42. Crash & Burn
FORTY-TWO
CRASH & BURN
? Broken - Lifehouse
CLIO
A frantic knock sounds at the cabin door, and I drop the half-folded T-shirt into the laundry basket, rushing to answer it. On the other side is a man I’ve never seen, but he looks vaguely familiar. I flip on the light to get a better view.
“Are you Clio?” he asks between heaving breaths.
“Yes. And you are—” I don’t have to look hard to know exactly who’s standing in my doorway under the flickering porch light. He’s an older version of Auggie. “Jonah?”
He nods jerkily, trying to catch his breath. I look over his shoulder for a car, but I don’t see anything. Did he run here?
“Where’s Noah?”
He doesn’t answer immediately, and my heart lurches. I grab the front of his shirt and shout in his face. “Where is Noah?”
“There was an accident. He’s in the hospital.”
I shove him, and he stumbles down the top step as I grab my keys off the hook and slip on my shoes. “How did you get here?”
He follows me to my car. “My bike. It’s parked up at the main house. They told me where to find you.”
“Get in.”
The door slams shut as I gun it down the gravel road. “What happened?”
“He crashed his bike.” Jonah grips the handle above the window as I take the curve onto the main roads. “Look, I don’t want to be that guy, but Noah will kill me if I don’t tell you to put your fucking seatbelt on. Considering the circumstances, he’d be more than justified.”
A few feet up the road at the stop sign, I pull my seatbelt on with a dramatic flair. “Better?”
“Much.”
“Tell me everything.”
“He was coming to find you. I was following behind on my bike. Just before the exit, a deer ran out into the road, and he swerved to miss it. I called an ambulance, and they said they were bringing him to Oak Ridge Memorial. Emma’s at the hospital waiting for an update. She sent me to get you.”
“He was coming to find me? Why?”
“He can tell you when he wakes up.”
“What if…”
“He will wake up, Clio.”
I park in the first available spot in the lot and rush in through the sliding doors, stopping dead in my tracks when a rush of déjà vu hits me. The last time I was here was for Lexi, and the outcome…
I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
Familiar arms band around my legs, and I look down to see Auggie clinging to me. I blink back tears and lower myself to his level.
“Hey, Super Auggie,” I say with all the strength I can muster.
“Hi, Cici. I missed you.”
I pull him into my arms and soak in what little comfort I can. “I missed you, too.”
“I’m looking for the family of Noah Weston.” The nurse from last time looks at me with something like recognition.
Before I can respond, Emma steps forward. “How is he?”
“Are you his next of kin?”
“Yes. I’m his sister.”
“He’s been moved to the ICU. He has several broken ribs and a punctured lung. His right arm was broken in several places, and he has severe road rash. The doctors have placed him in a medically induced coma. He has a chest tube, and his arm has been placed in a cast.”
“Can we see him?” I ask.
“I can take one of you there now.”
Emma and Jonah exchange a look. “Clio should go.”
“Are you sure?” I ask.
She nods. “If I know my brother as well as I think I do, he’d want yours to be the first face he sees.”
I follow the nurse back through a familiar corridor, but instead of going left this time, she turns right and takes us to an elevator, stopping on the second floor. The rooms here are much more private with four walls you can’t see into.
The sterile scent of the hospital room suffuses me, and I tamp down on the memories creeping to the surface.
I follow the oppressive beeping sound to Noah’s body sprawled out in the hospital bed. The door snicks closed behind me, and I stand there for a long while with my heart beating out of my chest.
Of all the ways I imagined seeing him again, this was never a fleeting thought. His right arm is in a cast all the way up to his bicep, and he’s connected to a bunch of machines by tubes and wires.
I walk toward him on leaden feet and perch beside his hip, tracing my fingertips along the contours of his beautiful face, now marred with cuts and bruises. He looks so feeble, and my heart shatters for the second time in as many weeks.
I can’t lose him again.
Time passes in a blur. People come and go, checking his vitals and administering more pain medicine. At some point they allow a second visitor. Jonah and Emma start taking shifts, but I can’t bring myself to leave his side. They don’t say anything. I think they know it's futile.
Lexi comes by with food and practically forces me to eat, but everything tastes like ash in my mouth.
She stays for a while, and then she’s replaced by Quinn.
I think they’re all waiting for me to break, but I hold onto my strength with both hands, knowing the alternative is hopelessness.
I won’t add this event to the others that haunt me.
I won’t let Noah Weston become another nightmare.
NOAH
I blink my heavy eyes open to a sterile room with harsh overhead lighting and an irritating, persistent beeping sound. Each breath takes a herculean effort. A flash of memory rushes back—the deer, screeching tires, asphalt, and pain.
So much pain.
“Welcome back,” a gruff voice says.
I lock eyes with my brother, and I remember he was there too. He must’ve witnessed everything.
I try to move my hand, but it’s trapped beneath something warm and soft.
I look down.
Clio’s here.
“She hasn’t left your side.”
I want to run my fingers through her copper hair, so I know she’s real. My other arm is trapped in plaster, so the best I can do is run my index finger along her cheek. It’s not enough, and my frustration mounts with each second that passes where she’s not in my arms.
“How long was I out?”
“Two days.”
“How bad is it?”
He quirks a brow. “How bad does it feel?”
“Nothing compared to losing her.” I stare down at her sleeping form, at her delicately parted lips, and her thirty-six freckles. “I survived that. I’ll survive this, too.”
“Did you get that shit off a greeting card?”
I laugh, and it hurts like a son of a bitch. “Oh, fuck. Ow.”
“That’ll be the broken ribs. Maybe the punctured lung, too.”
The bed shifts as Clio stirs. Her soft hair drags across my forearm as she lifts her head until twin pools of sage green are staring up at me. “Noah.”
I give her a feeble smile. “Hey, Princess.”