“You need to see who it is.” He’s right. My phone never rings this many times in a row. It stops as I reach for it. To myhorror, I find six missed calls from my dad and several texts from my family.
Dad: Call me, son.
Owen: You need to call me or Dad.
Owen: Answer your damn phone.
“Shit. Something’s wrong. Look.” I show the texts to Evan. He takes my hand and holds onto it while I call my dad, putting it on speaker. If this is serious, I need Evan to hear. My heart sinks, imagining all the things that could possibly be wrong. It has to be my mom since Dad and Owen are the ones calling. The thought of something happening to my mom horrifies me. She’s the glue that holds our family together. She’s the best mom and wife and we’d all be lost without her. Dad picks up after several rings.
“Isaac,” Dad says. “Hey, Son.”
“Dad what’s going on?”
He takes a deep breath and my heart sinks.
“It’s Aiden. He was in a car accident,” Dad drops an unexpected bomb on me.
“What? When? Where? Is he okay?” I word vomit, not sure what to ask. I’m relieved mom is okay, but knowing something bad happened to my little brother is whole other level of terror.
“We don’t know much. He was driving back to his apartment after class. Someone t-boned him on the driver’s side. We got to the hospital a few minutes ago and are waiting to see the doctor and talk to the police.”
My heart is racing and my entire body is shaking. My baby brother is hurt and there’s not a damn thing I can do. Evan squeezes my hand, but it barely registers.
“Thank you, Mr. Flores. Call us when you know more.”
“Take care of my boy.”
“I’ve got him.” Evan ends the call and looks at me.
“Why did you hang up?” I yell, grabbing my phone. Evan gently takes it out of my hand and places it on the other side of the table, then he takes my other hand, holding both of mine and turning me to face him fully.
“Where did you go?” he asks.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you stopped talking in the middle of the conversation.”
“Oh, I guess I was thinking about Aiden. Did I miss something?”
“The doctor came in. They are going to call us back after they talk to him.”
I pull away from Evan and pace the kitchen for several minutes. Why didn’t I answer the phone? My family needed me, and I ignored them for a stupid blow job.
“Stop beating yourself up.”
“I’m not!” I bark
“Not stopping or not beating yourself up?”
“Neither. Both. I don’t know!” I cry. I place both hands on the counter and drop my head. My chest tightens, my body shakes, and my vision blurs. How can this be happening? My little brother is lying in a damn hospital bed and there’s nothing I can do. I can’t go to him. I can’t help him. I’m useless.
Evan walks over to me and pulls me in for a hug. I melt into him, feeling safe and comforted in his arms. He leads me to the couch and gently pushes me to sit before he walks away and comes back a few seconds later with my phone and two glasses of wine.
“There is nothing we can do but wait. Try not to worryuntil we know more. I know that’s an impossible request, but let’s try.”
I take the glass and nod as he sits next to me, taking my hand in his again. It’s a simple gesture, but it means more than he’ll ever know. Without Evan by my side, I’d probably be driving to the airport right now.
By the time the phone rings again, I am on my third glass of wine and made it damn clear I need something stronger, but Evan refuses to give me bourbon. At this point, I’d like to down half a bottle of Tequila and forget everything.