Had it really only been that morning? It felt like a lifetime ago. Would today be the end of his life?
Tyler’s arms wrapped around me and he pulled me to him. My legs buckled. He held me, and we knelt on the concrete together, a big crumpled mess.
‘He can’t die, Tyler. He can’t die.’ My body shook. ‘They’ve already lost Richie, and Cal’s the only thing that’s kept ’em going. If he dies, it’ll kill ’em. He can’t die.’
Tyler whispered in my ear. ‘I know. Just breathe.’ His words and the strength of his hands layered me in more warmth and comfort than any blanket could provide. He guided me to the cafeteria, where I stood for about five minutes in front of the vending machine, struggling to choose between a plain Twirl or a Picnic bar. I felt guilty to be making such a simple decision as if it were any ordinary day, as if Cal wasn’t hanging on for his life. Cal might never wake up, but hey, let’s carry on as normal.
I chose the Twirl; it’d take less to get down.
We headed back into the cold, away from the sombre faces filling half the room. We sat on a garden bench beside a row of pink rose bushes.
‘It’s not fair. Richie’s already been taken from them, why can’t God find a different family to pick on. I feel sick.’ I dropped the half-eaten chocolate bar next to me on the bench.
‘I don’t think it works like that,’ Tyler said with a sympathetic frown.
‘Well, it should.’ I scoured, projecting some of my anger onto him, immediately regretful. ‘Sorry.’
‘No, it’s okay. You’re allowed to be angry. I get it. I tried it for a while, still do every now and then. I’ve come up with every possible reason why life could be so cruel. I blamed God too, even though I don’t believe in him, but sometimes you gotta blame something. You’re allowed to feel this way, but the truth is, nothing can change what’s been done, life’s as random as a frickin’ lottery ticket. It’s completely and utterly messed up.’
‘You got that right. I’ve seen it too many times. It doesn’t stop me from wishing it could be different, wishing I could change it, wishing to make it better. Half my life is daydreaming about the what-ifs, but they’re as useless as these damn tears.’
‘Those tears show the world you care. And you do make it better. Just not in the way you want to. It’s not all your responsibility, as much as you feel like it is. There’s nothing you could’ve done today to change any of this.’
‘I know, but the wanting hurts so much.’
‘Well, as my mum always says, “I want never gets”.’ He raised his eyebrows, and his attempt to lighten the mood worked; I managed a small grin.
‘She can’t be all right,’ I teased back with a sniff. ‘You wanted me and you got me.’
‘Nope, wrong again.’ He shook his head. ‘I didn’t want you. I needed you.’
By the time we made it back inside, Cal was in the chopper, and Marie and Harry were speeding behind in their car.
Still in shock, and exhausted from the strain of the unknown, the rest of us staggered back to my place. We crammed into the lounge room and fell onto the couches. I flicked on the TV, so there’d be something to distract us from the nasty place our minds wanted to take us.
I lay awkwardly along the length of the long couch. My head rested in Tyler’s lap, and he stroked my hair. Amber lay on my legs, her head rested on my thighs, and her hand reached above her head to hold onto mine. Lulled by the warmth and comfort of their closeness, I closed my eyes and slept.
I woke and launched myself upright, letting out a loud gasp before I realised where I was. I hid my head in my hands so I wouldn’t have to see the embarrassed looks on the faces around me. Tyler’s head lowered to rest beside mine.
‘Are you all right? Did you have a dream? Of Cal?’ he whispered.
‘Yeah, the accident.’ I tried to shake away the images of seeing the collision again, these ones with far more zoom than the originals. I could still hear the crack of Cal’s scull against the other player and the thwack as his body hit the wet ground. I trembled, and Tyler placed his arm around my shoulders. ‘How long was I asleep?’
‘Maybe half an hour?’
‘Have you heard anything yet?’ My heart accelerated, sudden panic forging itself on me. What had I missed?
‘No news yet, no.’
I found the clock, both hands were on the two – he’d left over three hours ago.
‘Is that normal? Should it take this long?’ I asked anxiously.
‘I don’t know, but I think brain surgery can take a while.’ I drew strength from the smooth confidence in his voice and the calm in his eyes.
Still, a shiver ran down my spine, and a ruthless ache stabbed at my heart. I scanned the faces of my friends. Everything had been so empty when Richie had passed, and I couldn’t imagine life without Cal to brighten our days. He was the effervescent bubbles in our soft drink, and without him everything would turn flat and dull.
No, he had to be fine. I couldn’t think like that.
Tyler held my hand, and we continued to wait. I startled and caught my breath each time the phone rang. By three pm I was a trembling mess, at four I’d almost worn a patch in the carpet, and at four-twenty-seven when Mum stepped from the kitchen with the phone to her ear, I squeezed Tyler’s hand so tight I may have left bruises.
My heart slammed as I tried to decipher the conversation. Mum’s eyes fixed on the floor, one hand on her cheek.
‘Okay, I’ll let them know.’ She stumbled and grabbed onto the back of the office chair, the phone fell from her fingers, and her glistening eyes met mine. Her head barely moved when she shook it. ‘He didn’t make it.’
My cry tore itself from my lungs, my body hurling forward as I clutched onto my knees shaking my head, the sobs tumbling out.
Amber fell onto her knees and crawled to the phone as if she could somehow retract the message. ‘No, no, no.’ Each word came out like jagged, pain-filled barbs, tears streaming down her face. She curled onto the floor, tapping at the phone, blonde hair tangling over wet cheeks. Mum shuffled over and pulled her into her arms where they wept together.
Max huddled into Sean, her shoulders shaking violently, clutching his hand. Sean stared straight ahead, trails of tears sliding from his chin.
A deathly pulse resonated in my ears, and my vision blurred, the tears coming in uncontrollable torrents. I found Tyler’s gaze, locked onto him. He tugged me into his arms, but I pushed him away. ‘I can’t…breathe.’ I tried to suck in a breath. Panic engulfed me.
Tyler pressed his hands to my face, forcing my eyes back to his, grounding me. He didn’t say anything, just inhaled deeply and then exhaled, imploring me to do the same.
My breaths returned, the tears continued to flow, all the while my heart wailed. Why Cal, why? You can’t leave us. We need you.
Sometime later in the blur of the night, Tyler helped me climb the stairs to my room. With swollen eyes, and a chest that felt like it’d been stabbed, kicked and hollowed out, I climbed under the covers. Warm lips pressed onto my forehead and my heavy eyelids drifted over.
— 21 —
I dragged the blankets up around my neck and sank further into their warmth. Was it morning yet? I cracked open an eyelid. Soft orange light filtered through the unopened blind of my bedroom. I scrunched my eyes from the early morning glare, making way for the memory of the previous day.
A whimper escaped with the deepening sorrow of our loss, and I folded myself into a ball and let the tears fall.
The agony of my dream surfaced. I’d dreamed that Eric slept in like everyone expected him to and Mr Jeffers put Cal on for the first half where a different accident played out. Cal lunged for the ball in his usual enthusiastic manner, which normally put him at an advantage, but on this particular day, would always be to his detriment, and he landed on his ankle, fracturing the bone. The ambulance took him to the hospital and far away from the pitch before he had a chance to collide with the other player.
The what
-ifs had never hurt so much.
With a painful heart I dragged myself out of bed and plodded downstairs in my pyjamas. My night was such a daze I couldn’t even remember changing into them. Mum stood at the kitchen bench spooning yoghurt over her muesli. She glanced up, concern and shock etched in her brow. ‘Honey, are you okay?’
My eyes welled up before I had a chance to shake my head. Mum hurried to wrap her arms around me.
‘What is it?’
I frowned through my tears and sniffed. ‘What do you mean, what is it? Cal. He’s gone.’
She held me away from her, a strange look in her eyes. ‘Gone? Where? He was at home just yesterday.’
My heart stopped, panic gripped at my sides. ‘Home? No, you’re lying.’ I pushed her away.
‘Lucy. You’re freaking me out.’ She reached for me and dropped her arms, but I stepped further away.
‘I’m freaking you out?’ I wiped at the hair stuck to the side of my face. ‘If he’s at home I want to go around there right now,’ I challenged. What the hell was going on? Why was she toying with me like this?
She slanted her eyes. ‘Okay? Just let me get changed.’ She was still in her pyjamas, I hadn’t even noticed, no way would she be ready fast enough.
Waving my hand to stop her, I backed out of the room. ‘Never mind, forget it. I’ll just run over there.’ I bolted upstairs, changing into my jeans and blue hoodie, and ran from the house.
Confusion barrelled into me with every pounding thump on the bitumen. Cal was dead, wasn’t he? How could he be at home? He died yesterday.
Marie opened the door shortly after I rang the bell, and with her usual large smile brightening her face, stepped aside to welcome me through the door. ‘Lucy, how are you?’ A turbulent breeze blew in from behind me, and she patted her hair down.
How was I?
Ignoring the question, I glanced over her shoulder, scrutinising the scent of frying bacon and the appearance of a regular Sunday morning.
‘Are you all right dear?’ She had similar worry lines Mum had worn ten minutes before.
‘Cal?’ My lungs surged in agony. They needed more air.
‘He’s here, love.’ She spoke like she was talking to an injured animal.
‘He’s here? He’s okay?’ I choked out, a big lump wedged in my throat.
‘He’s fine, would you like to see him? Oh, Lucy.’ She wrapped her arms around me and I silently wept on her shoulder. But he was dead. If he was here, what happened yesterday? Was I dreaming? If I was I never wanted to wake, not to a world without Cal.
Marie pulled away and wiped at a stray tear on my cheek, squeezing my shoulder. ‘Come on. Let me take you to him, he’ll be able to cheer you up.’
We walked down the familiar corridor toward Cal’s room at the back of the house and through his open door. I resisted the urge to run across the room and lunge myself at him. He was sitting up, pillows propped behind him, eyes locked intently on the television screen perched on the tallboy against the wall opposite his bed.
‘Lucy’s here to see you, love.’
His eyes darted quickly to me with a faraway smile and a ‘hang on’, his full attention held by the pretend world in his video game.
Marie rolled her eyes. ‘I’ll get you some water, dear.’
‘Oh…thanks.’ I turned to the form on the bed, still in shock at what sat in front of my eyes. I wiped at the tears trailing silently down my cheeks – joy, relief, fear.
Cal lost the game, plopped the handset beside him, and shuffled on the bed, poking at the pillows behind his back.
‘Luce. Whatcha doing up at this hour on a Sunday?’
Swallowing back the uncomfortable lump of denial and confusion, I searched for the time. The clock beside his bed said 09:33. I shook my head, frantic to understand what was going on and ignored his question with one of my own. ‘You’re okay.’ Actually, it was a statement, shrouded with query.
‘Of course I’m okay.’
Well, yeah, you’re not dead.
‘So how you feeling? How’s your head?’ Which was a stupid question because he looked nothing like someone who’d had brain surgery the day before, like someone who’d died.
‘My head? It’s fine. My ankle’s another story. Speakin’ of which.’ He plucked a box of pills from beside his bed and popped a couple into his hand, throwing them back with a glass of water.
My vision grew blurry, my head spun, and my legs almost buckled beneath me. I swayed and reached out aimlessly to grab something to hold me up.
‘Hey, you right? Here sit down.’ He winced as he shuffled his foot aside to make room on the edge of the bed. I ignored his obvious pain and sat on the side, afraid I’d end up on the floor if I didn’t. My pulse thundered in my ears, so loud Cal could probably hear it, but he spoke like everything was perfectly normal.
‘I have to stay home for a few days, wait for the swelling to go down. Then they’ll put the cast on. I’m thinking fluorescent pink, whadya think?’
Painful as it was, I found a smile. ‘Pink’s good,’ I said with barely an ounce of Cal’s enthusiasm.
His forehead scrunched with concern. ‘What’re you doing here, Luce? Has something happened, you don’t seem normal.’
‘Since when am I ever normal?’ I joked as I attempted to plaster a big fake ‘everything’s fine’ look on my face. ‘I just wanted to make sure you were okay, you had us all worried. But now I’m here, I’m not feeling that great.’ I wrapped an arm around my stomach. ‘I think I’ll go before I pass anything on. You right if I leave?’
‘Um, sure. I think Sean’s comin’ round later for a video game sesh.’
I stood. ‘Great. Well have fun.’ I placed my hand on the doorframe, ready to bail, and almost bumped into Marie with my glass of water. ‘Oh, sorry, Marie, I’m not feeling well all of a sudden, I have to go.’
I didn’t stay to hear the worry in her voice. I didn’t want to listen while another person asked if I was all right.
I dashed through the house and out the front door. I ran hard and ran fast, afraid that once I stopped I’d have to confront myself with the reality that I was most definitely not all right.
But I did stop, a few times to vomit. I staggered home to bed and the spinning began to slow, the reality catching up to me. It hit me with the force of a high-speed collision – one I should’ve seen coming.
My life buckled and crumpled around me in the most gut-wrenching sensation, the blow sending pain shattering right to the outer inches of my body. I’d known since that morning – when I woke wearing pyjamas, and saw the confusion etched on Mum’s face – that something was wrong, out of this world, X-Files wrong, but nothing could truly prepare me for the all-consuming realisation of what I’d done until the fullness of it hit me.
I was a ticking time bomb, about to implode. I cocooned myself in my bed and hoped the blankets would shield the people around me if I did shatter to pieces.
I slept, and when I woke, panic forced itself over me with the strength of a pro-wrestler, and I cried until I fell asleep again. I only ventured out to use the bathroom.
Did I do what I thought I’d done, or was I going crazy and only imagined the collision, the head injury, the painful agony at hearing Cal had died? No, they were real. As real as the crinkled covers on my bed, as real as the rustling wind outside, and damn it, as real as my beating heart. I squinted at the sliver of light peeking through the blinds, reminding me that the world continued to rotate, even if mine stood still. My body grew numb and weightless as I drifted into a state of insanity. I had no more tears left, they’d all dried up. Was this how people found themselves in mental asylums? Did they even exist anymore? Maybe I’d soon find out.
Darkness fell and Mum checked on me before she left for work. I apologised for my earlier outburst and blamed it on something I’d caught. I’d become limp and bleary eyed, and the bucket on the floor meant she didn’t even question the lie. I hadn’t eaten, and I’d barely had a drink all
day, my head throbbed like someone had been at it with a jackhammer. I tried some Panadol, but it may as well have been a tic-tac. My eyes were puffy, the standard symptom of a day spent crying.
I couldn’t feign a stomach bug for too long though. Besides, this was a much bigger, much more dangerous and formidable bug that needed serious quarantine. Yes, that was it, my best idea in a long time – if I quarantined myself, if I stayed locked up somewhere, way away from anyone and anything, no more harm could be done.
But there’d been no harm done. I’d saved Cal’s life, and in doing so, Marie and Harry’s. But that in itself was dangerous, wasn’t it? What other damage had I caused?
My stomach churned again. I thought of all the people I’d dreamed of in the last weeks, months and years, at all the lives I hadn’t been able to save, perhaps this really was my imagination playing the dirtiest trick of all, giving me hope that I had the power to change the ending.
But what if it wasn’t? The urge to know poked at me, prodded, and pushed me to reach for my laptop and search up the last death I’d dreamed. The farming accident. I hit the enter button. Scrolled. Tried a different search…scrolled some more – nothing.
My pulse thundered in my temple, and I reached into my bedside draw for my book, flicking frantically for the most recent pictures I’d sketched. The child on her bike. My search brought up a lot of driveway accidents, but I couldn’t find the one from last week. It wasn’t there.
I flicked back a page, scanning the scrawled image of the scuba diving instructor who’d lost his life two weeks ago. I searched the web, but all I found was his business page. I inhaled, sharp and deep. I blinked and clicked on the link to his Facebook page. A page not full of the expected commiserations at his passing, but one he’d been active on yesterday.
Lucid Page 17