Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: The Family Reunion (06/05/08)
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TITLE: Broken Bonds | Previous Challenge Entry
By Amber Underwood
06/10/08 -
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We reached my brother just in time, right before they took him into surgery. My dad was standing beside him, shifting from foot to foot in an attempt to stop himself from running. My dad was never good at hospitals. My mom ran to Danny's side and grabbed his hand, telling him everything would be okay. My sister and I sat on the edge of his bed telling him it wouldn't be long and the pain would be over. It was just a simple surgery, he was only getting his appendix out. Still, we were all there.
As much as my mom tried to postpone it, we would still have to make the call to his biological mother, who'd been calling us all night. My mom has never really gotten along with her, not since she'd signed the adoption papers. But, we all knew it would be a mistake if we didn't call her back. So, as my brother got whisked off to surgery we went into the waiting room and called his mom.
Within minutes she was up there waiting in the waiting room with us, demanding all the details. That's when we saw him. Josh was standing by the door carefully avoiding our eyes. At that moment I think we all just took a deep breath, fighting the urge to run up and hug him. Josh was my brother, who had just came back from Iraq to see the birth of his baby . The problem was that Josh had made it pretty clear that he didn't want anything to do with us anymore. He was there for his brother, that was all.
After receiving the information, Josh and his mom went to the opposite side of the waiting room and got settled for the two hour wait. Later that night Josh's wife came up to the hospital too carrying their new daughter, making the waiting room that much smaller. My parents and I sat there, our eyes glued to the television hardly seeing the news or George Lopez on the little screens, doing our best to pretend that nothing awkward was happening at all.
After, way too long of awkward silences and too loud laughter the doctor came to tell us Danny was out of recovery and we could go see him. My family rushed to the elevator and met him in his room. We each stood on one side of Danny's bed. The four of us stood on one side, then his mom, Josh and his wife and baby on the other. I remember thinking that this was a very odd reunion.
A few years before I would have never expected to see my niece for the first time in a hospital, or to not even be allowed to hold her. I would have never expected not to be talking to my brother or to be waiting for Danny, the kid who never gets sick, to get out of surgery. But, the first time I met Josh and Danny I would never have thought that they would ever be considered part of my family. I guess things change, because that night my whole family was together again in that hospital room.
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