by Nancy Rue
How could somebody not get hurt in that? Lily thought. She shuddered and tried not to think of what the people inside must look like.
Mom hung up the phone and grabbed her gloves. “I’m going to go see if I can do anything before the paramedics get here.”
“You’re going over there?” Lily said.
“I’d want somebody to come help us if we’d been the ones that got hit.” Mom pulled her knit cap down over her ponytail. “And we almost were.”
A chill went through Lily, and it wasn’t from the blast of frosty air that came in as her mother opened the van door. It could have been us, all crumpled up and maybe bleeding—
It wasn’t a thought she wanted to be left alone with. She got out of the van and followed her mother, picking her way across the ice.
“Lil, why don’t you stay here until I know what’s happened,” Mom said.
“I want to come,” Lily said. Her own voice sounded thin and scared.
“Then get some blankets out of the back, and the first-aid kit.”
Lily didn’t even know there was a first-aid kit in the van. It didn’t strike her as a Mom kind of thing. Whenever Lily or her younger brother, Joe, or her older brother, Art, got hurt, Mom would say, “Are you hemorrhaging? Have a bone sticking out?” When the answer was no, she’d tell them to go get a Band-Aid and not whine about it.
But there was a first-aid kit in the back of the van, along with two blankets and even a pillow. Lily grabbed all of it and made her way over to the side of the road.
Mom was there with some other people who had stopped, and they were all crouched around somebody on the ground. As soon as Lily got close, Mom put her hand up and said, “That’s far enough, Lil. Just leave the stuff here.”
There was no merry twitching around her mother’s mouth now. Her tan face was white, and her voice was strained. Lily backed away, heart pounding.
“Could we have one of those blankets over here?” someone said.
Lily looked up. There was a teenage boy, around Art’s age, crouched down beside a small person. The child was sitting up. It was probably safe to go over there. Lily grabbed one of the blankets she’d just set down and slipped and slid across the ice to get to them.
“I don’t think he’s hurt,” the teenager said to Lily, “but he’s shaking like he’s freezing.”
Lily squatted beside him. A boy of about five blinked up at Lily out of a face the color of cream of wheat. His lips were blue, and the teenager was right: he was trembling like a leaf about to fall off a tree.
“You want a blanket?” Lily said to him.
He didn’t answer, but Lily wrapped it around him anyway and then rubbed her hands up and down his arms, the way her dad did to her when she was whining about being in danger of frostbite if she had to walk to school.
“I don’t think he’s hurt,” the teenager said again. “He’s probably not, huh?”
Lily looked up at him in surprise. He was shaking as badly as the little boy was, and even in the dark Lily could see tears shimmering in his eyes.
“He doesn’t look like he is,” Lily said.
“Nah, I bet he’s not.”
The teen crossed his arms over his chest and stuck his hands into his armpits. His bottom lip was vibrating.
“Did you ask him?” Lily said.
“He won’t say nothin’. He just sits there. But he’s probably not hurt.”
The teenager just kept shaking his head. Lily got a strange feeling, like the kid didn’t really know what he was saying. Mouth suddenly dry, Lily turned to the little boy.
“What’s your name?” she said.
The little blue lips came open. “Thomas,” he said in a voice she could hardly hear.
“I’m Lily,” she said.
“Lily,” he said.
The teenager let out a shrill laugh. “You see! He’s not hurt, huh?”
“Do you have any owies, Thomas?” Lily said.
“What’s an ‘owie’?” the teenage boy said.
But before Lily had a chance to say, “You know, a booboo, a cut or a scrape or something,” the air was filled with the screaming of sirens. The teenager’s face drained, and his eyes went wild.
“I just lost control!” he said. “It was the ice! I couldn’t help it!”
His voice was so frightened that even little Thomas started to cry. Lily put her hands on his arms to rub them again, but he stuck his own arms out and hurled himself against her. There was nothing to do but fold him up in a hug.
“It’s okay, Thomas,” Lily said to him. “You’re okay.”
The teenage boy was not okay. The minute a police officer got out of his car and started toward him, the kid broke into tears. It made Lily feel like she wanted to be somewhere else. Fortunately, the policeman took him aside.
But then little Thomas started to whimper.
“You’re okay,” Lily said. “You aren’t hurt. It’s okay—”
“I am too hurt,” Thomas said.
Lily pulled him away from her a little and looked at him. “Where?” she said.
“My tummy,” he said. “It hurts a lot.”
“Oh,” Lily said.
She looked around for someone to call to, but the flock of uniformed adults who had just arrived all seemed to be either running around or hovering around the person on the ground. Lily looked back at Thomas. He was leaning over at the middle now, and his eyes were looking funny, like he couldn’t quite focus them.
“Um . . . why don’t you lie down, and I’ll get somebody to help us,” Lily said.
“Don’t leave!” Thomas said, and he clutched at her sleeve with his fingers. Lily noticed for the first time that he didn’t have gloves on, and his little fingers were red and stiff.
“Okay, but lie down. And put these on.”
She peeled off her knit mittens and slid them over his tiny hands. Then she got him to curl up in the blanket with his head in her lap.
“You smell like pizza,” he murmured.
It was the kind of voice a person used when he was about to fall asleep, and it scared Lily. She twisted around and caught sight of a paramedic walking away from the person on the ground, right toward them.
“This one’s okay?” the paramedic called to her.
“I don’t think so,” Lily called back. “He says his stomach hurts. And his eyes look funny and his lips are blue and he’s falling asleep.”
The paramedic’s steps got faster, and he already had his little flashlight out when he got to them.
“Hey, fella,” he said to Thomas as he shined the light in his eyes.
“His name’s Thomas,” Lily said.
“Stretcher over here!” the paramedic called out. “We’re gonna have to take you to the hospital, Thomas,” he said.
“Mommy!” Thomas said.
“Mommy’s going too, only she’s getting a different ride. You’ll see her when you get there.”
“You come with me.”
Thomas was looking right at Lily, his eyes trying hard to stay focused.
“Is this your sister?” the paramedic said.
“I didn’t even know him until just now,” Lily said.
The paramedic gave a grim grin. “He sure likes you.” He went on doing things to Thomas as he talked. “Thanks for staying here with him. The other driver told us he thought the little guy was all right.” He grunted softly. “’Course, he has a reason to want him to be all right.”
Thomas whimpered, and Lily leaned down over him. “You will be okay, Thomas,” she said.
“Sure, he will. All right, fella. We’re gonna put you on this stretcher and give you a wild ride. How would you like that?”
Thomas’s face puckered weakly. “I want her to take me.”
h friends