Touched

Touched *19*

Everything seemed to happen in extremely irritating slow-motion.

The minute Fern's eyes slipped shut when Sam kissed her, he knew something had happened. Something bad. And then she'd fainted.

Sam caught her as she fell, and realized she wasn't moving at all. She looked...

Dead.

"No," Sam whispered.

But now there was no time to waste. He flung Fern into his arms (she was tiny, no problem) and flew down the stairs, putting her on the hard wooden floor so her back would be straighter.

"Sam?" Dan called from the living room. "What..."

"CALL 911!" he screamed, tripping over his own feet as he ran to the phone. He stabbed the buttons and waited impatiently while Ava and Dan fled to Fern.

Someone picked up, and Sam began to blubber.

"We have a medical emergency! My friend, I was just kiss- uh, standing with her and then she just fainted onto the ground and..."

"SAM! Tell them she's not breathing!" Dan yelled. Ava was sobbing already.

"And she's not breathing. Something's seriously wrong I swear what if..."

"It's okay, son. Calm down." It was a woman's voice. "I'll have ambulances sent down immediately. Please say the address of where you're at."

Sam quickly gave the address and hung up, running back to Fern.

"Oh, God," Ava wailed. "What could've happened? Why did she faint? Sam, can you tell me what happened?"

"I was just...standing with her and she collapsed." A sickening thought struck Sam. What if she'd been in so much shock by his kiss she'd lost consciousness? Was that even possible?

Sam felt as if he was going to throw up. Literally.

He didn't get a chance to, because there was a loud knock on the door, along with the wailing of an ambulance. They were fast.

Dan rushed to open the door, and a paramedics team burst in with a stretcher. They checked Fern's pulse and said it was faintly, faintly there, but weakening. They put her on the stretcher and carefully loaded her into the ambulance.

"Two of you can come along," one nurse informed them.

"You guys go," Sam said quickly. He didn't want to be framed for murder just yet. "I'll go home."

Dan & Ava nodded and slipped into the ambulance, which sped away at the speed of light.

Sam's heart began to slam like it never had before. He rushed into his own house, ignoring his parents, and went to his bedroom, where his Mac was. He powered it on impatiently.

He googled around a bit, trying to figure out if shock could cause death. Only extreme, extreme shock. Could a kiss count as extreme?

Somewhere on the page, a link about "heart attacks" showed up and Sam clicked on it. He read the symptoms and main causes - Heart disease, obesity...

Smoking.