I Need You Now
.
I never knew what I had, until it was gone.
I’m sorry I was so foolish.
My cell phone rings at 3:13 am.
Grudgingly, I pick it up and press it to my ear.
“Annie! Get to the hospital as fast as you can!”
The urgency in your mother’s voice pulls me up from my pillow. “What’s going on?”
“Jason was attacked!”
Leaving Melody with my mother, I get in my car and speed to the hospital.
The doctors won’t even let us see you because your condition is too critical.
There are no answers, only questions to haunt us as we wait, minute after minute, hour after hour.
How could this have happened?
Who could have done it?
Why? For what reason would anyone beat you within an inch of your life, and leave you to die in a parking lot?
“… concussion …”
“… internal bleeding …”
“… induced coma …”
“… don’t know if he’ll pull through tonight …”
Too shocked for tears, I just wait with your mother and sister in the deserted waiting room until they let us in.
Four o’clock … five o’clock … six o’clock in the morning, and still waiting.
Chewed nails down to the stubs.
I need a smoke.
Your mother and I step out into the early morning light as the sun climbs over the horizon.
Trembling fingers light my cigarette.
No need for words. Only inhale, and exhale.
Despite only three hours worth of sleep, I am not tired.
Flick the ash and watch it flutter away in the breeze.
Where is God?
Inside, we finally speak with a doctor.
Little is still known.
“I don’t think he’s going to pull through. I’m very sorry.”
I can’t breathe.
This can’t be real.
All I can see is you holding Melody the day she was born three years ago.
I can’t do this alone…
Don’t leave me!
We’ve had our ups and downs.
You stayed by my side when I wasn’t so confident in myself.
YOU ARE READING
I Need You Now
Non-Fiction[One-shot -- Complete] You're leaving me, and there's nothing I can do to stop you. How can I tell our daughter that you died today? *On the anniversary of my stepbrother's near-death experience after a brutal attack, I wrote this from his girlfrien...
