A Hole in My Heart by Rie Charles Read Free Book Online Page A

little, the longer Lizzie stays healthy and the longer she can wait to have her operation, the better. Even now they’ve only done a few operations in Canada, let alone here in Vancouver, like the one she’ll need. It’s still very, very new. Each year the surgeons get more skilled and each year the nurses, the other doctors will know more about how to look after her during and after the operation.”
    â€œSo I was right. They’re experimenting on her.”
    â€œI don’t like to think of it as experimenting. But, in a way you’re correct, because with each operation they get better. Then the chance for it to work the next time, on the next girl or boy, increases.” He wipes his cherry-stained mouth with a serviette.
    â€œSo this time they’re going to open up her heart and sew up the hole?”
    Dad nods. “I don’t know actually how they do it, but yes.”
    â€œWithout this operation will Lizzie die?” I hate to use the d word but somehow I must.
    â€œLet’s not talk about that.” He wipes his face again, harder.
    â€œDad, I have to know, and I don’t want it watered down.” It’s like I have to hurt myself, jab the knife in. But that’s better than not knowing.
    Dad’s face twists as he screws his serviette into a ball and rams it half under his dessert bowl.
    â€œYes, dear. Without another operation she will die. Sooner rather than later.”
    I look across at Dad. Most of what he says I don’t understand, like where the arteries are, where the carbon dioxide is. But this part, I do. The silence in the room is heavy. My ears roar and close in. My mind wants to close in too, but can’t. How can Lizzie die? The air is thick and wavy, like looking through water. She can’t die. She’s young. She can’t. But the Quinn girl did. Beatrice did.
    I reach for the teapot and slide my hands up and down. It’s warm and comforting. “You said she’ll be one of the first to have it?” Dad nods. “Will they fix her? Will it work?”
    This time he doesn’t nod. “From what I’ve read, there’s a good chance.”
    â€œYou mean, even if she has it, it might not help? She might be just the same?” He nods again. His face twists and pinches more.
    â€œAnd what if it doesn’t work?”
    â€œLet’s not talk about that, dear.” He gathers up his half-finished cup of tea and starts for the kitchen.
    â€œNo, please Dad. I want to know. I have to know.”
    The cup plunks on the countertop. With a hold-on-a-second look on his face, he heads for downstairs. I don’t move.
    I remember how Lizzie never used to run and play. At the beach in the summer she read while, I jumped in and out of the water, swam for a while and then dripped down beside her. Lizzie sometimes paddled, ducked under, rolled onto her back, but she didn’t swim, not out to the raft to dive off. She went back to her book instead. I always thought she didn’t run or swim because she preferred to read. But now that I think about it, I did know it was about her shortness of breath and the scar on her chest.
    â€œThese are copies of the Canadian Medical Association Journal .” I startle. Dad’s back with a thick book under his arm and several thin, magazine-like things, with pieces of paper sticking out from one end.
    â€œWhen will she have the new operation?” I ask.
    Dad flips through the journals, then leafs through the book. It seems to be some sort of medical encyclopedia. “Look here.” It’s a diagram labelled “Circulation of the Blood through the Heart.” He drags his fingers on one side of the picture into an upper area that looks like the bag on our vacuum cleaner, then to a lower bag, and out what looked like pipes. “Blood comes from all of the cells of our body to our heart. It carries, among other things, lots of carbon dioxide that our