Where Dreams Come True

I had always thought that Disneyworld was a magical place where childhood dreams came true. I had visited Disney when I was two years old, but I really had no memory of it. When my friends and I began planning a senior trip, I immediately thought of Disneyworld as a great destination. It would be a fun and safe place where we could celebrate graduating high school and spend time together before we all went off to college. This was the first time I had been away without my family, and I was both excited and nervous about my friends and I taking the trip on our own. When we boarded the plane the Tuesday after graduation, we were all so excited. I was ready to relax and have fun with my friends. I never could have imagined that my trip would take a sour turn.
My first few days at Disney were great. My friends and I spent our days at the parks, acting like we were ten again. Our stomachs dropped on Tower of Terror, we went from zero to sixty on Rockin’ Roller Coaster, and we traveled the countries of the world at Epcot. I really felt like I was in another world, as Walt Disney intended. Thursday was the day we were going to the Magic Kingdom, and we were all excited. It was the biggest and best park, and we went to bed early the night before to get ready for a jam packed day. My friend went through our Disney information book, planning what rides we would go on first and what lines would be the longest. We wanted to make the best of our day at the Magic Kingdom and experience everything it had to offer.
We woke up early on Thursday to get to the park as soon as it opened. We rushed through breakfast, excited to get to the place we had all been anticipating. When we got off the bus, we walked through the gates and saw Cinderella’s castle. I felt like I was a little kid again, staring up in awe at the sparkling building. I didn’t have much time to marvel at the castle however, because we had to get over to our first ride before the line got long. We made our way to Big Thunder Mountain and decided to stop at the bathroom first. As I waited outside the bathroom for my friends, I looked at my cell phone and saw that I had two voicemails. I didn’t recognize the number and was confused at first. I put the phone to my ear to listen, not having any idea what I was about to hear.
The messages were from my boyfriend Nick’s mother, Donna. I thought it was very strange that she was calling me, so I knew that something must be wrong. I almost dropped the phone as I listened to her voice on the other line.
“Hi Hallie, it’s Donna,” she said. “Nick’s been in a really bad car accident. He wanted to talk to you before he went into surgery, but he’s pretty out of it now. Please don’t let this ruin your vacation and try to have fun. Call me back when you get this message, honey.”
I couldn’t believe this was happening. I was a thousand miles away, and there was nothing I could do. I felt so helpless. I immediately called his mom back to find that the accident was even worse than I had thought. Nick had a broken leg, broken ribs, a punctured lung, possible internal bleeding, and a contusion on his spleen. In my mind I thanked my junior year anatomy teacher for giving me some medical knowledge so that I knew what all of this meant. I knew it was serious and could potentially turn really bad. If the surgery didn’t go well, there was a chance he might not make it.
I tried to remember the last thing I had said to Nick, but my head was spinning and I couldn’t think. Did I tell him I loved him? Had I said everything I wanted to say? I tried to remember Monday night when I had gone to see him before my trip. We sat in his living room, talking to his mom about him getting a motorcycle.
“There’s no way Nick,” his mom had said. “I do not want you riding down the highway on a bike. You’re too much of a daredevil.”
He definitely would never get that motorcycle now. I remember kissing him goodbye and saying I’d see him Saturday. I never thought I’d be going to the hospital to see him. I had talked to him on the phone the night before the accident, but I couldn’t even remember what we talked about. I racked my brain for any memory of the conversation, but my mind was blank. I hoped I had said everything I wanted to say; what if I never got the chance again?
My friends tried to comfort me, but it was to no avail. Families walked past me and smiled, a little boy ran by with cotton candy, and the overall mood of Disney stayed the same, but I started crying. I couldn’t believe that this would happen while I was away. I was almost mad at him for getting in to the accident; how could he let this happen when I wasn’t there to be with him? So many emotions rushed through me at once: anger, sadness, despair, helplessness. I just wanted to get on a plane and go home to be with him, but I couldn’t. I had to hold back my tears so that I didn’t ruin the entire trip for my friends. I wanted them to have fun, even if it was almost impossible for me to.
I wiped the tears from my face and got in line for Big Thunder Mountain with my friends. They laughed and screamed, but I sat in silence. All I could think of was Nick, lying on a cold operating table, not having any idea what was happening to him. I went through the motions with my friends, but on the inside I was a wreck, worrying about my boyfriend. I kept my phone by my side at all times, waiting for his mom’s phone calls to give me updates. He made it out of surgery okay, but then the doctor’s were concerned about the internal bleeding. His blood count was extremely low, and it wasn’t going back up. All I could think of was that he wasn’t going to make it and I was going to be here, a thousand miles away. I counted down the minutes until we would return home.
I tried to stay strong for my friends for the rest of the trip and I think I did it pretty well. I may not have been happy, but I tried to hide how I was truly feeling. I tried my best to survive Magic Kingdom on Thursday and then again on Friday, but the time seemed to drag on. Saturday finally came, and I couldn’t wait to get on the plane and go home to Nick. I hadn’t been able to talk to him at all since the accident; his mom said that his lips were extremely cut up and it was too difficult for him to talk. I rushed my friends to the bus stop so that we would be sure to get to the airport on time. We were on time to the bus stop, but everything that could have gone wrong did.
We were supposed to be on the 3:30 bus to the airport, but there was no 3:30 bus. We had to wait until 5 for the bus to come, and our flight was at 7; it was a 45 minute bus ride. We weren’t going to make it. I couldn’t believe that this had all gone so wrong. Once we finally got on the bus, I completely let go of everything I had held in the whole trip. I cried the entire trip to the airport, in front of everyone on the bus. At any other time I would have been so embarrassed, but at this point I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I just wanted to get home to Nick so badly, and it seemed like everything and everyone was trying to stand in my way. I prayed to God that we would make this flight. Then a thunderstorm started. I have a huge fear of flying, and I couldn’t believe we would be taking off in this weather. I continued asking God to help us to get on this plane, and now I added the plea that we would make it home safely.
After all that had gone wrong, we actually made the flight. It was one of the worst flights I had ever been on, with rough turbulence and lightning bolts seemingly right outside the window. Once we were on the ground in Boston, I thanked God for letting us make it back. I was finally home and could go to the hospital to see Nick. I wanted to be with him so badly, but at the same time I was scared to see him in such bad condition. I had never known anyone who had gotten that hurt, and I knew it was going to be extremely difficult to go to the hospital.
I never could have prepared myself for what I was about to be faced with. When I walked into his tiny hospital room, he had all kinds of tubes attached to him and machines monitoring his blood count and breathing. I just sat next to him in silence, because he couldn’t really talk.
The only thing he said was, “Hallie, you better not cry.”
I held back my tears for him, because I knew my crying would just make the situation worse. I sat in the uncomfortable chair next to his bed, not knowing what to say or do. His mom and step-dad said they wanted to give us some time together, so they left to get something to eat. I didn’t want to show it, but I was scared to be alone with him. What if something happened while I was sitting there? I was so nervous. I sat in silence as he drifted in and out of sleep, occasionally waking up and staring at me, not remembering I was there. I changed the cool cloth on his forehead every twenty minutes like his mom had instructed, running it under the sink. It was difficult to see him in this tiny, dark room, with nurses rushing in and out, but in a way I felt relieved. It made me feel better just to sit there by him and not be a thousand miles away, wondering what was happening.
My first few visits with Nick were tough, but as the days went by, he slowly got better. When they stopped giving him morphine, he would say a few things and was awake more. The cuts on his lips were healing, and he could talk more and more as they healed. After about a week, he was moved out of the intensive care unit and into pediatrics. By this time he was finally talking and back to his normal self. He was released from the hospital after ten days and the doctors said with physical therapy, he would eventually be fully healed.
When I first boarded the plane for my trip to Disneyworld, I never thought that I would get that phone call from Nick’s mom. We always try not to expect the worst, and there’s no way to prepare for when it does happen. This experience has shown me that you have to make the most of every moment of your life. Life is fragile and can be taken away in an instant. We can’t live in fear of the unexpected, but we must take advantage of second we have. Never hold anything back and always say what you feel; you never know what tomorrow could bring.