Chapter 7 - Asher
By the time I made it to the job site, the anxiety over climbing the ladder was getting to me.
I paced until Micah arrived a few minutes later, trying to distract myself.
I didn’t want to tell him how I felt about heights—it felt far too embarrassing—but my chest and shoulders were tense.
It was just going to be the two of us, so I didn’t have an out.
I couldn’t very well ask Micah to climb the ladder and do my job for me, and I was out of options.
We fell quiet for a moment. I had no idea what else to say. We’d been at the job site for at least a few minutes and I still hadn’t gotten on the ladder yet.
“Well, I guess you probably want to get up there and get to measuring, huh?”
“Yeah,” I muttered, my voice strained.
I grabbed an extension ladder from inside the building and carried it outside.
As carefully as possible, I leaned it against the roof and made sure the feet were on level ground.
Once it was in place, I stood at the bottom and looked up, feeling a little like I was staring up at Mount Everest. People die on Everest, my brain said, unbidden. My heart pounded harder.
Micah approached me. “You want me to spot you?”
“Sure, that would be great.” Tape measure clipped to my belt loop, I swallowed hard and put my foot on the first rung of the ladder.
My palms were sweating and my body trembled in fear.
Slowly, I ascended, surprised at how easy it felt.
This isn’t so bad, I told myself. You can do this.
As I took a few more steps, my confidence grew.
It wasn’t nearly as terrible as I’d remembered it or as I’d feared it to be.
I took a few more steps. When I was nearly at the top, I craned my neck to look down at Micah and grin.
“Almost there,” I called.
And then I lost my footing and tumbled nearly ten feet to the ground, landing hard on my left side.
The wind was knocked out of me and my vision went black. Those were the first things that I noticed. I struggled to draw in a breath. With my eyes closed, I heard Micah call out.
“Oh my God. Are you okay? Asher? Can you hear me?”
My head was swimming and I couldn’t figure out how to respond. With no air in my lungs and my head and my entire left side burning in pain, all I could do was try to breathe.
“Oh, God,” Micah said. “I’m calling an ambulance.”
My mind kept spinning. Was I okay? I couldn’t tell. My head ached, my left side in an impossible amount of pain. I just tried to breathe.
Once I was able to catch my breath, I inhaled and exhaled, my breathing ragged. Something felt very wrong, and I tried to roll to my back, groaning, but fire shot up my arm and through my side, radiating down to my toes.
“Fuck,” I hissed, tears springing to my eyes. Or maybe I just thought it. I couldn’t be sure.
“We’re at the site of the old post office. I don’t know the address. No, I can’t tell. Yes, he’s breathing.” Micah continued to answer the emergency operator’s questions, but I wasn’t able to parse out what he was saying. My mind was too addled with pain.
I wasn’t sure how long I was on the ground, Micah near me, speaking soothingly, but soon, an EMT was hovering over me with a tiny flashlight, shining it in my eyes. My vision swam, but one thing I could make out was the flashing red and white lights bouncing off the exterior of the post office.
“Sir? Sir, can you hear me?”
“His name’s Asher,” Micah said.
“Asher, try not to move. First, we’re going to put a brace around your neck. Then we’re going to roll you onto a backboard and load you onto a stretcher so we can get you to the hospital. Try to keep your eyes open.”
My eyes fluttered open and I caught sight of Micah’s worried face before they closed again.
The next thing I knew, I was in an ambulance that was screaming toward the hospital, an IV in my right arm.
Distantly, I heard the EMTs discussing what was wrong with me.
They said things like “likely dislocated” and “concussion” and some other things my brain refused to understand.
I heard them call out the names of medications.
The EMT sitting beside me spoke soothingly, repeating that I’d be okay, that we were almost there, that I just needed to hold on a little longer, and to try and keep my eyes open and stay awake.
That last part was futile. I couldn’t have kept my eyes open if my life had depended on it.
A few minutes later, we pulled into what I assumed was the ambulance bay at the Port Grandlin hospital.
The bright lights hurt my eyes, so I closed them tighter as they lowered the stretcher to the ground and wheeled me into an emergency room.
The sharp scent of antiseptic burned my nostrils as I struggled to breathe and I tasted blood on my tongue.
My stomach churned and I wondered vaguely if I was going to throw up.
Someone pried my eyelids open and I tried to turn my head away, but things hurt too much. I was in and out of consciousness, and their words washed over me like waves.
“Pupils are dilated and reactive.”
“We need to get a CT scan and some X-rays.”
My stomach churned with anxiety. Maybe it was the meds they were pumping me with. Either way, nausea roiled through me. After a few more minutes of work in the ER, I was wheeled down the hall and up to imaging. For some reason, with my eyes closed tight, Micah’s face popped up in my mind.
And then I was out again.