Three Wishes by Barbara Delinsky Read Free Book Online Page A

of a plot. And he definitely had an imaginative streak. Something had to explain the eeriness he had felt when passing through the tunnel of light that the Blazer had carved in the snow. He felt that eeriness still, felt it deep in his tired bones.
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    While Tom waited for news with his eyes closed, his legs braced, and his arms cradling his bruised ribs, down the hall in the operating room, Bree watched with fascination as five skilled professionals tried to restart her heart.

Chapter
3
    W ake up, Bree. Time to wake up.”
    Bree struggled to open her eyes. It was a minute of starts and stops, and what seemed a great expenditure of energy, before she succeeded.
    â€œThat’s it. You can hear me, can’t you?”
    She nodded, more a thought than an act, and tried to look around. The woman who had spoken was pale green. Beyond was a room that was dimly lit, cool, and sterile, totally different from where she had been seconds before. That place had been bright and warm. The memory of it brought a wisp of calm.
    â€œShe’s awake?” asked another voice, this one male, and for a minute she thought it was his. But this face had features. The other had been too bright to see.
    So how had she known it was male? And how had it smiled? Or had she only imagined a smile?
    â€œHi there, Bree,” came this new one again. “Welcome back.” The voice was familiar, but nothing else.
    â€œDo I know you?” she asked in a whispery croak.
    â€œI’m Paul Sealy, one of the ones who’ve been working on you for the last five hours.”
    She tried to moisten her tongue, but her whole mouth was dry. “Where am I?”
    â€œIn the recovery room. How do you feel?”
    She felt confused. Sad, like she’d been someplace nicer and didn’t want to be back. But happy to be here, too.
    â€œAny pain?”
    Maybe, in her midsection, but it was more dull than excruciating. The thoughts that came and went were harder to handle. She kept picturing herself on the operating table, kept seeing herself there, as if she had left her body behind and was rising to a gentler place. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought she had died and gone to heaven. But this clearly wasn’t heaven. So she’d been sent back down to earth. Which was a really weird idea.
    Far easier to stop thinking and just drift off to sleep.
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    That first day passed in groggy spurts. She dozed and woke, dozed and woke. There were questions about comfort and pain, much poking and prodding, an overall jostling when she was wheeled down the hall to her room. Doctors and nurses hovered. More than once, she fought through a private fog to tell them that she would be fine, because she knew that she would be. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she did.
    That was the only certainty she had. Between the lingering anesthesia and the drugs they gave her for pain, she was confused about where she was and why she hurt. She was confused about who was with her, seeing familiar faces one minute and new faces another, and each time she remembered what had happened in the operating room, she was confused about what was real and what was dream.
    Sleep continued to be a lovely escape.
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    By the second morning, the effects of the anesthesia had worn off and she was awake enough to respond to the nurses attending her. Yes, her stomach hurt. No, she wasn’t dizzy. No, she wasn’t nauseated. Yes, she was thirsty.
    None mentioned the surgery. She guessed that they were leaving that to Paul Sealy. By the time he showed up, it was late morning, snow was dripping past her window from the roof under a repentant October sun, her mind was clearing, and she needed feedback.
    Standing by her bedside, with his hand in the pocket of his lab coat, he told of the tearing in her abdomen. “There was extensive bleeding. We had to find its source and stop it, then piece you back together again. It was touch-and-go for a