Danny stared up at the ceiling. There wasn’t a whole lot else he could do.

He was at the hospital now, but still restrained in a neck and back brace. 

They had taken him to get x-rays and to get scanned by another big machine that he couldn’t remember the name of. 

He still didn’t know how badly he had been hurt.

His parents were in the hall talking to the doctor.

He wasn’t sure if that was a bad thing or not.

He was supposed to be resting.

He was still exhausted.

He couldn’t sleep.

Part of it was because he wanted to know.

Part of it was fear that this was just a dream.

That he was still down in the well.

That if he fell asleep here he’d wake up there.

He really wanted someone to come back.

He didn’t want to be alone right now.

He tried to calm himself down again.

He didn’t want to cry.

He still wasn’t on any pain meds. They said that he could have some after he got a diagnosis. 

That didn’t make much sense to him, but there wasn’t much he could do about it.

He looked around the room. The ceiling was still white except for a yellow stain near the window.

There was a TV up in the corner to his right, near the window. It wasn’t on. He was supposed to be sleeping.

There was a wardrobe across the room from him. Or he thought it was a wardrobe anyway, he couldn’t actually see the whole thing with how his head was stuck.

To the left was the door to the hall.

There wasn’t a whole lot to look at.

He sighed and looked towards the window again.

He could see the sky.

It was blue.

No clouds.

No birds.

Just blue.

He was so bored.

The door opened and the doctor returned with his family.

“Oh, you’re awake. Were you able to get any sleep?” the doctor asked.

“No,” Danny answered simply. He saw no point in lying about it.

“I see. Well, why don’t you all get comfortable and I can go over the results of your scans.”

His parents and sister took their seats in chairs that Danny hadn’t been able to see. His mom scooted her chair closer to the bed and held Danny’s hand.

She gave it a reassuring squeeze.

It was strange how a simple form of contact could ground him so much. Sure he was still scared, but at least he knew this was real now.

He was in the hospital.

He did get rescued.

He wasn’t going to die in that hole.

“I’d like to go over the good news first if that’s alright with everyone?” the doctor started.

When no one objected he continued. 

“All of your organs are perfectly fine, nothing was punctured or ruptured from the fall. No signs of internal bleeding or any brain swelling.”

This all sounded good, but just knowing this was the good news meant there was bad news. 

“Your neck is fine and we can remove that brace shortly.”

He was trying to stay calm while also waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“But,” the doctor finally said.

Danny squeezed his mom’s hand as he waited for the news.

“You are going to be staying in that bed with that back brace on for a little while longer.”

“How long is he going to be laid up doc?” his dad asked.

“It depends. We’re going to have to wait for the swelling to go down before we can take a closer look. Once we’re able to do that we can go over the next steps in the recovery process.”

Once he heard the word recovery he stopped listening. He didn’t mean to, but he'd been so worried he'd done something really bad in that fall.

He was so scared that he'd be stuck like this forever. Bedridden and in constant pain.

"Danny?"

He blinked and did his best to look at who was talking. 

"Are you okay sweetie?" His mom asked.

"Yeah, sorry. I just got a little spacey for a second. Did I miss anything?"

"Just asking if you'd like me to take that off now?" The doctor said while pointing at the neck brace.

"Oh, yeah. That'd be great."

"Excellent!" The doctor said before pulling the velcro apart.

It was so nice to be able to actually turn his head.

"Alright, there's a few other things we need to go over before I go."

Danny turned to look at the doctor. Curious as to what else there was to go over.

“Here’s a button that will call a nurse in, use it as much as you like. Don’t worry about bothering them. It’s their job to make sure you have what you need to get better.”

The doctor slipped the button, which was about the size of a marker with a little red button on the end.

“You can test it out if you’d like.”

Danny hesitated for a moment. Did he really need to practice pushing a button? 

“Go ahead. I want to introduce you.”

It felt a little silly to push the button when he didn’t need it, but he did it anyway.

Maybe the doctor just really wanted to make sure he could.

It wasn’t even a minute later that a nurse came in.

“Oh hello everyone! Are we testing the button?”

“Why yes we are. Debbie, say hi to Danny. He’s going to be staying with us for a little while.”

That was a weird way to put it, but Danny wasn’t going to say anything about it.

Once the nurse had said her hello’s to everyone Danny was finally offered the pain medication he had been waiting for.

They had to hook him up to an IV due to his position but he didn’t even care. As long as it worked and even better if it kicked in soon.

When that was done, both she and the doctor left so Danny could finally talk to his family.

“How are you feeling, Sweetie? Do you want anything?” his mom asked as she stroked his hair away from his forehead.

“I’m okay. I’m just glad you guys are here now.”

“I don’t want to push you honey, but why were you in the woods last night?”

Danny took a second to think about how he wanted to answer that.

Should he lie or tell the truth?

He could lie and say he went for a walk.

He could say he just got turned around in the dark before he fell.

Or he could tell the truth and maybe Dash would get in trouble for something for once.

He wouldn’t have ever fallen down that well if it weren’t for Dash dragging him out there.

He really wasn’t a very good liar.