“Miss Green, can you tell us what happened?”
“Can you feel this?”
“Did you see the van run the light?”
“Miss Green, can you hear me?”
Phoenix slipped back into consciousness, fluorescent light zooming over her head like spaceships, several people hovering over her like alien beings, bright light cascading over their features. She felt a river of blood flow from the open gash on her forehead into her mouth, the taste bitter and surreal.
“I’m fine,” Phoenix responded softly, the moroseness of the situation slowly diffusing into her brain, hysteric adrenaline shooting through her body like fast-acting poison. “I’m fine, I’m fine. Where’s Madison?! Where’s Ethan?! Where are they?!”
“They’re being taken care of as we speak,” a tall, skinny woman assured her, her golden hair frizzing away from her ponytail holder as she kept up with the speeding stretcher, being a traffic cop, yelling for people to move out of the way.
“What do you mean being taken care of?!” Phoenix cried, making a futile effort to climb out of the stretcher in motion, her head spinning as if she went on ‘The Gravitron’ too many times in a row, “Are they hurt? Where are they?!”
“Please, Miss Green,” an elder doctor hushed her, “Let’s take care of the matter at hand.”
Phoenix wanted to protest, but she didn’t have the strength, a heavy weight being pushed against her body as she fell to the stretcher lifelessly. . .
~*~
Benji sat anxiously in the drab waiting room of the hospital with Paul, Joel, and their manager, Steve, but he hid his anxiety well trying to focus on a 7-month old ‘Spin’ magazine. His head was swimming and being tormented with mixed thoughts, his eyes squinting in effort to stop thinking. ‘It was the road, not me,’ Benji convinced himself, running his tongue over his dry lips, ‘It was like a hurricane out there. You could barely see!’ There may have been another reason why he couldn’t see, but he’d done it before. Everyone has! Driven after a drink or two. The only reliable thing about him was his drinking, knowing when to drink and when to stop. He wished his Dad would have had that trait. Maybe he’d still be in his and Joel’s life. With the extreme conditions which the police were under hindering their judgment, the rain, the traffic, the fatigue, they could have well forgotten to give him a breathalyzer or just assumed that the road was the cause of this crash. They weren’t good police officers then. Was this a test? Was this a punishment? Was this an end?
“What a time to get a hangover,” Paul groaned, hunching over and rubbing his fingers over his temples, his blonde locks wilting over his brown eyes.
“You get hangovers in the morning, Dumbass,” Joel retorted austerely, his hands folded across his chest and his slouching posture displaying how tired he was.
“What time is it?” Paul asked curiously, glancing around the room for a clock.
“3 AM,” Steve responded evenly, staring into an abyss in front of him with his sad, green eyes. The waiting room was occupied by misfortuned, miserable people, holding on to a hope. You could hear the heat hissing from the ancient radiator, almost like an alarm. You could see the cracks splintering the bashe walls like the spirits of many who enter this room. You could feel the dismay, the death hanging in the air like a soakened sponge. Steve was upset to see that fate had dealt them this card, injuring Billy and possibly canceling the rest of the tour, even though there was only a week left. Steve rarely ever showed his emotions. Emotions get you caught up in things you don’t want to be involved with. The guys hate to cancel gigs and Steve felt selfish for thinking this way, considering Billy could be seriously hurt, but that’s what managers are for, to guide and manage people’s careers. “I wish Billy’s parents would get here.”
“Anyone here for Billy Martin?” an elder doctor enquired as he stepped into the room, his glasses too big for his gray eyes, only little tuffs of white hair were gracing his head, his twitchy hand clinging to a pen and clipboard.
“We are,” Joel replied, dashing up from his marooned-cushioned seat, Benji, Paul, and Steve following quickly after.
“What’s the diagnosis, Doctor Learner?” Steve enquired eagerly.
“Considering the van skidded through the stop light at 50 mph, you must have all been touched by the hand of God,” Doctor Learner responded truthfully, “Billy received minor injuries, cuts, bruises, a few deep lacerations on his back, and a broken arm, tibia to be precise. We’re going to put his arm in a cast and keep him for 24 hours for observation.”
A ton of boulders was lifted off their shoulders and their hearts, relieved sighs exhaled thankfully, Joel and Paul patting each other on the shoulders and Steve clapping his hands together, staring up into the ceiling. Benji did nothing. “Who did we hit?” Benji asked timidly, lopping his fingers through his black and red plaid bondage pants.
“3 people,” Dr. Learner answered, “I don’t remember exactly who because I don’t have their files with me now, but 2 girls and a boy. Both girls seem to be doing well. The boy…” he hesitated, trying to pick the right words, his face being easily read by all of them, “Only time will tell.”
~*~
“Dr. Learner,” Phoenix smiled blissfully as he entered the room, Phoenix feeling well after her 8 off-and-on hours of sleep, having been woken up every hour by a nurse because of her concussion, the only injury she received besides stitches on her forehead. It seemed like she didn’t even remember the night before, which made Dr. Learner even more tangled with emotions inside by delivering his news.
“I feel like a million bucks,” Phoenix beamed, sitting up in her white hospital bed, gazing out of the window into the crisp fall day, tucking her dull hair behind her ears. Leaves were falling like snowflakes to the ground, leaving the brown and grey trees without warmth for winter. She had her health and her friends, that’s all that mattered.
“I thought I should tell you about how your friends are doing,” Dr. Learner cut to the chase, sliding a gray chair located by the door and adjusting his large glasses on his face.
“I’m sure they’re fine,” Phoenix assured the doctor like she was all-knowing, patting him genially on the arm, “I seem to be coming back together well. You guys do well here.”
“Phoenix,” Dr. Learner morosely began, placing his wrinkled hand over hers, Phoenix’s face morphing into concern at his gesture, “Do you remember anything about last night? You were hit at 50 mph. Your car is now scrap metal. Madison has a slipped disk in her back and deep fractures in her legs and ankles which we need to repair with surgeries. The passengers in the van are all fine, except for a young man who broke his arm.”
Phoenix sat pensively still, shifting her blue eyes to the white wall beyond Dr. Learner. “Who hit us, Doctor?”
“His name is Benjamin Madden, Benji for short,” Dr. Learner confided, glancing down at his chart to be sure.
Phoenix opened her mouth, but couldn’t speak. It was like the breath was sucked out of her. That name rang over and over again in her head like a migraine, ‘Benji…Benji…Benji…It couldn’t be!’’ So many emotions began to circle through her, shock, anger, sorrow, misbelief. Her blue eyes nearly tumbled out from her skull. “You…” she began softly, looking down at her white hospital gown fearfully, “You haven’t mentioned…Ethan.”
“There’s no easy way to say this,” Dr. Learner began, sitting stoically in his chair, “but Ethan has extreme amounts of internal bleeding and massive swelling of the brain, being on the side of impact. We’re trying to drain the fluid from his brain. His brain has little activity…”
“What are you trying to say?” Phoenix interrupted brusquely, her hands beginning to convulse at the thought of what the doctor would tell her, sweat beginning to snake onto her skin as she grabbed the sheets tight for dear life.
“He’s in a coma. There’s no telling if he will come out of it.”