Eric groaned loudly. Everything hurt. 'Whyyyyyy did I do this' He thought. ' I didn't know this would be so painful'

He pushed himself up with his arms but he was too hurt and weak from the climb up the tree that he just let his body rest for a few minutes.-

a few minutes past. He tried to get up again and succeeded. Slowly he pushed himself up against the tree. His vision was blurry.

When his vision cleared he tried to stand up, gripping the tree for support. When he had both of his legs supporting him, he looked around to see if anybody had seen him. Fortunately, nobody was around to see him. Eric looked at the tree, and around it.

 He hadn't too much damage for anyone to get suspicious. He looked around for his crutches, and he saw that they were still laying against the tree, about 3 feet away from him. He took a step toward them. And pain flared up his left left leg, and instantly he grabbed his leg. Eric sat down where he was standing and pulled up his pant leg, revealing a huge gash in his calf. Eric's eyes widened.

 Blood from the cut was gushing out blood.

Eric gripped his leg harder. He had to get back to his house. Forget the whole idea of suicide, and get home. He pulled down his pant leg and stood back up slowly. Ignoring the pain.He took one excruciating step after the other. He finally arrived at his crutches. He grabbed one and put it in one of his armpits. And the other in his other armpit. 

And he started walking out of the grass and onto the sidewalk.

                                                                                   *                             *                           *                 

He finally arrived at his house. He reached for the handle of the door, but he paused. He sighed and pushed the door open. And he walked in closing the door behind him. He into the living room where his Mom was still working on the papers. Suddenly blood streamed down his leg and onto the floor . Eric looked at. And he gasped. His Mom looked Eric. Her eyes were blood shot and she had a deep purple under them. Her hair was ruffled though she smiled at him.

" Did you have a good time?" She asked. 

" Yea I saw a couple friends there so I talked with them." Eric answered without groaning in pain.

It was half a lie, he did talk to Hadlee, but he said that he talked to a couple people to cover up what actually happened. 

"And, hey Mom, did you remember that tomorrow school starts?" 

Her face twisted into confusion, then concern. " OHHhhhhhh my gosh we need your supp-" Just then the home phone range, and Eric's Mom ran over to it. Seeing his chance, Eric hopped on his good leg to the bathroom. 

When he arrived at the door to the bathroom, he heard his Mom pick up the phone. And quickly He opened the door,  walked in, and shut the door. He walked over to the toilet and sat down. He lifted up his pant leg revealing his wound on his calf. It didn't hurt that much as it did at the park. But it still hurt beyond his capacity but he had to tough it our for his Mom.

 He looked around and the first thing he saw was a small green towel right next to him on his right.

He grabbed that and quickly pressed that on his wound. The towel soaked up his blood quickly. Eric bit his lip to fight back the pain. He looked around again to see what he could to to stop the blood from dripping out. 

He looked around quickly and he saw the cupboard above the sink. Quickly, he wrapped the towel around the wound and stood up and reached over to the cupboard. He opened it and took a look inside it.

Inside it had vitamins, combs, toothbrushes, tubes of toothpaste, a small box with small band aids in it, too small for his wound, cotton balls, rubbing alcohol, cotton swabs, and a first aid kit.

" Ah ha." Eric said. 

He reached and grabbed the first aid kit and quickly sat back down on the toilet seat. He opened the kit and looked at what was in it. 

It had bigger band aids, gauze pads, a thermometer, itch cream, bandages,  scissors, tape, and a small bottle of water. He took out the bandages and the bottle of water out and he closed the lid of the first aid kit and set it down next to him.

He then lifter his leg slowly over the bath tub. Overwhelming pain flashed through his leg as he did. He set his leg down and took the blood soaked towel from the wound on his calf. He then opened the cap of the water bottle and slowly poured water on the wound to clean it a bit an rubbed the wound with his fingers. It stung but he bit his lip to fight back the pain. After he was done pouring he grabbed the bandages and unwrapped it a bit. he put the edge of the bandage a bit above his wound and started wrapping the bandage around it slowly, using his hand to add pressure. to stop the blood while he wrapped.

Finally he finished wrapping the bandage around the wound. He let go of the bandage but it unwrapped just a bit. Eric narrowed his eyebrows. He grunted in frustration. He looked inside the first aid kit again to see if there was anything that he could use to hold the bandages. Almost immediately he spotted a role of tape. He grabbed it quickly and unrolled the tape just a bit. and using his teeth, he ripped the piece of tape off the role and carefully placed it on the edge of the bandages. 

He placed the role of tape back in the first aid kit and looked at the bandage. A little bit of blood had soaked through but he was satisfied.  Eric lifted his leg away from the tub and he put his foot on the floor and he hunched over for a second. Then sat back up.

He very slowly tried to stand up. Success. He held the edge of the sink counter for support. He took a step forward to see what would happen. A little sharp pain in his leg but other from that nothing happened. He took another step forward. This time not so successful. He stepped on a very soft green carpet and slipped. He fell and hit his head hard on the tile floor, making a loud thud. He heard loud footsteps coming toward him in his direction. Eric held his head with both of his hands squinting hard. 

He heard knocks on the door. "Eric? You all right in there? Whats wrong?" His Mom asked. The door nob twisted. " Yea Mom I'm all right I just dropped a bottle of soap and ehh, yea, but I'm all right." 

" Oh ok well when you get out I need to tell you something ok?" His Mom said. "Ok." Eric responded. Slowly and steadily he raised himself back up using the counter.  As he got up, he felt his head. There was a large bump on the back of his head, and he had a very large head ache. He groaned again. Rubbing his head he limped over to the door and turned the door handle slowly and pushed the door open. He looked around to see if his Mom was anywhere near him. She was nowhere to be seen. "Excellent" 

He looked to his left and he saw his crutches. Leaning against the wall.  He grabbed them and put them between his arms and taking long strides to the front door closet, and opened the door and looked for the hats. He saw the hats and he grabbed a hat that was white and had a red N on the front of it. That hat was Luke's favorite hat. The N stood for the  Nebraska Huskers, Luke's favorite football team. Eric didn't really care for the Nebraska Huskers but since it was his brothers, it was sacred to him.

He put the hat on his head, and stepped back and shut the closet door. He heard steps coming down the stairs. He looked down at the floor, and at that second he noticed that he still had his pant legs still rolled up. Panicked, he unrolled the pant legs as quickly as he could before his Mom showed up at the end of the stair case with her purse in her hand. She smiled at Eric. " Hey honey I'm just going to go to the store to go grab a few supplies for you for your first day at school."

"Why just a few?" he asked. " Oh, well, you remember that call that I had while you were in the bathroom?" "Yea."

"Well, that was your grandma Libby asking if we could go over to their house for a while, for a little vacation." She said, " tomorrow you can just say goodbye to your friends and then I'll pick you up after lunch." 

She sighed." Well I'll see you after a few." "Ok Mom see ya." She waved and waled to the front door and walked out to her car. A little confused, Eric sat down on a sofa right next to him and thought what his friends would think about him when they met again.