Broken (NaNoWriMo)

Chapter 3

The words ring in my head, echoing around continuously. Like the sound when a CD skips and you just hear the same sound continuously. Like how when you say a word again and again until the word looses all meaning. They don’t make sense. I simply stand and stare for what feels like forever. I have no perception of time. I don’t know how long I stand there. It could be seconds, minutes or hours. I’d have no idea. My mind was blank except for Wades voice echoing in my head.

She’s dead.  Two words. She’s dead. Eight letters. She’s dead. A simple phrase.

She’s dead.

It hit me like a ton of bricks. My legs collapsed beneath me. I felt the cool tiles spread their refreshing temperature and texture through my body, relaxing my muscles further. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. She’s dead. Lilas is dead. Gone. Because of a freak accident. If we’d waited any longer to leave the school, she’d be alive. Right here. I’d be able to touch her. I can’t do that now. When was the last time I did touch her? Hug her? Smell her signature perfume or borrowed her designer clothes? I’d never do any of that again. Because of a freak accident. A stupid thing. Was this her fault? Could she have prevented it? What if she took a second longer at her locker? Stopped to tie her shoelace? Nothing could change what happened now. Nothing. She was gone. Forever. She could never come back. I couldn’t believe it. She had so much going for her, she had a promising modeling career and enough money as an eighteen year old to last her though college. She could have had the perfect life. And now she couldn’t. And I could have prevented it.

I could feel someone’s embrace around me. I didn’t know who and I couldn’t move. My arms hung limply at my sides and refused to move. I was paralysed with grief. I sat on the floor; so deep in my thoughts no one could reach me for a good half hour. By the time I’d come to my senses I’d been moved to a chair like the ones the others were in. My mother held my hands as I mumbled nonsense to myself. I finally looked up.

“She’s dead.” I whispered to no one in particular. No one moved.

Ryan and I were the only ones left in the hall, Trinity drove Wade home and they left over an hour ago. Everything was still confused and jumbled in my head. I heard footsteps approaching and slowly turned to face who they belonged to. My eyes met my mothers, her eyes weren’t like mine, she had green eyes and mine were more a pale grey. Although when I look at pictures of her when she was my age, we look strangely familiar.

“You two should get some sleep. It’s past midnight. Sam, you’re in room 207, Ryan, you can stay in the lounge as long as you need. I spoke with your parents earlier and they’re leaving Boston tomorrow, they’ll be home soon.” Ryan’s parents traveled a lot for work. They were usually gone seven months of the year and since my mother worked a lot, Ryan usually stayed at my house so my mom and him were pretty close. Ryan and I said our goodbyes for the night and walked in separate directions.

“Mom, I need to know. What happened?” I said suddenly, stopping in my tracks. My mother took a moment to face me.

“Come inside and we’ll talk.” She instructed, opening the door to the room marked 207. I made eye contact with her as I walked past and her face told me all I needed to know before we started, I wouldn’t be sleeping tonight.

I sat on the edge of the same hospital bed I’d been in for ten days, although the sheets had been replaced and flattened. I stared at my hands in my lap for a while while my mother fussed with buttons on a machine on the opposite side of the bed.

“We’ll need to hook you up to this overnight to monitor your vital signs.” She explained as she hit a button. The machine gave a long beep and flashed words I didn’t understand, my mother obviously did though, as she managed to bring it to a screen that had words I understood like heart rate, lung capacity and so on. She then picked up a thin tube and carried it over to me. I hadn’t even noticed but i had a disconnected IV tube in my hand. She attached my hand to the IV she brought over and the machine began to beep again to the steady beat of my heart. I thought of Lilas. Her heart would never beat again. The words hurt to think about.