Axel sees it. I see it. The operator is talking, but the words are just noise now.
Dad shoves both into his pocket and stands. His eyes meet mine, and there’s something wild in them. Something cornered.
“You called them,” he says. Not a question. An accusation.
“She needs help—”
“This is your fault.”
He backs toward the kitchen. The back door. His hand is already on the knob.
“Dad—”
“This is all on him.” He jerks his chin toward Axel. “He gave them to her.”
Then he’s gone. The door slams. The house shakes.
Axel and I stand there, on opposite sides of Mom’s body. The operator is asking if I’m still there. I can’t answer. I’m staring at Mom’s chest, counting the rises. One. Two. Three. The gaps between them stretch longer each time.
“What do we do?” Axel’s voice is small, younger than sixteen.
“I don’t know.”
We kneel on either side of her. I tilt her head back like I saw on TV once. Axel holds her hand. We don’t know if we’re supposed to do CPR. We don’t know if moving her will make it worse. We don’t know anything.
The minutes crawl. The operator keeps talking, but I’ve lost the thread. Axel is crying now, silent tears dripping onto Mom’s sleeve.
I count the breaths. Four. Five. The space between five and six lasts forever.
Six doesn’t come.
“Mom?” Axel shakes her. “Mom, please.”
Her chest is still.
“Mom!”
I press my fingers to her neck, searching for a pulse. I don’t know if I’m doing it right. I don’t know where it’s supposed to be. My hands are shaking too hard to feel anything.
The sirens start far away, then closer. Red and blue lights slash through the front window.
The paramedics burst through the door in a rush of heavy boots and equipment. They push us aside, and we stumble back against the wall, shoulder to shoulder.
They work fast. Hands moving, voices clipped and professional. Needles. Tubes. A machine that beeps.
One of them looks up. “How long has she been unresponsive?”
I don’t know. Ten minutes? Twenty? Time folded in on itself.
“I don’t know.”
“What did she take?”
I point to the bottles. They’re still on the counter, caps off, pills scattered.
A paramedic reads the labels, says something into his radio I don’t understand.
They lift Mom onto a stretcher. Her arm hangs off the side, limp. One of them tucks it back.
