The strangest thing about waking up after nearly a month in a coma wasn't the hospital.
It wasn't the weakness in my legs, the soreness in my chest, or even the fact that I had to relearn how to trust my own body.
It was waking up to a life that had apparently continued without me.
Bailey Falls was normal.
My school was normal.
My family was normal.
Everyone was just…
Normal.
And somehow, I was the only one who felt like I'd been left behind.
My grandfather had temporarily moved into our house while I recovered.
I didn't exactly understand why.
When I asked Mum, she simply said, "Your grandfather wants to make sure you're okay."
Apparently, that was enough explanation for everyone.
For Grandpa, it meant checking on me every morning before breakfast, asking whether I had taken my medication, reminding me not to overexert myself, and somehow appearing downstairs whenever I so much as coughed.
"You're hovering," I told him one morning.
"I'm supervising."
