Page 29 of Ex Marks the Spot

Each unanswered call adds another brick of dread in my stomach, quashing my earlier relief about being home and knowing I’d finally have some respite from everything I’ve been through in the past month.

Half an hour later, the Court-induced ache in my heart shifts to make room for the realization that something is very, very wrong. Do I keep waiting? Try to get a rental car? Call my brother even though it’s—I check my phone and calculate the time change—almost midnight there? At what point do my parents officially become missing people? The thought of their faces on a poster sparks a new wave of panic, turning my chest into a vise.

This isn’t happening.

I try their numbers seven more times while trying to regulate my breathing so I don’t pass out on the gross airport carpet. When I can trust myself to stand and walk, I head to the rental car area and stand in the shortest line.

“Hi, do you have a reservation?” the desk attendant asks five agonizing minutes later.

I clear my throat and say, “No, but I need to make one. Please.”

She taps on her keyboard. “How many days do you need it?”

“Um, I don’t know. Three maybe?” Tears prick my eyes and I attempt to blink them away.

“Will you be returning the rental to this location?”

“Probably not.”

“What type of vehicle do you need? We have a special right now on?—”

“I just need one that has wheels. And gas,” I add, my voice cracking.

She studies me with suspicion, then concern. “Ma’am, are you okay?”

I think something awful has happened to my parents and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do right now.

“Um, my...ride hasn’t shown up. So whatever your cheapest car is, I’ll take that.”

Fifteen minutes and just as many pages of forms that I didn’t read later, I’m behind the wheel of a glorified wind-up car. One suitcase is in the trunk and the other is wedged in the back seat, nearly blocking my view through the rearview mirror.

I’m navigating to the exit of the garage when it occurs to me that I don’t know where to go. How many hospitals are between the halfway point and Raleigh? Should I make a list and start calling? Or would the police know?—

The police.

I pull into another parking space and unlock my phone. With shaking hands, I bring up a browser window and type, “How do the police notify next of kin?”The top five search results all say, “in person,” so I quit scrolling and switch over to my map to plug in my parents’ address. That’s probably where they’d attempt a notification, right?

With no other logical guesses, I tap Go and follow the exit signs out of the parking garage. When I pass under the first sign directing me to I-40 East, my phone rings with a call from a 919 area code. I swipe my finger across the screen and veer to the shoulder, not caring about the handful of cars I just cut off.

“Hello?”

“Hartley?”

“Mom!” A tsunami of relief washes over me, only to be replaced with more panic when she says,

“We were in an accident.”

“What? Where? Are you okay?”

She pulls in a raspy breath and coughs. “My arm is broken and a few ribs are fractured.”

I’ve never heard her sound so small or weak, like it’s only the shell of her doing the talking. Everything inside me hurts for everything inside her.

“And Dad?” I manage to say before my voice breaks.

“His top half is okay. They’re...not so sure about the bottom half.” She coughs again, and then the phone is passed to another woman.

“Hi, this is Doctor Vann at Benson Memorial Hospital. Your parents came in about an hour ago.”

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