The Other Man

Prologue

The red sky burned into the snowy surface on this early December night. I sat in my room, all ready to go to bed, wanting to go outside and play.  I looked through the blue curtain, while sitting in my blue and green pajamas.  Then, my mom called me, "Jake come to the living room." So I ran down the stairs and calmly walked over to her in her green dress that matched perfectly with the big evergreen.  She handed me my favorite orange ornament to put on the tree. Next, my dad and sister appeared from the kitchen and were handed green and blue ornaments to put up.  They returned to the kitchen to take out the white chocolate chip cookies from the oven.  My sister, then, took the rainbow decoration to put perfectly on the tree.  She yanked the purple ornament out of my hand and put that one up on the tree, too.  Once we fit all the ornaments we could, my dad lifted up my little sister up.  My mom handed her the snow-white angel with the golden blonde hair to put up on the top of the tree.  Once done, my dad set the timer up on the black camera and took our annual Christmas photo.  We printed off dozens for family and friends.  Shortly after the holidays I found a copy lying on the kitchen island.  I swiftly took it and set it on my desk in my room.  That is the last photo of my dad.

Sirens wailed and tires squealed as police sped through town.  The driver of the car they were chasing never slowed down.  Then, as we pulled off to the side of the road...BANG!!!!!! We were off the road and nose first into the river, though we weren't in the water the front end was, I was trapped and my dad, who was driving, was unconscious.  "Help somebody, help us," I screamed.  When I stopped for a moment all I heard was my heavy breathing and the sound of the river streaming.  After a moment, I heard men coming down the bank, "Hello, hello, is anyone down here," the officers yelled.  They approached the side windows and started to help.  Almost instantly, medics and firefighters were down by the side of the car.  First, they got my dad while a police officer calmed me.  Soon my mom and sister arrived, by now I had been brought up from the car. They rushed my dad to the hospital and I followed in another ambulance.  My mom was with my dad and my sister was picked up by our neighbors and her best friend.

I woke up in a hospital bed with my mom sobbing by the side with my aunts, uncles, and grandparents.  Once I was fully awake I asked what was wrong, but they were crying so much they couldn't stop to tell me.  Once they calmed down my mom said, "your father died," and started crying even more and I cried with her.

Once I regained my composure I asked my mom, "does Molly know about dad?"

"No," she spit out through her loud sobs.

At that moment, Molly and Christy walked in followed by our neighbors and we all tried to stop crying.

"Molly, daddy's not here, he died" My mom and I said in sync. The room went silent, and then Molly ran over to me and cried next to me on the side of my bed.