Incidental Contact (Those Devilish De Marco Men)

by Connor, Eden

  She grabbed his jacket sleeve. Her eyes were wide. “Killing her won’t help a thing, so you drive safe. We’ll follow you with Jonah.” Her fists tightened in the denim sleeve. “This is not going to be a replay of the night he lost his mother, so we’re taking him to the hospital with us. Don’t take any shortcuts. I gave the nine-one-one operator your route and a description of your truck. Get on the highway, then cross the interstate. Taking the four-lane into town means an ambulance can meet you sooner. There’s a huge wreck on the interstate, toward Greenville. Going through town’s the best way.”

  “Got it.” Eric ran around the front end of the truck, cursing when his boots slipped on the icy driveway.

  “Sleet in this mess,” Dan yelled. “Bridges are gonna be like glass. The rigs are both out. We can’t wait.”

  Eric grabbed the extra scraper, jabbing at the ice-slicked windshield. “Go, go!” he cried to his brother. “Your truck has me blocked. The defrost will melt the rest before I get to the highway.”

  All he could think, while his heart hammered his breastbone, was that he’d been given a second chance to handle something critically important for his family. Dan was giving him a chance to save Lila. To make up for losing Sarah.

  I cannot fuck this up.

  The world was a whirling curtain of white. If not for the trees, Eric couldn’t have seen the edges of the road. Colton threw the front door open the minute Eric backed down the drive. He jumped out and yanked open the back door, then ran to help Lila across the grass.

  “What? No doughnuts?” Lila’s joke fell flat when pain twisted her face.

  “Soon as you show me my niece or nephew, I’ll buy you three dozen.” He slipped an arm behind her back. “With salt.”

  “Jonah, run get in Dan’s truck,” Colton ordered. The teen plowed through the snow, clutching a piece of luggage. Colton hoisted Lila into the back seat. Eric jumped behind the wheel while Colton rushed to the other side and climbed in beside Lila. Dan waited in the road. Cynda threw the door to Dan’s truck open, motioning for Jonah to hurry.

  Pulling out ahead of Dan, Eric kept his foot on the gas and aimed for the place he thought the road might be. His lips moved continuously, praying for the ambulance, for Lila, for his brother’s unborn child.

  Was it too soon for the baby to survive? He had no idea. Preemies made it all the time, but they were born in hospitals, not the back seat of a truck. He strained to see the flashing lights of the ambulance through the swirling white as soon as he made the highway, though he knew it was far too soon for them to meet.

  Dan’s headlights soon disappeared from his rearview mirror. Lila’s moans became cries, then screams and they came too goddamn close together for Eric’s liking. He risked pushing the needle on the speedometer up another couple of notches. The wipers raked the windshield, but before they could complete their sweep, more snow obscured his vision.

  Among the flakes were clear pellets of ice. He watched the tiny balls strike the glass and bounce off with a sense of foreboding. The dual rear tires would keep the truck on the road if he veered off the edge, but nothing would stop them if they hit ice. Five more miles an hour. He eased the gas pedal down. More speed meant less visibility. A tradeoff he had to make.

  The stench of his sweat seemed sharp inside the closed space. Familiar landmarks were unrecognizable gray forms. His headlights made golden halos that only illuminated more snowflakes. The ticking of his emergency flasher lagged behind his heartbeat. Twice, he had to veer around parked vehicles that loomed out of nowhere, fighting the wheel to keep the big dually moving forward.

  Lila let out a long, wordless sound of agony, driving steel talons of fear through his chest.

  “Fuck, E, can’t you go any faster?” Colton begged in a harsh whisper. Daring a glance into the rear view, C’s expression was the same one he’d had the night Rafe had taken his fists to Eric. He had the fleeting thought that Colton no longer looked young

  He powered the truck around curves, correcting whenever the big vehicle began to lose traction, using the rare traffic sign and the occasional building to guesstimate whether he was on the road or heading for a ditch, while passing miles of open fields. The entire time, he worried about the big hills he’d have to navigate before they hit more level road.

  “Lila, we never decided what we’re gonna name this baby. Now or never, woman. Unless you want me to put ‘Fred De Marco’ on the birth certificate, speak up.” To Eric’s ears, Colton’s voice shook, but he admired the level-headed way his brother hoped to distract her.

  “Oh God, it hurts,” Lila gasped. “Carah. For Sarah, but with a hard C, for you.” Her words seemed slurred to Eric’s straining ears. “My head... hurts.”

  Maybe he’d heard that wrong. Shouldn’t her tummy be what hurt?

  “Does she get a middle name? I like Mia.” Colton’s voice held a tremor.

  Eric had to strain to hear Lila’s whisper. “Mia. Okay.”

  “What about a son? What will you name my son, Delilah?”

  Something struck the back of Eric’s seat. The blows came hard and fast. “What’s happening?”

  “I think she’s having a seizure!”

  Eric dared another peek at the rearview mirror. He heard Colton tapping cell phone keys. “My girlfriend is thirty-three weeks pregnant. We’re on the way to the hospital. She’s in labor, but she just started jerking uncontrollably. We’re supposed to meet an ambulance, but we do not have that vehicle in sight,” Colton barked. “What do I do?” Eric heard him press another button, then the phone sailed over the seat, landing beside him.

  “Is she seizing now?” A male voice filled the large truck’s cab.

  “No.”

  “Check to be sure her airway is open. You do that by tilting her head back and....”

  Eric followed a curve in the road. Trying to unglue his tongue from the roof of his mouth, he darted another glance in the mirror. Colton’s eyes were wide, very wide.

  “Lila? Dammit, Delilah, don’t do this to me.” Colton might’ve whispered. He might’ve screamed. Eric could barely hear over the jackhammer in his chest.

  The steady voice on the phone cut through Eric’s panic. “Loosen her clothing and turn her onto her side. I know you don’t have much room to maneuver in a vehicle, but can you tilt her seat back?”

  “We’re in the back seat of a four-door dually. Got room to work.” Colton sounded calmer now.

  “What’s your location? I’ll check on that ambulance.”

  “Just passing the turn off for Gramling Mill Road,” Eric barked.

  “They are in route. I’ll be right here on the line until you get her in the ambulance. What’s your girlfriend’s name?”

  Eric pressed the gas, driving now at near-normal speed, and fuck the snow. He’d driven this road a million times.

  The notion popped into his head that the snow was him. Not him, exactly, but the emotions he used to obscure his ability to see what was real.

  Like Amy. Amy was real. She laid it out there, all the time.

  When the highway curved before it led through through town, the change in direction turned the snow into onrushing daggers that threatened to blind him, but Eric steadily lowered his foot on the gas. Maybe the snow is my father, blanketing what was real in all of us beneath the fog of his pain. He’d been too young to understand that pain, but it vibrated in Colton’s voice.

  And in the hardworking chambers of Eric’s heart, he could feel its mate, imagining Amy in Lila’s position. No kids for us. Not like this. If she wants a kid, I’ll buy her one.

  The stores lining the small section of highway people called “town”—as opposed to “downtown”, the nearby city where the hospital was—went by in a blur. Eric ran the handful of red lights dancing from wires that sagged under the weight of accumulating ice without hesitation. Miles seemed to crawl past. Colton and the nine-one-one operator talked. Eric did the only thing he could do. He just kept driving, pushing the truck as fast as he
dared. Then pushing the big diesel engine some more.

  Closer to the interstate, the road surface became more treacherous. A series of hills stood between him and his destination. Going uphill should be okay as long as he didn’t have to stop. There wasn’t another moving vehicle in sight.

  The truck’s tires began to lose their grip on the road, spinning uselessly. Eric geared down and veered in the direction of the skid, resenting the need to sacrifice speed for traction. Sweat trickled between his shoulder blades, but he made it to the top. Two more to climb, then they’d be at the long bridge crossing the interstate and once he crossed that bridge, the terrain would smooth out.

  He felt the Dodge slip to the left. Ice was becoming a factor. He corrected course and managed to top the second hill. One more.

  Halfway down the hill, Eric saw them.

  A doe and her fawn stepped out of the woods. The doe had to weigh a hundred and thirty pounds. If he hit her, there was little chance she’d flip over the hood and come crashing through the windshield, but the collision might cause him to spin out. He couldn’t afford to slow down. He’d never make it up this last hill if he lost speed. Eric laid down on his horn, pressing the gas. He prayed she’d wheel and head for the closest safe place, the woods at her back, rather than bolt across the road.

  Deer weren’t known for making smart choices under pressure.

  He could only curse when she jumped right into his path, her fawn springing at her side.

  Colton saw the goddamn thing, too. “Drive through the hit.”

  He had no choice. Cursing, he kept his foot on the gas.

  The deer’s white tail went up, signaling her alarm, but the damn thing didn’t move. The fawn was at her flank, a few feet behind, between his truck and the doe. She came to a halt at her mother’s side. Neither creature moved while the truck rushed toward them. He couldn’t slow down now if he wanted. Goddammit. Do not fuck this up. Drive through the hit.

  His hands seemed to move of their own accord, yanking the wheel to the left.

  The transmission wasn’t in charge now, the ice was. Eric turned the wheel uselessly as the truck spun. Evergreens laden with snow whirled past his windshield, then a ribbon of white, then the trees again, then the road.

  When the truck finally stopped, he was staring at his tire tracks, disappearing into a smothering cocoon of blankness. Behind his brother’s head in the rearview, he saw the doe sail into the woods, her fawn at her side.

  I saved the wrong fucking baby.

  His father’s voice seemed to fill the truck. All anyone can count on you to do is to fuck up.

  “You guys okay?” the nine-one-one operator asked.

  “We’re good. Get it together, E. Just turn around and let’s go. We’re not in a ditch. That’s great.” Colton laid a hand on his shoulder, squeezing hard.

  He had plenty of room to make the three-point turn, but he needed momentum to make it up the damn hill. Gunning the motor, he popped the clutch and started up the rise, concentrating to feel the instant the truck’s tires started to spin. Whenever that happened, he shifted the transmission into reverse, backing down the rise and up half the hill at his back, until he felt the truck begin to drift sideways. Slammed the gear shift into first. Steady pressure on the gas. Lose traction, repeat. It took three tries before he clawed his way to the top. The entire time, Colton sat silent while Eric cursed the weakness that made him veer around the fawn.

  Having one jump in front of you when you had no time to stop was one thing. Just running them down in the road when he could avoid them felt like something else, but.... He clenched the wheel, wanting to put his fist through his window. No excuses. I fucked up.

  The weight of his brother’s disappointment pressed sweat from every pore in Eric’s body. Going down the final hill, he didn’t trust himself to speak. Just press the gas and go. Words wouldn’t fix this mistake. Words never fixed his mistakes. He wished he could make his mind as blank as the scene through his windshield, but he saw every mistake he’d ever made, heard every word his father ever yelled at him for fucking up.

  He felt a small thump beneath the big tires and saw the long concrete barriers lining the long bridge arcing across eight lanes of interstate through the heavy snow. The bridge and the interstate below were just more white layered on white. Nothing moved on a stretch of road that was never still.

  “We’re on the bridge over I-26. Where’s the fucking ambulance?” Colton demanded. “She’s fainted. I can feel a pulse.” His brother’s voice cracked. “But I don’t know about the baby. She’s cold, Eric. Her skin feels cold. Can you turn up the heat?”

  “They’re at your location. They’ll meet you on the east end,” the steady voice of the emergency operator assured them. “Just get her over that bridge. You’re almost there. Doing real good, guys.”

  The heat was as high as it would go. “Sure, C.” Eric blinked fast to clear his vision and steeled himself for the next challenge.

  The concrete structure arced above the interstate and made a thirty-degree turn to the left in the process. With cold air rushing beneath it, the bridge would be a skating rink. He’d towed a hundred vehicles off this bridge in weather not nearly this bad. Every second’s delay might cost his brother either or both of the lives he held dear.

  Eric’s straining eyes made out a sight that caused his heart to rabbit wildly again, this time tapping out a rhythm of relief—flashes of ultra-white light, designed to pierce the worst weather conditions. A quarter-mile stood between Lila and medical assistance. Colton was counting on him. The whole family was counting on him.

  “We have the ambulance in sight. They need to be ready to move,” Colton leaned over the seat to yell at the phone.

  Eric tried not to look over the low concrete barrier along the edge of the bridge, even when the truck began to skid during the downhill run. Another few feet and he was able to make out the long bar of churning red lights, mounted atop the ghostly ambulance. The emergency vehicle was backed into a deserted gas station parking lot. Two attendants jumped out, running to open the rear doors.

  The truck skated into the barrier. The vehicle shuddered and bounced off. The world spun again. Metal shrieked in protest at contact with concrete and the entire truck shuddered. He turned the wheel in the direction of the skid, using the bridge railing to stop. They could carry her from here.

  Colton had the back door open before the heavy truck lurched to a standstill. “She needs help!” his brother cried. “Tell them we’ve wrecked. They need to hurry!”

  Peering through the snow clinging to his side window, Eric couldn’t see the concrete barrier, but he could look straight down at the blanketed interstate and the softened forms of big rigs, huddled on the edge of the wide four-lane road. If those rigs, with all their weight and multiple tires couldn’t make it—

  Swallowing hard, he realized he was looking at his tire tracks again. They’d spun completely around. I should’ve taken the time to load wood into the back to equalize the weight.

  It sure seemed even Mother Nature was telling him trying to move forward was futile.

  “E! Help me!” Colton cried.

  Slapping the console into the upright position so he could dive across the passenger seat, he kicked the passenger door open and leapt out of the truck. The grim look on the youthful faces of the two emergency workers pounding past made his blood freeze. Move!

  Shoving his arms under her legs, he helped hoist Lila’s swollen, limp form onto the stretcher. Blood trickled across her chin.

  Lila might die and I saved a deer.

  Colton wasn’t wearing a coat. He ran beside the stretcher holding Lila’s hand and he wasn’t wearing a coat. Just like Amy.

  Sarah’s dead. He knew now why people insisted on those viewings. Unless you saw the life missing from a beloved face, you could pretend they weren’t gone.

  One attendant shook his head. Working like a well-oiled team, the paramedics collapsed the wheeled frame underneath
the stretcher and shoved Lila through the open doors.

  Cammie’s dead. Mom. She was my mother. Funny, his mother felt more real to him now. More than just a vague memory of long hair sweeping across his face and a soft voice. More substantial than a shadow, bending over him when he was falling asleep—a loving mother, ripped from her family by hate. The snow kept falling, obscuring the last drop of hatred for Cammie he’d used to fuel his fear of love.

  His tears stung his cheeks.

  He wanted to tell Amy he loved her. Last night, he could’ve said the few words it would take to find out if he could have that sort of love, the same way he’d decided not to avoid the deer, but both times his backward-thinking brain had other plans.

  Unable to bear watching the desperate scene, he turned south, peering through the pelting pellets to look at the interstate again. Nothing moved but the snow. It was as though the entire world had been whitewashed with glue.

  A lot like his life.

  Colton straight-armed him, jerking him from his reverie. “Go! Go! They don’t have room for me in there. They need the space to work so they can save Lila.” Wind whipped his brother’s long hair and Eric saw Cammie in his mind, whirling in Rafe’s arms, while he and Dan rode a pony. The look in his mother’s eyes was the same look he’d seen in the most beautiful brown eyes in the world—Amy’s eyes. Trust and love. Had that been only last night?

  Sliding across the seat, he shoved the transmission into reverse. Metal screeched when his weight hit the driver’s seat. Colton climbed in beside him. Laying his arm across the back of Colton’s seat, Eric squeezed his brother’s shoulder and eased his foot down on the clutch and the gas. The truck’s body shuddered but pulled loose from the bridge. Eric didn’t dare accelerate much, though Colton’s impatience was a live current inside the close confines of the cab. Turning around was suicide, so he kept the truck in reverse for the last hundred feet of the treacherous bridge. When he felt the little thump indicating they’d made it across, he spun the wheel hard to the right. The rear end bounced when he plowed over the churned ice left in the wake of the emergency vehicle.