Drowning

Chapter 60:

My eyes opened and burned from the bright fluorescent lights hanging above me. My head was pounding and my vision was blurry. I looked up at the bright white ceiling above me and didn't know where I was. I lifted my right hand up to touch my face and the weight of my arm felt foreign. When I looked down at my arm, it was covered in a bright blue cast. My whole body began to ache.

Why did I have a cast on my arm?

Why did my body hurt so much?

At my first movement, my Mom, Dad, and JD rushed to my side.  It looked like I was in a hospital bed. My mind was blank and I had no idea how I ended up here.  Did something happen to me?

"Riley, Peanut, are you ok? How are you feeling?" My Mom was crying as she held on tightly to the rail of the bed.

"We're here, Riley. I am so sorry." JD croaked out.

My Dad just stood in the back of the room with tears in his eyes and his arms crossed in front of him.

This was too much for me. I laid there in shock. The bodies surrounding my tiny bed overwhelmed me. I still don't know what happened or why I was even here. The last thing I remembered was driving to the party with JD and Anna. I was feeling sorry for myself and missed Ezra. JD looked fine, so what had happened to me?

"Honey, you were in a car accident." My Mom slowly told me as she rubbed the arm without the cast. I winced in pain and she moved her arm back. "I'm so sorry, baby."

"JD, are you and Anna ok?" I asked him. JD looked like nothing had happened to him, but I didn't see Anna by his side. Anna was always standing next to JD. Where was she?

JD passed a concerned look to my Mom and then one to my Dad. He looked baffled at my question. He took a long time to respond to me like he was not sure what to say next. My parent's faces mirrored JD's. I was a little dazed, but clear enough to see that I was missing something.

"Anna's ok, right? She didn't..." No, that sounded crazy. JD would not be standing here with me if something happened to her.

"Anna's fine. What do you remember?" JD asked me.

We were in the car on our way to Aiden's grandparent's house. I was sitting in the backseat and you two were in the front." Something in my story felt like it was missing. The timeline in my head wasn't quite right. Everything was so jumbled and fragmented. I must have hit my head pretty hard in the accident.

My Mom and JD exchanged another worried glance. My Dad looked at both of them and stepped closer to my bed.

"Enough with this. Why do you all keep looking at each other like that? Am I missing something?" A small tear trickled down my cheek and stung a spot underneath my eye. I must have had a cut on my face. I wanted to reach up and touch it, but my body hurt too much to move.

Dad grasped the rail of the hospital bed a little too tightly. His light brown eyes had lost the spark they normally had. He began to speak softly to me.

"Honey, you weren't in the car with JD and Anna. You were with Ezra. JD said he left the party after he saw you two together." Dad paused, not sure what to say next and took a deep sigh before starting again. "Aiden called him when you left the party with Ezra. JD tried to call you, but you never picked up. We got a call from the hospital and they said you and Ezra had been in an accident."

My mind was blank.

The sound of crushing metal flashed through my brain. I could feel the panic and terror in my body, but none of the pieces lined up to make any kind of sense in my head. Ezra's angry voice was there too, but I didn't even remember being with him.