Page 2 of The Wrong Quarterback

For a while, the drive was smooth, and the night was quiet outside the car. I could almost forget how annoyed Ben was. Almost.

“Maybe we can just go back,” Ben muttered from the front seat, turning to look at me. “You wouldn’t completely hate that, right?”

Before I could answer, headlights flooded the road in front of us, blinding, too close. “Fuck!” Gray cursed, jerking the steering wheel hard to the left. The tires screamed, and the Jeep veered off the road. I felt the drop in my stomach as we flew down the embankment, the trees rushing toward us in a blur.

“Hold on!” Gray shouted, his voice panicked.

The impact hit like a punch to the gut. The front of the car crumpled against a tree; the sound of metal crunching so loud it drowned out everything else. My head snapped forward, and pain exploded behind my eyes. The airbags slammed into Benand Gray, but in the back, all I felt was the glass shattering against my skin.

Everything slowed. The world became a blur of noise, of pain. My head throbbed, and my right hand…I looked down at it, how blood was dripping onto my legs from a deep cut…was that my bone I could see? The metallic smell of the gash filled my nose, and I blinked, trying to get my bearings.

“Casey!” Gray’s voice cut through the haze. I blinked again, focusing on him as he twisted in his seat, panic etched into every line of his face. “Are you okay?”

I tried to nod, but my head swam. “I…I think so,” I whispered, the words slurred, like my mouth wasn’t working right.

Gray’s eyes flicked from me to Ben, and suddenly everything shifted. His expression changed, terror flashing in his eyes. He leaned over, shaking Ben’s shoulder. “Ben! Ben, man, wake up!”

Ben didn’t move.

Gray’s voice broke, his hands trembling as he shook him harder. “Come on, Ben! Wake up!”

I couldn’t breathe. My body felt heavy, and I tried to call out to them, but the world was spinning too fast. I watched Gray, his face desperate, his voice fading as everything around me blurred into darkness.

When I was five years old, I’d fallen into the lake behind our house. I remember sinking below the murky depths and a sense of calmness washing over my skin. The water was warm, and it felt like it was almost calling for me. For a second, I hadn’t even tried to get back to the surface. I’d just stared out at the darkness.

It was only when my oxygen had totally disappeared that I’d begun to struggle, kicking my legs violently as I tried to get to the surface.

Ben had been the one to save me and pull me out of the lake before I could drown.

Waking up felt like trying to swim through that thick, dark water again. Everything was heavy, pulling me down, my body refusing to cooperate. I blinked, but my eyes wouldn’t focus. The light was too bright, stabbing through my head like a knife. The steady beeping of machines filled the air, but it all felt distant, like I was hearing it from underwater.

I tried to move, but even the smallest shift sent pain shooting through me. My hand…my head…everything hurt. I forced my eyes open, slowly, the world coming into focus in pieces. A white ceiling. Harsh fluorescent lights.

Where was I?

Something bumped my leg, and my gaze darted down to a figure slumped over me on the bed. Mama. Her eyes were closed, but her lips were moving, like she was talking in her sleep.

Only, I couldn’t hear her clearly because sound was still coming in all garbled and messed up. I blinked a few more times, and more details came into focus in the room. The hospital. That’s where I was. There was an IV pump next to me, and my left hand was bandaged.

I stared at Mama again. She looked pale, like she hadn’t slept in days, her hair tangled, dark circles smudged under her eyes. Her hands were clutched to her chest, so tight her knuckles were white.

And I could finally understand what she was saying. “Ben.” Over and over again she was saying my brother’s name.

I glanced around the room again, looking for him. Was he in the hospital, too?

I tried to speak, to call out to her, but my throat felt raw, like sandpaper had scraped it clean. The word wouldn’t come, caught somewhere between the pain and the fog in my head. I swallowed, forcing it out, a weak croak.

“M—Mama.”

It took a minute, but the sound of my voice eventually cut through her sleep. She opened her bloodshot eyes, and the second she saw I was awake, her face crumpled. A sob broke from her lips, and she leaned forward, grabbing my hand. Tears streamed down her face as she clung to me, her whole body shaking with the force of it.

“Casey,” she gasped, her voice barely holding together. “Oh, Casey…”

I blinked, still groggy, my mind fuzzy, trying to piece together why she was so upset. Was my hand really that messed up? How long had I been here?

And then it hit me. The car and the headlights and the crash…Gray shouting…and Ben…

Ben.

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