I twisted this way and that in the mirror.
This look was neutral. It said very little about me.
Yeah, this was a go.
I wondered what kind of “pocket debris” I should gather. The minutiae that went into my pocket or my purse so that anyone looking would find artifacts of the life I wanted them to believe I led.
A bit problematic since I didn’t have a handle on my role yet.
No purse. I’d carry my phone, some crumpled low denomination bills, a Chapstick…
Yeah, the less I had with me, the more malleable my character would be for me to construct in the future.
Metro and city bus cards.
Ready.
Striker was standing at the bottom of my staircase, keys in hand.
I quirked an eyebrow. Did he think he was coming with me?
“You’re taking public transportation since you don’t have time to develop a cover car, right? I thought I’d give you a ride to the Metro, so you don’t have to figure out what to do with your keys.”
“You’re so smart.” I stood on the bottom stair and gave him a gratitude kiss. “And darned cute.” I sighed as I stepped off the step.
“I hear you, Chica. I’d much rather stay home and play but—”
“Duty calls.”
***
“Oh, wow.” I put my hand on the window as the bus rumbled down the street. I knew exactly where I was.
Bouncing over the potholes, the lights of oncoming traffic chewed through the early morning fog. Sirens and the flashing red lights of an ambulance passed by on the other side of the road and thrust me back in time to when I had looked up this very street, watching rescue lights coming toward me.
I pressed my forehead against the cool glass, the hiss of air conditioning sprayed upward from the tiny perforated holes. Sweat slicked my skin with the recognition and was dried into a salty tightness freezing my features as my system took the hit.
In my memory, I was back, reliving the horror.
That dreadful rain-slicked night, Dad and I had been driving along, belting out a song on the radio. We had been having a wonderful time when suddenly my life cracked open.
It was a feeling of utter helplessness. There was the boom of impact, the shrill wrenching of metal, the tinkling of glass shards as they hit the pavement.
Our car was upside down in the ditch.
With ringing ears and blood dripping into my eyes, I turned to find Dad dangling from his seatbelt.
My door was mangled, but with the window broken out, I was able to wrestle myself free. I dashed around to Dad’s side of the car and reached in, trying to rouse him.
The next part was a blur. Pulling my Swiss Army knife from my pocket, I’d cut him free.
Should I have cut him free?
Even now that I’d been trained and had worked with the local rescue squad, I was conflicted about my decisions.
I hadn’t found a pulse. But that might have been the tremble in my hand, like a hummingbird’s wing, flapping against his carotid.
I couldn’t tell if he was breathing. But I was in shock, myself. Maybe my mind was stuttering. Maybe I’d just missed his shallow inhales.
It doesn’t matter. It’s over. What I did was what I did.
Right or wrong.
With his safety belt cut free, gravity tugged Dad from his seat.
All I could do was try to protect his head and then drag him out of the wreck to the hard surface of the road where I could perform CPR.
Was he still alive in the driver’s seat?
Would he have survived had I waited for the rescue crew?
I’ll never know.
The what-ifs were always there in my memories of him. They coated the images of my amazing dad with my shame and guilt at not having helped him.
I didn’t know how I got Dad as far as the road.
I didn’t remember ripping open his shirt or positioning my hands.
I did remember the compressions.
I tried. Tried for a long time. Tried until I knew that even if he came back, by some miracle, that his brain had been deprived of oxygen far too long.
That realization came on the tail end of exhaustion.
It was a whisper and not the gnashing of teeth and screaming to the heavens. I simply crawled up to rest his head in my lap, and I chanted, “Please be okay, please be okay.” Though, I knew that “okay” had nothing to do with being alive or smiling at me again. It was more like a wish that his soul’s journey be gentle.
That he be at peace.
I had stroked my fingers over Dad’s hair and thought about the night when Mom had died the first time. They had shocked her back down to Earth again. Before she was fully conscious, she had lifted her arm to point and said, “Oh, I want to be there.”
As painful as it was in that moment for me, I was sorry the doctors had saved her.
The conviction in Mom’s voice was so powerful. Whatever she’d seen was good. That place that Mom didn’t want to leave—that’s the place I imagined my dad had reached.
Now that my bus had rumbled closer to the diner. I was out of the vicinity where Dad had laughed his last laugh, sung his last note, breathed his last breath.
I closed my eyes and tried for a slow, steady inhale.
My stop was next.
If I was going to try to parallel Modesty’s situation, my eyes should look haunted.
