Pumped (Mars Fitness #3)

Chapter 5

CHAPTER

FIVE

EVEREST

Owen is wrong. He has to be wrong. There’s no way Eden and Jeremy are dead. Shit like that doesn’t really happen. That’s like, movie-type stuff. That’s not real life. There has to be another explanation.

My brain runs wild with crazy possibilities. Maybe they got kidnapped and are being held for ransom. Maybe they got abducted by fucking aliens. I’ll take any of those over the bullshit Owen was spouting.

I’m still slumped against the wall when he stalks out of the kitchen and goes upstairs. A few moments later, the water starts running in the bathroom. He’s gotten Ivy up.

Oh god. Ivy. I have to stop him. He can’t tell her right now. Not until we’ve figured out what actually went down and where her parents are.

I sprint up the stairs, two at a time. They’re in her bedroom and Owen is helping her get dressed. I meet his gaze over her head and the look in his eyes stops me in my tracks.

They’re hard as steel. The dark circles under them making them look even more menacing. There’s a defeated sense of resignation, a reluctant determination. He won’t be moved. There’s no changing his mind.

It’s not the first time I’ve seen that look in Owen’s eyes. It usually gives me a little thrill, like it’s a personal challenge directed only at me. Can I get under his skin? Can I provoke him into an outburst? It’s a game I’ve made for myself, one that I’m damned good at.

Not today, though. Today, I’m frozen to the spot, helpless as I watch Owen destroy a little girl’s life.

“Ivy,” Owen says, voice soft and somber as he lowers himself to her level.

Despite her young age, Ivy seems to sense that something’s wrong. She sits on her bed hugging Zuzi the unicorn to her chest. Her chubby little face is way too serious and her large blue eyes blink innocently at Owen.

No. He can’t do this to her. He can’t shatter her world like this. She’s too young, too small. She won’t understand.

A strangled sound escapes my throat and I cling to the doorframe.

Owen’s shoulders stiffen, but otherwise, he pretends he doesn’t hear me. He’s on his knees in front of her. Arms bracketing her on both sides.

“It’s about your mommy and daddy,” he starts.

I don’t hear the rest. The sound of my heartbeat in my ears drowns it all out. My vision blurs and all I can see are blobs of pink and rainbow. It hurts to breathe.

Then a high-pitched wail breaks through my trance and I’m thrust back into reality.

Ivy is thrashing around while Owen’s trying to hold her, screaming at the top of her lungs about wanting her mommy and daddy. Owen’s shouting on top of her, as if that will make her calm down.

I push off the wall. “Ives! Ives!”

She squirms her way out of Owen’s arms and launches herself at me. Her arms and legs snake around me like a boa constrictor and I hold her just as tightly.

“I want mommy and daddy!” she cries.

“I know, sweetie, I do too.” I rub circles across her back as her tears trail down my neck and soak into the collar of my shirt.

“Where are they? Why aren’t they here?” She kicks her heels and they land painfully on my lower back.

“I don’t know where they are, sweetie. But we’re going to find them, ’kay?”

Owen glares at me, lips pressed into a flat line and hands curled into fists at his sides. I glare back. What does he expect me to say? That we’re never going to find them because they’re in heaven now? No, thank you. I’m not going to be the bad guy here. He can play that role.

“We should go,” Owen bites out. He scans the room before grabbing Ivy’s pink and rainbow backpack and fills it with a few toys and some books. He snatches Zuzi from the floor where Ivy dropped it and squeezes past me and out of the room.

I carry Ivy downstairs. Owen’s banging around in the kitchen, pulling snacks from the pantry and fruit from the fridge. He stuffs it all into Ivy’s backpack and fills her little pink water bottle.

In one swift motion, as if he’s going into battle, he swings her backpack onto his shoulder as he marches out to the foyer. I hold Ivy in my arms as he struggles to put her shoes on, then he shoves her coat at me with a look that says “you deal with this.”

“I’m calling a car.” Then he opens the front door and flees out into the early morning air.

Carefully, I bend down and set Ivy on her feet. Her face is wet and blotchy. Her bottom lip is still trembling. My heart breaks to see her like this. I mean, I’ve seen her cry before, obviously. But this is different. This is fear and confusion and a touch too much understanding that makes it all so much worse.

I wipe her chubby soft cheeks with my thumbs, then hold out her coat. “Come on, Ivy-bear. Let’s see if we can find your mommy and daddy.”

Her movements are sluggish as she threads her arms through the sleeves, and the moment the jacket is on, she scrambles to be picked up again. I carry her outside. Owen locks the front door. We climb into the backseat of the rideshare that pulls up.

The drive to the hospital is silent save for the radio playing quietly in the background. When the car pulls up in front of the hospital, I awkwardly climb out with Ivy still attached to my front.

“My mom and dad should be here by now. Your parents are on their way down. I tried calling you last night, by the way. You didn’t pick up,” Owen rattles off as he speed walks through the hospital hallways.

I rush to keep up, trying to pull my phone out of my back pocket without dropping Ivy. The screen is black and no amount of tapping will get it to light up. “It’s out of battery,” I shoot back. “Do you even know where we’re going?”

The elevator doors open and he steps in first, punching the button for the eighth floor. “More than you do,” he mutters.

When the elevator spits us out, Owen leads the way down the hall, slowing as he approaches an open door. He stops in front of it, but he doesn’t go in.

When I look inside, I can’t really tell what I’m looking at. It takes my brain a second to piece together the scene. But when I finally do, I squeeze Ivy so hard she whimpers.

“Sorry, sorry, sweetie.” I’m in a daze as my feet carry me inside.

Eden—my beautiful big sister—is lying on the bed, hooked up to all these machines. They beep and whir and there’s a screen showing the steady beating of her heart.

“Mommy?” Ivy lets go of me and reaches for her, straining so far away from me that I almost drop her.

“Careful, Ivy-bear,” I say, shifting her weight in my arms and stepping closer to the bed.

“Mommy? Wake up. Mommy, it’s me. Wake up!” Ivy squirms, desperate to be let down.

“It’s okay, you can put her on the bed.” The gentle voice comes from Alyssa, Owen and Jeremy’s mom.

I hadn’t even noticed her and her husband, Martin, sitting next to the bed.

She puts a hand on my arm, her expression full of grief and sadness.

“Mommy!” Ivy squirms again and I let her crawl onto the bed next to Eden. She shakes Eden’s shoulder. “Mommy! Why won’t you wake up?”

“Ivy, my dear,” Alyssa steps in and I stumble backward, struggling to breathe.

“Grammy, why won’t Mommy wake up?”

“I’m afraid she’s not going to, sweetie.”

A strong hand claps my shoulder and gives it a squeeze. When I glance at Martin, it looks like his hand on my shoulder is as much to hold himself up as it is to give me reassurance.

“Wha—what happened?” I ask, sounding strangled.

Martin’s throat works and he shakes his head. Owen answers the question instead.

“Multi-car accident. Jeremy had massive internal bleeding and died en route. Eden made it into surgery, but then her heart stopped. There’s no brain activity.”

I understand all the words Owen says, but I don’t know what they mean all strung together. “But they got her heart going again, right? I can see it on the monitor. It’s beating.”

“There’s no brain activity,” Owen repeats like it’s obvious what he’s trying to say.

“I don’t fucking know what that means,” I stage whisper to him through gritted teeth.

“It means her brain was deprived of oxygen for too long,” Martin explains. “I’m sorry, Everest.”

“No, but—” I stab my fingers through my hair. “It has oxygen now, doesn’t it? She can still wake up, can’t she?”

Owen’s arms are folded over his chest, glower firmly in place.

Martin’s hand drops from my shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

A loud gasp comes from the door. “Oh my god.” Then my mom rushes to the bed, followed closely by my dad.

“No, no, Eden, honey. Oh god, no.” Tears stream down Mom’s face and Dad embraces her from behind.

“Nana!” Ivy says from where’s she still sitting on the opposite side of the bed. “Make her wake up, Nana.”

“Oh, Ivy.” Mom reaches across and brushes her hand over Ivy’s shiny blond hair. “Oh, Ivy.”

I can’t. I can’t be here. I can’t watch this scene unfolding in front of me. The air is too thick for me to breathe. The walls are closing in. I scramble to get out, to get air, to get as far away from this nightmare as I can.

I find a stairwell at the end of the hallway and rush down the steps before bursting out onto the loading dock at the back of the hospital. I stumble a few steps before bending over and bracing my hands on my knees.

It smells like rotting corpses and dog piss back here. But I’d rather breathe this air than suffocate in that room.

I don’t understand. None of it makes sense. They’re young. Happy. They have a little girl. How can they be dead? They still have so much life to live. They have to watch Ivy grow up. Maybe have a second kid. They have plans to grow old together and cruise around the world when they retire. They have people who depend on them, people who need them.

They can’t be gone.

They can’t be.

They can’t.