“I swear to God, Emilia, this baby is going to be the end of me!” Lottie exclaims, throwing herself down on my couch. She pushes off her boots and kicks her feet up, sinking into the cushion.
“Jesus, Lo, your feet are so red. Did you cram those things into your shoes?” I eye her swollen size-six feet, which clearly no longer want to fit into her boots.
“These are my favorite shoes,” she sulks. “I don’t want to wear anything else.”
I sit down next to her and rub her arm. “It’s okay, Lo. You’re a month away from your due date—you need to stop being so hard on yourself. Things are going to change, your body will change, but it’s going to be beautiful, and you’re going to get the world’s most amazing little girl out of it.”
Squeezing her eyes tight, she throws her head back. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’m so emotional all the time, Em. I don’t feel like myself. I’m a pharmacist, for God’s sake. I know the symptoms of pregnancy, along with body changes. I just didn’t think it would be so up and down.”
“I think someone needs a cuppa,” I tell her, to which she quickly nods, eyes still shut.
I stand from the couch, then head into the kitchen to put on the kettle. I’m about to pour the water when my phone begins to buzz, seemingly going mental from my bag. I ignore it, deciding Lottie is more important to focus on. But when Lottie’s phone starts pinging from the other room, my gut tells me there is something up.
As I’m walking into the room with both cups, Lottie answers, and her face goes ashen as soon as she hears whoever is on the other side.
“We’ll be right there,” she says into the phone, then hastily shoves it into her purse and grabs her shoes.
“Lottie? What’s wrong? Where are we going?”
She freezes before turning to me, eyes wide and watery. “Owen and Reeve have been in a car accident. They’re in the hospital. We need to go.”
She hastily puts on her shoes while I continue to stand there shell-shocked.
“Emilia!” Lottie yells, shoes now on and ready to go, while I’m still standing here, teacups in hand and barefoot.
“Em, I need you to snap out of it. I know this is scary, but I need you.”
And with those three words, I’m brought back to reality. Shaking my head, I put the cups on the table, then slip on the closest pair of shoes I can find, not caring that they are Cora’s.
“I’ve called an Uber,” Lottie tells me as I close the front door, attempting to put on my coat while shoving my phone and keys into my bag.
“Okay, let’s go.” I grab her hand, linking our fingers together. “Did they say anything? On the phone, I mean, did they say if Reeve and Owen were okay?”
She shakes her head, having gone silent as we wait on the corner. I squeeze her hand, knowing I need to step up.
“It’s going to be okay, Lottie. I promise they are going to be okay.” They better be.
“We don’t know that, Em. For all we know they’re dead and we have to identify their bodies,” she says with a sob. My stomach drops at the thought, but I refuse to let it overtake me. They have to be okay; I won’t accept anything less.
Reeve and I still have so much to do together. He’s so young, his whole life ahead of him.
Once the black car pulls up, I help Lottie in before going around to slide in next to her. Her leg bounces up and down while her hand rests against her stomach, seemingly providing her some semblance of comfort.
“It’s going to be okay,” I tell her again, or maybe I’m saying it more to myself. I pull out my phone and dial both guys numerous times, both having no answer.
I blink away my own tears, dread filling my insides at the thought of either of the boys I love being harmed. Poor Lottie doesn’t need this stress either, heavily pregnant as she is.
“I’m scared, Em,” she whispers next to me, her eyes glassy. I wrap my arm around her, pulling her as close as the seat belt will allow.
“I know you’re scared, Lo. I’m scared too, but we can’t think like that. I’m sure they’re perfectly fine and this is all a huge misunderstanding.”
We’re silent for the rest of the ride, neither of us keen to spill potentially false truths to comfort one another. We’ve said all we can, expressed our fears. Saying anything more won’t do us any good.
I try calling the boys one more time as we pull up to the hospital, my panic at an all-time high. Thoughts of having to tell Ali that something has happened to his two best friends paralyze me with fear and grief.
I rush over to the first nurse’s desk I see, then ask about the two of them, Lottie now full-on sobbing behind me.
It takes the nurse a few seconds to pull up their information, find their room number, and direct me down the hall. I grab Lottie’s hand, and our footsteps echo down the sterile white hall as we speed-walk to the room on the right.
This is good news. If there is a room for us to visit, that means they have to be okay. I repeat that thought to myself until we finally reach the room, both of us stopping right before the door.
“Let’s just get this over with,” Lottie says through a hiccup, her usually bright blue eyes now rimmed with red.
I nod, placing my hand on the cold metal handle before pushing forward.
The sight before me nearly brings me to my knees. Lottie, on the other hand, rushes forward, letting out a yelp.
Owen and Reeve turn to us, neither appearing to have visible injuries. My wide eyes can’t seem to close as I take them in, looking over every single aspect of their visible skin.
“What the actual fuck!” Lottie screams at them, hitting Owen on his side with her bag. “How the fuck are you alive!” It comes out as if she’s upset they made it through, and I want to laugh, totally poor timing. Luckily, the shock of the entire situation pulls me back.
“Huh?” Owen manages to spit out before Lottie’s bag comes flying at him again. This time he grabs it out of her hands.
I turn to Reeve, my heart smashing against my chest, the endless possibilities of how this could have turned out playing in my head like a movie that won’t stop.
“Why didn’t you call us? Some nurse saying you were in a crash, and you were dead for all we knew! What the fuck!” she yells again, her eyes now dry but burning with anger. I know she isn’t actually mad at them, but the shit was scared out of her. This is how she’s coping.
“Fuck,” Owen lets out, reaching to grab her hand. She’s hesitant at first but then gives way, inching closer to him.
“I left my phone in his car and Reeve’s died. I asked the nurse to call you guys for me while we were being checked out. I really thought she would have mentioned we were okay. Reeve’s car is fucked up, but we don’t have any serious injuries.”
Still speechless, I let my gaze drift back to Reeve. Owen keeps talking, explaining how some prick ran a red light and T-boned them. It wasn’t serious—the car sustained most of the damage—but Owen’s head smacked on the dash and the doctor was worried about a possible concussion. I stand there, listening to him tell the story, yet can’t find it in me to turn away from Reeve, somehow afraid that if I do, he might disappear. Although this turned out to be a false alarm, the fear it placed inside us was very real.