Amber and Her Friends

"I have to decide which of my writings are good enough to include in my compilation," Amber told Danny. "I know I want to include my poem about you, but other than that, I just don't have a clue! I was hoping that maybe you could help me go through them and pick out the best ones."

"Sure, I'd be glad to," Danny replied. "Everything you've written looks good to me. You're so deep and introspective. This one about the rainbow looks really nice."

"I wrote that one rainy afternoon."

"I like this one about the circus too," Danny continued.

"That happened when I was five," Amber told him. "My Dad was still alive then. He let me ride on his shoulder."

"I can tell you remember it really well," Danny remarked. "Especially the part about the clown."

Amber laughed. "He was so funny."

"And this essay on courage is just incredible."

"Thank you."

"I'd say these are your best, but that's only my opinion." Danny stacked his favorites and handed them to Amber, who quickly leafed through them, then yawned.

"Come here." Danny lay back on the bed with his head propped up on his elbow. Amber lay beside him, and he put his arms around her and held her close. She rested her head on his shoulder and listened to his strong, steady heartbeat.

"This is my Mom and my sister Shelby," Trey told Jade.

"Nice to meet you." Trey's mother shook Jade's hand. "I'm Debra Whittaker."

"I'm Jade Cartwright."

"Jade's been such a great friend," Trey told Debra. "I met her back in October when she and some friends came by to cheer us up, and she's been coming around regularly since then."

"That's wonderful," Debra replied. "You don't know how hard it was for me when they told me Trey had been hurt," she continued to Jade. "I thought I was going to die. I just couldn't stand the idea of my baby lying there without his legs, but when I got here and saw how happy and upbeat he is, I felt so much better."

"All the credit for that goes to Jade," said Trey. "She gave me back my will to live again."

All Trey's possessions, including his wheelchair and crutches, were loaded into Debra's van, and she drove the short distance to Trey's new apartment. It was across the street from the community college Jade attended and the mall and was made of red brick. Vines bearing pink flowers covered one side, and in back was a swimming pool surrounded by palm trees. The living room had sliding glass doors. The walls were painted white, the kitchen floor was white tile, and the living room floor was brown wood. Jade thought that it looked very cheerful.

The four of them spent a busy morning moving all Trey's belongings into the apartment, and at about noon Debra went out for pizza while Trey, Shelby, and Jade rested and talked. "It looks like you're getting along really well on your new legs," Shelby said to Trey.

"It took a lot of effort and determination," Trey replied. "Jade can vouch for me on that score."

"It's true," said Jade. "So do you still live with your folks, Shelby?"

Shelby nodded. "Where's your Dad?" asked Jade.

"At home." Shelby sighed. "He said he had important business to tend to today."

"That's just an excuse," Trey said grimly. "The truth is that he can't bear to see me the way I am now. To him I was always the big, strong boy, the hero, the one who would make him proud. He just can't accept that fact that I lost my legs. That's why he won't come visit me. As long as he doesn't see me, he can keep pretending that everything's still the same."

"That's terrible!" Jade exclaimed.

"Yeah. It really hurts because I love him and miss him very much."

Debra returned with the pizza and they dug in. After lunch they returned to the task at hand, and by late in the evening, everything had finally been moved from the van to the apartment and stacked in piles in each room. "We can do the sorting another time," said Debra. "That's about enough for one day."

"Well, thanks for helping me move," Trey replied.

"No problem at all," said Debra. "Glad to do it." She and Shelby hugged Trey good-bye and left, and Trey and Jade were alone together for the first time. Jade recalled the first time she'd been alone with Danny and her heart began to beat faster in anticipation. She quickly glanced at Trey to see that he seemed a bit uneasy as well, his one eye darting around to finally rest on her.

"I really appreciate you coming along to help," he told her. "I know you didn't have to."

"That's OK." Suddenly she felt quite shy.

"Hey, when I get this place fixed up, I can have you over for dinner and to watch movies." Trey looked dreamy. "And when I start driving again, we can go for rides and I can take you out to nice places."

"When you start driving again?" Jade was astonished.

"I'm going to have hand controls installed in my car," Trey explained.

"Cool! I didn't even know they could do that."

"Say, Jade." He licked his lips nervously. "Can I kiss you?"

"I think I'd like that."

So he did.

"Very good, Amber. I could tell you worked hard on choosing your best pieces to include in your compilation." Mrs. Williams smiled as she handed the compilation back to Amber. Amber saw that the teacher had written a big 'A+' in red ink on the front cover.

"Thank you!" she exclaimed.

"Yours was the best in the entire class," Mrs. Williams continued. "I hope you'll consider a career in creative writing. I just know you'd be a huge success."

"So how did you do?" Trendi asked Amber after school. Amber proudly showed her friend the compilation.

"Wow, that's great! I only got a B+ on mine."

"A B+ is still a good grade." Amber didn't want her friend to feel bad.

The following morning, Amber simply couldn't get out of bed. Every time she sat up, a wave of dizziness forced her to lie back down, and her throat was so sore that she could barely swallow. "Mom, I'm really sick!" Her voice was so weak that she could barely hear it. Helen came and quickly felt her forehead.

"My God, you're burning up! Get dressed. I'm taking you to the clinic right away." Amber was so weak and dizzy that Helen had to help her dress and walk out to the car.

The clinic was very crowded, and they had a hard time finding a place to sit. When they finally did, Amber was shocked to discover that the boy who was sitting beside her was someone she knew. "Dekker!" she exclaimed. "What are you doing here?"

She hadn't known him very well at all. He'd been Danny's best friend and the driver of the car he'd been riding in when he'd been killed. Jade had kept in touch with him until she'd left for California, but Amber hadn't seen him since Danny's funeral. "I have to come here now when I get sick," he told her. "We lost our insurance when my Dad lost his job. We lost our home too, and had to move into a smaller one."

"I'm sorry," Amber replied. "Well, at least you're not in a wheelchair anymore."

"I'm not completely better, either." He glanced down at his brace-clad legs. "I never will be. How's Jade? Are she and Gideon still together?"

"They broke up before Christmas. She's with a different guy now."

Dekker was shocked. "But those two were inseparable!"

Amber didn't say anything. How could she possibly explain to him all that had happened? It struck her how ironic it was that Danny, who'd been killed in the crash, was now healthy and whole, while Dekker, who'd survived, was still crippled over three years later. "What about you?" Amber asked. "Are you seeing anyone?"

Dekker scowled. "What woman would want to hang around with a crip like me?" Amber thought about Trey and how badly he'd been injured, much more so than Dekker had, yet how much Jade seemed to care for him.

"Some girls are willing to look beyond all that," she told Dekker.

He snorted. "Well, I sure wish you'd introduce me to one of them." Amber thought of her friend Trendi and wondered whether or not she was seeing anyone. She decided to ask her the next time she saw her. "So are you seeing anyone?" asked Dekker.

Amber smiled. "Oh, yes. I'm seeing someone very special."

"Oh yeah? Anyone I know?"

She nodded.

"Who is he?"

"If I told you, you'd never believe me in a million years."

"Try me."

Amber was still debating how to answer him when he was called back to be examined. Feeling tired and weak, she tried to nap but couldn't get comfortable. After a long wait, she was finally called back and examined. "Looks like mononucleosis," the physician on duty told Helen. "We'll just have to let it run its course." He prescribed fever and anti-inflammatory medications and sent her home. By the time she got there, the only thing she felt like doing was going to bed.

Amber could hear a baby crying. She knew that it was her son and that his name was Nathaniel. "Nathaniel! Where are you?" she called to him. She realized that the street on which she was walking was made of gold. I must be in heaven. For some reason she wasn't one bit surprised. Danny!

Right away she saw him, making love to Jade on a large, fluffy bed with a leopard-print coverlet. Her sister's head was thrown back, her eyes closed in ecstasy, and Danny thrust into her ever harder and faster, and tears filled Amber's eyes as she recalled the pain, the horror, of being pinned helplessly beneath Bruce's body, completely at the mercy of his perverted demands...

And suddenly he was there, dressed in sackcloth, his body burned and ravaged, reeking of sulfur. "Our son, Amber," he sneered. "You're neglecting our son! What kind of mother do you think you are?"

She gasped and opened her eyes to look into Danny's and instantly realized that she was lying in her bed and he was holding something cool and moist to her forehead. "Oh, Danny, you'll never believe what I just saw!"

"It's all right." His voice was ever so gentle and soothing. "You were hallucinating. Your fever went up pretty high, but it's a little lower now." She heard a trace of worry in his voice that she'd never heard before.

"How did you get in here?"

He smiled. "How do you think?"

"Does my Mom know you're here?"

He shook his head. "She fell asleep watching a soap opera. I knew you needed me so I just came on over." His fingers brushed moist hair back from her forehead. She closed her eyes. It felt really nice. Then she remembered and opened them again.

"I met up with Dekker at the clinic."

If the news disturbed him at all, he certainly didn't show it. "Sh. Rest now. We'll talk about it when you're feeling better."

The next several days passed in a blur for Amber. The medication made her sore throat feel better, but it also made her very sleepy. Every time she awakened, Danny was there with a cool rag for her face or a cup of soothing spiced tea or comforting soup. "Certainly my Mom knows you're here by now," she said to him once. He nodded. "And she doesn't mind?"

"Nope. She told me to keep coming around. Said she didn't know what she'd do without me."

"But what about all the other people who need you?"

"Right now, you're the one who needs me most. Plus, you're the one I enjoy being with the most."

"Good to know I'm not just a sickie to you."

He laughed. "Oh, no. You're much more than that."

One day when she was feeling better, he took her for a walk. They walked right past a tree that had been split right down the middle. Amber remembered how that had happened and shuddered. Danny didn't even seem to notice.

Suddenly she realized that they were on what she'd always considered to be the 'bad' part of town. The houses were older, smaller, and less well built, the sidewalks had cracks with weeds growing in them, and the buildings were dirty with graffiti and peeling paint. "This part of town gives me the creeps." Amber shuddered.

"Why? You know I'd never let anything happen to you." Danny put his arm around her protectively.

"Yeah." She laughed. "Sometimes I just forget, I guess."

Danny stopped before a particularly humble home and rang the doorbell. A middle-aged woman whom Amber didn't recognize answered the door. "Is Dekker in?" he asked her.

The woman's eyes narrowed. "Do I know you?"

"My name's Danny. It's a long story, but we've met before. I'm a friend of Dekker's."

The woman's eyes had a faraway look. "Gareth did have a friend named Danny once..." She shook her head and laughed. "Never mind. Come on in. Is he expecting you?"

"I told him I'd try to stop by today. This is my friend Amber."

"How do you do."

Danny knocked on Dekker's bedroom door. There was a slight delay, and then the door was opened. "Danny!" Dekker looked elated. "It really is you!"

"Of course it's me. Who else would it be?"

"Come on in." He moved so that Danny and Amber could enter. "Digs aren't quite as fancy as before." He sounded embarrassed.

"That doesn't matter at all," Danny replied.

Dekker stared at the floor, unsure of what to say. "I'm sorry," he finally blurted out. His eyes didn't meet Danny's. "It was all my fault. What can I say? It was stupid and irresponsible. There's no excuse for it."

"I was pretty stupid and irresponsible too," Danny replied. "After all, nobody forced me to get in the car with you."

"Even so, I was the one driving, and you were the one who..." He couldn't finish.

"That doesn't really matter anymore, does it?" asked Danny.

"Thanks for being so nice about it," Dekker mumbled.

"Hey, what are friends for?"

"That was the most fun I've had in a long time!" said Jade as she and Trey left the bowling alley.

"Me too," Trey agreed. "That's the first time since my injury that I've felt completely normal. For a couple of hours, I actually forgot that I lost my legs!"

He drove her back to her apartment in his car with the hand controls, and she asked if he'd like to come inside for a drink. He looked frightened for just a minute. "It'll be all right!" she encouraged.

Still looking a bit doubtful, he followed her into the apartment and sat on the sofa. She went into the kitchen, fetched the drinks, and then took them into the living room, where she handed one of them to Trey. "Thank you," he said.

"You're welcome." She sat beside him on the sofa. "You look so handsome tonight, Trey."

He blushed and stared at the floor. She was thinking of her first time, with Danny, on what now seemed a lifetime ago. Had he acted this shy? She couldn't remember.

"You look very nice as well," he said. She leaned her face toward his, and suddenly they were kissing passionately. Her tongue sought entrance to his mouth, and he granted it. Her desire mounted higher and higher, until suddenly he pulled away in alarm. "I can't." His voice sounded small and scared. "I just...can't."

"That was really brave of you," Amber said to Danny as they left Dekker's house. "I'm not sure if I could have done that, if I were you."

"He's been consumed with guilt ever since it happened," Danny replied. "I could tell that seeing me alive and well and happy gave him peace about it."

"Well, not actually," Amber said softly.

Danny frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Well...you're not exactly the same as you were before, are you?"

"I'm better than I was before. I can't get sick or hurt anymore. That's why I didn't have to worry about catching mononucleosis from you. I'll never get any older, either."

"But I will."

"Yeah, I know." He looked like a child whose balloon had just been deflated.

"Did I do something wrong?" Jade was alarmed.

"Oh, no! Not at all!" Trey quickly assured her. "It's not you. It's me. You see...how can I put this...I haven't been intimate with a woman since before I left for Afghanistan, so no woman has ever seen me naked without my legs before, and I just don't know how it would go. I'm...I'm scared, Jade. What if you saw my stumps and got totally put off?"

"You're more than just your legs, Trey. You're still the same person you were before you went to Afghanistan. Who you are inside hasn't changed, and that's what's important."

"Yeah, I know, but still...you've never even seen my stumps when I'm not wearing pants. What if you did and got totally grossed out?"

Jade shook her head. "I don't think that would happen." At the same time, it occurred to her that she had never seen stumps of amputated limbs before. What if they were covered with scar tissue and looked really horrid? Would she really be able to look beyond all that? She'd like to say yes, but she honestly didn't know for sure.

"I think I'd better just leave," Trey said shortly.

"Oh, no, you don't have to..."

But he was already gone.

Amber stood in front of the mirror in her bedroom, surveying her facial features intently. She knew that she'd someday be older, the pimples would go away and crow's feet would appear, and the roots of her hair would turn white. Yet Danny would still look exactly the same as he did now. What would their relationship be like then? Would they be more like mother and son than boyfriend and girlfriend? She decided she'd simply have to stay looking as young as possible for as long as she could. There were wrinkle creams and hair dyes. It could be done...for a while, anyway.

At lunch time the following Monday, Amber had just picked up her tray when she heard someone call to her and turned to see Trendi sitting with Ashlynn and Blake. Ashlynn was in their creative writing class, and Blake was a good friend of hers. Amber remembered what she'd planned to ask her friend. She walked over to their table and sat down.

"So do any of you have plans for spring break?" asked Ashlynn.

"We'll probably go visit my grandparents," said Blake.

"We don't have any definite plans," said Trendi. "I guess we'll just hang around here." She looked at Amber. "Hey, maybe you and I could do stuff together...oh yeah, you have a boyfriend, don't you?"

"Yeah, but we could still do stuff together. Say, do you have a boyfriend?"

Trendi rolled her eyes. "Not even close!"

"Danny has a friend who'd like to meet someone. Only thing is, he wears braces on his legs. Would that be OK with you?"

"I guess so. I don't see why not."

"Great! I'll tell Danny you want to meet Dekker, and maybe we can all get together sometime."

Jade typed 'amputation stumps' into Google images and gazed at the wide variety of photographs that came up. Some were neatly healed with smooth scars, while others were hideous. Since Trey was able to get around really well on artificial legs now, she assumed that his must resemble the former, and that made her feel very relieved.

Days went by and she didn't hear a word from him. She sent him emails that he didn't respond to and left calls that he didn't return. When Friday night came, she found herself sitting alone and watching television when she felt tears sting her eyes. It had now been an entire week since she'd seen or even spoken to Trey, and she missed him.

Just then the telephone rang. Jade's heart thrilled when she heard Trey's voice. "Hey, guess what!" he exclaimed.

"What?"

"I've got a job! I'm gonna be doing computer work for the police department. Veteran's Affairs helped me get it. Say, can I take you out for dinner tomorrow night to celebrate? I know it's late notice, but this is the first chance I've had to call you all week."

"Sure! I'd love to see you again. I've been missing you."

"I've been missing you too, Jade."

"I've tried to call you a bunch if times. Sent you emails, too."

"I've been busy. Look, I'll pick you up at six, OK?"

"OK."

Jade felt really anxious about the date, concerned that it would be awkward. Yet Trey was so thrilled about his new job that that seemed to be foremost in his mind. He took her to one of the nicest restaurants in town. "Order anything you want," he told her. She chose a medium-priced meal.

"Sorry I was out of touch for awhile," he said as they waited for their food to arrive. "I've just been so busy looking for a job lately that I haven't really had time for much else. I expect you've probably been busy with school as well, right?"

"Oh, yes. I just had an exam this morning."

He smiled. "I hoe you did well on it."

"Thanks. I hope so, too."

The conversation flowed naturally for the rest of the date, and then he drove her to her apartment. She hesitated only a moment before inviting him in for drinks again. Once they were inside, an awkward silence prevailed until Trey finally broke it. "Would you like to see?"

Jade gulped, then nodded. Trey removed his shoes, his pants, his prosthetic socks, and the socks covering his prosthetic legs. When he was finished, he watched Jade's face carefully, gauging her reaction.

To Jade's relief, she saw that his stumps were indeed neatly and cleanly healed. After the initial shock of seeing thighs that didn't end in knees, legs, and then feet, nothing about them seemed unnatural to her at all. On impulse, she knelt beside the sofa and began to kiss them.

She felt his fingers stroking her hair and looked up to see him grinning at her.

Danny stood on Amber's front porch, smiling and holding two kites. "Want to come to the park with me?" he asked her.

"I was going to call Trendi, but that's OK. I'll just call her later," Amber told him.

"Why don't you invite her along?" Danny suggested.

"Great idea! Maybe we could invite Hector to come along as well."

"I was just thinking the same thing."

Trendi was at a dentist appointment, but her brother said he'd tell her Amber had called when she got back home. Danny and Amber headed for the park together, and soon Danny had both kites soaring high in the sky. As Amber stood with Danny's arm around her, watching the kites bobbing in the wind, she thought about heaven and marveled at the fact that Danny had actually lived there for three years. She recalled her hallucination about the crying baby as well. "He must be a few months old by now," she said.

"Yes."

"I wonder if I'll ever know what it's like to hold my own baby in my arms," she mused.

"Of course you will."

"I think it would be so neat if..." Knowing that there was no point in talking about it, she swallowed the lump in her throat as she fingered the 'forever' necklace Danny had given her for Christmas.

"Do you know why the sky is blue?" asked Danny.

Amber shrugged. "That's just the way it is, I guess."

"The molecules in the air absorb all the colors of the spectrum except blue. They reflect blue, so that's what we see."

"What causes rainbows, then?"

"Since waves of light are of different lengths, they react differently with water droplets," Danny told her.

"How do you know all that?"

"When you don't have to worry about the pressures and stresses of life on earth, you have more time to think about other things."

"Must be nice."

"Yeah, but there are nice things about living on earth, too."

"I don't know what I was afraid of," said Jade."It seems so silly now."

"Perhaps I was a bit hard on you." Trey sounded apologetic. "But I was scared, too."

"That's perfectly understandable," Jade replied. "If something like that happened to me, I'd be scared no man would ever be attracted to me again, too." She looked at him with solemn eyes. "So if I, like, got breast cancer and lost both breasts, would you still think I was desirable?"

"Of course I would! I hope nothing like that ever happens, but if it did, it wouldn't be the end of the world."

"I'm awfully glad you feel that way." Secure in his arms, she yawned.

"Sleepy?" asked Trey. "You can take a nap, if you want."

"Sounds like a great idea."

"So how did it go at the dentist?" Amber asked Trendi. The two of them were sitting with Danny and Dekker at a table in a pizza restaurant, talking together while waiting for their pizza to arrive.

"Pretty good. I don't have any cavities, thank goodness." Trendi was very pretty with her hair freshly done and her face made up.

"That's cool," said Amber. "So you don't have to go back for six months?"

"Nope. So you guys both graduated high school four years ago, right?" Trendi asked Danny and Dekker.

"Uh...yeah." Dekker looked down at the table top.

"We're both the same age as Amber's sister Jade," Danny told her.

"So I'm out with an older man, then." Trendi chuckled.

"Yes, you are." Dekker shot Danny a grateful look.