to his sister's room so that he could watch the second football game of the day together with his sister. Normally they would each pick a team and place small bets on the outcome of the game. Tonight, he mainly would use the game as background noise. After he set the television up and got the channel tuned in Bo turned and spoke to her hoping that she could hear him.
"You know the rules, the Cowboys are my team since they are from south of the Mason-Dixon which means you get to pull for the Vikings during this ga-"
Bo paused as he saw something that he'd not seen in weeks. Kira's eyes were open.
"Kira? Kira, darlin'?" Bo put a hand on his sister's, but she didn't respond to him at all. "Kira? Can you hear me?"
Bo fumbled for the device to call a nurse and waited impatiently as it seemed it took an eternity to get a response from someone. When the nurse finally asked him if she could help him, he called out a bit louder than needed, "Get a doctor in here! My sister's awake!"
Bo stood back and watched as a nurse and then one of the doctors on staff came in to check his sister. The doctor shone a light into Kira's eyes, checked her reflexes, asked Kira to blink before rereading parts of Kira's chart before he shook his head as he addressed the Duke.
"I'm sorry, she's still in a coma."
"But her eyes are open. She's awake!"
"Sometimes that happens. It may be a sign that she's closer to waking up but for now there is no other sign that she's regaining consciousness."
The doctor and nurse then left Bo alone with his sister. Bo tried to touch his sister's mind, but it was still closed off to him. He'd been so sure that Kira was back when he saw her eyes were open. "It's alright, Kira. I know that you're tryin' to get back. It may just take some more time."
Bo watched his sister more than the game over the next couple of hours. He tried to keep up a running commentary on the game, even pretended to pout over losing their non-existent wager on the game. All thorough out the game, though, Bo kept track of when his sister's eyes were opened and when they weren't. Trying to discern if there was a pattern to her blinks, even. There wasn't one that he could see but he knew that if Kira was conscious at all then she'd try to reach out to him in any way that she could.
Finally, the game was over, and he knew that he should head home to his wife. He knew that she would find tonight's events interesting and may even have some insight on them for him. Bo glanced around the room and saw that Crystal had left her doll for her mother. The same doll that Pauline had made for her for the girl's birthday. Crystal didn't want her mother to be alone in the hospital. Bo took the doll and slipped it under his sister's arm before leaving a light kiss on her forehead. He hoped that the doll could bring some sort of comfort to her as she slept alone in the hospital.
"G'night, Darlin'. Sweet dreams."
~01~
Jebb dropped the children off at the schoolhouse and went to sit with his wife. When Kira had first opened her eyes when Bo had sat with her on Thanksgiving afternoon the family had all hoped that it meant that she was waking up. Now a week later and while she had some moments with her eyes opened longer than that first day, she still didn't seem to be responding to anyone or anything. Each day the doctors checked to see if any stimuli could reach Kira. Kim had told him that the first response would likely be to pain. It was why when Kim came in to join him that he wasn't surprised to see his sister-in-law pinch Kira in various locations.
Kira was in a sleep cycle, meaning that her eyes were closed when Kim began her morning ritual. On the third pinch, when Kim pinched the thinner skin under Kira's arm, her patient slowly opened her eyes. Jebb saw the action and looked to Kim to see what it meant.
"Let me see if she responds again, Jebb. It could have been a coincidence," Kim explained as she waited for Kira to close her eyes once more. She gave her a moment more before Kim repeated the pinch in the same location to see if it would illicit the same response. When Kira's eyes once more flitted open. Kim let out a sigh as she fought a grin.
"Well?" Jebb's focus when back and forth between the two women.
"It's a good sign." Kim brought the blanket back up to cover her sister-in-law and tucked her back in. "I still have no answers as to when she will wake up, but this is the most positive sign since her attack that we've seen out of her. Just keep trying to get her engaged with you by discussing anything that you think that she might respond to."
Jebb nodded and when he was left alone with his wife, he sat next to her while trying to figure out just what he should talk about. "You know I still have some gaps in my memory, even though a lot of it has come back. There's been a memory that I wanted to talk to you about."
Jebb did his best to pretend that he wasn't watching for a response from Kira. After all, wasn't the old saying that a watched kettle never boils? Maybe the same could be said for a comatose patient waking. "I'm pretty sure that it is a memory from before we were together. At least that is what I gathered since in the memory you poured your glass of whiskey all over my head!" Jebb couldn't help but chuckle. "Maybe you could fill me in on how we went from where you clearly couldn't stand me to how we ended up being so close."
Jebb took Kira's hand in his own and took comfort in the warmth coming from it. "It still bugs me that there are parts of my life that I can't remember. Not as much as before, but I guess there will always be blanks that need to be filled in. That's why you need to wake up, Kira. I need you to fill those blanks in."
He brought up different memories that he figured if anything would elicit a response they would. "I've been thinking more about when we first came out with the rest of the family. I've asked the family and apparently according to Daisy, she was the first one who found out about us. She said that we got a little careless at the festival the weekend after Thanksgiving and she walked in on us. The way she tells it, it was pretty sweet. Even told me that watching us together made her hold out her belief in true love. I think she's still hoping that she'll end up finding her Prince Charming. Someone who can come and sweep her off of her feet." Jebb snickered.
"I guess you never told her that from what I can tell, I hadn't exactly shown up and whisked you away with love at first sight." Jebb watched as Kira blinked in what he could imagine was a response to his one-sided conversation. "Sometimes, though, I sit here and wonder what would have happened if we'd told the family about us when we were first dating. You'd have to tell me about how you would see all that going down, though, since I don't remember that time. So, it is a bit hard to imagine. But I've heard that the first part of our marriage was... kept interesting thanks to my mother. So, guess I can't help but wonder if she'd known about us when we were first dating if it would have been easier for her to accept us once she learned that you were Bo's sister."
Jebb squeezed the hand resting in his own and shook his head. "But at least now it seems that whatever rough patch there had been between you and my mother has long since been worked through. I can tell you that there was nothing that she wanted to say to me more than to tell me how foolish I was to walk away from what we had the entire time I was back in Placid. That couldn't have been an easy feat; to have her from at one time hating the idea of the two of us together to being angry at the two of us being apart."
He watched as Kira blinked again. But her expression was still so incredibly blank. She showed no sign that she understood what he was saying. Jebb briefly closed his eyes before he added, "But I tell you, no one could be angrier at the whole situation than me right now. Because I can't shake the feeling that if I hadn't up and left that you wouldn't have ended up in here. Because you wouldn't have hidden the fact that you were scared of that bastard getting out of prison. We could have then done... I don't know. Something. Anything. Like making sure that you weren't alone so he couldn't have swiped you right off of Main Street like he did."
He swallowed hard as he felt this throat clogged with emotion. He watched as Kira's eyes closed and remained that way. He supposed she was entering into another sleep cycle. "I'll let you rest, now. Just, wake up soon. Okay? For all of us."
