The thought of that situation being as bad as this one crossed my mind. I could see the look on Paxton’s face when he answered that knock. “I’m not disappointed, Izzy. I just need for you to be okay.”
“He’s afraid of storms. I make those nights special, movie night and pizza, to help take his mind off it.
Had we been in a different situation, I would have laughed and told her I did the same thing with my girls. It’s what our mother did, but I really think she was the scared one. She did it more for her than us.
“Izzy, give me your hand,” I said in an anxious tone. Fear filled my blood, but desperation kept me calm. I felt the car shift again and went for it. It was just enough to grab the thin branch. Izzy didn’t listen. Her head shifted and I could see why she couldn’t see. I had to turn away, but I couldn’t hide the frightened gasp. Her face looked like the skin was peeled back, covering both her eyes. A flash of lightning revealed bloody lips. It looked like something from a horror movie, not like my beautiful twin. “Izzy! Give me your hand!”
I realized that I wasn’t half in, half out of the car like I had thought when it slid again. This time several inches. I screamed in pain when the car moved off my body, but kept my composure. I vaguely remembered grabbing Izzy’s hand when the car continued to move. Panic of not knowing what to do set in and I began to freak. How did this happen? Why did it happen?
I have no idea where the strength came from. I didn’t even have time to think about it. There was no time. Just like the wreck, it happened quickly. The car shifted and I held tight to Izzy’s hand, wrenching in pain. Somehow, someway, we both managed to stay out of the river. Even with slippery hands. Somebody was with us that day, somebody held both our hands. Something bigger than me. I held on for as long as I could, but my strength was no match for the pain in my wrist and the slippery substance between our hands. My fingers slipped in slow motion and I let her go. I let her go again.
I cried out for her, noticing she stopped just below me, her body cradled between two trees, side by side. Had it not been for the awkward position of her leg, and her head slumped to her chest, I would have thought she was comfortable. Like the trees held onto her, keeping her safe from the raging water, inches from her broken body.
I laid just above her on a small ledge a couple feet from her broken body. The car slid another foot or so, trees catching it the same way they had Izzy. One tire stuck on a stump and one on a tree. I could hear the water racing through the mangled mess. We definitely rolled it at least once. Maybe twice.
“Izzy?” I gasped with raspy words, trying to deal with my own pain. “Izzy?” I repeated in a desperate tone. My arm dropped and our hands clasped together.
“I need for you to listen to me, Gabby.”
“Izzy, no. Please don’t do this. I just found you.”
Looking up gave me little insight on what had happened. I still couldn’t tell where we’d went off the road at. Not through the wind and the rain anyway.
“Are you listening to me, Gabby?”
“Yes, I hear you,” I promised. My hand brushed hair from her face and I felt the gash in the back of her head. The feeling of something warm, like blood, mixed with the cool rain and disappeared. Her head flopped back and I gasped at the sight of her face again. I could tell she was hurting, and it broke my heart in two.
“I love you so much, Clyde,” Izzy quietly said. I heard deep breaths almost like a wheeze and then quiet.
I looked up the embankment again, scoping a way out. The more I thought about what had happened, how we ended up there, the more real it became. We were driving, barely moving. One minute we were on top of the world, flying away like free birds, and then. And then what? What happened? I remembered Izzy screaming my name, but it wasn’t clear. Dreamlike. And then what? I recalled jumping inside the car, but I couldn’t reach. My hands grabbed the wheel at the same time Izzy’s did, but it was too late. We were already sliding down the embankment. Our eyes locked and then nothing. Darkness.
The thought about how smoothly we drove off the cliff crossed my mind. We missed the guardrail completely. Nobody would ever find us. They wouldn’t even know to look. I screamed out to the tropical storm while my mind whirled frantically. Empty cries, being lost in the violent wind. Her little boy. He would grow up without a mommy. All because of me. I thought about alligators and the rain, and then I screamed some more. Help me. Over and over again.
My teeth chattered, but I don’t think it was from being cold, more from my body going into shock. The pain was unbearable and I was all alone. I closed my eyes when all I could do was give up, look for something happy. Something from within. Ignore the pain. Ignore the wind. Ignore the rain. Ignore the river. Ignore Izzy.
“If I leave here tomorrow,” I sang through a soft voice, barely even a whisper, tears mixing with the rain. I was sure what happened next was the corporate of my brain injury. My mind and my memory fine before that. I heard the splitting of wood, and the branch as it fell. Everything went away. I couldn’t see the darkness, hear the wind and river, or feel the rain. I felt warm and happy. And then at peace.
“Gabby? Can you hear me? You’re okay. You’re here with Mi and I. I’m going to count you back now, starting with ten. When I get to one you can open your eyes if you want to. You’re safe if you choose to stay asleep. All thoughts will stop at the count of one. You’ll either open your eyes, or you’ll sleep. Do you understand me, Gabby?”
“I don’t want to wake up. She’ll be gone.”
My hand covered my mouth and I looked to Mi, standing right in front of me, wearing a sad smile.
“She has a little boy, Mi. Oh, God. That was over three months ago. What if I’m too late?”
“Don’t you start with that. I hate what ifs. I found her car. It’s in a junkyard over by Lincoln Park. Let’s start there.”
Nothing could have prepared me for that. I had a four-year-old nephew. Izzy came for my help and I let her down. I let her die, and I left her little boy without a mommy.
“Mi, what happened to Izzy? I still don’t know where she is.”
“I don’t know, you didn’t say.”
“He has to do it again. I need to know what happened to her.” I said in a desperate tone.
“I don’t think you know, Gabby. I think you woke up in the hospital after that. Let’s go check out her car, okay?”
I nodded in agreement and sipped my coffee, feeling even more lost than I already was, terrified that I was too late. Too late for my twin and her baby.
Four
Mi was crazy, not that I didn’t already know that, but even more so. She was an expert con man, even bigger than Paxton.
“I’ll do the talking. Just follow my lead, okay?” she coaxed.
Of course I agreed. I didn’t know what to say.
“Hi, I called earlier. I’m Mi Chin, head of the Department of Diagnostic Medicine.”
“Oh yeah, I’m a little busy, but you can go on back. It’s the Honda with the missing bumper along the fence,” the guy explained while searching for a key amongst a thousand other ones. There was no way in hell he would find it in that mess. No way. “Here you go. Lucky for you it was stuck underneath the front bumper in one of those magnet things. Stay on the path, don’t go wandering around out there. It’s dangerous. I hope you feel better,” he added, sincere eyes on me.