5 YEARS LATER

As I sit here in bed looking at the stump that my leg has become, I think about all I have lost. My dream ever since I was a little girl is gone. I’m never going to become an Olympic gold medalist. It was 5 years ago, but somehow it feels like it was just yesterday. The images burned in my head will be there until the day I die. Sometimes I wish I was killed. So I don’t have to live with the thought that I could have become something amazing, someone amazing. My dreams have been torn. My passion has been crushed. 

 My door suddenly creaked open. My sister, Catie, walks into my room. She watches me stare out the window, and rolls her eyes. “Caroline, you gotta get out of bed.”

 “No point,” I mumble, still staring at the cars driving down the highway. 

She skips over to my bed happily and throws herself onto the bed. She lays down and puts her arm around me. “Come on, you’re being ridiculous!” 

She gripps her hands in mine and attempts to drag me out onto the cold, wooden floor. My robotic leg squeaked as it touched the ground. To lose a leg as young as I did is detrimental to the rest of your life. I remember the day my parents told me the big surprise, it was my eleventh birthday. The day they told me I was going to run like the big leagues. As I tried to take a few steps out of my room, the thought was ringing in my head.       

“No way!” I exclaimed.

“Happy Birthday Caroline!” my mom and dad spontaneously responded.

I jumped up and down. My two legs banging the floor beneath me. I was so excited. It was my lifelong dream, finally coming true.  

I couldn’t stop smiling! But little did I know this birthday gift would turn into my worst nightmare. 

Then 2 weeks later, I lost my leg. And my life came crashing down. 

Catie pulls my arm towards the door, I snap out of my daydream. “I get it, you’re upset,” she sighs, “But you can’t hold on to that forever. You gotta let go, sis.”

I hate when she does this. “Catie you don’t get it!” I yell. “You have all your limbs!” 

I stormed out of the room.

After 3 long minutes of hobbling down the six stairs, I sit down at the kitchen table for breakfast. Mom was opening the fridge to get the milk. “How are you doing, sweetie?”

“Fine,” I mumble, staring at the empty bowl in front of me. 

I can see her sorry eyes as I reach for the Trix. 

“Now,” she said, “I know you don’t want me to bring this up but  it’s so soon.”

She was talking about school. The topic I hate the most. “Mom,” I stare her down, “I don’t want to have this conversation.” I turn my back, but she still walked towards me. 

“I know, I know, but it’s coming up soon. I know kids aren’t always the nicest, but this is life. You need to learn how to deal with it.” 

“Mom,” I grunt, “I know, but still. It’s hard to be turned on by your friends because you can’t walk the right way. I know that this is life, but you have never been called robot or had to sit out of the thing you love to do.”

While I munch on my cereal, I remembered the day Grace abandoned me. It was two months after the accident and I had just gotten out of the hospital. I had somewhat came to the conclusion that no one wanted to be seen with the ‘robot girl’. Now or never. 

It had been a while since we had seen each other. She didn’t even visit me. I could tell that it was a sign that my best friend had moved on. 

“Hi Grace,” I said shyly. 

“Oh,” she mumbled, “hi.”

She stared at my leg. I could tell she was trying not to stare, but she couldn’t. She stared at her hands, and down to my leg.

“How are you?” I asked nervously.

“F..F...Fine,” she responded.

“Good.” 

I remembered all the fun times we had together. Sleepovers, birthday parties, all the amazing memories.

“I better get to class,” Grace mumbled, still staring at the ground. 

“Same,” I responded.

She turned and I watched her walk away, secretly wishing that she would stay. I could tell it was going to be like this for a long time.

The weeks had gone by and it was the first day of school. It’s my sophomore year, which everyone says is the absolute worst. As usual, I walk through the halls only to get stared at. The whispers, the laughs, the taunting. I’m used to it. Grace stares at me up and down like a piece of trash as usual. You would think they would be supportive and helpful, but no. The once athlete is now sitting out in gym and quit all the sports teams, where all your friends are. 

I walk into history. My teacher is the definition of a plain jane. She wears a beige color dress with her stick-straight hair styled in a short bob. The way she talks sounds like the teachers and parents in Charlie Brown.  “Mwah, mwah, mwah… “

“Caroline,” the doctor said, “Can you hear me?”

Slowly, I opened my eyes to the fluorescent white light of a hospital room. I didn’t know why I was there. I didn’t remember anything that had happened. I lifted my head, “Where am I?”

“You're in the hospital sweetie,” my mom said as she inched closer to the bed.

I wanted to get up and walk around but I couldn’t feel my right leg. I brushed the blanket off my legs, only to see one of them. Tears started welling in my eyes. “Where’s my leg, mom?”

I didn’t understand what was happening, but I knew it was important. I couldn’t hold it back anymore. The tears started flowing, and once they started, they weren’t stopping. The same thing with my mom. I could tell she was trying to hold them back too, but it wasn’t working out in her favor. 

The doctor looked at me with sad eyes. “You were in an accident. Lots of other people were hurt too.” 

 “Ms. Martell? Wake up, it is unacceptable to sleep in my class,” someone had shook me awake.

I looked up to see my history class around me. Everyone was staring. Well, not like they usually do in a taunting sort of way, they were staring at me like I was an alien. Some faces confused, some faces taunting, while others were sympathetic, wondering if the alien was lost. Being sympathetic is an emotion I don’t get a lot from my peers. Ms. Plain-Jane had started to get back into the lesson. All I know was that the memory was still haunting me. 

After school, Conner drives me home. The perk about having an older brother that’s a senior is that he can drive you places to avoid the smelly bus.

He turns his head to look at me. “How was your day?” he asks.

“Fine,” I mumble.  

“Come on,” he turns his head back to the road, “You can’t be a negative nelly forever.”

“I’m not,”

I pull my hood over my head, turn my back to him, and stare out my window at the trees for the rest of the drive home. 

When we get to the house, I don’t even stop to let my mom to ask me how my day was. I limp as fast as I possibly can up the stairs. I don’t want to hear what anyone else had to say.  

When I get into my room I can hear mom trying to pry out the reason I was upset from Conner. 

“I don’t know, mom!” grunts Conner from the bottom of the stairs.

“Okay...” she responds in a disappointed tone.

I’m sick of the fighting and yelling. I’m already sick of school and it’s only the first day. “Only one-hundred seventy-nine days to go,” I sigh. 

I lay on my bed and stare at the ceiling. I can feel the tiredness of my eyes start to flutter. 

“How’s that?” the doctor asked.

“It’s okay,” I mumbled, staring at my hands.

“I know, it’s a big change,” the doctor said, “but you’re going to get used to it.”

“Yeah, I guess.” I stared down at my new artificial leg that I was going to have to live with for the rest of my life. 

“Do you want to try to stand up?” the doctor asked.

I pushed myself to sit up, then I tried to push myself out of bed. I put too much weight on the new leg and fell forward, but my dad caught me. “It’s just going to take some getting used too,” he said as he helped me back up onto the bed. 

“Dinner!” my mom yelled from downstairs. 

I wake up startled and sweaty. The thought of it is still stuck in my head. After pondering the terror of my dream, I suddenly think of an idea. I scramble to get my computer to look something up. “October 17th. Perfect.” I slam my computer shut, throw it on to my bed, and ran downstairs. 

I walk downstairs with my head held high. I have some great news to tell my family. “Mom, Dad, Conner, Catie,” I say, “I have an idea.”

“What is it?” my mom asks with a mouth full of pasta. 

“I’m going to speak at a convention.”

Everyone stops looking at their plates and stares at me. 

“What?” my family says synchronized.  

“Yeah,” I respond, “I found this charity called ‘Boston Strong’. It helps survivors of bombings build the strength and the courage up to be able to do what they love again.”

“I think that’s great Caroline,” my dad says. 

“Me too,” says my mom.

“Me three,” adds Catie.

“Me four,” finishes Conner.

“I’ll do it.” 

1 MONTH LATER

My hands are shaking and my heart is beating a million times a minute. If you can’t tell I’m super nervous. To speak about my experiences to people who have gone through an identical situation shakes me up a bit. “Caroline Martell,” the loudspeaker booms across the gallery. It’s my turn. “You got this babe,” my mom says. She gripped my hand and didn’t give me the sorry eyes, she gave me the ‘I’m so proud of what you have overcome’ eyes. I look at her and the rest of my family who is there to cheer me on. 

I walk up to the podium with my hands shaking. “I feel like I’m gonna faint,” I say to myself. I look at my family and take a deep breath. “Hello. My name is Caroline Martell and I am a survivor of the Boston Marathon Bombing.” 

THE END

Boston Strong Foundation: boston.cbslocal.com/2018/03/28/boston-marathon-bombing-survivors-one-world-strong-global-healing-charity/