Chapter 34
THIRTY-FOUR
Alexia
Rhys drives. Zachary and Marcus are in the back, and nobody says anything the whole way to Royal Adelaide Hospital. I sit with my phone gripped so tight in both hands that my knuckles ache, watching the screen for some news. But it stays dark the entire drive.
The car's not even fully stopped outside the Emergency department when I open the door and get out. I hear them shout after me. I don't stop.
“Leon Riley.” My voice comes out too loud at the desk. “P-please. I need to know about Leon Riley.”
The woman behind the counter immediately checks something on her screen. What she reads has her understanding my desperation. “He hasn't arrived yet, hun. His helicopter's about five minutes out.”
The guys catch up to me a second later, all three of them talking at once, and nobody behind the desk can tell them anything either. Security ends up having to step in, quiet but firm, and it's a nurse who finally gets us to sit, promising she'll come find us the moment there's news.
They pull me down into a row of plastic chairs. “Tell me again,” I say, trying to keep my voice calm. “What happened.”
Zachary's the one who answers, sitting forward on the worn leather bench, elbows on his knees.
“He was driving back to Adelaide. A kangaroo came out onto the road, the truck in the lane next to him, driven by a trainee, swerved and pushed Leon's car into the oncoming lane. The car coming the other way only clipped him, but it was enough. His car flipped.” He stops.
Starts again. “They had to cut him out of the wreckage. He wasn't conscious.”
I don't remember starting to cry. But at some point I realise my hands are drenched from the tears spilling down my face.
“What was he even doing,” I say, “driving back here?”
Nobody answers straight away. I look up and catch the three of them trading a glance. They know something.
“Tell me,” I press.
“We think—” Marcus stops, clears his throat. “We think he was coming for a surprise. For your birthday.”
I don't say anything. I don't think there's anything to say. I put my face in my hands instead, and I'm still in that position when a nurse crosses the waiting room towards us.
“Alexia? Your brother's arrived,” she says. “He's in critical condition. We only know for sure that he's got a few broken ribs, and there are signs of internal bleeding. We're not sure yet if there's any cranial bleeding.”
I feel the blood leave my face.
Rhys is the one who finds words first. “What can we do?”
“Right now, the best thing you can do is wait here.” Her voice is kind, steady. “I know that's not much of an answer. But we'll come find you the second we know more.”
“Please.” Rhys's voice cracks slightly on the word. “He's — he's very important to us.”
“All our patients are important to us.” No offence in it at all. “What that means, practically, is that we're very used to doing our absolute best. For every single one of them.”
I stand up before I know it and put my arms around her. She lets me. “Thank you,” I say. “Please — anything you know. Anything at all.”
It's a long, interminable night.
The updates come rarely, and none of them good.
Five broken ribs. A broken ankle. Then, an hour or so in, a different nurse comes to tell us what the scans found — a lacerated spleen, bleeding steadily into his abdomen from the impact against the door frame when the car rolled.
It's the kind of injury that can kill you slowly if nobody catches it in time, she says, careful with her words, but they have caught it, and he's already been taken through for surgery to deal with it.
Could be as long as five hours. Serious.
But not the kind of thing that can't be fixed.
I remember Marcus's hand never leaving mine. I remember Zachary bringing back coffee none of us drink. I remember Rhys pacing so many laps of the same stretch of carpet it will probably be permanently marked into the DNA of this damn place.
Two surgeons come through the double doors just after two in the morning, both of them looking like they haven't slept in a week.
“Leon Riley's family?”
We're all on our feet before either of them finishes the sentence.
They were able to repair the spleen, save it. The ankle has a metal rod in it, the ribs will just take time. He's out of theatre, still critical but stable, and being moved to ICU for close monitoring over the next few days.
“Can I see him?” I get the words out eventually. “I'm his sister.”
“Once he's settled in the ICU someone will bring you in, for a few minutes only. What he needs most right now is rest.”
“Thank you.” It's all I've got to give them.
I sit back down. And try to keep breathing.