Sitting on my bed, I stared at my phone like I’d done a hundred times since the accident. It was small and black. The screen was as smooth and perfect as the day I got it, while every part of me felt cracked and shattered.
I closed my eyes and breathed through the burn crawling up the back of my throat. The session with Dr. Perry killed me. Other than when the police had come into my hospital room, it was the first time I talked about what happened and actually gave those memories a voice.
I thought talking about what happened would serve like some kind of epiphany. That things would change. That I’d feel some sort of release. But talking openly about the accident, about everything leading up to it, just made me want to take a wire brush to my memories.
I’d known Cody shouldn’t have been behind the wheel. I should’ve listened to that little voice in my head and that feeling in the pit of my stomach, but I hadn’t. If I had, today would’ve been different. Tomorrow would be like all the better yesterdays.
I just hadn’t thought anything would happen.
Opening my eyes, I saw my phone and the pressure in my chest tightened, reminding me of how it felt when I first woke up from the accident. Of course I’d used my phone—texted and called, but...
But there were still texts I hadn’t looked at, voice mails I hadn’t listened to. They remained on my phone, not forgotten but untouched.
I picked up my phone and opened my texts. I scrolled until I got to the dozen or so unread ones. All of them had come in after the crash. I opened them and read the OMG, I hope you’re okay! messages. I opened up the numerous I’m so glad you’re ok. Text me messages. I read them all, my brain completely empty as I clicked out of one and went to the next, until my finger hovered over Abbi’s name and the goofy picture of her wearing a panda hat.
I didn’t even know where she got the panda hat.
I opened her message and slowly scrolled up. The last text from her was the Wednesday after the accident.
Why don’t you want to see us? We miss you and we’re worried about you.
The breath I took scorched my throat. Did Abbi know I hadn’t had my phone while in the hospital? Did that matter? I hadn’t wanted to see my friends and I hadn’t even checked her messages in over a month. It didn’t even matter if she did at this point.
I kept reading and I saw the texts from that Saturday night. It was just two of them. Where are you? And PLEASE TEXT ME BACK NOW.
The text before that was from before I left the party. It was a selfie that she’d taken of us and sent to me. Our cheeks pressed together and both of us smiling. Over our heads, I could make out part of Keith’s face.
Dumbly, I backed out of her texts and then I scrolled back up to Sebastian’s. Swallowing hard, I opened up his texts and made my way to the ones I hadn’t read. His started off just like Abbi’s.
Where are you?
There were several more messages, and I could easily see him firing them off, one after another.
You didn’t leave without coming to get me?
Okay. Please text me back. I’m starting to freak out. Someone said there’s a really bad accident not too far from here.
Come on. Answer your phone. Please.
My heart thumped heavily in my chest. I knew his voice mail was one of the many that sat unheard on my cell.
Closing his texts, I scrolled back down. My thumb hovered over Megan’s texts. I could see that the last text she ever sent me was an attachment. I already knew what it was. A picture of a volleyball that she’d drawn a face on. She’d done it after practice one day. No idea why, but that was Megan. She just did things.
A huge part of me wanted to read through her messages, but I couldn’t handle it—reading her words, seeing what used to be and now what could no longer be. I tapped out of the texts and went to my voice mails.
I listened to them.
The missed call from Lori happened after Mom must’ve called her. In her message, she told me she was coming and that she loved me. She’d sounded okay, calm even, as she spoke. It sounded nothing like Abbi’s message that had come that Saturday night when she had been looking for me, or Dary’s message the following Sunday. I could barely make out what Dary had been saying.
There were more messages from friends I saw every day at volleyball practice, and other messages from people I hadn’t spoken to since we shared a class last year. They were the voices of strangers, but their messages were all the same.
I could barely see the delete button when each message came to an end. Tears filled my eyes and my hand was shaking as I got to the last one I’d skipped over. It was a message from Sebastian, from that Saturday night.
Every muscle in my back locked up as I hit the play button. There were only a few seconds of silence and then I heard his voice.
“Answer your phone. Come on, Lena. Please pick up your damn phone.” His voice was hoarse with a panicked edge after a pause. “You’re not in the car. God, please tell me you’re not in that damn car. Call me and tell me you’re not in that car.”
The message ended. Dropping the phone, I pressed my palms to my eyes. Sebastian sounded like he did when I first woke up in the hospital and saw him.
He sounded destroyed.
Because he knew when he made that call, deep down he had to have known at that point, that I wasn’t going to call him back. That I was in that car along with Cody, Phillip, Chris and Megan.
My hands felt damp as I dragged them down my face. Everything inside me felt raw and bruised. One night had irrevocably changed all of our lives. One choice had altered the course of what we all were supposed to become.
What would I have done differently that night if I’d known there was no tomorrow? Everything. I would’ve done everything differently.