“You mean Leave It to Beaver?” Joe laughs. “Yeah, my dad loved that show.”
“You think that’s what it was really like?” I ask, captivated by the thought.
“Maybe something like that.” He smiles at me in the review mirror.
I look out of my window and imagine families walking up and down the sidewalk. The mothers are lovely in their white gloves and knee-length dresses and the fathers tip their hats and shake one another’s hands. Little boys and girls chase each other around their parents’ feet, while their mothers tell them not to ruin their new clothes in the freshly cut grass.
“I wish I was born in the fifties,” I say quietly to myself, and Sam reaches for my hand.
“Where does that leave me?” he asks softly.
I smile at him. “I think you’d look pretty cute in a white T-shirt and a leather jacket.”
He laughs quietly and shakes his head.
“So what happened to your dad?” Tristan asks.
“He got cancer. Died just a few years after my mother passed.”
“Joe, I’m so sorry,” I say, glancing up at him in the rearview mirror. “That’s terrible.”
“Ahh, I was one of the lucky ones,” he says, winding the steering wheel and turning into the Pizza Hut parking lot. “My parents didn’t choose to leave me.” He parks in the shade of the pointed red roof and looks at us over his shoulder. “There are still good people left in Brighton Park. People like my father. That’s why I came back here.”
Sam reaches for Joes shoulder. “You’re one of those people, Joe. You’re one of the good ones.”
Joe smiles. “Come on, knuckleheads, let’s go eat.”
* * *
“Lucy, can you hear me?”
I blink at the glaring light in my eye and try to move my tongue, but my head feels like it’s underwater, caught in a strong current.
“Her pupils aren’t dilated, but her BP’s climbing.”
“We’ve got to get her into surgery.”
The dull pain radiating down my leg suddenly stabs all over my body and I let out a scream that brings my back off the bed.
The man and woman hovering over me press their hands to my shoulders and hold me down. “Lucy, Lucy…look at me,” the woman says. “I need you to be still. Okay? I know it hurts, but we’re going to help you.”
I feel a sharp stick in my arm.
“We’re going to give you some medicine that will let you sleep for a little while, so you don’t feel it anymore.”
“No. No.” I turn my head from side to side, searching for Sam. “I want Sam. Where’s Sam?” I struggle against the fading pain and let out weak cry. “Sam.”
Chapter 12
Sam
You ready?” Miles asks me, and I lean back in my chair, exhausted from listening to the reporters’ questions.
“Yeah, let’s go.”
“Okay, that’s it for tonight, guys,” Miles says into the microphone, getting up from his chair.
I pull my phone out of my pocket and see a missed call from Lucy. “Hold on,” I say to Miles. “Lucy left a message.” I hold my phone to my ear and listen to it.
Hey, call me when you’re done. There’s stupid paparazzi following us home. Joe’s trying to lose them, but at this rate, you’ll get there before we do. I just wanted you to know. Love you, bye.
“Dammit.”
Miles gives me a curious look, but I ignore him and call Lucy.
Her phone just rings and rings. “Come on, Luc, answer the phone,” I say through my teeth, trying to keep my worry under control.
“Sam, what’s the matter?” Miles asks.
I shake my head and call Joe, but his phone goes straight to voicemail.
“Sam! Sam!” Leon shouts from the back of the room, holding his phone to his ear. He waves me over, ignoring the alarmed reporters who are staring at him with the same concerned look on their faces as I have on mine.
Miles pulls his phone out of his pocket and answers a call. “Yeah?…What?” He turns sheet white, and my heart spikes with a sudden burst of adrenaline. “Where are they?”
“What is it, Miles?”
He doesn’t answer me.
“Tell me what the fuck is going on,” I say, but he keeps his phone to his ear.
I run to the back of the room, shoving reporters out of the way to get to Leon. “What happened?”
He gives me a look that makes me want to throw up. “It’s Lucy and Joe. They were in an accident.”
“What?”
Miles shoves his way through the reporters surrounding us. “Come on, we gotta go. Come on!” he shouts, pushing the reporters back.
I run next to Miles and Leon, feeling my heart pound painfully against my ribs. “What happened?” I shout at Miles as we hurry to the car outside the arena.
“I don’t know. But they’re at the hospital. That’s where we need to go,” he says to Leon, who climbs into the driver’s seat.
I get in the passenger seat and close the door, ignoring the reporters shouting questions outside. I pull my phone out as Leon tears away from the arena parking lot and I call Sebastian, who answers quickly.
“Hey, Sam. Is everything okay? I’ve been trying to call Lucy, but she’s not answering her phone.”
“You haven’t talked to her?”
“No. Not since Joe took her home.”
“Fuck,” I whisper into the phone.
“Sam, what’s going on?”
“They were in an accident. Lucy and Joe were in accident.”
“An accident? Oh, my God. Are they okay?”
“I don’t know, we’re headed to the hospital right now.”
“The hospital? Oh, God, the b—”
“Sebastian, please…I can’t think about anything besides Lucy right now or I’ll fucking fall apart, so please don’t say that. Okay? Just…don’t say it.”
“Okay, yeah. Okay,” he says with a trembling voice. “I’m leaving. I’m leaving right now. I’ll be right there.”
I hang up and look at Miles in the back seat, who’s been on his phone since we left the arena.
“Let us out at the emergency room entrance,” he says to Leon, and hangs up his phone. “They were T-boned, Sam. The other driver ran a red light. They were both going too fast. It’s not good,” he says dismally.
“No. Don’t you do that. Don’t you fucking look at me like that. They’re fine!” I shout at him. “They’re going to be fine.”
“Sam—”
“You don’t know shit! Okay? You don’t know anything. So get that fucking look off your face.”
“You’re right Sam, you’re right. Let’s just get inside and talk to someone who can tell us what’s going on.”
I turn back around and close my eyes, but it does little to calm me down. The fresh cut above my eye throbs as my blood pulses through my veins and my heart aches inside my chest, which tightens around it with every tortured breath. My mind moves from thoughts of Lucy to thoughts of Joe to thoughts of my unborn baby, and I feel each one of them slipping out of my grip.