Gingerbread Man

dimness it looked black.
    "I usually
am
more Goth, but I toned it down for this," she said, grinning, tears rolling down her cheeks.
    And then I looked at Doc. And blinked. "You’re
Asian
?" I burst out.
    She broke into laughter, wiping tears from her cheeks.
    "Well, you could have told me! What the hell kind of Asian is named Fenway?"
    "A married one."
    I looked at the laptop on the tray table beside the bed where BW was sobbing her eyes out from inside a little box on the screen. This must be the magical Skype I’d heard so much about. She had a predictable short, sleek silver hairstyle, but I couldn’t see her face, because she had dropped it into her hands and was bawling like the rest of us.
    "God, BW, look up will you?"
    She did. Man, she was a classic beauty, sculpted cheekbones, big brown eyes. And sharp. Even if they were weepy at the moment.
    She smiled at me. Her teeth were
so white!
    "You’re gorgeous! You’re
all
gorgeous." I couldn’t stop looking from one woman to the other. "God, everything is…brighter. Even in the dark." Then I looked at Doc again. "Can’t I have a little more light?"
    Nodding, she went to the window and opened the blinds just a crack, and I could see even more. If it was blurry, I didn’t know it. Since, aside from twenty-year-old memories, I had only darkness to compare it to, and the teasing glimpses offered by transplants gone by, it seemed perfectly 20/20 to me.
    "This is amazing. Oh my God."
Please last, please last, please just fucking last this time.
"When can I have full blasting sunlight?"
    "In a few days. Here." She leaned over and slid a pair of tinted glasses on my face. "You need to wear these—
these
, not your designer ones—until further notice, okay?"
    I pulled them off and looked at them. "Oh, come on, these? Can’t I pick out a nicer pair? You know, something trendy, with spangles or—" I stopped and looked at Sandra, grinning like a loon `cause I could still see her. "For all I know, these
are
trendy. Are they?"
    "Not in the least," Sandra said. Then she leaned over and picked up the top of the tray table, revealing a mirror.
    And there I was, staring at myself. At me. Seeing me more clearly than I had in twenty years. It was so surreal my stomach twisted a little. "That’s
me
?" I pulled off the sunglasses and leaned closer, tipping my head at various angles, touching my hair. "It’s like looking at a stranger."
    "A beautiful stranger," Sandra said.
    Amy added, "Yeah, but way more beautiful when you’re not in a hospital bed, post-op, no makeup, kind of pale and tired. Trust me, you look way better on your good days, hon."
    I couldn’t take my eyes off myself as I searched for the image I used to identify with, which I only now realized was a slightly older, slightly taller twelve-year-old. With boobs.
    "We’ll go shopping for prescription glasses in any style you want the minute you get out of here," Sandra promised. "But you really need to listen to the doctor and put those back on for now."
    I nodded but didn’t obey. "When do I get out of here?" I asked. Because I wanted to see everything.
    "Later today," Doc said.
    I shook my head in amazement. Later today I was going to walk out of this hospital without a cane, without having to count my steps or listen for traffic. "I don’t see how life can get any better than this," I said, sounding like one of my own books.
    Almost as soon as I said, it, I wanted to snatch the words back. And not just because they made me gag. It didn’t pay to tempt fate like that. I mean, maybe life couldn’t get any better or maybe it could. What I knew for sure was that it could
definitely
get worse.
    And it was about to.
    ‘Cause really, miracles are just fairy tales. And reality pretty much sucks.

4
----

    BEING ABLE TO see was so damn good, I almost started believing my own bull. I mean, really, you’ve gotta give me some leeway here. After being blind for twenty years, getting your sight back is a pretty big deal, and even the bitchiest of skeptical bitches would start to waver a little.
    We had agreed to keep my "miracle" quiet for a while, which was great. I just wanted to bask in
seeing
for a little while before going public with the whole thing.
    I had never seen my own house, and my first day home from the hospital all I wanted to do was walk through just
looking
at it, you know?
    I rode home in Sandra’s minivan. Jim had to work, but the twins were in the backseat, chattering all the way about