Chapter 15 The Tree
THE TREE
The EMTs tell them to stay back as they wheel Baker’s stretcher out to the ambulance.
But Hannah follows them anyway, and so does Clay, and so do Joanie and Wally and Luke.
They file past grumbling police officers, nosy neighbors clad in bathrobes and frayed LSU shirts, and dozens of St. Mary’s kids getting Breathalyzer tests.
The sirens throw flickering blue and red lights across all the faces, and Hannah has the bizarre feeling that none of this is real, that she has somehow landed in an alternate world where she can’t feel her own body.
One of the EMTs, a middle-aged guy with a ponytail and earring, turns back toward the group of them. “You can’t ride with us. Stay with the police until your parents pick you up.”
“No!” Hannah says. “No, I have to go with you!”
“Protocol,” he says dismissively.
“No—no—please.” She squares off in front of him, blocking his path. “Her parents aren’t here to go with her. I’m her best friend. I’m her—I’m—”
The EMT gives her a hard look, then glances beyond her to Baker on the stretcher. Something flickers in his expression. “I’d better not see you get in, or my neck’s on the line.”
“No, sir. Thank you.”
Joanie approaches her as soon as the EMT walks away. “We’ll meet you there as soon as we can,” she says, her face blotchy and tear-streaked. “I already called Mom and Dad.”
“Bring the boys,” Hannah says, glancing beyond Joanie to where Wally, Clay, and Luke linger uncertainly. Clay meets her eyes but quickly looks away, sniffling.
Baker has passed out by the time Hannah climbs into the ambulance.
In the harsh, glaring lights, Hannah can truly see the damage for the first time.
Baker has an oxygen mask secured around her head, but the rest of her face is smeared with dirt, blood, and bruises.
Her hair is tangled up in the mask straps; her shoulder is bleeding; and her limbs are covered with cuts and abrasions.
But she’s breathing. Her chest moves slowly up and down as surely as it did in their bedroom in Destin. Hannah takes her hand and focuses on that small, magnificent miracle.
The ponytailed EMT slams the ambulance doors shut without looking.
A moment later, the vehicle lurches with movement, reminding Hannah that her heart still works.
The siren on the roof wails its desperate song, and Hannah’s mind takes up the familiar refrain of Please, please, please while she squeezes every prayer imaginable into Baker’s hand.
The hospital waiting room is so devoid of sound that Hannah feels like she might be underwater.
The only other person in the vicinity is a middle-aged nurse posted at the front desk with her eyes closed and her hand around a coffee mug.
As Hannah paces around the lobby, the front desk nurse opens one bleary eye to watch her.
“It’s gonna be okay, sweetheart,” the nurse says.
“I don’t know if it will be.” When she hears how her voice sounds, she stops walking and stares at the nurse. “That’s not what I usually sound like,” she says stupidly.
The nurse’s cheeks lift with a tired laugh. “I don’t think anyone sounds the same when they’re waiting in here. That girl, is she your friend?”
The tears prick at her eyes. “Yes, ma’am,” she answers, her throat aching.
The nurse gives her a sympathetic smile.
Hannah paces and paces and paces, her mind hopscotching through hundreds of images, her muscles trying to jump out of her skin. When she looks down at her arms, she can almost see the blood rushing through her veins, sweeping through everything like a great flood.
She startles when the automatic doors open and Mrs. Shackleford hurries into the room, dressed in loose jeans and an overlarge sweater, her eyes glassy and her face wan.
“Are you all right?” Mrs. Shackleford asks, hurrying over to her. “Hannah, you’re bleeding!”
Hannah opens her mouth to answer, but the lobby doors open again and Mrs. Hadley comes bolting inside.
“Ginny!” Mrs. Shackleford calls, but Mrs. Hadley ignores her and rushes toward the nurse’s desk.
“My daughter is here,” she says in a tight, panicked voice. Her hands are shaking and her normally perfect hair is mussed. “Baker Hadley. Please tell me where she is.”
“Let me go speak to the doctor, ma’am,” the nurse says.
“I’m coming with you.”
“Ma’am, I’m afraid you’ll have to—”
But Mrs. Hadley rushes past her and slips through the doors to the emergency room. The nurse heaves an irritated sigh and follows at a much slower pace.
Then Baker’s dad comes sprinting into the lobby, car keys shaking in his hands, his thinning hair windswept. “Where?” he asks abruptly, and Mrs. Shackleford simply points toward the ward Mrs. Hadley just rushed into, and he goes running through the same doors.
Then Hannah’s parents and Joanie arrive, and Hannah’s mom pulls her into a hug and holds her tight.
“You smell like beer,” she says, her tone more a worried question than an accusation, and Hannah can’t help the way her voice breaks when she whispers that someone threw one on her.
Her mom’s expression is shattered when she pulls away, and Hannah doesn’t want to see that, doesn’t want to remember the shame she felt when it happened, so she turns away and hugs her dad instead.
Her mom says nothing else, just accepts the chair that Mrs. Shackleford pulls over for her and sits down with her hand resting over Hannah’s arm.
Luke and Mr. Broussard are next, and Wally and Ms. Sumner after that.
Mrs. Shackleford gasps at Luke’s and Wally’s bruised faces, at Wally’s broken glasses, at the blood on their button-down shirts.
“I can’t understand how this happened,” Mrs. Shackleford says, her normally strong persona withering away before them, and all the parents simply shake their heads, at a loss for what to say.
And then Father Simon sweeps through the waiting room doors, his bald head glistening with sweat.
He touches their shoulders paternally and asks to know what happened, but no one answers him.
Finally, Mrs. Shackleford rubs the bridge of her nose and starts to recount everything the police told her over the phone.
Father Simon’s eyes widen in shock, and he looks at them and mutters their names—“Luke”—“Joanie”—“Wally”—“Hannah”—like he doesn’t want to believe they could have fallen so far.
“And I thought we’d already hit the heart of our struggle,” he says, knocking his folded hands against his forehead.
“But I don’t understand how this whole thing started,” Ms. Sumner says desperately. “What were you all fighting about?”
Hannah’s heart pounds so fast that she can’t breathe. She keeps her head bowed, waiting for someone to explain, waiting for it all to come back to her. But no one speaks. The silence between them all is heavier than Hannah has ever known. Until—
“One of our students has been struggling with same-sex attraction,” Father Simon says, and Hannah’s stomach splits open. She feels her mom’s hand tighten on her arm and Joanie’s posture stiffen next to her.
“And I’m assuming, from everything I’ve heard just now, that there was a clash over this issue,” Father Simon continues, his voice despondent, “and our student body resorted to violence rather than compassion.”
“But what about Baker?” Ms. Sumner says. “What does she have to do with this?” Her voice drops all of a sudden, and she looks back to Father Simon with a wide-eyed expression. “Was she the student? The one that—?”
“No,” Hannah says firmly. She raises her eyes to meet Wally’s mom’s. “I am, Ms. Sumner.”
“Oh—Hannah—”
“And there’s nothing wrong with that,” Hannah’s mom says loudly. “And as far as I’m concerned, all of the kids who were bullying Hannah should be expelled!”
“We’re going to take care of it, Anne, I promise you,” Mrs. Shackleford says. “But my first priority is to make sure everyone is safe and sound.”
“We’ve seen a lot of brokenness over the last month,” Father Simon says gravely. “Our whole community needs to work through it together, and I think the sacrament of Reconciliation could be a good place to start. Would any of you like to come to confession now, while we’re waiting?”
No one answers him.
“Hannah?” he prompts. “Maybe we could start with you?”
She stares him down. “No.”
Father Simon licks his lips. “Hannah, this brokenness is going to continue until you make your peace with—”
“I’m not going to confession,” she growls. “I’m not going anywhere until Baker walks through those doors.”
“That’s not what matters most, Hannah. It’s not your physical bodies we should be worried about, it’s your souls. I can feel the hurt and damage around you, with your soul crying out for tenderness and love and—”
“You know nothing about my soul!” Hannah screams.
“I know you are lost!” Father Simon roars, his whole face turning purple, his neck straining against his clerical collar. “You are lost and you need the saving grace of—”
“Stand down!” a new voice yells.
Hannah’s heart reels when she realizes her father has jumped out of his seat. He towers above Father Simon, blocking him from Hannah’s sight.
“I beg your pardon?” Father Simon sputters indignantly.
“Stand down, man!” Hannah’s dad roars again, clenching his fists at his sides. “Don’t you ever speak to my child like that again, or I swear to God, I’ll make you regret it, I don’t care what your vocation is—”
“Do you realize who you’re threatening right now? I am a father of the church—”
“And I’m Hannah’s father, and I’m telling you to walk away, right now, before you hurt these kids any more than you already have.”
There is a long beat of silence, broken only by heavy breathing from both men. Then there is the sound of Father Simon sucking air over his teeth.
“Fine,” he spits.