Chapter 5: The Medical Emergency
The cold of the highway bus stop bit right through my thin jacket, but I didn't move. I stood there beneath the flickering yellow sodium light of the streetlamp, my boots pressed hard against the cracked concrete curb, watching every pair of headlights sweep around the bend. Ten minutes past six. Twenty minutes past. The midnight-blue pickup truck I had come to recognize as Jax’s never appeared. The heavy, greasy silence of the county road only broke when an eighteen-wheeler roared past, kicking up a spray of slush and grit that coated my scuffed sneakers. My fingers, buried deep in my pockets, gripped the folded paper Sarah had given me until the edges were soft and damp with sweat.
By seven o'clock, the wind had picked up, howling down from the foothills and carrying the sharp, metallic smell of an incoming frost. I knew I couldn't stay out there all night. The diner was closed up, its neon OPEN sign clicking off as Martha locked the front door and walked out to her rusted sedan without looking back. She had given me one last long, unreadable look through the passenger window before pulling away, her tail-lights fading into the blackness of the valley. I turned my back to the empty bus stop and began the long walk down the shoulder of Route 9, heading toward the small, decaying rental house where Mom and I lived behind the laundromat.
The house was dark when I pushed the front door open. The single-bulb porch light had burned out three weeks ago, and nobody had bothered to replace it. Inside, the air smelled stale, thick with the chemical tang of rubbing alcohol and the metallic scent of an old radiator that clanked and sputtered in the corner.
"Sarah?" I called out, my voice sounding small and fragile in the narrow hallway.
There was no answer from the back bedroom. Only a low, ragged rasping sound, like dry leaves scraping across a concrete floor. My chest tightened, a cold panic seizing me as I dropped my schoolbag by the door and hurried down the short hallway. The bedroom door was cracked open. A pale square of moonlight fell across the narrow twin bed where my mother lay curled on her side, clutching a faded patchwork quilt up to her chin. Her skin had the yellowish, waxy hue of old parchment, and her breathing was shallow and uneven.
"Leo," she whispered, her voice barely a breath. Her eyelids fluttered open, revealing eyes that were too bright, burning with a feverish heat. "Did you... did you find him?"
I hesitated standing in the doorway, the memory of Jax’s towering frame and the slammed door of the salvage yard fresh in my mind. I thought about the broken promise at the bus stop, the way he had looked down at the photo before covering it with his heavy, calloused hand. For a second, I wanted to lie to her. I wanted to tell her that Jax was coming, that he had looked at the picture and cared. But looking at the thin, blue-veined hand she reached out from beneath the covers, I couldn't do it.
"He was at the salvage yard," I said softly, walking over to the side of the bed and sitting down on the edge of the mattress. I took her cold, dry hand in mine. "He looked at the picture, Mom. But he didn't come to the bus stop. He... he didn't want anything to do with us."
Sarah closed her eyes, a slow, heavy tear slipping down her hollow cheek. She didn't scream or rage. She just let out a long, shuddering sigh that seemed to drain the last bit of air from her lungs. "I was afraid of that," she murmured, her voice breaking. "He was always running from something, Leo. Even before you were born. He never knew how to stay."
A sudden, violent coughing fit seized her, and she doubled over, pressing a thin washcloth to her mouth. When she pulled it away, a dark, alarming smear of crimson stained the fabric. I stared at it, my heart hammering against my ribs. I knew what the doctors at the county clinic had said last month before the money ran out—that her lungs were failing, that she needed constant oxygen and specialized care that we couldn't afford. The emergency pill bottle on the nightstand was completely empty.
"Mom, I'm calling an ambulance," I said, reaching for the landline phone on the dresser.
Sarah’s hand shot out with surprising strength, gripping my wrist in a tight, desperate hold. "No," she whispered fiercely. "No ambulances, Leo. We don't have the insurance. We can't pay the bills. Promise me... promise me you won't call them."
"But you're bleeding!" I cried, my voice cracking with panic. "I can't just let you lie here!"
"Listen to me," she said, her eyes locking onto mine with an intensity that terrified me. "There's an old envelope in the bottom drawer of the bureau. Under the spare blankets. Take it. It has the address of a garage on the south side of town. A man named Red... he owes me a favor from a long time ago. Tell him who you are. Tell him Sarah sent you."
May you like
She tried to say more, but another wave of coughing choked off her words. Her grip on my wrist suddenly slackened, her fingers slipping away as her head fell back against the flat pillow. Her breathing grew slower, shallower, the terrible rasping sound filling the quiet room.
I stood up, shaking from head to foot, the reality of our situation crashing down on me like a physical blow. The midnight-blue truck was gone, the bus stop was empty, and my mother was lying helpless in a cold, dark room. I didn't call an ambulance. Instead, I pulled open the bottom drawer of the bureau, shoving aside piles of frayed linens until my fingers brushed against a heavy manila envelope. I pulled it out, shoved it into the inside pocket of my jacket alongside Sarah's note and the faded photograph, and ran out the front door into the freezing night, heading back toward the roaring highway.
