That Moment

3. This is it

I have had nightmares before- falling nightmares, failing-my-Math-exam-nightmares (especially them), playing-a-Violin-without-knowing-the-music nightmares; But I have always been able to command my small mortal mind to wake up, bang my pillow, to halt the horror movie playing behind my closed lids. So I tried again. Wake up! I scream. Wakeupwakeupwakeupwakeup! But I can't. I don't.

But the music's still playing. I still hear it. So I concentrate on that, instead of thinking about what happened. Could human brains explode from too many worrisome thoughts? Maybe. Try it someday. And also let me know. If I'm alive. Soon the last bit of the car dies, and the music goes with it.

It isn't long after the sirens come.

9:40 A.M

Okay,  am I dead?

I actually have to ask myself.

Am I dead?

At first it seems obvious that I am.

The standing-here-and-watching was the intermission before the bright life and the light-flashing- before- me business  would probably transport me to heaven. 

Except the paramedics are here now. The police and the fire department are on the way. At least that's what the rookie beside my sister's body said. Someone had put a sheet on Uncle Eric and Dad. Mom was packed in a blue plastic bag. I couldn't hear most of the conversations between the two people next to my Dad's corpse. The older guy was explaining something to him, probably how this incident took place. "This is very common in areas where it snows."

Then there's a nurse next to my mom's body. She takes on look at my Mom and seals up the plastic bag. I can't see Mom anymore. Her soothing blue eyes, curly blonde pixie-cut hair, that warm smile, I would never get to see that face again. I can't think about this.

But still, am I dead? The me who is lying on the edge of the road, surrounded by a team of men and women performing frantic ablution over me and plugging my veins with I do not know what.

Gwen too was surrounded by a group of people poking her with needles. The cut on her head stopped bleeding. Gosh, she'd be terrified if she knew she was gonna be poked around with needles. She hated them. She hated vaccination. She hated blood testes. She basically would cry every time she'd have to go to the hospital. (See that's why I find her very little indeed even though she's 17. Also this is supposed to be a secret.)   Now that I guess I'm dead, she won't be there to assault me if I tell you all her secrets.

Horrified seeing this, I look away. The police have lit flares along the perimeter of the scene instructing vehicles to  turn back, the road is closed. The police politely offer alternate routes, to take back people to where they need to be.

But a few of them still don't turn back. They climb out of their cars, appraise the scene and turn away and become pale. Some of them are even crying, one woman throwing up on the side of the road. And even when they don't know who we are or what happened, they pray for us. 

I can feel them praying.

Which also makes me feel I'm dead. That and the fact that my body's completely numb. I should be in agony. And I'm not crying either, even though something unthinkable has just happened to my family. We are like Humpty Dumpty and all the King's men cannot fix us back together at the moment.