Brooke

When Lucy didn’t show up at the game, Brooke knew something was wrong. And when Lucy didn’t answer the hundredth text Brooke sent, she began to panic.

Brooke couldn’t shake the sense of dread that washed over her as she rushed out of the stadium with the crowd after the soccer match ended. She desperately wished she were back in her dorm room so she could consult her Magic 8 Ball, but she had a sneaking suspicion she wouldn’t like the answer if she asked the question on her mind right now. “Is everything okay with Lucy?” The response ‘very doubtful’ came to Brooke’s mind.

She knew it was hypocritical to bash Alex’s superstitions about his good luck kiss when she had a few a childish habits of her own. But Brooke swore by her Magic 8 Ball. Her Nonni gave it to her for her eighth birthday and Brooke used it religiously ever since. The damn thing was freakishly accurate and Brooke was convinced it held some sort of magic powers. Her Nonni was a self-proclaimed Wiccan, believing in the inner consciousness of the third eye and the powers of prediction it granted. When she gave Brooke the Magic 8 Ball she told her it would help her hone her gift.

Brooke had always thought her Nonni was a bit loopy when she was younger, but the more she used her Magic 8 Ball, the more she was convinced her Nonni might be on to something. Either that or she put some sort of spell on it . . .

Brooke shook her irrational thoughts from her head as she jumped into her powder blue vintage Volkswagen Beetle. She was desperate to get out of the parking lot before Alex could find her and ask her where the hell Lucy was again. One more confrontation and Brooke knew she’d cave. Plus, she didn’t want to look at Trista’s smug face one moment longer.

Alex had chosen to kiss Trista before the game started since Lucy didn’t show up. Of course his cameras had caught the whole thing, so Lucy would see it soon enough. What a slap in the face. Lucy deserved so much better than either of them. It made Brooke’s blood boil when she saw Trista’s satisfied glow after the kiss. The girl was pure evil. Brooke should know.

As she drove, Brooke forced herself to relax with some deep breathing. She pushed thoughts of Trista from her mind and decided to focus on the positive, like how she’d escaped the soccer complex without running into Alex again. She was still worried about not hearing from Lucy, but the more Brooke thought about it, the more likely it seemed that Lucy had just gone back to campus. Maybe she’d realized that traffic was too horrid to get to the game in time and decided to hide in her room rather than face Alex’s lecture. It didn’t explain why she wasn’t answering her phone though. Her battery could be dead, but that wasn’t like Lucy. She was the responsible one. It was always Brooke who was forgetting to charge her phone or blow out the candles she burned in their dorm.

Brooke and Lucy had been assigned as roommates at Saint Andrews Prep their freshman year. They’d been lucky and struck up a friendship right away. They were unlikely friends. Lucy with her tidy, preppy good looks and popularity, and Brooke with her quirky awkwardness and artsy fashion sense. But somehow they clicked.

Over the last four years, they’d become best friends. Well into their last year of high school, there wasn’t much Brooke wouldn’t do for Lucy. Except when it came to Alex. He was pretty much the only subject Lucy and Brooke disagreed about. Brooke was firmly anti-Alex, blatantly telling Lucy that her soccer-star boyfriend was a total bag of dicks and Lucy deserved better.

That’s why when Lucy asked Brooke to lie to him today she knew it must be something important. Normally, to keep their friendship running smoothly, Lucy tried to steer clear of bringing Alex up to Brooke. And she’d never asked for help lying to him before. Maybe this meant there was hope and Lucy was finally seeing the light—aka: that she didn’t need Alex.

Brooke was an eternal optimist, so she clung to the hope that Lucy was finally coming to her senses. She still had trouble ignoring the nagging feeling of unease in her gut, but as she drove onto Saint Andrews campus she told herself everything was fine.

“Lucy’s probably sitting in our dorm room right now,” Brooke muttered. “And she’s gonna have a lot of explaining to do.”

Jaxon

Jaxon called his uncle from the ambulance on the way to the hospital, so he wasn’t surprised to see him waiting at the ER bay when they arrived. His uncle made sure Lucy was rushed to the ER so all her injuries could be assessed and treated. The preliminary report was that she had a concussion and some bruised ribs, but the worst of her injuries was her leg. There was a fracture dangerously close to an artery, so she was rushed off to surgery and Jaxon was left to wait.

He paced the waiting room for what felt like hours. Lucy’s accident kept running on a loop through his mind, muddling together with memories of his own crash. Jaxon couldn’t shake Lucy’s screams of pain. They echoed through his head, mixing with the ghost of his mother’s fatal scream. Lucy’s shrill cries had nearly crippled Jaxon when he’d been trying to pull her from the car. It sounded hauntingly like the wail that escaped his mother before she died. But she’d only screamed once. It was the last sound Jaxon ever heard his mother make. Today, when Lucy’s panicked shrieks continued, it had snapped something inside of Jaxon.

When he’d stumbled up to her wrecked Jeep and saw blood, Jaxon thought his flashbacks would swallow him whole. He’d had to work hard to remind himself to stay in the present; that it wasn’t his mother inside the car.

That was the closest Jaxon had ever come to losing it since his mother died. For a split second today he thought he was back in that car with her, helpless and terrified. But when he heard Lucy’s voice she’d drawn his attention back to where it belonged. He looked into the smoking Jeep and he saw all the fear he felt reflected in her big hazel eyes and it drove him into action. Action that probably caused severe damage to her leg.

Jaxon wished he could say it was selflessness that kept him pacing the hospital waiting room. But if he was honest, it was guilt. He may have saved Lucy’s life, but at what cost? He couldn’t live with himself if he’d caused permanent damage to her leg. She was his age for Christ’s sake. She was supposed to have her whole life ahead of her. What if she was crippled? And that’s to say if she even made it through surgery.

Jaxon had grown up in a family of doctors and cops. He knew better than most that nothing was guaranteed in situations like this. But there was nothing he could do. Pacing was useless, but sitting still was agonizing, so Jaxon continued to feel helpless as he wore tracks in the shiny white waiting room floor.

Finally, Jaxon’s uncle pushed through the double doors and into the waiting room. He was wearing dark blue scrubs and a tired expression. He pulled his surgeon’s cap off his head and Jaxon’s eyes focused on his temples, where his uncle’s dark hair was shot through with gray. He was young to have gray hair already, but Jaxon imagined the job took its toll. His uncle had been overseeing Lucy’s surgery himself to ease Jaxon’s mind. He looked drained as he approached. “Figured I’d find you here.”

“How is she?” Jaxon asked, mentally preparing himself for the worst.

“She’s in recovery. The surgery went well and her vitals are strong.”

“Her leg?”

“The break nicked an artery but it’s been repaired She needed a few screws to hold the bones in place, but it was a clean break and barring any complications, she’ll make a full recovery.”

Jaxon sagged into a chair with relief. “Thank God.”

Uncle Steven sat down next to him. “So you know her?”

“Sort of. I recognize her from school, but we’re not exactly in the same circle.”

Uncle Steven smiled tightly. “Are things going okay at Saint Andrews?”

Jaxon didn’t give a shit about his posh prep school at the moment, but he didn’t want to hurt his uncle’s feelings. “Yeah. It’s going fine.”

Uncle Steven sighed and rubbed his brow. “Look, Jaxon. I know you’ve been through a lot. Today couldn’t have been easy for you. But I’m proud of you. You saved that girl’s life.”

Jaxon snorted. “I’m pretty sure the EMTs and doctors get that credit.”

“You share it with them. If you hadn’t pulled her out of that car she would’ve bled to death.”

“Or burnt to death,” a voice added.

Jaxon turned to see his brother, Conner, striding toward them with his official police officer swagger. “Just got back from the scene,” Conner added. “There’s hardly anything left of that vehicle. It went up like a matchbook. You’re a hero, little bro.”

Jaxon felt his skin crawl at the title. He was no hero.

“Word is you saw the whole thing go down,” Conner said. “Feel up to giving me a statement?”

Jaxon nodded. He had already given an official statement to the police when he arrived at the hospital, but he knew Conner was just being thorough because a hit-and-run was personal to him too.

“Before you get too involved,” Uncle Steven said, climbing to his feet, “Jaxon, would you mind speaking with patient services? They want to inform the girl’s family but don’t have any information other than her first name.”

“Sure, but I don’t really know too much about her,” Jaxon replied.

“Just let them know she’s a classmate of yours at Saint Andrews and I’m sure they’ll be able to contact the school to get what they need.”

Jaxon nodded.

Uncle Steven turned to face Conner. “When you’re done, would you mind giving Jaxon a ride home? I’d do it but I’m in the middle of my shift.”

“No problem.”

“Actually,” Jaxon interrupted. “I’d like to see Lucy before I go if that’s okay.” He was desperate to see that she was okay with his own eyes.

Uncle Steven shook his head. “Sorry. It’s family only right now.”

“I think we can make an exception for my little bro here,” Conner said, slinging and arm over Jaxon’s shoulder. “He’s a freaking hero!”

Conner was four years older, but Jaxon was three inches taller. But that didn’t stop Conner from perpetually reminding everyone that he was the older brother.

Uncle Steven grinned. “I suppose it’s fine. But don’t disturb her. She needs to rest. And you might want to clean up first.”

Jaxon looked down at his soot-stained clothes for the first time. How had he not realized he was such a mess? There were smudges of blood on his arms and he could feel a layer of dried sweat covering him like a filmy second skin.

“That’s hero he’s got all over his clothes,” Conner said proudly. “You hold your head high, little bro.”

“Well hero, there are spare scrubs and a shower in my office,” Uncle Steven offered, as he tried to hide his smile. “You boys behave. I’ve got some scheduling to do, but if you need me have someone page me.”