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Maybe this is real. Maybe I can have a different kind of life. With him…
Slowly, hesitantly, I reached over and took his hand, warm and strong, and held on. He turned to me, his smile widening, his fingers twining with mine. I’d never seen anyone look at me like he did in that moment, and the sudden warmth that flooded me had nothing to do with the truck’s heater. It flowed between the broken pieces of me, melting them down so maybe they’d have a chance to come back together.
Love. This is love. I’m in love with him.
I swallowed hard, the words on my lips for the first time in my life. “River, I…” Out of my peripheral, I saw a dark shape in the road ten yards ahead. “Look out!”
River dropped my hand and gripped the wheel. “Oh shit,” he bit out and slammed on the brakes, swerving hard right as the headlights illuminated a deer bounding in front of the truck.
I saw the deer’s eyes, wide and black, and then the truck was spinning, sliding off the side of the road. My world tilted sickly. Turned upside down. The sounds of shattering glass, denting metal and my own blood roared in my ears.
The truck hovered in a frozen moment that lasted forever, then slammed down on its four wheels. The impact reverberated in my skull. In my bones. I saw nothing but black and then the sudden white of an inflating air bag exploding in my face.
Silence. The only sound was the truck settling and the hissing of my breath. I waited for the pain to find me, but shock cocooned me in a bubble, and alcohol had made me limp and loose.
Slowly, I turned my head and another agonized sound—born in my heart—fell out of my mouth.
River sat slumped forward, tethered by his seatbelt. Blood streaked darkly across the white of the deflating airbag. With trembling fingers, I reached up and flipped on the cab light and another strangled sound burbled out of my throat. River’s face was deathly pale, his chin resting on his chest that rose and fell in almost imperceptible breaths.
“River!”
My voice was tattered, torn to shreds with fear, my hands shaking as I fumbled at my seatbelt, then the door handle. The door gave and I tumbled out onto the pine-needle covered ground. My body bent in half and vomit spewed out of me in an acid fountain of vodka and sour bile.
When I could stand, I made my way around the truck, legs buckling every other step. The roof of the car was dented, and River’s side crushed.
We rolled. Holy fuck…
With strangled moans, I made it to the driver’s side door. The window was smashed in; safety glass glittered over River’s black pants like diamonds. By the lone light of the cab, River looked asleep but for the blood staining his shirt. A gash had been torn into the left side of his temple and his breath hitched shallowly. A fresh shockwave of terror bolted through me to see blood trickling from his ear.
“River, no…”
I yanked at the handle, but the metal was warped, the sidemirror gone. Sagging against the door, I reached inside the broken window and took River’s hand in mine. He was limp, unmoving.
“Please…wake up. River, wake up…”
Tears blurred my vision as I fumbled my other hand in my coat pocket for my phone. The screen was cracked but it still worked. With a trembling thumb, I dialed 9-1-1 and put it to my ear. Taking off my coat with my phone in it before I walked into the fucking ocean was the only thing I’d done right the whole night.
“9-1-1, what is your emergency?”
“There’s been an accident. It’s bad. Hurry, please.”
“Where are you?”
I fell back against the door, staring around the darkened forest and the ocean beyond, hopeless panic rising as I strug
gled to remember a road sign…anything.
This is my fault. And he’s going to die…
“I don’t know… On the 1, eastbound.” Then a flash of memory cut across the dark night. “We passed a sign… Wilder Ranch.”
“Okay, stay on the line with me. I’m sending emergency response to your location. Is anyone injured?”
I gripped River’s hand tighter. “Yes. He won’t wake up. Please, hurry… Please.”
“Is he breathing?”
“Barely. I can’t open the door.”
