AllFreeNovel
Share Us
That message was left three hours ago. Just as we’d been sitting in the back of an ambulance. Three hours. So much can change in three hours.
“What’s wrong?” Ben follows quickly behind me as I throw my discharge papers on the nearest nurses station and race down the corridor. I don’t know this place well enough - Mik takes Mom for her appointments and recent renovations left her turning in circles in the last month too - and I feel like I’m walking through quicksand.
“I’ve got to go. I’ve got to find Mik and - and -” My voice cracks as my chest does. Pain floors me and drags me down, and I know. I know within the very bones of my being that it’s too late.
I’m too late.
“Jamie.” Ben’s pulling me up, his eyes darting around the space for somewhere to take me. “What do I do?”
“I need air.” I choke on the words as he pulls me with him, guiding me out to the nearest exit.
She’sstandingintherain. Just standing there. And my body seems to shatter as I step towards her.
One step pushes me closer, then another, and then I’m running to her and she’s staring at me with empty eyes.
“Mik! Mikaela! I’m so sorry. I - Mik.” I reach out for her, crashing into her as she flinches away and pushes. She pushes hard.
“Don’t touch me.” Her voice is lifeless, dull.
“Mik -”
“I called you.” Her eyes are hollow as she tilts her head to the side. Her anger is seeping out with the rain, clinging to her skin but never reaching in. It doesn’t warm her with any fire. “I called you so many times, Jamie. Where were you?”
“We were in the emergency room.” I admit, far too aware of the smell of whiskey breathing from me. I reach towards her and she pulls away again. “My phone was on silent and I was getting my shoulder fixed and I - Mik, I’m so sorry. I should have been there.”
“We?” She laughs bitterly as a spark of something fans behind her eyes. Emotion, however small, takes hold and she stares at Ben. “Of course. I should have known Ben was involved.”
When I step closer this time she hits me.
Her fist smashes into my chest again and again as agony rises within her and her whispers become wails.
“Don’t fucking touch me.” She sobs. “Don’t touch me.” Its a knife in my chest. “You were supposed to be there.” Twisting. “You promised her.” Eviscerating. “You promised her you’d be there, Jamie. But you weren’t. You fucking weren’t.” She whimpers. “I hate you.” Whispers. “I hate you so much.”
I stand and I take every blow. I wrap around her as she pummels into my chest. I hold her as pain screams in my shoulder.
I let her break me because she is broken.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry.” My whispers are nothing, but they are truth. I sweep my hand over her hair and I hold her.
I hold my sister as she falls apart.
“You said you’d be there.” She crumbles. “Why weren’t you there, Jamie?”
I try to tell her. But when Ben speaks and tells her it was him - when Ben takes the fall for me again, like the time I stole his driver’s car - I can’t say the words. I can’t tell her the truth. Because even now, with this lie hanging over us, a lie I know is to save what little there is left of us, Mikaela freezes against me and pushes me away.
When she looks at me it’s as if she died too.
She backs away and moves towards Matthew’s car.
“I’ll let you know the funeral arrangements when they’re finalised.” My heart implodes as her lifeless voice fills the space between us. “And then we’re done, Jamie.”
A strangled sob catches in my throat as I step towards her, my whole world going up in flames as she shakes her head.
“And Ben?”
“Yes, Mikaela?”
Is the world still turning?
