Georgia
They pulled up to the emergency room and Georgia was greeted by a nurse who helped her get out of the car and into a wheel chair. As her mother drove off to find a parking place, Georgia started to cry; partly out of pain but mostly out of despair.

“Why so upset, baby?” the nurse tried to comfort her.

“It’s nothing” She proclaimed as she assessed her injuries. Her knee was throbbing; it was already turning different shades of bluish-purple. She must have injured her PCL due to the direct blow to her patella.

“Doesn’t look like nothing, sugar. What’s the matter, baby?”

“My knee hurts,” Georgia lied trying to get the nurse off her case.

“Now that I can fix, baby! What did you do? It looks pretty banged up!”
“I fell out of bed and landed right on my knee. I hit it pretty hard; can I just have some pain relievers?” Georgia said harshly trying to get rid of the annoying nurse.
“Sure thing, baby. I’ll just put you next to Wren for now. Mingle on! I’ll be right back with the pain relievers.” the over coddling nurse shouted.

‘He’s kinda cute’ Georgia thought to herself. As the nurse wheeled her around to sit next to Wren, she noticed his black hat and his broad shoulders filling the contour of navy blue fleece. When she was right next to Wren, she could feel the nurse’s over–excited glare hitting them.

“So what are you here for?” he asked in a deep voice. It was beautiful. ‘I bet he can really sing,’ Georgia thought to herself.

“I woke up on the wrong side of the bed I guess,” She chuckled out wittingly. “And you?”

“Mom think’s I’ve got pneumonia” he said as he started to cough violently.

“You seem to be pretty well known around here,” Georgia stated tilting her head towards the nurse who introduced the two of them. Georgia noticed her knee was starting to throb and swell more; it was even starting to turn a gross plum color.

“Eh, I uh… I live around here?” He said hesitantly.

“Oh, okay.” Georgia said without question.

“So obviously my name is Wren, what is yours?”

“Georgia.”

“Like the state?”

“Like the state.”

“So Georgia, wanna get out of here?”
Georgia quickly looked at him very confused. She noticed his electrifying blue eyes. They were lovely.

“But I can’t walk,” she sputtered.

“No problem, I’ll just push you. I’m kinda hungry. Let’s go to the cafe, I hear its grilled cheese day,” he replied with such confidence. And before Georgia could even reply, he unlocked the wheels on her chair and wheeled her down several dark and twisty hallways before coming to the café.
She loved how he knew exactly what he was doing when in reality he probably didn’t. He pushes her into a table and walked off. She couldn’t see him for some time and thought that he was just being a jerk and left her alone at the table. She started to maneuver herself out of the table when she saw the boy with two coffee cups in hand. How sweet, she thought. She felt slightly guilty that he had paid for her cup but she didn’t mention anything.

“Here goes,” he said as he joined her at the table, “My name is Wren. I’m sixteen. I have a little brother who is a trouble maker and he is always getting hurt and that’s how everyone knows me. I’m a junior at King Harold High school. Your turn.”

“Oh, okay well my name’s Georgia. I’m fourteen. I have only been in this hospital once. I’m a freshman at School Ville High. What next?” she asked. He was kind of fun. It wasn’t awkward how he pushed her chair around the hospital and how they had just started talking. She felt like she had known him forever. She studied his crooked smile, his perfect teeth with one out of place. He smelled nice too. It was an old scent, sort of like how her grandfather had always smelled, it reminded her of home.

“What is your dream in life?” He asked sipping his coffee.

“My dream?” she was startled, “I’m confused, do you mean? What do I want to be when I grow up? What are you really asking me?”

“Your dream,” he left the question so broad. What was she supposed to respond?

“I guess my dream in life is to become a famous singer and tour the world, that would be a dream. What about you?” she replied as she started to take a few sips of the coffee.

“I have many dreams” he noted, “One would be to get rid of this damn cough! But that’s short-term. I guess my long-term dreams are to go to college and become a gym teacher.”

“A gym teacher?!” she exploded as she nearly spit all the coffee out onto the poor boy.

“Yeah, what’s so wrong with that?” he questioned.

“Well for one, why would you want to teach pubescent children how to exercise?”

“I don’t know, I guess I just like the idea of exercising.”
Georgia was confused to why he would say this. He looked to be in great physical shape, besides being a little gawky. Wren reminded her of a green been, so long and tall but thin at the same time. He started coughing again, quickly becoming red to the face and then significantly pale.

“Are you okay?” Georgia asked nervously. The last time she had seen someone turn so pale was when a girl in her Biology class passed out from the smell of formaldehyde from the fetal pig they were dissecting.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just a little hungry, be right back” He said. She watched him as he went to the line again to buy a grilled cheese and a fruit bowl. She wanted to make sure he wouldn’t collapse because she knew if he did she wouldn’t be able to help him.

“Here we go,” he said as he plopped himself into the chair, “I hope you like fruit and grilled cheese, they are my favorite.” He took a knife and started to saw the sandwich in two.

“You want to share with me?” she asked hesitantly.

“Well, yeah, I mean I feel bad just eating in front of you. And I can hear your stomach growling from here, eat.” He urged as he was handing her half the sandwich.
Georgia took the sandwich from Wren’s outstretched hand and started examining it. The smell of the melting cheese was making her nauseous. She had forgotten that she missed breakfast due to her rude awakening, but this immediately wanted to vomit. She silently tore the sandwich into little bits so that she would keep busy. However, Wren did the complete opposite. He gobbled his half down in what almost seemed to be one bite.

“How can you eat that? It’s disgusting!” Georgia giggled.

“Oh,” he said in an embarrassed manner, “I haven’t eaten a lot since Thursday…”

“Thursday?” she cried, “but that’s almost a week ago! Why haven’t you eaten since then?”

“Well, it’s kinda been a little tough on my mom, you know? Like, a single mom raising two hungry boys, one always being in the hospital. Just keeping our apartment and paying for the medical bills is hard enough. So I try to eat what I can when I can.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she gulped. He didn’t look like the type of kid who needed financial aid. Now she really felt guilty about the coffee and mutilating his food. “Let me pay you back!” she urged.

“No, it’s okay. I have a discount.”

“Hospitals have discounts?”

“Well, uh, I kind of used the five finger discount”

“You wh-” she mumbled as he put his hand over her mouth in efforts to muffle her noise.

“Shhhhh!” he begged.

“Why would you do that?” she whispered.

“Like I said, they know me pretty well because of my brother and the chef knows my situation. He is cool with it.”

“Oh, okay. I guess I can understand it,” But in reality, she felt pity for the poor boy.

“So tell me more about yourself, Georgia” he said popping a grape into his mouth followed by a big gulp of steaming coffee. “What is your life like?”

“My life sucks, well kind of.” She ranted, “I have this passion to sing, but my parents don’t see the point in that. All they think about is me getting into Harvard Medical School. And I don’t doubt that I could, but I just really want to follow my passion of singing.”

“I bet your voice is almost as beautiful as you are” he said quietly.

“What?” Georgia gasped.

“I said, ‘I bet you have a lovely voice.’’ He lied.
Georgia knew this isn’t what he said the first time. The sentence was longer.

“No, tell me what you said!” she demanded.

“I said, ‘I bet your voice is almost as beautiful as you are.’”

“What?” she said baffled.

“God, don’t you pay attention?” he barked.

“Yes, I do actually. I just didn’t understand at first. Wait, do you think I am pretty or something?”

“No.” he remarked, “I think you are beautiful.
Georgia’s face flushed so quickly she couldn’t help but look down and smile. She felt a warm figure place itself beneath her chin and raise her face. Wren left his hand there and they both smiled. His soft touch made her extraordinarily happy. She had never been in this position before, so she immaturely took his warm hand and put it on the table.

“Oh, sorry. Did I make you uncomfortable or something?” He asked regretfully, shoving his hands in his pockets.
‘Dammit!’ she thought to herself. Why couldn’t she had just left his hand there? He is so cute and older; she felt irrationally dumb and young.

“No, I have just never-, “she tried to change the subject, “Tell me more about yourself.”

“Well, my dad died when I was little.” He started. Georgia just kept feeling guilty for this poor boy. “But I don’t remember him, I was too young.”

“Oh my god! That’s awful! How did he die?” she immediately wanted to suck the words back into her mouth. What the heck was she thinking! This poor kid has a single mother who can barely afford her kids partly because one is always in need of medical attention and here she is prodding about this poor boys tragic life.

“Oh my god, you don’t have to answer that. I didn’t mean it. What the heck did I just do?” she said regretfully.

“No, it’s okay.” He said understandingly, “He died of Leukemia when I was three. I hear he was pretty awesome, though. But ever since then, my mom has been working two jobs and trying to support Henry and me, Henry is my little brother.”
Georgia noticed that her iPhone kept vibrating. She quickly observed the messages from her mother, nothing looked urgent. She shut off her phone and returned to her conversation.

“I’m sorry, you were saying?” she said apologetically.

“Nice phone you got there,” Wren retorted.

“This old thing? I hate it. I wanted my mom to buy me the iPhone 5 but she is such a b**** I hate her. She made me get the 4s.”

“Can I tell you something?” Wren asked suspiciously.

“Yeah?” Georgia replied slightly offended that he had interrupted her.

“Do you know how privileged you are?” he asked.

“What? Who do you think you are asking me that?!” she said visibly offended at this point.

“You sit here and complain to me how you hate your parents because they want you to go to a good college so you can have a bright future. I don’t even have that option. You talk about how your parent’s hate you because they didn’t get you the iPhone 5. Do you honestly have any idea how privileged you are? If I could trade spots with you, I would in a heartbeat! You live in School Ville! Do you know how amazing the education is there? Your parents pay more taxes every year to send you to those schools than my mom does for my medical bills! You call your mother a b****? She does everything in her power to make sure you have it made! Do you know what I would do to have your life? Your opportunities? Your iPhone 4s? Your health!?”

“Your medical bills? My health?” Georgia said startled.

“Henry’s medical bills, I meant Henry. And I didn’t say health, I- I- I- said” he stuttered, trying to convince himself.
Suddenly, a loud crackling noise came from the intercom system and Wren and Georgia heard the voice of the over-attentive nurse.

“Georgia Phillips and Wren Michaels to the Emergency Room, please, Georgia Phillips and Wren Michaels”

“That’s us,” Wren declared as he picked up the trash and threw it away. Georgia unlocked her wheels and Wren worked his way around the crowded café to wheel her out. They went back down the poorly lit hallways silently. Georgia didn’t know what to think.

“Where have you been?” their mothers screamed in unison.

“The bathroom,” Georgia said sharply with a quick roll of the eyes.

“The café, I was hungry,” Wren said extremely quiet.

“Wren Michaels, follow me please. We are going to room 538” a nurse interrupted.

“Georgia Phillips, follow me. We are going right next door to room 537,” said a different nurse.
Both parties walked hastily to their room in silence. Georgia was wheeled into her room. No sooner had she arrived she was being taken away again by a nurse to a room where they would take x-rays of her knee.
The machine was loud and but she didn’t mind. She took this time to think, she was puzzled about Wren’s situation. He had said that his brother was the one in need of medical attention all the time, not him.
When the machine stopped buzzing, a nurse came into the room to help Georgia off the bed and into her chair to lead her back to the room. As she was passing Wren’s room, she could hear people talking through the door.

“Where were you?” his mother interrogated.

“I was just at the café with this girl Georgia, she is really wonderful” he replied sweetly.

“The café? Did you eat?” his mother said harshly.

“Course I ate! I’m starving! I can’t keep anything down! Plus I drank some coffee trying to clear my chest so I could breathe better! Excuse me for trying to feel a little better when I feel like utter crap!” He shouted. He was audibly mad.

“Why would you eat? It just makes you sicker!”

“No mom! The food doesn’t make me sicker! For a little bit it makes me feel normal!”

“I know, I’m sorry” his mother said sorrowfully.
By this time Georgia was in her room pressed against the wall trying to hear what was going on with Wren and his mother. She could hear the squeaky door open to his room.

“Doctor Campbell, tell us the news!” Wren’s mother urged.

“Not good, Lacey. Not good. You see, the leukemia has weakened Wren’s immune system. You were right though, it is pneumonia. I’m going to keep him here to do some further testing, but when cancer patients catch something like this, especially with Wren’s advanced stage, it doesn’t usually end positively.” The doctor said regretfully.

“I told you not to go outside! I knew you were going to get sick!” Wren’s mother screamed at him in such an agitated way but she only did so because she was mad at him for catching pneumonia and basically signing his own death certificate.

“Mom! You have no idea what it is like for me! Ever since I got cancer I haven’t been able do to anything healthy kids can! I can’t exercise anymore because it takes too much out of me! I can’t have friends because the chemo takes up too much of my time! I can barely talk to people anymore because they just see me as the sad little boy with cancer! I met a girl today, and she talked to me like when I was healthy. She didn’t treat me like the kid with cancer; she treated me like a human being! I’m sorry I went outside; I went for a walk around the block. Excuse me for trying to grasp some of my old life back. I just want to be healthy again!” Wren screamed. It was audible to most that he was crying and so was his mother.
Georgia curled herself into a ball. She started to cry. She started to become hysterical. She had only known Wren for no more than two hours and he had already changed her life. Here he was, a poor boy with leukemia. His father has died; his mother working two jobs to support him and his brother. He was so appreciative of what he could get. He looked at the world in a whole different way that Georgia could not understand.

“It is with great pleasure and honor that I receive this award tonight. I was once inspired by a young man who looked at the world in the best of ways. He taught me how to appreciate the things most take for granted. He allowed me to see what was really in front of me. And for this young man, I am here to give you tonight,” Georgia stated whilst wiping the tears from her face. “The Wren Michaels Vaccine for Leukemia.”