“How do you expect to work on your game?”
“I'll play summer ball with my team in Oregon. I don't even fit in on that team anymore.”
“You think I'm going to let you throw away your whole life for some country boy and shitty basketball team?”
“I'm not throwing away my life,” Whitney said.
“No Whitney! You're throwing away our lives. You're taking everything we've worked for and every chance at success you have and flushing it all down the toilet. You ungrateful little snot!”
Whitney fought to breathe. “I'm sorry dad,” she said slowly. “I know you've worked hard for me but I don't want to come back. And I'm worth more than basketball.” As she said the last part she heard Leif's voice not her own, but she was glad she'd said it.
“You better hope you are,” he said. Then, silence. Whitney checked her phone to find the call disconnected. Sadness and fear washed over her, but behind them was peace. She just wished she could call Leif and tell him about it. He’d be so proud of her. The thought pinched her heart.
◆◆◆
Whitney fell asleep after talking to her dad and only woke when Everley shook her awake.
“Movie time sleepy head!” she said. Whitney blinked at her.
“The movie we planned to see. Kathy is driving. In fact she’s downstairs now and so are Ivy and Brynley.”
Whitney finally nodded and quickly threw on clothes.
The movie turned out to be stupid, but the company was good. They went to Yogurt Time after and then headed home hyped on sugar. They were discussing the hot exchange student who’d developed a crush on Kathy and laughing at his inability to understand prom when they turned a corner on the main road into Millersburg and smashed, with unbelievable force, head-on into a car in their lane.
Whitney would remember the experience like a movie. The air bags in the front went off right away sending Kathy and Ivy’s heads flying back like bobble heads you shook too hard. The car spun around multiple times, twice is what she told the police, but she wasn’t sure. A car behind them rammed into the rear section of the driver’s side during the last turn, ending the spinning and Brynley’s screams with one quick impact. When the car finally stopped moving Whitney took inventory of herself first, and then the others. She bled lightly from a small cut on her head, which hurt, actually most of her hurt, but overall she appeared fine. Everley sat next to her. She was also awake and screaming at Brynley who slumped, unnaturally, against the opposite window. The front of the car lay silent. Ivy and Kathy slumped towards each other, both unconscious while blood flowed from unseen places.
“Everley!” Whitney shouted, immediately regretting it when her head started ringing with pain. “Everley, we have to help them. Are you hurt?”
Everley stopped screaming and shook her head.
“Okay. Then you need to help me. Is Brynley breathing?”
Everley leaned close to Brynley, “Yeah,” she said.
“Good,” Whitney said. “I need you to look her over and if she’s bleeding you need to put pressure on it. Okay?”
Whitney opened the door and stepped out onto the pavement. The air was cold and moist. The cement beneath her feet was wet and the world smelled of fresh rain, exhaust and scalded metal. She’d never forget that smell. She looked into the still darkness trying to process the scene. It wasn’t until that moment that she thought about calling for help. She ducked back into the car and grabbed her cell phone from her purse. She dialed 911 and handed the phone to Everley.
“Tell them we’re on Johnson Road by the big turn and we need a lot of help,” she said. Everley took the phone and Whitney heard her repeat it word for word three times to the operator.
The front passenger door opened easily and she checked over Ivy.
“Ivy! Ivy can you hear me?” Whitney asked.
“Yeah,” she said.
“Ivy, what hurts?” Whitney asked.
“My neck mostly,” Ivy said. Whitney continued to check for injuries but couldn’t find any.
“Whitney?” Ivy moaned. “Why can’t I feel my legs?”
Whitney looked to Ivy’s legs in a panic.
“I don’t know Ivy, but Everley called 911 and they will fix it soon. I know they will. You just sit tight okay? Talk to Everley. I’m going to check on Kathy,” Whitney said calmly to Ivy.
Whitney walked around the car, only slightly aware of her hand shaking, and tried to open Kathy’s door, but it was jammed. The whole door was smashed in at least six inches. The window lay on the ground and each time Whitney fought to unjam the door the glass crunched beneath her feet. She reached in and felt for a pulse on Kathy’s neck, but she couldn’t find one.
“Kathy!” she screamed as she heaved at the door with no luck. Beyond her echoing voice she heard another.
“Help me!” came the weak cry from behind her. “Please, help me.”
Whitney felt Kathy’s neck again without any luck.
“Everley, keep talking to Ivy,” she said as she turned to find the cries.
She turned twice, surveying the red, grey and black metal carnage covering the wet pavement around her. Finally the call came again and she followed it through the darkness to the edge of the road. A red car laid on its roof beside her. The windows were gone and Whitney could see through it to the open road beyond, it’s occupants seemingly gone.
“Please,” cried a girl’s voice and Whitney turned to see a leg protruding from the tall grass of the ditch before her. She hurried down it, her feet slipping through the gravel and glass mixture beneath her. The foot lacked a shoe, she noticed that first, and second the perfectly manicured toes. Attached to the foot she found a tight mini skirt, pushed up to the girl’s waist, and a loose red sweater. She wondered how much of the red had been there before the wreck, and then she saw the mouth that had called out. She recognized it immediately. Eva’s eyes were blinking against blood flowing steadily from three different gashes on her head, but she too recognized Whitney immediately.
“Whitney! I’m really hurt.” She said. Whitney shook off the shock and went to work.
“It’s okay, Eva. I’ll help you and the ambulance is on the way. We called them,” she tried to assess Eva’s injuries as she kneeled in the damp grass. Her left arm was broken through the skin right below the elbow and the torn flesh nearly made Whitney vomit. Whitney took off her cardigan and tied it tightly around Eva’s upper arm, trying to stop the blood flowing across the jagged radius that stuck into the air, or was it the ulna? Whitney actually questioned it, trying to remember her 8th grade anatomy class. Eva moaned bringing Whitney back to the present and she looked around for something to press against Eva’s head. Eva’s lack of clothing made it impossible to use something she had on so Whitney pulled off her blue t-shirt and laid it over Eva’s gashes. She placed her hands on the shirt, trying her best to cover all three gashes and leaned into Eva’s head.
“Eva,” Whitney said softly when she saw Eva’s blinking slow. “Stay with me.”
“What?” Eva moaned quietly.
“Stay with me,” Whitney said again.
“What’d you do tonight?” Whitney asked, trying to keep Eva engaged.
“We went to a party,” Eva said. Whitney wondered who we was.
“Was it fun?” Whitney asked.
“Yeah, it was. We played pong with hot guys. College boys love me. They do,” she said in juts. Whitney tried to focus on keeping the pressure constant even though she could feel the shirt becoming soaked.
“That’s awesome,” Whitney said, although she didn’t think it was at all.
“Leif loves you,” Eva said. Whitney just stared at her.
“You should date him. I don’t need him. I’ve got college boys. They’re better anyways.”
Whitney wondered what they were better at, but didn’t ask. She sincerely hated Eva right now and it took all of her energy to not walk away and let her die.
Whitney heard sirens coming in the distance. It seemed like she’d b
een there forever. What was taking them so long?
“Hold on Eva, I hear the ambulance,” she said.
“Whitney you’re really gorgeous. I wish I looked like you. All freckles and dark hair. Leif loves you.”
Whitney called to the paramedics when they arrived and two of them slid down the side of the ditch and went to work. Whitney backed up, fell against the far side of the ditch and watched them get Eva onto a board. She gathered enough energy to climb out of the ditch and back to Kathy’s car. There were police and firemen everywhere. Ivy was gone and they were talking to Brynley. Everley stumbled over when she saw Whitney.
“Whitney! Where did you go?”
“Eva,” Whitney said, suddenly tired and unable to see clearly, “she was in the ditch. I helped her.”
And then Whitney collapsed onto the wet, glass covered pavement. Everley tried to catch her and screamed for help, piercing the night air with even more fear and pain.
Whitney was in and out over the next few days, but mostly out. When she finally woke for real, her mind held scenes from the previous three days she hadn’t really been awake for.
She remembered her mom flying through the door, flinging herself onto Whitney and crying uncontrollably until Whitney’s dad came in, rational as ever, and peeled her mom off gently. After which, he’d leaned down and apologized, quietly in Whitney’s ear.
She’d heard the doctor explain to her dad, in lots of doctor terms, that the wreck had caused a severe brain bruise that had led to intense swelling. They’d had to cut into Whitney’s skull to relieve some of the pressure and had to keep her in an induced coma until the swelling went down. Only then would they know what kind of damage would be permanent.
She remembered Brynley and Everley visiting. They’d talked about how it was amazing that only Beth had died and how the paramedics said Whitney saved Eva’s life.
And she remembered Leif, often. She remembered him holding her hand and kissing it softly. She remembered another time when he’d cried with his head against her chest. And she remembered his dad too.
“Leif, they said family only,” he’d said from the doorway.
“I don’t care. Her mom said I could see her,” Leif had said without even turning around.
“Your sister and Eva are both fighting for their lives, maybe you should come be with family.”
Leif had stood up and placed Whitney’s hand down gently before striding quickly to the door.
“The only reason they are fighting for their lives is because of Whitney. Ivy would be paralyzed if Whitney hadn’t been there and every doctor who’s seen Eva has said that she should have died. But she didn’t. She didn’t because of Whitney. But Whitney still might die. So I’m going to sit with Whitney,” Leif said.
“Leif, I know you think you like this girl, but she isn’t your future. Whitney isn’t Millersburg and when high school ends she’ll be gone and you’ll be left with nothing. I need you to think about the family, and the farm and your future. Go sit with Eva. Eva was almost taken from you, but by a miracle of God she wasn’t. You need to realize that and be grateful. You need to get your head on straight,” Leif’s dad said in the closest thing to a gentle fatherly voice Whitney had ever heard from him.
“YOU need to get your head on straight!” Leif said shaking. “The farm and Eva are your dreams for me, they aren’t my dreams. I don’t even know what my dreams are because you’ve never let me think of any on my own.” He turned and looked at Whitney as the machines beeped and wheezed around her. “Your precious Eva got wasted at a college party, where I’m sure she was hooking up with college guys, again, and then got into a car with Beth and they plowed into a car that carried your daughter. They almost killed your own daughter and four of her friends, yet you STILL side with Eva?!?! I don’t fucking understand you. Eva is selfish and reckless and I guarantee you she won’t take any accountability for what happened, God knows she hasn’t ever taken any before. That is not the type of person I want to be with and I hate that you are mad at me for that. I love Whitney and I am dying inside right now watching her fight for her life. You should be supporting me. You should be worried about Ivy. You should be doing anything besides trying to get me back together with Eva because that will NEVER happen. I don’t even want to ever see Eva again. I hate her and right now I hate you!” Leif opened the door and held it for his dad. “Please get out.”
◆◆◆
When Whitney finally woke for good, she had been in an induced coma for four days.
“Do you know your name?” the, very attractive, doctor asked.
“Whitney. Volsum,” Whitney said through a raspy dry voice. Everyone smiled and her mom started crying.
“Do you know what happened to you?” the doctor asked.
“There was a car wreck,” Whitney said as the memories filled her head.
“How do you feel?” the doctor asked.
“Pretty crappy,” Whitney said and everyone laughed.
They tested her ability to move everything and her reflexes with her dad celebrating after each one she passed.
“It looks like she’s suffered very minimal damage,” the doctor said. “It’s really the best case scenario.”
Her mom covered her in kisses and tears.
“I’m still not moving back,” Whitney said looking at her dad who stood against the far wall. “I love you and I love basketball, but I’m happier here.”
Her dad moved to her side the room.
“I love you too Whitney. I’m sorry I push you so hard, I just want you to be amazing.”
“She is amazing.”
“Lief,” Whitney said quietly, following the sound of his voice to where he stood by the door.
He crossed quickly and leaned down, his forehead touching hers, his clear blue eyes staring into her heart from just inches away. “You scared the shit out of me.”
Whitney smiled wiping a tear from his cheek. “I’m sorry.”
“And I don’t care what you say, we aren’t breaking up. Ever.” he said before kissing her softly on the lips.
SPRING
Chapter 19
By the time everyone returned to school it was already May. The entire school had been turned upside down by the accident.
Beth’s death rocked the small town, who all packed the local Baptist church for her service two weeks after the accident. Whitney went with Leif and didn’t let go of his hand the entire time. She just kept thinking how easily the funeral could have been for any of her friends instead of Beth.
Everley had only spent a night in the hospital, for concussion observation and Whitney and Kathy had both been released on the same day, eight days after the crash. Brynley suffered from a severely broken leg, collar bone and bad concussion while Ivy had fractured her spine and required weeks of physical therapy to relearn her coordination. Everley and Whitney visited them every day until their releases.
Eva had the badly broken arm, internal bleeding, brain damage and some memory loss. She’d tried to deny both that she’d been drinking at a party before the accident and that Whitney had helped her. Her blood alcohol level of .172 and multiple witnesses proved both of those facts to be true.
Whitney spent the weeks after the wreck trying to find a foundation again. Unable to return to track, she spent her afternoons shooting around at home, riding her much neglected horse or hanging with the girls. The wreck hadn’t put her whole life into perspective as such events always did in the movies, but it had changed her, or maybe just everything before the wreck had done that. Either way, Whitney felt much more at peace with herself, and she liked that.
◆◆◆
About five weeks after the wreck, as life was beginning to seem a little normal again, Leif stopped by Whitney’s unexpectedly on a warm spring Sunday morning. Whitney was laying in bed watching Netflix when he knocked softly at her door before letting himself in.
“You’re still in bed?” he asked making his way towards her.
“I’
m recovering from a bad car accident,” she said.
“How long is that excuse valid?” he asked.
“Like a year at least,” Whitney said. Leif laughed as he climbed onto the bed and snuggled against her.
“You wish,” he said. He kissed her on her cheek and she rolled onto her back allowing him to kiss her again, his lips lingering on hers.
“What’s up?” she asked after a few minutes.
“I was wondering if you might want to go for a ride,” he said smiling.
“Since when do you ride?” Whitney asked.
“Since forever.”
Whitney eyed him, “I’ll have to see that to believe it.”
“Does that mean you wanna go? It’s a beautiful day.”
“It wouldn’t be my first pick for activities to do, but I’m in.”
“What would be your first pick my dear?” he asked kissing her softly.
She reached up and pulled him into her. “To stay here like this.”
“We know where that will go,” he depositing kisses down her neck. “Quickly.”
“SO???” Whitney said tilting her head back and soaking up each touch.
Leif shook his head at her as he climbed off the bed. “Get dressed little lady. I’ll meet you downstairs.”
Whitney watched him go with a smile across her face before jumping up and dressing quickly.
The day was perfectly pleasant. A warm, soft breeze cut the fresh spring air nicely. Lately cold reminded her of the accident filling her with sadness. She was glad the cold was moving on.
“How would you rate your riding skills, on a 1-10 scale?” she asked Leif as they reached the barn.
“I’d give myself a solid 6, maybe 7,” he said.
“Than Chuck it is,” Whitney said. She opened the tack room and handed Leif a green halter and lead. Third door down Mr. 6, maybe 7.”
“Is Chuck the old horse you put babies on? Cause I can ride, I’m not lying,” he protested.
She laughed at him and patted him on the shoulder as she took the red halter and headed towards her horse Allie’s stall. “Chuck is good. He’s Mable’s horse, although she rides mine or my mom’s a lot these days.”
Being Whitney (Book one of the Being Series): A Young Adult Novel Page 26