When We Were Wildflowers

Chapter 18 - Realizations

When Mom pops the trunk, my body leaps into action, picking up my bike and resting in the space behind the row of leather seats but my mind is still skipping on her words like a broken record. 

There's been an accident. There's been an accident. There's been an accident.

I race to the side door and climb into the backseat. "What happened? Is he okay?"

"Car wreck. He's conscious and in stable condition the nurse said, but he has a head injury.."Mom shifts into drive and speeds down the narrow lane at 40 miles per hour. "Why didn't you answer your phone? I've been calling for 30 minutes."

"Sorry, Mom."

The useless situation with Poppy tumbles from my mind like a penny from my pocket, and all I can think of is Dad. My only regret  now is not calling mom back and taking the long way home. I pray silently that he is okay, and everyone else involved is too. Although the hospital is only a 15-minute drive, time passes in anxious silence making it feel like twice as long before we pull up to ER entrance and Mom parks at the end of a line of parking spaces marked 'For Physicians Only.'

I don't bother asking if it's safe to park there because Mom and Teddy are already jumping out of the car, nearly running to the sliding glass doors. Following closely behind, I watch Mom approach a man sitting behind a glass wall. She reaches into her purse and flashes her ID, and within a minute, we are whisked away from the crowded waiting room by a nurse in a face mask and blue scrubs, through the thick Emergency Room door, past rows of narrow rooms with empty beds, into a small, dark space where Dad is laying in a white hospital gown, buried underneath a dusty blue blanket. 

When we walk in, I am hoping for a warm smile but Dad doesn't look up at us at all. My eyes take in my father in this broken state: the monitors beeping at his side, the bloody bandage on his brow, and his broken arm pinned against his chest in a sling. In this moment, it is clear to me my parents are no longer the immortal super heroes of my youth and I am somehow older, aging years in an instant.

I rush to Dad's side. "I'm so glad you are all right."

He reaches out with his free hand and tugs a strand of my hair behind my ear. "I'll be okay, sweetie. Just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"How's the car?" Teddy asks.

"Well, uh, the car is, uh, fine, actually." Dad stammers between words, and for a second I worry it's because of his head injury, but when he looks up at Mom with plaintive eyes, it dawns on me. 

There's something he's afraid to say.

I've seen this look on Dad's face before: pressed lips, sunken brows a gloomy gray cast over his brown eyes. It was the same way he looked at me when I asked why our cat Bruno never came home from the vet's office when I was five.

"What do you mean?" Mom takes a step back. "I thought you were taking it in for an oil change when you got into the wreck?"

"We can talk about it later." The words sputter from his mouth like an engine running out of gas.

"No, we'll talk about it now." Mom sways in the threshold of the doorway, between worlds, not quite fully committed to this new reality.

With a defeated sigh, Dad motions toward the door with his good arm and speaks, his voice lacking its charactaristic richness and vigor. "Kids, why don't you go out into the hallway and see if you can find a soda machine or something. I need to speak to Mom alone."

Teddy and I lock eyes, and from his dumbfounded expression, it's clear we're thinking the same thing. What the heck is going on? Dramatic tension settles in the room like cold, dense fog and it is impossible to determine what strange truth is obscured from our eyes.