“Don’t leave me,” she mouths under her breath.
“Never,” I mouth back.
I watch as another group head over to the pickup truck. I want to yell at them, tell them there’s no need to bother, that he’s for sure dead, but I can’t seem to say the words out loud.
My eyes are suddenly drawn to the water, as I see new lights creeping in. I raise my finger up to Eva to let her know I’ll be right back, and I walk over to the Halifax. Bright white lights are gliding by as a massive yacht is approaching. It’s being held back though. The accident is too close to the drawbridge. I know they won’t let it rise until they’ve cleared everything from the scene. The yacht is pulling over to the docks when I hear Eva yelling.
“I don’t need to get on a stretcher!”
I turn back. Luna is by Eva’s side. Paramedics have put her in a neck brace, her broken arm is in a sling, and her head is wrapped in gauze. It’s quite the sight and makes my stomach drop. They’re trying to get her on the stretcher and she’s putting up a fight.
“It’s just protocol,” Luna says to her. “You need to let them take care of you.”
I walk back over and crouch in front of her on the ground. “Remember when you broke your leg?” I grin. “You didn’t want a stretcher that day either. Remember who convinced you to get on it?”
I see a smirk on her face. “You. It’s just a broken arm.”
A paramedic taps me on my back. I stand up. “Her blood pressure’s a little low, and her heart rate is elevated,” he says to me out of the corner of his mouth. He looks young, like he could almost pass for someone in the halls of my high school. “She’s fighting us on everything we try to do. We need to get her transported, the sooner the better.”
I nod my head and crouch back down to Eva. “You have a head wound too,” I point to it. “You were unconscious. You weren’t moving. For minutes, at least. I know you’re hurting. Please let them get you to the hospital, for me, I need to make sure you’re alright, and then we’ll go home and you can sleep in my arms for days. I’m going with you and will be by your side the entire time, I promise, but get on the damn stretcher and let’s go, okay?”
I can see in her eyes that she’s given in. “Fine, but you come with me, you stay with me. Don’t leave. Not even for a second. Promise?”
I kiss her hand. “No one’s going to keep me away.”
She looks relieved. “Can you call my mom? You’ll have to call Calvin’s phone.”
I nod and reach in my pockets. “Shit. My phone’s on Porter’s boat. I’ll get Porter to get it, okay?”
The paramedics get her on the stretcher and wheel her towards the ambulance as I walk next to her, scanning the crowd for Porter. I see him, standing closer to the drawbridge, talking to a man whose back is to me. This man looks familiar, even if all I can see is the back of his head, I know I’ve seen him before.
“Where is she?!” I hear the man shout. “What the hell happened?!”
Eva’s head turns as much as it can with the sound of this voice. “That’s my dad!” she looks at me. Her eyes looked alarmed, not comforted, but definitely alarmed. “My dad is here!”
I see Mr. Calloway running down the road to Eva and I. He has three other people following behind him. He gets to us first and slams into the ambulance he’s running so fast.
“Eva!” he cries out. He pushes me to the side. “Oh, my god! What happened?”
“I’m okay,” she tells him. “There was an accident. Bodhi’s dad was here—”
“Bodhi’s dad?!” he shouts, panic on his face. “Where is he? Where’s Sully?”
Eva points to the truck. Mr. Calloway and I both turn our heads just in time to see my dead father being zipped into a body bag. Mr. Calloway turns his face back to my own. His eyes are large, his face is pale. I’m wondering what awful things he’s going to say to me, when his hand suddenly comes up and rests on my shoulder. I confusingly look down at it.
“I’m sorry,” Mr. Calloway says. “I’m so sorry, everything, Bodhi. I’m sorry.”
I’m still looking down at his hand when I reply, “All that matters is Eva.”
“I’m okay,” she says again, talking to both of us. “My arm is just broken—”
“I’m going with you,” her dad declares.
“No!” Eva yells, grabbing at my hand. “No! Don’t do this, Dad! Please! Please don’t do this! I want Bodhi to come—”
Her words get stopped as the paramedics load her into the ambulance. I stand right outside the doors.
“We need to leave,” the one paramedic says to me and Mr. Calloway. “If someone is coming with her, now is the time.”
I nod my head at him. I don’t want to fight with her dad in front of her, not after everything she’s been through tonight, but I’ll be damned if he thinks I’m fucking going to let him leave with her.
I look over at Eva, and then I look back at Mr. Calloway. I point at the pickup truck. “This was because of you, and Henry Channing,” I tell him. “Some grudge the father I never knew had against you both, and last time Eva was in the hospital, I lost her for three years. Which was also because of you, and Henry Channing is what I’ve heard.” I move a little closer to him. “When Eva is better, you and I will definitely be talking about that.”
He runs his hands over his head. He looks ashamed. “There’s a lot I need to explain … a lot we need to discuss. All of us, you, me, Eva, Audrey, I know this, and we will … but I don’t have a car here, to follow the ambulance.”
I almost feel bad for him. I don’t bother questioning how he arrived on High Bridge without a vehicle. I don’t have time for that. I point to Beck in the distance. “His truck is here, he can take you, he doesn’t bite.”
Mr. Calloway doesn’t have the chance to respond, as the three people who were behind him earlier, are now walking right up to us. I blink quickly. I even rub my eyes with my hands, questioning if maybe this is just my imagination going completely insane. I know them. I know these three people. I know who they are.
“Mr. Calloway,” I say, my voice cracking as I’m absolutely panicked on the inside. “Why is Owen Edwards here with you? Why is Owen Edwards alive? Did you guys come here on his yacht? Is that his yacht down there?” I point to the dock.
He doesn’t answer. Just keeps looking between me and the three people standing behind him, like he doesn’t know how to respond without causing absolute destruction.
I then stare straight at the only female in the group. An older lady, roughly the same age as Owen, with long red hair that hangs in curly tangles down her back. She looks so concerned for me. A wounded look set on her motherly face. She reaches out to take my hand. I don’t move. I know who she is, but I need to hear someone else say it out loud.
“You’ve grown,” she quietly says, a few tears drip down her face. “It’s been a really long time, Bodhi.”
I hit my fist on the ambulance and point at her. “Why do you look so much like my fucking mother! And you!” I turn to the older man that’s holding her hand. He jumps as I glare at him. “You look like my mother too!”
I lean my back up against the ambulance. Hyperventilating as Mr. Calloway puts his hand on my shoulder again. I forcefully push it off.
“Don’t touch me!” I yell. “Someone tell me what the fuck is going on!”
“Bodhi …” I hear my name come from Mr. Calloway’s mouth. “I promised I’d fix this. I promised Eva. I need to fix this for her, and you, and I’ll explain everything, I promise I will. These are your grandparents … Annie and Kenneth Rialson …”
Everything is spinning. The ground. The trees. The lights. All the emergency vehicles. All the people in front of me. My friends in the distance who are standing in a line watching this all unfold. I feel like I’m going to throw up. I can’t get any of it to stop. Everything is crashing down on top of me until I hear her voice. Eva’s voice. It pulls me back down immediately.
“Bodhi,” she whines. I look into the am
bulance. She’s trying to sit up, she’s yanking at the neck brace, ripping it off. She’s bringing her knees up to her chest. She’s moaning in pain and arching her back. I jump in. I go right next to her. “Bodhi,” she whimpers again, grabbing my hand. There’s fear in her eyes that hasn’t been there all night.
“What’s wrong, Eva?” I question.
The paramedic who spoke to me earlier is also at her side. I hear the engine start to the ambulance. “Where does it hurt?” he asks her.
“My stomach!” she cries out, tossing and turning as she tries desperately to crawl out of her own skin. “My stomach burns!”
I’m pushed back now. He pushes me back to give himself space. My hand leaves hers and her eyes immediately search for mine.
“I’m right here, right here, Eva.”
Scissors cut her dress down the middle. It’s ripped opened, exposing her bra and panties for everyone to see, but that’s not what I’m looking at. I know that’s not what anyone else is looking at either. We’re looking at how incredibly swollen she is right above her panty line. We’re looking at the dark purple bruising all over the width of her stomach. My hand comes up to my mouth. I know this can’t be good.
“Internal bleeding! Seat belt!” I hear the paramedic exclaim. “We’re leaving right now!”
The doors slam shut without even giving Mr. Calloway the chance to make a scene. I see him through the back window, standing there with a shocked look on his face as my friends run towards him.
The ambulance rushes down the road. Sirens are blaring. I’m being tossed around. I hang on to anything that I can.
“Bodhi!” Eva calls out for me. I can hear the agony in her voice and it kills me I can’t do anything to help her. She looks for me again, locking her worried eyes right on mine.
“I’m here, Eva! I won’t leave!”
She moans and closes her eyes. “I … I don’t feel good,” she breathlessly declares, and then her entire body becomes limp. Her arm drops and dangles off the side of the stretcher, she is no longer making any sound at all, she is no longer moving, she is no longer here.
The paramedics are busy working on her, but all I can do is stare at her, willing her eyes to open again. And because I’m so consumed with watching her beautiful face, I see it before they do. I see the blood start to seep out of the sides of her closed mouth.
I point and scream, “She’s throwing up!”
She’s quickly moved to her side. Blood projects immediately out of her mouth. All over the ambulance floor. All over the paramedics. All over my feet. It puddles on the ground, it doesn’t end, it just keeps coming and coming, like her mouth is a goddamn running faucet. But we were too late. You can tell she had been choking on it as it silently entered her mouth.
“Do something!” I hear myself screaming.
The paramedics are trying to clear her airway, but she just keeps vomiting. Every time we think she’s done … we hear the gurgle of more coming up. She can’t catch her breath. She is suffocating as the vomit continues to force its way out of her mouth. It feels like the seconds passing are agonizing hours as I watch this, until finally, finally it stops as quickly as it had started. The paramedics are quick to assess the damage, and my world officially comes to a screeching halt as I hear five simple words that echo throughout the ambulance.
“I can’t find a pulse.”
epilogue
I met my soulmate when I was twelve. She and I, we had this immediate connection from the moment she walked through my door. At first, I wasn’t sure what I was feeling. All I knew was that I wanted to spend every second that I could with her, and I felt absolutely empty when she wasn’t around. As the days and years went by, even as a young teenager, it became more and more obvious to me that what I was feeling was true love.
Then, at fourteen, I lost her. The three years I spent without her were absolute hell. It was as if I didn’t know how to live anymore. I didn’t know how to be me anymore without her. She took my soul away when she disappeared.
Then I got her back.
I had less than two weeks to love her again. Less than two weeks to feel whole. Less than two weeks to confess how madly in love I was. Less than two weeks to tell her how I am nothing without her. Less than two weeks … because then I lost her again.
I watched as they tried every little thing to bring her back. Witnessing the efforts of the paramedics isn’t like what you see in a movie. It’s messy, and loud, and traumatizing for everyone involved. It’s something I’m sure they won’t ever forget. I’m sure it will haunt their nightmares for years to come. This beautiful seventeen-year-old girl, lying there with blood all over her face and limbs, her heart resting still in her chest when it should be pumping life throughout her body. I sure as hell won’t ever forget it. That image will indeed haunt me forever.
I sat there as they worked on her, begging to anyone who could hear my thoughts, that she not be taken from me again. No one heard me though, or maybe my prayers just weren’t top priority at that moment. I guess the love I had for this beautiful soul wasn’t worth the extra time from whoever had the ability to bring her back.
I watched as she slipped away. The memories of our days spent together repeated in my mind like some sort of goddamn memorial loop. They pounded on her chest, they worked to clear her airway, they tried to get her heart beating again. My entire life ended right there during the time spent in the back of that ambulance, because I am indeed nothing without her. I do not exist in a world that Eva Calloway does not exist in.
I met my soulmate.
I lost my soulmate.
I got my soulmate back.
Then my soulmate died right in front of me.
Life is funny that way. It likes to tease you. It taunts you with beautiful memories and moments. It gives you love, real love, love that can never be replaced. It shows you how amazing your life could be, even when you’ve already been through so much heartache, only to snap its greedy fingers and take it all away and leave you feeling broken and empty again.
That feeling, knowing I’d never recover from this and that the Bodhi I was for those weeks with Eva Calloway was now gone, is a feeling I was hoping I’d never have to deal with again. That feeling, knowing there was absolutely no coming back from the hell I was being thrown into once more, is a feeling that instantly swarmed over me as I prayed to anyone that could hear my thoughts.
That feeling, it was short-lived though.
Someone did indeed hear my prayers. Someone did indeed take the time to save the beautiful soul that is my Eva Calloway.
I’d like to think it was my mom that finally heard me. That wherever her soul was resting at for an eternity, she was suddenly awoken and watched as this all played out in front of us. I promised her, my mom, as she slowly died in front of me weeks ago, that I would get Eva back, and I did. I fulfilled the very last promise I ever made to her, and I know that if there was anyone, anywhere, that could accomplish the extraordinary task of making sure Eva got to stay with me forever, it would be my mom.
Yes. I was there when Eva’s heart stopped beating right in front of me, but Eva and I once promised each other that she’d never leave me and I’d never leave her. That she was mine, and I was hers, and that we would never be without each other again. If there’s anything you should take from getting to know even a fraction of our love story, it’s that we are one soul existing in two separate bodies, and that Eva would never go against her word.
“We’ve got a pulse,” the paramedic reassured me. I remember him looking right into my eyes. He knew I needed to see the relief that flooded his worried face. “She’s back.”
As horrible as this all might seem right now, every single tragic event that happened that night … please don’t lose any sleep over it. There are some moments in your life that change your entire existence. They define you. They make you become a better person no matter how awful they were, because for a moment you knew exactly what it would feel like to live in hell
forever. This was one of those moments. I refuse to live in hell forever. No matter what happened that night, love will define me from here on out, and I will willingly allow it to change my entire existence. I will willingly allow her to change my entire existence. Again.
Love, because it is the only true adventure, right?
I’m sure at some point you thought this was it. That I was going to tell you this was the end of my epic love story with Eva Calloway. Another tragic event to add to all the other tragic events that have happened in my short, young life … but I’m not, trust me. There’s no need to self-destruct again, no need to walk that damaging path I was on when we first met, because my love story with Eva Calloway is not over. Far from it.
As this part of my story comes to a close though, I am going to leave you with just one simple, final word, followed by the most beautiful sentence I’ve ever spoken.
Confession.
My love story with Eva Calloway has only just begun.
Confession Page 44