She didn’t feel like herself. People were swirling around her in the lobby of the hospital, but she felt very separate from everything: bone distantly throbbing, drifting around in the weird, nauseous pain tempered by the medicine. She grabbed the arms of the wheelchair in order to hold on to something. Only hours after she picked up Chet, she was back in the lobby of the Chippewa Valley Hospital, except this time she was the patient. It was such a relief that her arm didn’t hurt much anymore thanks to the painkillers, but she was sweating like a pig and the perspiration was running into her cast. Meg had assured her that she’d find someone to pick her up, either Bridget or Curt. If Claire knew her darling daughter, she would probably use this situation to prove that she needed to get her license immediately. As she sat there, she grew anxious and jittery, wanting to bite someone else’s arm or head off. Any extremity would do as long as it made a satisfying snapping sound as it detached.
