Burning Red [TMNT Raphael - FanFiction] Chapter 3 I look like fresh hell shit! I was looking at myself in a hand mirror that the night nurse gave me from the Hope & Faith Gift Store near the main entrance in the hospital. April was brushing my tangled mess of hair as I held the mirror to watch her as well as stare at the black and purple bruises that were tattooed under my eyes. Clear sign of trauma…and maybe some stress. I had scabbing scraps on my forehead and neck, and small cuts from the fiberglass that was in my face. I pouted and groaned at my appearance. I was so ugly looking. I slapped the mirror facedown between my legs; I didn’t want to look at this witch in the mirror anymore. Once April finished brushing my hair she sectioned my hair and pulled them into their own personal high-top bun. She took the mirror and held it up to my face for me to see her masterpiece. It wasn’t bad looking; I kind of looked like a cute domestic abuse victim. I held the mirror as well, smiling at this funny but cute sight of myself. “She can smile now, good.” April smiled with me. She took the mirror from me and placed that and the brush on the table next to me. I watched Casey sleeping in the reclining chair under the window while April took her place in the folding chair next to him. She pulled out an iPad from her backpack and started working on…whatever she was working on before she turned her attention to me. I looked back to the TV hanging from a ceiling platform; Ridiculousness was on MTV. I can walk now, with the help of a nurse and a walker. I have nerve damage in both of my legs, curable with regular physical therapy and occasional leg massages from a really cute male nurse. Of course, he’s just checking to see I can feel anything yet. I have a cast on left arm too; I recently broke that. I woke up at night, really needing to use the bathroom but I didn’t want to call a nurse in to walk me to the bathroom…embarrassing! So I tried myself. Mustering up all the determination and strength I had if I just believed I could walk and do it on my own. FAIL! Once I put my legs down and lifted my body up, my legs slipped away from me. I crashed to the floor, hitting my forehead on the edge of the rolling table first and of course putting my left arm under me to brace my fall was an instinctively stupid mistake. I slammed that on the rolling legs of the table, breaking my arm. I wasn’t on the floor for very long, apparently I tripped an alarm on the bed that signaled ‘Hey! She’s not in the bed anymore, she fell!’ Whatever. About a month from now will be my mother’s funeral, she’ll be taking her place next to my dad in the New York City Marble Cemetery. I’m still not ready to say “Good-bye” but…I can say “See you later”, Good-byes and Farewells to me mean ‘forever and never’. I don’t…want to say Good-bye now.