Chasing Spring(55)

I gulped down some of the water, but as I pulled the cup away from my mouth the room spun around me.

“Trent are you sure there wasn't much rum in that drink?” I asked, looking up at him. The edges of his face were blurred and I squinted, trying to make him out in the fuzziness.

He smiled and shrugged. “Nope. Not much rum at all.”

I should have paid more attention to that grin, but it was my turn to draw a card. I reached out to grab a card off the top of the deck and everyone shouted. I blinked my eyes again, feeling the same dizziness overtaking me. When I moved to sit back in my seat, a sharp feeling of vertigo overtook over me.

I tried to tell Ashley that I had a headache and didn't want to keep playing, but the words came out muddled and slow.

“What the hell did you put in her drink, Trent?” Ashley snapped.

The last thing I remembered was the laughter of the three boys rolling joints on the couch. They sounded like a pack of cackling hyenas.





Chapter Fifty-Three


Chase





Springtime had always let me down. The season had an uncanny ability to disappoint me and that year was no different, except for Lilah. That year I had Lilah. Lilah and a drunk dad.

Kimberly had called me twice during Physics and by the time I’d finally returned her call in the guys bathroom, she was frantic.

“Your dad was in an accident.”

“What?”

“A car accident,” she clarified.

I stared at myself in the bathroom mirror and asked the question that could forever change my life.

“Is he still alive?”

The details were minimal: my dad had been driving home when he’d run his car off the road. An ambulance had taken him to the county hospital where Kimberly’s mom, an ER nurse, had been there to admit him.

I met Kimberly at the back of the school and followed her out to her car, hoping she'd have a lead foot the entire drive to the hospital. I couldn't think past the idea of being an orphan, of being completely alone. Can someone become an orphan at eighteen or is that a term only used for children? My dad was hardly a dad, but he was better than nothing.

Kimberly put her car into park and I ran inside the emergency waiting room, scrambling to find someone who could point me in the right direction. There were bright-colored signs everywhere, leading to and from wards and checkin desks.

I ran to the first desk I saw and tried to speak as calmly as possible.

“Excuse me,” I said to the nurse. She was multitasking, filling out a chart while on the phone. I didn’t care. “Excuse me.”

“Just give me a second,” she said, eyeing me with annoyance.

There was a spectrum between the two possibilities and I didn't know which end of it I should start preparing for. If I prepared myself for the worst, then I couldn’t be surprised.

The set of double doors beside the reception desk swung open and Kimberly's mom stepped into the waiting room in pale blue scrubs. Without a word, she guided me back to sit in a chair against the wall. Her kind eyes sought mine and she took a deep breath before beginning.

“I don't want to sugarcoat this for you, Chase. Your father was in a very bad accident. His car flipped off the road and landed upside down in a ditch. The paramedics were called to the scene immediately and the fire department helped pull him from the car. Once they had him in the ambulance, they checked his blood alcohol level. Most people would have been unconscious with the amount of alcohol he had in his system.”

“He's built up a high tolerance over the years,” I explained, not to defend him, but just to explain that sad fact to her.

She blinked and kept her eyes closed for a moment before continuing.

“There's quite a bit of internal bleeding. He's in surgery now so the doctors can find the source and repair the damage as best as possible. Once they have that under control they can focus on the other injuries he sustained.”

“Did he hurt anyone else on the road?” I asked, needing to know that answer before continuing. I couldn't care about my father's injuries until I knew if he'd injured anyone else.

“Thankfully, no.”

I took a deep breath and then sat there listening to her continue to list the damage. It was surprisingly hard to hear it all through unbiased ears. My mind was already spinning scenarios, trying to figure out how it would impact my father. Would he care? Would he change his life? Would he go right back to his self-destructive ways?

I felt sick at how impossibly selfish he'd been getting behind the wheel of car in that kind of state, even worse so because I knew it hadn't been the first time. I had never felt more grateful for Coach Calloway's foresight in taking me in; this was exactly the kind of thing he wanted to protect me from.

Mrs. White patted my hand and promised to update me as soon as she had more information. I nodded and let her walk back through the shiny chrome double doors.

I'm not sure how long I sat there before Kimberly walked in with some Chinese food from a restaurant down the street. I guessed she'd gone to grab something after dropping me off.

“Here, you should eat,” she said, opening the to-go boxes and preparing a small meal for me. The thought of food repulsed me, but I didn't want to offend her, so I took the plate and set it on my lap, swirling the noodles into a smooth spiral.