14. Chapter Fourteen - Tanner
Tanner
Zoey's in the hospital.
Adam's words as I answered my phone when it started buzzing in the middle of the night through my ‘do not disturb’ echo in my head, each repetition increasing the panic that has settled in my gut.
I barely remember how I got onto the plane.
All I know is that I rushed out of Summer's room, running down the stairs to mine only to grab my passport and meet my brothers, who were already waiting in the lobby.
“And there's nothing else she said?” Reed had pestered Adam throughout our car ride to the airport, but he shook his head, his whole face set, jaw twitching as he fought to remain calm.
"Here." He threw his phone at Reed, who immediately pulled up Zoey's chat.
"Hospital, going in surgery now, love you," he reads out loud, lowering his hand holding the phone with a dejected look on his face.
“Nothing else? At all?”
“No. I tried calling for about twenty times, but nobody answered. I have my people on it, trying to find out which hospital she’s at, but right now it’s a waiting game.”
And then followed the silence.
We'd made our way through security on autopilot and gotten onto the plane without a word, all of us prisoners to our own thoughts. What happened? What is she going into surgery for?
It's hitting Adam and Jackson the hardest. They're sitting opposite each other at the table, a whole conversation happening between them without any words spoken.
And I can almost feel how all of this is bringing their past trauma right to the surface. Of course it would.
There is not a single doubt in my mind that their thoughts are going straight to the call they got when our parents were in that accident. I can see the memories replaying in their head, the way they are fighting to not let their desperation show.
"What if she's dead by the time we land?" Reed asks me in a whisper, and I quickly shush him, my eyes darting to my older brothers, sitting a only a few metres away, like statues.
Thank fuck they didn't hear.
"She's not dead," I whisper back, barely audible, but Reed is wringing his hands, anxiously playing with his fingers.
"You don't know that."
"I'm pretty sure we would," I assure him, putting my hand on his shoulder to give him a reassuring squeeze.
I don't remember much of the day our parents died, but what I do remember is the feeling of overwhelming dread settling in my gut. The feeling of impending doom, the deep, undeniable knowledge that something terrible has happened, even before we got the call.
"She'll be all right," I whisper, more in an attempt to convince myself than him. "She'll be okay."
But will she? I try to catch more sleep, but I can’t. I try to distract myself, but even the thought of watching a movie while Zoey could be dying for all we know, has me nauseous. All I can manage to do is stare out the window, trying to let cloud formations distract me from all the different scenarios we may find once we land.
Maybe she’s been run over by a bus. The only silver lining is that she messaged Adam herself. I guess that means she was conscious and of sound mind before she went into surgery. Otherwise the hospital would have called… right?
The silence grows heavier as soon as the wheels of our plane touch the ground. Wordlessly we follow Adam through the gate as he barks orders and questions into his phone, almost jogging to keep up with him, then jump into a waiting car.
"Let's go," he tells his driver. "As fast as you safely can. Any fine you get, it's on me."
He gives Adam a solid nod, and we're barely buckled in when he takes off like he’s helping James Bond flee from his enemies.
Thank fuck none of us is driving. Jackson's hands are trembling, Reed's empty eyes are glued to the window, watching the city pass by, and I'm trying to keep myself together with my arms crossed in front of my chest.
What could have happened to her?
All of us are trailing after our own thoughts, our own personal speculations of what happened, one theory worse than the next, hoping our greatest fears didn’t come true.
What if she got drugged as well? What if it was something worse? What if she got into a car accident?
My hold on myself tightens as I take a deep breath and force my thoughts into another direction. All will be well. Everything will be okay. It has to be.
"Where's our sister?" Adam's booming, panicked voice reverberates on the bare hospital walls.
It's early. So early, in fact, that there are barely any people around as we sprint to the reception.
"Knowing the name of your sister might help," the nurse quips, lifting her red-tinted eyebrows almost up to her curly hairline.
"Zoey," Adam presses out. "Zoey Walker."
"Right," she murmurs, scanning the three of us staring at her, then types something into her computer so goddamn slowly it feels like she's doing it in slow motion in order to piss us off.
"Ah. Looks like we’ve been expecting you," she says, not looking too impressed by that face and nods to our left where we can see three elevators. “She’s in the VIP suite. Room 306. She's…”
But before she can finish her sentence, we have already taken off. God, we must look ridiculous. Four guys sprinting through the lobby like our life depends on it, then having to wait for the elevator as they descend down.
"Fuck it,” Reed whispers, turning around himself to scan the area. "Where are the stairs?"
Just in that moment, the elevator doors finally open and we rush inside, none of us able to remain still as it gets us to the correct floor.
Adam’s strides are so fast, we almost have to jog again to keep up with him, until he comes to a sudden stop in front of room 306, staring at the room number.
I can see the demons he’s fighting. All of us can.
“Let’s go,” Jackson says softly and puts his hand on Adam’s shoulder, opening the door with the other one and gently pushing Adam inside.
His shoulders tense and his breaths turn ragged and I’m afraid he’s going to hyperventilate, when suddenly time stops as we come to a stop and all four of us stare at our sister.
"What are you doing here?" Zoey looks at us confused, a spoon of cereal halfway to her mouth, wide eyes jumping between all four of us.
"What the…" Adam takes a deep breath, all the tension of the past fourteen hours draining from him at once. I quickly grab a chair, and he gives me a thankful nod as he sinks down on it, legs shaking and his hands trembling.
"What the fuck, Zoey?" Reed curses and pinches the bridge of his nose, hand patting the air until he finds a wall to hang on to.
"It's your arm ?" I ask, relief and confusion tainting my voice. The arm she’s not holding the spoon with is in a cast, from her wrist to the middle of her upper arm.
"Yes?" she answers, bemused, and lifts her left arm, putting the spoon back into her cereal bowl. "That's a cast. Good catch, Sherlock."
Jackson and I shoot each other a look. I’m not sure if I should let relief wash over me or get really fucking angry that she had us worrying for almost a day. All the worst case scenarios that we imagined, all the fear every single one of us felt and it’s just a broken bone?
"All that panic for a broken arm?" Reed speaks out loud what we’re all thinking, before he bursts into a maniacal laughter.
"What's going on here? How is that news? I messaged you."
All of us turn to Adam, whose expression slowly turns from apathetic to furious.
"You did not," he says very matter-of-factly, before taking a breath to calm himself down and takes out his phone.
"Nope, you didn't," Reed agrees. "I saw the message."
"Here." Adam pulls up his chat with Zoey and hands her the phone, and as soon as her eyes land on it, she pales, and her eyes grow wide.
"No, no, no." She scrambles for her own phone, quickly unlocking it, more color draining from her face when she pulls up her chat with Adam. Her eyes fill with tears as she lifts her head again.
"I didn't press send," she whispers, her panicked eyes jumping to us. "Oh my god, guys, I'm so sorry. I could swear I sent it."
Finally, the tension falls from all four of us at once. I lean my back against the wall, slowly sliding down until I sit on the ground, a relieved chuckle escaping me.
"Holy shit." My eyes are stinging with unshed tears, and I clutch my shirt right above my thundering heart as all the panic I felt for the past day seeps out of me. "Fuck."
“And you couldn’t have sent us a follow up message?” Adam asks, his voice eerily calm.
“I was about to. But the doctors said the surgery was super complex so it took six hours. When I woke up from the anesthesia, I was so groggy I slept through the night until about half an hour before you four stormed through my door. I was going to get to it now.”
“Of course you were,” Reed mutters, earning him an eye roll from Zoey.
"Guys, let’s be thankful it’s only a broken bone,” I chime in, catching me a glare from Adam. “I know emotions are high, but calm down, will you?”
“So what even happened?" Jackson asks, looking like his knees are about to buckle. He steps closer to Zoey and takes a seat at the side of her bed.
"I went skiing with some friends of mine and I fell." She shrugs. “Tried to catch myself, but it ended with me breaking both bones in my forearm.”
"Skiing?" Adam asks, crossing his arms in front of his chest. "You told me you had exams."
"I lied." She shrugs, and suddenly the air in the room thickens.
"You fucking lied?" Adam asks loudly, quickly wiping the smile off Zoey's face. "I can’t believe you. Zoey, we rushed to you from the other end of the world, from a family vacation you didn't join because you said you had exams. And not only did you make us worry that you were about to fucking die and we wouldn’t even make it back in time for half a day. You made all of us panic for a fucking broken arm, and you lied about why you couldn't come along in the first place. Can you even imagine what you’ve done to us here?"
“Adam,” Jackson tries to calm him down, but he shakes his head.
Zoey shrinks into herself, looking like a scolded puppy, her eyes filling with tears. She’s our little princess. Before scolding, we always had a calm conversation with her and more often than not, that was enough.
But neither of us has a calm conversation in them at this point. All of us are raw, trauma we thought we’d buried or worked out in therapy pushed to the surface. Adam forces himself to take a deep breath and rubs his hand over his face, pinching the bridge of his nose as he tries to calm himself down.
"I'm sorry," Zoey whispers, tears running down her cheeks, but Adam shakes his head.
"Well, Zoey, this time, ‘sorry’ doesn't quite cut it." Adam gulps and gets up slowly, leaving the room without another word. My eyes jump between Zoey and the door.
"You know what?" I finally say into the silence, exhaustion enveloping me like a warm hug. "Adam is right. If you don't want anything to do with us anymore, just say so, Zoey."
"That's not it." She sobs, but all of us are too emotionally drained for empathy.
"Well, then what else is it?" Jackson jumps in. "You barely answer when we message you; you’re not joining our weekly gaming nights and even before you left for college you were stand-offish with us.”
“And when I wanted to visit you a few weeks back and you said ‘no,’” Reed chimes in, hurt, and my eyes jump to him. I didn’t know that.
“You’ve been showing us that you want nothing to do with us for a while. And now this?" Jackson shakes his head. "What else are we supposed to think?"
"Guys, it's not like that."
"Whatever it is, right now I need some space. Let’s talk when I’m not in the middle of an emotional crash, alright?" I say, taking a deep breath and finally getting up from the ground, not waiting for her answer. Now that we know Zoey is not dying and, in fact, is pretty much fine, there are a few logistics we need to take care of. "I left all my shit at the hotel. I’m going to have to call them and ask to pack it and send it over."
And with that, I leave the room, finding Adam in the hallway on his phone.
“Yes, she’s fine. Thank fucking God.” And I just know that it’s Lily he’s talking to. Our eyes meet and I motion for him to let me talk to her, but of course, just like the smart guy he is, he knows exactly what I want to ask her. “Sweetheart, can you do me a favor and pack our rooms together? No, no need to haul it to the airport, I’ll get the hotel to ship it. Thank you. It’s alright, you don’t need to come. Okay. Well in that case, I can’t wait to see you. Love you, too.”
“Can you read my mind?” I ask him as we trudge down the hallway, all of the earlier urgency gone.
“Hm, let me see. ‘I’m so fucking tired, I need to crash, I wish we could check into the hotel next door and sleep until tomorrow?’ Because same.”
“Now do the lotto numbers,” I joke, and for the first time since this whole thing started, I see a smile threatening to grace his face.
“Come on. Let’s check in there and get some sleep. God knows, we need it.”
I wake up again around midnight, feeling like someone took a sledgehammer to my head.
Where am I? Why isn’t Summer next to me?
Suddenly, a cold wave washes over me. Fuck. Summer.
I jump up from bed and ruffle through my clothes for my phone. Once at the hotel, I undressed and threw all of them on a chair and now I can’t find… ah, there it is. Only 5% on the battery, but it has to suffice.
As soon as I unlock it, my heart sinks. Messages from an unknown number, but I know exactly who it is.
"Fuck," I curse under my breath as I pull up the chat, my heart beating into my throat.
Summer: Where are you? Asher gave me her number, hope that's okay. Is everything alright?
My lips tug into a smile, but that quickly falls off my face when I realize the gravity of what happened as I read on, noting the missed calls in between messages.
Summer : I’m worried about you. Are you okay?
Summer : Tanner, what’s going on?
Summer : Lily mentioned an emergency, is everything okay?
Summer : Tanner?
And then, more messages that came in only fifteen minutes ago, and my heart sinks.
Summer : Really?
Summer : I get something’s going on, but ghosting me is not it. Not after saying you wanted more.
Summer : Thanks for last night. Hope everything is okay. Have a great life.
No. Fuck, this can’t be happening.
I try to call her, but the call doesn’t even go through. And when I pull up the chat again to answer her, I realize she has blocked me.
I reach for my pillow, burying my face in it.
“Fuck!” I shout into it, hoping it muffles the sound enough to not have security knocking on my door. I can’t believe this happened. I should have messaged her. Should have left a note.
Fuck.
I start pacing the room, fighting with tears, punching and kicking the pillows I threw off my bed before crashing out.
Congrats, Tanner. You might just have destroyed the best thing to ever happen to you.