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“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Cramp?”
“Uh, n-no,” she said, her hand at her back. “I need—” She stopped short, falling against me.
“Cricket?” I asked, worried.
“Home,” she whispered, the color draining from her face.
“Cricket!” I yelled, scooping her up in my arms as she collapsed toward the ground.
“Cricket,” I demanded, panicking, but she didn’t respond.
I checked for a pulse but it was weak. She was breathing though, shallowly. I ran with her in my arms up the deck and into the living room, shouting.
“Ellie! Emmett!”
I laid Cricket on the sofa and reached for the phone, dialing nine-one-one.
“Ellie!” I shouted once more before the operator answered.
“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”
“Uh, my girlfriend just collapsed and I’m not sure what’s wrong with her. Please,” I pleaded, “send an ambulance immediately.”
Ellie came bounding into the room, tying a robe around her waist. “What’s wrong?” she began but took in Cricket on the sofa.
“Emmett!” she shouted and ran over to her. “Oh Lord! Cricket,” she said, crying, “can you hear me?”
I hung up the phone and kneeled at her side. “I don’t know what happened,” I explained. “One minute she was fine, and the next she was grabbing at her back.”
Ellie was crying and smoothing Cricket’s hair from her face. “She, uh, she has kidney failure, Spencer.”
It felt like a bomb had just been dropped, shattering my perfect world.
“What?” I asked.
“The past year, she’s needed dialysis several times a week. She needs a transplant.”
My chest felt constricted and I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t have time to worry about anything other than getting Cricket help.
“What can I do?” I asked.
“Are they sending an ambulance?”
I shook my head. “No, a medevac.”
“Keep an eye out and guide them in?” she asked.
“Of course.”
I felt so helpless. I paced the deck back and forth, praying harder than I ever had before, begging God to save her, to keep her here. An agonizing, seven minutes later, the helicopter made its appearance in the sky. I jumped on the balls of my feet in anticipation. It felt like they took forever to set down in the bit of driveway in front of the main house. Two EMTs emerged, and I led them into the house while the pilot sat ready to leave as soon as possible. They rushed past me and into the house. I followed them, panicked, on the verge of falling to my knees and yanking out my hair. I had no idea what was going on. Just an hour before she was normal, happy, in my arms. I was kissing her. Falling more and more in love with her.
In a whirlwind, they had her on a gurney, and had flown off with the love of my life. I was left standing alone on the deck wondering what in the hell I was supposed to do.
“Come on, son,” Ellie said, wrapping her arm around me. “The hospital,” she explained.
I bounded down the deck stairs and opened Ellie’s door for her. Emmett promised to follow within minutes after he informed Jonah, Bridge and the rest of the hands.
The thirty minutes it took to drive to Kalispell were the longest of my life. We drove in absolute silence, both praying, both hoping when we got to the hospital that she’d be fine. That it’d be a false alarm. That she would be walking, talking, being her normal, happy, funny self.
