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3 (#u03196365-e241-516a-a543-24cc33d0df3f)
I’m only three minutes behind schedule when I pull into the long pickup queue to wait for Audrey. I quickly check my phone, feeling relief when I see replies from both Noah—Jillian is excited to see the house, how does Thursday work?—and Tom, who has had a change of heart and agrees perhaps all the statues should go, though he words the email in a way that makes it seem it was his idea all along. Clearly things have taken a turn for the better, and even my fever seems under control with the ibuprofen I’ve been popping all day.
I see Audrey come through the doors, looking for my car in the long pickup line, and I put down the passenger window. “Audrey!” I try to shout, though it comes out sounding more like a squeak. I would honk, but that’s frowned upon in the school parking lot. Audrey still hasn’t seen me, but Emma Steen, waiting for her own daughter, Charlotte, by the front doors, does. I bristle as Emma strides toward me, cursing today’s timing.
She tightens the belt of her Burberry-patterned coat around her tall, slim body and steps toward the passenger side of my car and the open window. “Oh, hell,” I mutter, trying to decide if I have time to pick up my phone and fake a call. Emma’s smiling as she approaches, but I notice it’s strained. As it should be, I think.
“Hi there, Meg,” she says, bending down so her face is framed by the window. Her auburn hair is pulled back in a tight, high ponytail, her smooth bangs hanging perfectly upon her forehead, showcasing fabulous eyebrows. I absentmindedly rub a finger over my own brows, knowing it’s been too long since I had them waxed. My fingers itch with the urge to type a reminder to call the spa into my phone.
“How are you? Sorry you missed the last meeting, but hopefully the minutes were helpful.” I think of Emma’s last email, which I deleted without opening. This is her first year as president of Merritt High’s Parent Teacher Organization, and it’s the perfect position for her—some people lead through creativity or inspiration, but Emma relies on her Martha Stewart–like tendencies and homemade chocolate chunk cookies.
I wish I could put up the window without it appearing downright rude, and imagine with some satisfaction what it would be like to catch her nose between the glass and the steel frame of the door. Instead I nod, force a smile and silently beg Audrey to hurry up so we can get out of this damn queue.
“I can’t chat, Emma. Audrey has a dentist appointment. Oh, and here she is.” I move my purse off the passenger seat for Audrey, who has thankfully just opened the car door, having squeezed around Emma.
“Hi, Audrey,” Emma says, shoving her hands in her pockets and watching Audrey as she buckles her seat belt. “How’s the tennis these days?”
“I don’t play anymore,” Audrey says, her tone polite but not inviting more questions. Audrey’s a natural athlete, like her dad, and used to play tennis and soccer, but when she turned twelve she decided she didn’t care for the competitive nature of organized sports. She still hits balls with her dad on occasion, but her interests have shifted: to journalism, environmentalism, saving the backyard birds.
“Oh?” Emma holds on to her wide smile, though I can see it faltering. I know Emma still feels a connection to Audrey, having spent so much time with her when she was young, but Audrey has all but forgotten that relationship and treats her no differently than any other adult she’s forced to converse with—polite, but revealing little.
“Well, I can see you’re in a rush,” Emma says, even though we both know I’m going to be stuck here for another few minutes until the line moves again. “But maybe we can do coffee soon?” She smiles brightly as though this is a normal thing we do, a perfectly reasonable suggestion. I don’t bother to remind her that we haven’t had a coffee together in about six years and instead point to my watch. “We have to go,” I say. Perhaps she thinks this passage of time is long enough for things to thaw between us, but after what she did, Emma and I will never have another coffee date—even though we used to be best of friends, seeing each other daily when our girls were in elementary school.
“Absolutely. Off you go.” She pushes the air in front of her like she’s shoving water out of the way in a pool, walking backward toward the school as she does, still forcing that bright smile. “Don’t want those beautiful teeth to be late!” She gives a final wave to Audrey, then tucks her hands back into her coat pockets as she turns around.
Audrey—who was too young to understand the abruptness with which my relationship with Emma ended, and who has long since forgotten how she and Charlotte used to tell everyone they were twin sisters—looks at me and rolls her eyes. I mutter, “Be nice,” as I put up the window and move ahead another car length.
I hate how flustered I still get whenever I see Emma, each time remembering what happened six years ago. When I walked into my kitchen to restock the ice bar during our annual New Year’s Eve bash, warm with celebration and a few nips of champagne, to see Emma and Ryan standing too close. Emma’s lips were on Ryan’s, but with his arms like wooden planks at his sides, his body rigid and disengaged, it was clear he wasn’t a willing participant—which he vehemently reinforced after I physically threw her out of my house.
“You’re one to talk,” Audrey says, raising her eyebrows at me, clearly referencing my thinly veiled dislike of Emma.
“Well, she’s...exhausting.” It’s the kindest comment I can offer as I settle back into my seat. Right or wrong, Ryan and I have always adopted the team approach to our family, meaning Audrey has participated in adult conversations since she was a little girl. I’ve only regretted it once, when Audrey announced proudly, and loudly, when she was four years old—during a library reading group for moms and tots—that a man puts his penis in a woman’s vagina to make a baby. Always curious, we had the day before read The Book of Life and had some graphic—particularly for her age—conversations about how babies came to be. That was our last parent and tot library visit.
“How was school?” I ask, pulling out of the pickup roundabout, trying to shake off the Emma annoyance that has settled into my shoulders.
“Good,” Audrey says, and I know that’s probably all I’ll get for now. Years ago I read an article in some parenting magazine that said to never, ever, ask your child a question that had a yes or no response. So I used to think up all sorts of clever ways to mine her for information with open-ended questions, but after a few months I realized I usually got more and better information if I let her tell me in her own way.
“I didn’t even know my phone could whistle at me. Did you know that?” I ask, a smile on my face, turning on to the main road.
Audrey grins at me, then looks out her window. “I know how busy you are, Mom. Just wanted to help.”
“Thank you, baby.” I rub her legging-covered knee. I slow for the first speed bump in a series of three, my car’s shocks groaning as we crest it.
“Hey, there’s Jack.” Audrey points a half a block ahead, to a tall, blond teenager, crouched down at the curb, tying his shoelaces. “His dad took Sam to the clinic, so I guess no ride home for him today.” Jack and Sam Beckett are identical twins and look so much alike I’ve never been able to tell them apart.
“I guess his mom is still at work?” I ask. Alysse Beckett, the boys’ mother, is a financial whiz and works at one of Boston’s most-respected private equity firms, drawing a salary that, when I sold them their current house, resulted in my best commission check ever. Their dad, Andrew, is a bit of a legend among the stay-at-home moms, having quit a journalism career when the twins were born to stay home with them.
“Sam said she’s working on something big right now and goes to work before six in the morning and stays until, like, midnight sometimes.” Audrey takes out a stick of gum, folds it into her mouth. “I never want a job where I have to work that early or stay that late,” she adds. I don’t bother bursting her bubble—she’ll figure out soon enough getting up early and working late are fairly basic parts of being an adult. I slow down for the final bump, practically coming to a full stop.
Jack stands and bounces on his tiptoes on the curb’s edge, skateboard in one hand, impatiently waiting for the car coming toward me to pass so he can cross. His shorts hang low on his hips and land just below the knee the way all the boys seem to be wearing them these days. On his head is a red baseball cap, turned backward, with large earphones—the noise-canceling kind—circling his neck.
I look to the other side of the road and see a couple of other teen boys, skateboards also in hand, clearly waiting for Jack to catch up.
“We should let him cross, Mom,” Audrey says.
I press my foot firmly on the brake, completely stopping the car. “You know, they look so much alike,” I say. “I don’t know how you tell who’s who.”
Audrey waves at Jack, and he waves back and smiles, recognizing her. “It’s the hair,” she says.
“What is?” I ask.
“How I tell them apart,” Audrey replies. I hold my hand up and wave Jack across the otherwise empty road, toward his group of friends. He smiles in acknowledgment and sets his skateboard on the pavement. “Sam’s hair is a bit longer, sort of curling around his ears. See?” Audrey holds up her phone, a picture of her and Sam lighting up the screen. Where he’s tall, she’s a pipsqueak—long-legged like me, but still short for her age; where he’s fair, she’s dark, brown-haired like her dad. In the photo they’re laughing, their faces squished together inside the picture’s frame.
“Cute photo,” I say, picking up my travel mug half full of now cold coffee. I’m about to take a sip when Audrey screams, jolting me. The next sounds I hear are a sickening thump and the squealing of brakes. The mug drops from my hands, and, as the coffee seeps into my lap, I gasp, watching Jack Beckett’s lanky, fifteen-year-old body smash into the windshield of the other car—which came out of nowhere, too fast—and cartwheel into the air like it weighs nothing at all.
4 (#u03196365-e241-516a-a543-24cc33d0df3f)
I’m pushing so hard on the brake pedal my toes start to cramp. Instinctually I withdraw my foot to stop the pain, and the car jerks ahead. It’s only a couple of inches, but Audrey screams again with the jarring movement, and the shrill sound rattles in my head, confusing me. What happened? Did I hit someone? No, no. It wasn’t me. My car was stopped. My foot, hard on the brake.
My eyes dart to my rearview mirror, and I see Jack Beckett lying still on the pavement not far behind us, mostly obscured by a woman on her knees beside him, wearing a Burberry-style trench coat. The coat triggers recognition, but still, I stay buckled in my seat. “This is my fault,” I say, the beating of my heart pounding in my ears, my voice shaking. “I shouldn’t have stopped in the middle of... I shouldn’t have... Where did that car come from?” Audrey cries softly beside me, and I focus on her, murmuring that it’s going to be okay. I quickly turn off the ignition and put the car in Park but don’t unbuckle my seat belt just yet. I think of the bird, broken on my balcony, forgotten in the crazy rush of the morning. I’m terrified to see Jack up close—unfortunately, I know what a body looks like after it has done battle with a car—but am irrationally hoping, as I did this morning with the bird, that he’s simply stunned. He’ll be up and walking it off in a few minutes.
My breath comes too fast, but the influx of oxygen is also bringing back awareness and clarity. Now I hear the shouts and panicked instructions being barked out by a male voice that rises above the others. Someone thankfully taking charge of the situation.
What finally brings me back to the present and spurs me into action is the sound of Audrey gagging. She’s twisted in her seat, straining against her still buckled belt, eyes wild as she stares through our SUV’s back window at Jack. I grab her chin and turn her face to mine, noticing how odd her color is. Gray, like the caulking putty Ryan used to seal the cracks in the garage last winter. “If you’re going to throw up, get out of the car now.” My voice is calm, directive, though it has no power to it.
Regardless, my words reach her. She says nothing but unbuckles her seat belt. Then she quickly opens her door, jumps out and promptly vomits on to the curb, about where Jack was standing only a minute ago. For a moment I’m unsure what to do: my mothering instincts command me to go to Audrey, to rub her back like I have many times before when she’s been sick, but a stronger instinct tells me to get out of the car and go—no, run—to Jack Beckett.
He’s only ten feet or so behind my SUV, on the other side of the road, splayed out like he’s mid-jumping jack. I’m the third person there, joining the trench-coated woman I now recognize as Emma, who must have just started walking home with Charlotte when the accident happened. A man is crouched beside her, talking, I think, to the 911 operator on his phone. I recognize his voice as the barking, take-charge one, but now that I’m closer I can hear how the slight, nervous shake of his body is making his words tremble, as well.
“Yes, he’s breathing. Not conscious...There’s a lot of blood...His head...Okay, okay.” He turns to Emma, who is amazingly in control of herself, despite what’s in front of us. She used to be an emergency room nurse before leaving to stay home with her two children, and I often sought her advice when Audrey had a fever or a cough that wouldn’t leave her little lungs. “We have to try and stop the bleeding.” The man then notices me standing there and hands me his phone. I put it to my ear, not yet seeing the streak of red on it that has now transferred to my hand, my ear, and he stands to take off his sweater. Now that he has moved slightly away from Jack, I can see how much blood there is, and that the knees of the man’s khakis are soaked dark crimson. I unwrap the pashmina from around my neck and hand it to the man. “To help with the bleeding,” I say, my voice quivering with the adrenaline coursing through me. I notice Jack’s ball cap is gone, but the headphones are still around his neck—backward now, so it sort of looks as though he’s wearing a plastic dog collar.
“Hello?” the operator says. “Are you still with me? Don’t hang up, okay?”
“Yes, sorry. I’m here,” I respond, trying to stop my arms from shaking while I hold the phone tight to my ear and listen to her instructions. “She says to apply pressure on the head wound, with whatever we have. But to be careful not to move his neck.” With a nod the man passes his sweater to Emma, who gently places it around Jack’s head, before folding my scarf into neat squares to firmly press against Jack’s skull. Emma takes over, her confident and nimble hands holding the scarf to Jack’s head as she talks softly to him about help being on the way and that he shouldn’t worry, they are going to take good care of him. Her coat is still tightly belted, though now there are splotches of blood mingling with the tan, black and red plaid squares. I have no idea where Charlotte is. Then I realize I have no idea where Audrey is, either.
There are now two lines of cars, one behind my SUV and another behind the white Volvo wagon that hit Jack, curious heads poking out of rolled-down windows, wondering what the holdup is about, the odd honk to get things moving. A crowd has gathered around us, including Jack’s buddies who were waiting for him to cross the road and whose faces betray the horror—a horror I know all too well, the kind you can never erase—of what they just witnessed. They all hold phones to their ears, their panicked voices mingling, so I can’t hear distinct words.
But the onlookers, including Jack’s friends, stay along the periphery of the accident scene. Outside the worst of it, some sharing prayers for this poor young man. I wish to be with them instead of standing in this inner circle, where we are removing clothing as quickly as Jack’s blood is flowing, trying to do something, anything to help. Things feel wildly out of control, a sensation I loathe. The man is now shirtless, his nipples hard with the cool fall breeze, a little pooch of white belly hanging over his belted pants. My own fingers have gone numb with the chill, and I squeeze them tighter around the phone, hoping I don’t drop it.
“Meg,” Emma says, repeating my name when I don’t immediately answer. “Can you untie my coat?” I nod and come behind her, which seems the easiest way to do what she’s asked without getting in the way, and with quaking fingers, I wrestle the knot at her waist, still keeping the phone tight to my ear with the pressure of my shoulder. Emma shrugs off her trench coat with my help—being careful to leave one hand on the clothes on Jack’s head—and tells the man to put it on. He does, without seeming to notice it’s too small. Even though Emma is tall, the black-piped cuffs rise above the man’s wrists by a few inches, and in any other setting I might have laughed at how ridiculous he looks.
A woman from the peripheral circle hands the man in Emma’s coat a thick wad of gauze, a large pressure dressing from a first aid kit in someone else’s car, she says. He hands me my blood-soaked pashmina and his shirt, and he and Emma apply the dressing against Jack’s skull. I don’t realize how hard I’m pressing my scarf and the shirt against my stomach until I try to take a deep breath and feel resistance. I look down and my dove-gray wrap dress is now marked red and brown, damp with Jack Beckett’s blood and the spilled coffee.
Then I hear someone say, “Oh, my God, his leg,” and I pull my eyes down from Jack’s head, and for the first time I look at Jack’s left leg. His shorts have shifted up, so there’s nothing obscuring the injury. But despite the clear view I can’t make sense of what I’m seeing.
Because nothing is where it should be. Most noticeable is Jack’s foot, pointing in the wrong direction—facing inward the way Audrey used to draw the shoes on her stick figures when she was in preschool. The leg also seems crooked where there isn’t a joint, a few inches above his ankle, and I feel bile rise in my throat when I realize what the thing sticking out of his shin is: a jagged piece of bone. “I think I can see his bone,” I whisper to the operator, my voice catching. “It’s...it’s coming out of his leg.” The man looks at me, pale, clearly unsure what to do, while Emma murmurs, “Compound fracture to the tibia.”
“Should we do anything with his leg?” the man asks quietly, looking from me to Emma, hands still levitating above Jack’s mangled leg.
“She said to leave the leg,” I tell the man, who nods—a look of relief passing across his face. “The ambulance is almost here.” Moments later we hear the sirens, and it’s as though the three of us take a collective deep breath. Help is almost here, and soon it won’t be up to us to hold the pieces of this poor young man together.
Someone comes up beside me, brushing against my arm. Audrey. “I called Sam,” she says, her voice quiet and close to my ear—the one without the phone. “He and his dad will be here soon.” My heart lurches at the thought of getting that phone call. Of the crushing panic of hearing a car has hit your child.
“I want to help,” she whispers. “What can I do?” Her tear-streaked face is still a concerning shade of gray, but there’s a firm set to her mouth I know well. It’s the face she gets when she’s determined to have her way, and is similar to the face Ryan made this morning when we argued. I want to tell her to go back to the car, to not look too closely at Jack, but I know there’s no point now.
I shift the mouthpiece of the phone away and whisper back to her. “Talk to him, honey. Can you do that? Just don’t touch him, okay? We need to keep him still.” With a nod she kneels on the ground beside Jack’s head, beside Emma. Watching her, I vow to put up the gel clings the moment we get home and to bury the bird under the hydrangeas.
“I can see the ambulance,” I tell the operator, who in her fluid, calming voice, tells me we’ve done a great job, the paramedics are almost here, but don’t hang up yet. Just then a police officer approaches and starts pressing the crowd back, repeating in a loud and authoritative voice, “Give us some room, folks,” to make space for the incoming ambulance.
I scan the faces nearby, looking to see if Andrew Beckett has arrived. It’s then that I see her—the woman who drove her car right into Jack—sitting on the curb beside the white Volvo wagon with a massive dent in its hood, a blood-spattered air bag hanging out its open driver’s side window, the windshield smashed in a spiderweb-like circle, like a basketball—or someone’s head—hit it.
A shiver moves through me when I realize I know this woman. It’s Sarah Dunn, Audrey’s history teacher. She’s staring straight ahead, at Jack’s skateboard—which is upside down and trapped under her front wheel—her face slack and mouth hanging open. She’s bleeding from her forehead, with two red rivers streaming out of her nose, but she seems unaware of her injuries. There are two more officers standing beside her, one peering inside the Volvo and the other talking into the walkie-talkie attached to his shoulder, but both ignoring her. I wonder how the hell she didn’t see Jack, and it’s then she glances up and our eyes meet.
Maybe it’s my own guilt rising up through the wall of shock, but it’s as though she knows I was driving the other car. That I was the one who deemed it a safe crossing for this innocent and clearly vulnerable teenager, now lying in the road with an injury that will forever change his life. Maybe even—I realize with a sickening lurch in my stomach—end it.
How did you not see me coming? I can almost hear her saying. How could you let him cross the street?
Why were you driving so fast in the school zone? I would shout back, not understanding how she wouldn’t know better and feeling defensive for my part in this accident.
But she wouldn’t answer my question, would only say one thing in this dreamlike conversation I have with her. We did this, Meg, is what she would say if she weren’t catatonic on the curb.
My eyes drop back to Jack, now surrounded by paramedics moving quickly and quietly, like they’ve rehearsed this exact scenario a hundred times. The half-naked man, shivering under the ill-fitting trench coat, takes his phone gently from my hand, and Emma wraps her arms around Charlotte, who has tears running down her face, and when I look back up, Sarah isn’t sitting on the curb anymore.
We did this.
I’m suddenly slammed with a memory from when I was sixteen; from a terrible night where another teenager lay bleeding and broken on a road in front of me. I have worked hard not to think about that night anymore, because I can’t breathe around my guilt when I do. But just like that, it’s back, and I’m left sucking in air around the heaviness of the memory, a fish out of water.
And like the part I played in that night when I was sixteen, I am the reason Jack Beckett crossed the road when he did. It’s my fault, I think, as the ambulance pulls out, sirens blaring. With a simple, careless wave of my hand, I did this.
5 (#u03196365-e241-516a-a543-24cc33d0df3f)
The police have taped off the area and asked me to stay put until they can take statements, which they’re currently doing with Emma and the man who has now replaced the bloodied trench coat with a sweatshirt that fits much better. I’m sitting in my SUV, restless and still trembling even with my coat on, trying to bring life back into my fingers while also trying to reach Ryan for the tenth time, when Audrey tells me Sam and his dad are here. Before I can respond she opens the car door and jumps out, running toward them.
A shiver runs through me when I look at Sam, so much like Jack in every way it’s disconcerting—for a moment my shock-weary mind tries to believe he is Jack, just fine and home from school as though nothing has happened. That this afternoon’s accident was merely a fever-fueled nightmare brought on by whatever virus has infiltrated my body.
I see Andrew, tall and lean-limbed like his boys, some thickness around his middle only visible because the wind today is strong, molding his shirt to his stomach. He’s standing slightly behind Sam, who is hugging Audrey so tight she looks as though she might disappear into his body, and staring at the road where Jack was lying only minutes before. His eyes are trained on the pool of blood, now littered with medical supplies the paramedics left in their hasty departure. He stumbles back slightly, a hand going to his open mouth. Audrey and Sam are lost together, not noticing Andrew’s stumble, and I step closer to him, concerned.
“Andrew,” I say, putting my hand on his arm. We’ve been friendly with one another since I sold them their house, more so now that our kids are dating, and have had our fair share of backyard barbecue conversations over the last few years. But even still, Ryan and I don’t count the Becketts as close friends. I suddenly wish there was someone else here, someone he knows better than me—the last thing you want is to get this kind of news from the person who knows how you like your hamburger cooked and what your home-buying budget is, but not much beyond that.
He looks at my hand on his arm, my SUV that I just got out of, and finally at my face. “Did you hit him?” he asks, the words tumbling from his lips desperate, quiet, laced with anguish.
“No,” I say, shaking my head a bit wildly. Then, with more conviction I add, “No. It wasn’t me. We were on the other side of the road.” I say nothing about waving Jack across the street. “They just took him, in the ambulance. To Children’s.” I’m about to offer to drive him to the hospital and then remember I can’t leave the scene. “The police have asked me to stay. Can you drive yourself to the hospital? Andrew?” Watching him, I know that’s not a good idea. “Or maybe the police can take you?”
He’s no longer looking at me, or the road. I follow his gaze and see Sarah in the back of a police cruiser parked a few feet away, her head down and long, dark curls framing her face. “Is that who hit my son?” he asks, so quietly I lean closer to hear him better. But he doesn’t say anything else, so I simply nod. “Yes,” I reply. “It’s Sarah Dunn.”
“Sarah Dunn,” he repeats, his voice monotone, his eyes unblinking as he stares at Sarah inside the car. “Jack’s history teacher.” He makes a strange sound in the back of his throat, and with some alarm I notice how unwell he looks. “How? Why?”
“I don’t know exactly what happened, Andrew. I don’t know how she didn’t—” I’m about to say, “see him,” but I hold my words, because I can tell he can’t take any more in right now. He’s operating on autopilot, and precariously close to losing it. “I don’t know exactly what happened,” I repeat. “Her car wasn’t there one moment and then the next...”
I glance toward the cruiser and Sarah, where his gaze continues to rest. “I still have to talk with the police,” I say, trying to fill the silence.
His face has lost what little color it had when he arrived, and he’s shaking head to toe. “Andrew?” Even though he’s much taller, wider than me, I put an arm around him as best I can. “Do you want to sit down?” I wonder if he’s going to collapse and how I’ll keep him from crashing to the ground if he does. I move my feet slightly farther apart, as far as my dress allows, so I have better balance. But he doesn’t fall. Instead he turns to me, his back to the scene, and says, “I have to go.” His eyes are unfocused, and it’s clear he should not be getting behind the wheel. Just then Emma hurries up to us, holding Charlotte’s hand tightly as they cross the road, the way she used to when Charlotte was much younger. Though another day I might scoff at her overprotectiveness, I don’t blame her for it after what just happened.
“Andrew. I’m going to drive you and Sam to the hospital. Give me your keys.” Emma’s tone is no-nonsense and urgent, and Andrew hands her his key chain without a word. Then she says, “Sam, take your dad back to the car. We’re right behind you.” She turns to me. “The police are ready to talk with you now, Meg,” she says, before she and Charlotte break into a run, heading to Andrew’s car.
“Mom, I want to go with Sam,” Audrey cries, tugging on my arm, her eyes on Andrew’s car a half block away. “Mom, they’re leaving. Please!” I see Emma get in the driver’s side of Andrew’s car, and the car takes off quickly toward the hospital.
I shake my head. “You’re staying with me.”
She makes a sound that’s partway between a sob and an angry, frustrated groan, and I go to rub her back, but she pulls away so my hand only finds air. “After I talk with the police we’ll drive to the hospital. Promise. Okay?”
Her lips are pressed tightly together, eyes red-rimmed, and for a moment I think she might scream at me. But then she launches herself into my arms, and I hold her petite, shaking body and whisper that everything will be all right, praying it’s the truth.
* * *
The police take my statement—no, I didn’t notice anything strange about Ms. Dunn’s car or her driving or that she was on her phone. I didn’t even see her car until it was too late. Yes, I did wave Jack Beckett across the street in a nonpedestrian crossing zone. Yes, I thought it was safe for him to cross, because I didn’t see the other car coming, like I already told you—and then they let me go. I’m grateful the drive to the hospital is a short one because I’m so bone-weary I probably shouldn’t be driving.
We park in the visitors’ lot and make our way into the hospital. There’s an email from Emma, which this time I don’t delete—Jack is being evaluated, and she and Charlotte are with Sam and Andrew in the emergency waiting room.
It’s surprisingly busy for late afternoon on a Monday, the waiting room littered with worried parents and kids holding kidney-shaped pans under their chins, ice packs pressed to foreheads, and arms held stiffly in makeshift slings. I see Emma on the other side of the room, and we hurry over. Sam and Charlotte are sitting side by side, a few seats down from Emma, both staring at their phone screens. I don’t see Andrew.
“Sam,” Audrey says, and at the sound of her voice he looks up. Charlotte moves over one seat so Audrey can sit beside Sam, who leans heavily against her. She takes the weight of him and grabs his hand, and I smile gently when she catches my eye. I sit down beside Emma. “What’s happening?”
“I don’t know,” she replies. “Andrew is with Jack, and Alysse is trying to get on a plane. She’s in New York City and isn’t supposed to be home until late tomorrow night.” Emma shakes her head. “I can’t even imagine, being a plane ride away when this is happening to your child.” I swallow hard, feeling my head spin a little.
“Are you all right?” Emma asks, before shaking her head and letting her breath out slowly. “Of course not. How could any of us be okay?”
For a moment I wish things between us were the way it used to be. Back when Emma knew the day-to-day nuances of my life better than even Ryan did, and would have known exactly what to say to make things better. I’m trying to think of how to respond when I catch a glimpse of Andrew standing just inside the glass emergency room doors. He looks awful, and he’s crying. A doctor wearing green scrubs is with him; their heads bent together, Andrew nods, a fist clutched to his mouth as the doctor talks.
Emma glances at her watch. “Meg, I need to get home. Can you stay for a bit? Andrew’s parents are on their way, but they’ve got an hour’s drive or so before they can get here.”
“Of course,” I say, my voice cracking. I clear my throat. “Thank you, Emma.” I’m not sure exactly what I’m thanking her for, but it’s the first thing that comes to mind. It’s so strange to be sitting next to her, talking with her like this after all these years of silence. I wonder if she’s feeling as discombobulated as I am.
She nods and gives me a small smile. “Will you keep me updated?”
“I will,” I say, thinking perhaps this will be the moment when I forgive Emma Steen for kissing my husband, because it suddenly feels like such a small thing in the face of this tragedy we’ve shared.
A few minutes after Emma and Charlotte leave, Andrew walks into the waiting room. He looks surprised to see me, and I quickly stand to meet him. “Emma had to go home,” I say. “But I’m happy to stay with Sam for as long as you need me to. Or he can come home with us. Whatever’s best for you.”
“They’re taking Jack into surgery,” Andrew says, and I let out a weak, “oh.” He goes to say something else, but then leans toward me and puts his forehead on my shoulder in much the same way Sam did with Audrey at the accident scene. His arms stay at his sides and we stand there for a moment in the packed waiting room, awkwardly close yet with only his forehead and my shoulder making contact, his cries muffled by my jacket.
Then I swiftly step closer and wrap my arms around him, and he does the same to me, holding tight in a way that feels too intimate yet exactly right for the moment. I feel tears prick my eyes but will myself not to cry. I take a deep breath, smell a hint of something woodsy, like aftershave or cologne, and squeeze him tighter when I exhale. His chest heaves against mine, and his heart beats furiously. A moment later he pulls away so quickly, I’m left with arms still in a semicircle, suspended in the air. I quickly drop them, feeling uncomfortable.
“Thank you,” Andrew says, scrubbing a hand across his chin and wiping at his eyes. He sounds better, stronger, though he looks anything but, and we sit back down.
“It’s the least I can do.”
He tilts his head slightly to the side, confusion on his face, and I feel self-conscious. Then he turns to Sam, who is sitting with Audrey on another bank of waiting room chairs. “How are you doing, buddy? Feeling okay?”
