Page 91 of All the Ugly Things
My screams were cut off by bright lights in our faces. They blinded me and I screamed right as the car somehow swerved and missed us. Tires squealed and I slapped Josh’s cheek. “Wake up, you asshole!”
But it was too late. He wasgoneand the truck flew right off the edge of the road.
We hit the ditch and I fell forward, slammed my face onto the dash, then my shoulder to the window. I was bounced again and pain so fierce slashed my temple, I bent over.
“Josh! Wake up!”
The truck played me like a ping-pong ball, tires scratching, and then all I saw was a tree, racing toward us. Josh’s foot still on the gas.
I covered my face, braced for impact and all the horrific screeching sounds amplified until there was nothing but the truck’s horn, the racing of my heart.
“Josh? You awake yet?” That had to have woken him up.
I pushed down the white pillow of the airbag and looked to my left.
“Josh?! Josh!?
The driver’s side was empty. Glass was everywhere. The front window. The driver’s side door. Glass was gone. And Josh was nowhere.
“Oh fuck,” I groaned. Something wet slid down my face and my arm felt like it’d been yanked a thousand directions but I was alive.
I was breathing. And I could move.
Move!
“Josh! Where are you!?”
I unbuckled my seat belt and scrambled over the console to his seat.
And then I looked out the window’s empty frame.
Blood.
So much blood.
And then everything went black.
* * *
“But I wasn’t driving. Josh—”
My dad was bent over the edge of my hospital bed, arms braced, scowl etched in place so harshly. I’d seen that look before. Frequently. Usually right before his hand curled into a fist. “Josh’s reputation will be ruined.Iwill be ruined if anyone finds out about this.”
“But…” My chin trembled. I could no longer deny what happened. “Is… is he okay? Where is he?”
I’d came to while being loaded into an ambulance. Vaguely I remembered the EMT mumbling to his partner, “Teenage kids and alcohol. Fucking rich kids.”
“No joke,” I’d said, right before I passed out again.
“Josh will be fine. But you were in the driver’s seat, so you can’t tell me you weren’t driving.”
“I wasn’t. Josh was. I just climbed over…”
“Shut your fucking mouth.” My dad leaned over me on the bed, shoved his finger in my face.
His words hit me like a slap and I laid back in the bed. Monitors beeped next to me, checking my vitals. My heartbeat. Ten stitches in my temple and a dislocated shoulder.
Josh… no one yet had told me about him, so I assumed the worst.
