Warning- This Story Contains sensetive Themes, including:
Acute Trauma/Survivors Guilt
Off Page Death
Grief and Loss
Loss of Child
Live in survival mode for two hours.
Live in it for two days.
Live in it for two years.
But somehow, it is those first two seconds that shock you.
Imagine waking up in your bed, sweat pouring out of every pore. Nightmares of that haunting day are all that I wake from, but I cannot escape them in the daylight.
The wall of steel rears before my face; its horn blares. The tires whine, losing traction. I can’t move, can’t call out. I want to scream, reaching my hands out to block the blow, but there’s the sickening crunch of metal. Steam hisses from the engine making it impossible to breathe. The front windshield shatters, and icy air slips into the space. Blood smears over my eyes, and my skull throbs when I finally awaken.
People stand over me, faces blurring together. I can’t even recall what happened; it was a blur of screams and a metal grill. Where am I? Why are there so many people around me? Someone braces my neck in their hands and I wince.
Ow, that hurts, please stop. I plead internally, but I can’t even cry out. Stop, stop…
I whimper as a light is shined in my eyes; it’s so bright it’s painful. I feel a sudden lightness when I’m lifted onto something firm. Lips are moving, but there’s no sound coming from anywhere, only the sharp ringing from my ears. They’re talking to me? My eyes wander to the scene around me, but I can’t move my neck. There’s something preventing movement. I wish I could move it, because if I could. I would’ve looked away.
There’s blood, maroon on the ground; painted glass is laid everywhere I can see. And there are other people. A man sits against an ambulance, staring blankly at the ground as they treat a small wound on his head. But no one else is moving. None of the people I’d just seen were there anymore- only white bags. Two white bags on the ground. One the size of an adult, and one smaller one.
The smaller one is empty, but it is hanging over a familiar carseat stained a deep ruby.
It’s from this scene that I realize the people I had loved will not be there when I wake up.
So when I do -soaked in that cold sweat- it’s all I have not to vomit. The tranquilizers are in the bathroom in a bright orange bottle, but there was no one to remind me to take them. The other half of our bed is empty. Her ring is still there, where she had forgotten it the morning we had left.
Our son’s room still had his toys, the one’s he had promised to clean up when we got home, and the sofa still holds my wife’s perfume. Her chapstick is undoubtedly wedged between the lips of the leather cushions.
His present is still waiting; the signed hockey puck is collecting dust now. Daylight streams in, and my phone buzzes on the nightstand. I can feel the vibration through my finger placed against the wood. But there’s no sound. There has been no sound since the ringing in my ears started and then ended.
I roll over in the bed and slam my hand over the screen, I can’t look at it. I can’t look anywhere without seeing their ghosts.
My wife’s face is the most present, carrying our son in her arms the same way she had when we had gotten them home from the birth. He was perfect-my little boy-he was perfect to his last breath, and even then, his “perfect” did not end.
We’d been saving for his college fund since we’d found out she was pregnant. We had counted ourselves lucky that my job had such generous wages, that we could afford to put money aside for our boy’s future.
As I think on this, I choke back a sharp aching sob, no one has visited but their ghosts. No one had offered their shoulders; no one had held me. My wife’s ghost extends her arms out to me, but they vanish straight through me, and I wake up a dozen times more.
There’s no sound anymore, only oppressive silence. I can’t even hear my own racing heart as I vanish through my visions. There’s been someone in the house, they come and go in my sleep. Objects move, dishes pile up, then vanish in the whisper of a moment. Laundry appears in my drawers, and the toys that were left out are put away. Our home looks perfect.
Then my wife’s ring vanishes, and her perfume fades from the cushions.
The scent of baby powder spilled on bathroom tiles makes my psyche splinter. The bottle was on the edge, then it was suddenly on the floor.
Memories run like electricity through me, full of overwhelming emotions. His first steps, our joy as we cheered. His senseless babble, through a teething grin. But most of all it’s the angel eyes my wife had gifted him, honey-brown below his fawn tousled hair.
It returns again and I can hear the hiss of the engine as heat blasts my face, the screech of tires as the steering wheel moves against my hands, and the steel cobra coming for my family. I draw my arm out, and then I fade out.
I awaken again, in my bed, different clothes, tucked in at the center of the mattress. My eyes open slowly, adjusting to the light of evening through the window. A figure I’ve seen before is standing in front of my closet.
“Hey.” my lips move, and the figure of my best friend turns to face me. He looks tired; I imagine I look worse.
“You’ve been taking care of me all this time?” my voice comes out so small I don’t even consider if he can even hear it. I have no way to gauge my volume anymore. His lips move, but when I don’t respond, he stops and nods.
My best friend steps closer to the bed and tears stick to the rim of my eyes. He steps closer again, and my tears quiver from their positions going freely down my face.
I hadn’t seen anyone since the accident; I have the cards for their obituaries, but I’d be lying if I said I remembered anything. My world has gone quiet; gone are the birds, the rush of wind in the ears, the giggles I’d grown so accustomed to, the tantrums, and the gentle humming. My best-friend does not let me consider these thoughts and wraps his arms around me. Calloused hands warm my tired soul, even just slightly. There are cold tears on his face; I can feel them on my neck as I break down again. I cling to him as if he might fade too. I had not considered either-he’d just lost his sister.