K. Bromberg: Crashed

There’s a knock on the stall door. “Mmm-hmm?” is all I can manage because my breathing is still forced and irregular.

“It’s Quin.” Her voice is soft and uneven, and it kills me to hear the break in it. “Ry, please come out …”

I reach forward and unlock the door, and she pushes it open looking at me oddly, her tear stained face and smudged mascara only emphasizing the devastation looming in her eyes. She purses her lips and starts laughing, in a way that’s borderline hysterical so when it echoes off of the tile walls around us all I hear is despair and fear. She points to my half-shoved down shorts and checkered panties and keeps laughing, the tears staining her cheeks an odd contrast to the sound coming from her mouth.

I start laughing with her. It’s the only thing I can do. Tears won’t come, fear won’t abate, and hope is wavering as the first laugh falls from my lips. It feels so wrong. Everything is just so wrong and within an instant, Quinlan—the woman who hated me at first sight—reaches out and wraps her arms around me while her laughter turns into sobs. Gut wrenching hiccups of unfettered fear. Her tiny frame shakes as her anguish intensifies.

“I’m so scared, Rylee.” It’s the only thing she can manage to get out between hitches of breath, but it’s all she needs to say because it’s exactly how I feel. The defeat in her posture, the fortitude of her grief, the strength in her grip reflects the fear that I’m not able to express, so I cling to her with everything I have—needing that connection more than anything.

I hug her and soothe her as best as I can, trying to lose myself in the role of patient counselor I know so well. It’s so much easier to assuage someone else’s despair than to face my own. She tries to pull away, but I just can’t let go. I don’t have the wherewithal to walk out the doors and wait for the doctor to report news I’m terrified to hear.

I fasten my shorts and look up to meet my own reflection in the mirror. I can see the haunting memories flickering in my eyes. My mind flashes to a shattered rearview mirror, sun reflecting on its blood-specked, jagged edges as Max gurgles his last breath. And then my mind grasps onto a happier memory with another mirror. One used in the heat of passion to demonstrate why I’m enough for Colton. Why he chooses me .

“C’mon,” she whispers, breaking my trance as she releases me but moves her hand down to wrap around my waist. “I don’t want to miss an update.”

Time has stretched. Each minute feels like an hour. And each of the three hours that have passed feel like an eternity. Each swoosh of the doors has us all startling and then sinking back down. Empty Styrofoam cups spill over the wastebasket. Fire suits have been unzipped and tied around waists as the waiting room grows stuffy. Cell phones ring incessantly with people searching for updates. But there’s still no news.

Beckett sits with Andy. Dorothea has Quinlan on one side of her and Tawny on the other. The waiting room is full of hushed murmurs and the television plays background to my thoughts. I sit by myself and except for the constant texts from Haddie, I welcome the solitude so I don’t have to comfort or be comforted—the schizophrenia in my mind only getting louder with each passing second.

My stomach churns. I’m hungry but the thought of food makes me nauseous. My head pounds but I welcome the pain, welcome the drum of it to count to as I try to speed up time. Or slow it down—whichever is to the benefit of Colton.

The electronic beep of the door. The squeak of shoes. I don’t even open my eyes this time.

“I have an update on Mr. Donavan.” The voice jolts me. Feet shuffle as the guys stand and an understated anxiety hums through the room in anticipation of what is going to be said.

Fear grips me. I can’t stand. Can’t move. I’m so petrified of the words that are going to pass through his lips that I force a swallow down my throat but remain paralyzed with trepidation

I squeeze my hands, gripping them into the bare flesh of my thighs, trying to use the pain to bury the memories. Willing the past to not repeat itself—to not trade one wrecked car with a man that I love for another.

He clears his throat and I suck in a breath—praying, hoping, needing some kind of scrap to hold on to. “Let me just say that scans are still ongoing at this point but from what we can tentatively see, it’s obvious that Mr. Donavan has suffered a sudden deceleration injury with an internal organ disruption from the force in which he hit the catch fence. The injury occurs because the body is forcibly stopped but the organs inside the body remain in motion due to the inertia. From what we can tell …”

“English, please,” I whisper. My mind tries to comprehend the medical jargon, knowing that if I wasn’t swimming in this fog of uncertainty, I’d be able to process it. He stops at my comment and even though I can’t lift my eyes to meet his, I say it louder this time. “English, please, doctor.” Fear overwhelms me. I cautiously lift my eyes to meet his, the crew turning to look at me while I stare at the doctor. “We’re all very worried here and while you may understand what you’re saying, the terminology is scaring the shit out of us...” my voice fades and he nods kindly, “...our minds are too overwhelmed to process this all right now … it’s been a long wait for us while you’ve been with him … so can you please just tell us in simple terms?”

He smiles gently at me but his eyes are grave. “When Colton hit the wall, the car stopped—his body stopped—but his brain kept going, slamming into the skull surrounding it. Fortunately he was wearing a HANS device which helped to protect the connection between his spine and his neck, but the injury he sustained is serious nonetheless.”

My heart races and my breath labors as a million different possible outcomes flicker through my mind.

“ Will he …?” Andy moves into my view facing the doctor and asks the question he can’t complete. Silence descends upon the room and the nervous shifting of feet stops as we all wait for the answer with baited breath.

“Mr. Westin, I presume?” the doctor asks as he holds out his hand to a nodding Andy. “I’m Dr. Irons. I’m not going to lie to you … your son’s heart arrested—stopped twice during transport.”

I feel as if the bottom of my soul has dropped out with those words. Don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me. I plead silently, willing the words to hit him somewhere within the confines of this hospital.

Andy reaches out and squeezes Dorothea’s hand.

“We were able to get his heart regulated after a bit which is a good sign as we were afraid that possibly his aorta had torn from the force of the impact. At this point in time we know that he has a subdural hematoma.” The doctor looks up and meets my eyes before continuing. “This means that the blood vessels ruptured and the area between his brain and the skull is filling with blood. The situation is twofold because Colton’s brain is swelling from the trauma of hitting his skull. At the same time, the pooling blood is putting pressure on his brain because there is nowhere for it to escape to relieve said pressure.” Dr. Irons scans the eyes of the crew surrounding him. “At this time he’s more stable than not, so we are prepping him for surgery. It’s imperative that we go in and relieve the pressure on his brain to try and stop the swelling.”

I watch Dorothea reach over and cling to Andy for support, the obvious unconditional love for her son pulls on my every emotion.

“How long is the surgery? Is he conscious? Were there any other injuries?” Beckett speaks for the first time, rapidly firing off the questions we are all thinking.