THERE’S BEEN AN ACCIDENT.
Accident. The word turned over and over in my head as I reached for the phone. I drew in a ragged breath, my heart squeezing in my chest. My stomach clenched and my mouth was instantly dry as I pressed the phone to my ear, my hand wrapped around it so tightly that my knuckles ached.
Please. Please don’t be bad.
But I already knew my mental begging was futile. You don’t call people up at four a.m. just to tell someone you stubbed your toe or broke your arm. This was bad; I somehow felt it deep down in my gut.
I looked over at Toby for reassurance, but instead his expression made it worse. The sympathetic eyes and firm set to his mouth made my heart race in my chest. I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Toby placed his hand on my knee, squeezing gently. I cleared my throat awkwardly and then tried again.
“Hello?” My voice was almost a whisper.
The caller sniffed. “Ellie, oh darling.” Even though it was husky and filled with emotion, I recognized her voice instantly—my paternal grandmother, Nana Betty.
My eyes prickled already. “Nana, what’s happened, is everything okay?”
“No, it’s...oh, Ellie, I don’t even know how to say this.”
I swallowed around the lump in my throat, my lungs beginning to ache from holding my breath, trying to steel myself against whatever she was going to say. My imagination was running wild, my panic setting in, wondering what type of accident had happened, who had been injured, how bad it was.
“Nana, please. What?!” I begged, desperation leaking into my voice.
“There was a car accident. Your parents...”
I gasped in a quick breath. “Oh my God, are they okay?” My free hand balled into a fist that I pressed against my chest, as if trying to slow my hammering heart. I could feel Toby staring at me, attempting to work out what was going on, his grip still firm on my knee.
“Your mom, she’s badly injured, Ellie. She has a fractured skull and internal bleeding, and something called a hematoma. They’ve taken her into surgery to try to repair some of the damage.”
I groaned, the sound filled with pain. I swallowed, my eyes falling closed. “Surgery?” The word felt like acid on my tongue, burning my throat on the way out. “She’ll be okay, though, right?” I clenched my jaw, waiting for her reassuring words, words that would calm the storm of emotion building inside me at an alarming rate. Panic was taking over, my hands beginning to shake.
“We won’t know more until she’s out. They’re doing everything they can for her, but she’s very badly off right now.” Nana’s answer didn’t offer the reassurance I was hoping for.
“I...I...” My brain didn’t seem to be working. My heart hurt. The pain in my chest was overwhelming. My mom was in surgery; she was fighting for her life with a fractured skull. My lip trembled as my eyes prickled with tears. I couldn’t lose her. I simply couldn’t. “Nana, is she going to—?” I stopped abruptly, unable to say the last word. It was too final; I couldn’t bear it. My voice didn’t even sound like mine, the words barely intelligible, but she somehow understood what I was asking.
“I just don’t know, honey.” No sugar coating it, just brutal honesty that felt like a kick to the gut.
I wished with every bone in my body that I were there at the hospital, waiting for her to come out of surgery. My dad and sister would need me; we should all be together supporting each other. The fact that I wasn’t there for them made an extraordinary amount of guilt mingle with the grief inside me.
“How are Dad and Kels coping?” I croaked.
“Kelsey is fine. She was at my house at the time, she was planning on staying with me for the weekend. Your parents had just dropped her off and were heading home when...” She stopped and cleared her croaky throat, sniffing loudly. “She’s here with me at the hospital now, I’ve just slipped out to call you.”
I nodded, more than a little relieved that Kelsey hadn’t been in the car at the time, too. “Okay. Where’s Dad, why didn’t he call me himself?”
My words were met with nothing but silence. It stretched on and on to the point of being uncomfortable. Impending horror built in my stomach, but I was unsure why.
“Nana?”
“Oh, Ellie. I’m so sorry to tell you this...Your dad, he didn’t make it.” As she said the words, her voice cracked, and so did my heart, splintering off, shattering like glass into a thousand pieces. “He’s gone.”
Gone.
When I’d heard the news about my mom, I’d thought that was the worst that could happen. I wasn’t even close.
Gone.
The word was like physical pain, like a knife to the gut, twisting, tightening, slowly killing me. My lungs constricted, making it difficult to draw breath. My father, the first love of my life, the man I looked up to, the man who was my role model for all men—he’d died. Everything in me ached, my insides clenched, my heart thundered in my ears.
Dad. Gone.
An involuntary, guttural grunt left my lips. I blinked, my vision becoming a little blurry as tears slid silently down my cheeks. My bottom lip trembled as I struggled to find something to say. But what was there to say? My mom was fighting for her life, and the man who’d raised me, given me everything, encouraged me to be the woman I was, the one I ran to for help, my rock...gone. There were simply no words to cover that.
I pictured my dad’s smile, the cheeky glint in his brown eyes, the conspiratorial wink he would throw me when we were ganging up on my mother. I remembered the hugs, how his large arms would wrap around me, dwarfing me and making me feel so small. Memories, all of them good, hit me at once: Christmases, birthdays, pancakes, his terrible jokes, his love for white chocolate, his laugh...
It was too much. I couldn’t bear it.
“Ellie?” Toby said, scooting closer to me, his hand rubbing gently at my leg. “Sweetheart, what is it?” To my ears, he sounded a million miles away, his voice slightly muffled.
I shook my head, unsuccessfully trying to clear the fog that was settling over me.
Gone.
I was losing it. I could feel things slipping away, fading out. The grief was consuming me, dragging me under, drowning me.
The phone slipped from my sweaty hand, thudding to the floor. My eyes followed it, not making sense of it, not comprehending anything that was going on around me. Memories, grief, guilt, horror, sadness—all swirled dizzyingly inside my head, tangling together, not making any sense. My vision swam as tears continued their torrential flow, running down my cheeks and neck, wetting the collar of Toby’s T-shirt I was wearing.
And then Toby was kneeling in front of me, wrapping his arms around me, pulling me tightly against him as I sobbed, my heart broken.
“My dad, he’s...” I pressed my face into his neck, crying harder. “And my mom, she’s in surgery, and I’m not there. I’m not there!” I wailed, losing the final part of my control.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Toby whispered, pulling back, his eyes narrowed with sympathy, his face contorted in grief too, grieving right along with me for the people he’d never even met.
“I gotta go,” I whimpered, bringing my arms up between us, pushing him away from me. “I have to be there. There’s so much to do. I have to get a flight and pack, I have to...I have...” I stood, but my legs were so weak I stumbled and Toby’s arms wrapped around me again, holding me steady.
His eyes, alight with concern, met mine. “You ’ave to breathe, Ellie. Shh, just breathe and calm down, sweetheart.” He dipped his head, planting a kiss on my forehead. “Just breathe.”
My eyes dropped closed as I sagged against him weakly, letting him hold me until I gained control over myself again.