Night Road (18 page)

It was the four of them now, just the family. All those doctors and specialists were outside, waiting.

“Something’s wrong with Mia,” Zach said. “I can’t feel her.”

Miles went pale at that. “Yeah,” he said. “Mia … didn’t survive, Zach,” Miles said at last.

Jude knew she should go to her son, be there for him, but she couldn’t make herself let go of Mia’s hand, couldn’t move. If she let go, Mia would be gone, and the idea of that loss was overwhelming, so she held it away.

“She d-died?” Zach said.

“They did everything they could. Her injuries were too extensive.”

Zach started ripping the bandages off his eyes. “I need to see her—”

Miles pulled their son into an embrace. “Don’t do that,” he said, and by the end of his breath, they were both crying. “She’s right here. We knew you’d want to say good-bye.” He led their burned, bandaged son to the gurney, where his sister lay strapped down, her body covered in white and kept alive by wheeled machines.

Zach felt for his sister’s hand and held it. As always, they came together like puzzle pieces. He bowed forward, let his bandaged head rest on his sister’s chest. He whispered the nickname from their babyhood, “Me-my…,” and said something Jude didn’t understand; probably it was a word from long ago, forgotten until now, a word from the twin language that was theirs alone. It had always been Zach chattering back then, talking for his sister … and it was that way again.

Behind them, someone knocked on the door.

Miles took his son by the shoulders, eased him back from the gurney. “They have to take her now, son.”

“Don’t put her in the dark,” Zach said in a hoarse voice. “I’m not really the one who was afraid. It was her.” His voice cracked. “She didn’t want anyone to know.”

At that little reminder of who they were, who they’d been—the twins—Jude felt the last tiny bit of courage crumble away.

Don’t put her in the dark
.

Jude squeezed Mia’s hand tightly, clinging to her daughter for as long as she possibly could.

Miles and Zach came up around her, reached out. They held one another upright, the three of them, the family that was left.

The knock at the door came again.

“Jude,” Miles said, his face wet with tears. “It’s time. She’s gone.”

Jude knew what she had to do, what they all were waiting for. She’d rather cut out her own heart. But she had no choice.

She let go of her daughter’s hand and stepped back.

Thirteen

Jude crouched in the hallway near the OR door. At some point, she’d lost her footing and fallen to the cold linoleum floor, and she stayed there, her face pressed to the wall. She could hear people coming and going around her, rushing from one trauma to the next. Sometimes they stopped and talked to her. She looked up into their faces—frowning and compassionate and a little distracted—and she tried to understand whatever it was they were saying, but she couldn’t. She just couldn’t. Her whole body shook with cold and her vision was cloudy and she couldn’t hear anything except the reluctant beating of her heart.

No. I do not forgive you
.

We’ll talk tomorrow
.

These were the words that ran in an endless loop through her mind.

“Judith?”

She turned slightly, saw her mother standing there, tall and straight, her white hair perfectly styled, her clothes ironed. She knew her mother had been here for hours; she’d tried repeatedly to speak to Jude, but what good were words now between strangers?

“Let me help you, Judith,” her mother said. “You can’t sit here in the hallway. Let me get you some coffee. Food will help.”

“Food will not help.”

“There’s no need to yell, Judith.” Mother glanced up and down the hallway, to see who might have heard the outburst. “Come with me.” She reached down.

Jude wrenched sideways, scurrying tighter into the corner. “I’m fine, Mother. Just let me be, okay? Find Miles. Or go see Zach. I’m fine.”

“You most certainly are not fine. I think you should eat something. You’ve been here seven hours.”

Already Jude was sick of people saying this to her. As if food in her stomach would remedy the hole in her heart. “Go away, Mother. I appreciate you coming here, okay? But I need to be alone. You wouldn’t understand.”

“Wouldn’t I?” Her mother made a quiet sound, and then said, “Fine.” She lowered herself to her knees beside Jude.

“What are you doing?”

Her mother collapsed the last inch to the cold linoleum floor. “I’m sitting with my daughter.”

Jude felt a stirring of guilt—no doubt this was one of her mother’s self-interested gestures, a way to force Jude into bending to her will. At any other time, it would have worked, Jude would have sighed in defeat and gotten to her feet, doing as her mother asked. Now, she didn’t care. She wasn’t going to leave this spot until Miles came to get her. “You shouldn’t sit here, Mother. It’s cold.”

Her mother looked at her, and for a split second, there was an unbearable sadness in her gaze. “I’ve been cold before, Judith Anne. I’m staying.”

Jude shrugged. It was all too much for her. She couldn’t think about anything right now, and certainly not her mother. “Whatever,” she said tiredly, and the minute the word was out of her mouth, she regretted it. How could one word bring back an era, a child, in such exquisite detail? She saw Mia at thirteen, braces and acne and insecurity, saying “whatever” in answer to every question …

She closed her eyes and remembered …

*

“Jude?”

She looked up, confused by the sound of her own name. How long had she been here? She glanced sideways; her mother was asleep beside her.

Miles stood outside the OR.

“It’s over,” he said, reaching down for her.

Jude started to get up and fell back down. He was beside her in an instant, steadying her. When Jude was standing on her own, he helped Caroline to her feet.

“Thank you,” Caroline said stiffly, smoothing her hair back from her face, although no strands had fallen free. “I’ll go to the waiting room,” she said. Glancing at Jude for a moment, she almost said something more; then she turned and walked away.

Jude clung to her husband’s arm and let him lead her into the operating room, where Mia lay on the table, draped in white. Her silvery-blond hair was covered in a pale blue cap. Jude took it off, let her daughter’s hair fall free. She stroked it as she’d done so many times before.

Mia still looked beautiful, but her cheeks were pale as chalk, her lips were colorless.

Jude held Mia’s hand and Miles held Jude’s. The three of them stayed connected, no one saying much of anything, just crying, until a nurse finally came in.

“Dr. Farraday? Mrs. Farraday? I’m sorry to bother you, but we need to take your daughter.”

Jude tightened her hold on Mia’s cold hand. “I’m not ready.”

Miles turned to her and tucked her hair behind one ear. “We have to be with Zach now.”

“She’ll be gone when we’re done.”

“She’s gone now, Jude.”

Jude started to feel pain and pushed it away, letting numbness return. She couldn’t allow herself to feel anything. She leaned down and kissed Mia’s cheek, noticing how cold it, too, was, and whispering, “I love you, Poppet.” Then she drew back and watched Miles do the same thing. She didn’t know what he said; all she could hear was her own blood, rushing into and out of her heart. At first she was dizzy, but as she walked down the busy hallway and stepped into the elevator and rode down to the sixth floor, she lost even that slim sensation.

*

“Mrs. Farraday?”

“Jude?”

From somewhere in the fog, she heard Miles say her name. The impatient tone told her that he’d said it more than once.

“This is Dr. Lyman,” Miles said.

They were in another hallway, outside Zach’s room. Jude didn’t even remember getting here.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Dr. Lyman said.

She nodded and said nothing.

Dr. Lyman led them into her son’s room. Zach sat slumped in bed, his arms crossed.

“Who’s there?” he said.

“It’s us, Zach,” Jude said, trying to sound strong for her son.

Dr. Lyman cleared his throat and moved to Zach’s bedside. “How are you feeling?”

Zach shrugged, as if it didn’t matter. “My face hurts like hell.”

“It’s a burn,” Dr. Lyman said.

“I’m
burned
?” Zach said quietly. “On my face? How?”

“It’s rare,” Dr. Lyman said. “Most people don’t even know it’s possible, but car airbags have something like jet fuel in them, a propellant. Normally they deploy just fine, but sometimes, and this is what happened to you, Zachary, it can go wrong and cause chemical burns. That’s what happened to your eyes, too.”

“What do I look like?”

“The burns aren’t bad,” the doctor said. “There’s a small patch along your jaw that we’re going to watch carefully, but there should be little or no real scarring. We don’t anticipate needing any skin grafts. May I remove the bandages now?”

Zach nodded.

Dr. Lyman went over to the sink and washed his hands and then carefully unwound Zach’s bandages. Zach’s hair had been shaved on one side and left long on the other, and it gave him a lopsided, off-balance look.

As the bandages came off, Jude saw the whole blistered, oozing burn, the way it swept down along his hairline, across his cheek and jaw.

Slowly, Dr. Lyman removed the bandages on Zach’s eyes, and the metal, honeycombed cups over each eye. He tilted Zach’s head and put some drops in his eyes. “Okay,” he finally said, “open your eyes.”

Zach’s lashes were crusty and spiked looking. He wet his lips and bit down on his lower lip.

“You can do it, Zach,” Miles said, leaning toward him.

Zach’s eyelashes fluttered like a baby bird’s first lifting of wings, and then slowly, slowly, he opened his eyes.

“What can you see?” Dr. Lyman asked.

Zach took his time, turned his head. “It’s blurry, but I can see. Mom. Dad. New guy with white hair.”

Miles sagged forward. “Thank God.”

Dr. Lyman said, “The blurriness is temporary. Your vision should clear up in no time. You’re a lucky young man.”

“Yeah. Lucky.”

*

Jude could hear Zach crying, and it brought her fresh pain, both because it was happening and because she couldn’t think of how to make him feel better. There was nothing she could do to help him or herself or Mia.

“It’s okay, Zach,” Miles said when the doctor left them.

“It’s my fault, Dad,” Zach said. “How am I supposed to live with that?”

“Mia wouldn’t blame you,” Miles said, and though his words were reasonable, his voice betrayed the depth of his pain. Jude could tell how hard her husband was trying to grieve for one child while comforting the other. She could tell because her struggle was the same.

“I wish I
were
blind,” Zach said, and for the first time, he sounded like a man. Certain. “I don’t want to go home and see Mia’s room. Or her picture.”

Just then, Officer Avery walked into the room. He was holding a crumpled-up paper bag in his hands, worrying the rolled crease with his blunt-tipped fingers. “Dr. Farraday? Jude?” he said, clearing his throat. “I’m so sorry to bother you at this difficult time.” He cleared his throat again. “But I need to ask Zach some questions.”

“Of course,” Miles asked, stepping closer to the bed. “Zach? Can you answer a few questions?”

“Whatever,” Zach said.

The officer cleared his throat and then stepped awkwardly toward Jude, offering her the paper bag. “Here,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

She felt as if she were underwater, reaching for something that looked close but was really far away. She was faintly surprised when she felt the rough brown paper. Opening it, she saw a blur of quilted pink—Mia’s purse—and she closed the bag quickly, clutching it in shaking hands.

The policeman stepped back a respectful distance, opened a small notebook. “You are Zachary Farraday?”

“You know I am. You were Officer Friendly in fourth grade.”

Officer Avery smiled briefly at that. “And it was your white Mustang that was totaled on Night Road last night?”

“It was my car.”

“And you attended a party at the Kastner house on Saturday night, with your sister and Alexa Baill?”

“And about a hundred other people.”

“And you were drinking alcohol,” the officer said, consulting a piece of paper. “I have test reports here that show your blood alcohol level at point twenty-eight,” the officer said. “That’s almost four times the legal limit.”

“Yeah,” Zach said quietly.

I won’t drink and drive, Madre … you know you can trust me?
How many times had Jude heard him make that promise?

She closed her eyes, as if darkness offered any refuge from this.

The officer flipped a page. “Do you remember leaving the party?”

“Yeah. It was about two o’clock. Mia was having a cow about us being late.”

“So you all decided to get in the car and drive,” the officer said. The words were like a battering ram. Jude felt each one hit her spine and reverberate up.

“Lexi wanted to call home,” Zach said quietly. “I told her not to be stupid. We did that once and Mom flipped out. I didn’t want to miss another party.”

“Oh, Zach,” Miles said, shaking his head.

Jude thought she might be sick again.

She’d forgotten all about that other time, when they’d believed her words and called her for help. And what had she done—made them pay for it by forcing them to skip several events that weekend.

Oh, God
.

“You were fine until you came to Night Road,” Officer Avery went on.

“There was no one on the road. Mia was … Mia was in the backseat, singing along to the radio. That Kelly Clarkson song. I told her to shut up, and she hit me in the back of the head and then…” Zach drew in a deep breath. “We weren’t even going that fast, but it was dark and the turn just came up, you know? That hairpin just past the Smithsons’ mailbox. Like out of nowhere. I heard Mia scream, and I yelled at Lexi to hit the brakes and tried to grab the wheel … and then…”

Jude’s head snapped up. “You told
Lexi
to hit the brakes?”

“She was driving,” Zach said. “She didn’t want to.
I
was supposed to. I was the designated driver. It’s my fault.”

“Ms. Baill’s blood alcohol level was point zero nine. The legal limit is point zero eight. Of course, she’s under twenty-one, so she can’t legally drink at all,” the officer said.

Lexi was driving, not Zach.

Zach hadn’t killed his sister.

Lexi
had.

*

“I need to see Zach.”

“Oh, Lexi,” her aunt said, her face slackening with sorrow. “Surely—”

“I
need
to see him, Aunt Eva.”

Her aunt started to say no, but Lexi wouldn’t listen. Before she knew it, she was crying and pushing past her aunt, limping down the hall.

She saw him through the open door at the end of the hallway.

He was alone in his room.

“Zach,” she said at the doorway, moving toward him.