Page 123 of Saving the Halfback

Hands met mine, but I needed to go up for more air. I swam to the top. Ethan. Ethan was down there, lifting the cement block. Nolan dove in and grabbed it with him, the two of them carrying it to the shallow end of the pool while Lachlan was swimming, his arm across Chase’s chest to hold his head above the water, pulling him along the surface of the water. “Come on, Chase,” Lachlan growled, the pain etched in his features.

None of us said a word, all too focused on the task at hand. Ethan dropped the cement block in the shallow end at the edge of the pool as Nolan and Lachlan hoisted Chase up onto the concrete patio. Chase’s lips were a dark purple, his skin a sickly grey.

“Is he breathing?” Ethan asked.

“No.” Lachlan was frantic.

Nolan started doing chest compressions. I jumped out of the water and ran over to them, tilting Chase’s head back, like we had learned in gym class. Nolan was counting compressions.

“Come on, Chase,” Lachlan screamed at him again, and his agony tore at me.

Ethan came back with a knife to cut the rope off his foot. As soon as Nolan said “thirty” and stopped compressions, I tilted Chase’s head, sealed my lips around his mouth, and gave two breaths.

Nolan started up compressions again. The ambulance was close; they would likely go to the front door. “Tell the paramedics to come over here,” I yelled at Lachlan and Ethan. Lachlan took off running.

“He’s vomiting,” Nolan shouted.

Ethan grabbed Chase’s side and pulled him over, so he wouldn’t choke on his own vomit as water kept pouring out of his mouth. Ethan looked up at Nolan, absolutely devastated.

“Is he awake?” I asked.

Once the vomiting stopped, we carefully laid him on his back, and the color in his lips had returned. Nolan put his hand on Chase’s chest and his ear by his mouth. “He’s breathing,” he whispered.

Paramedics came into the yard, led by Lachlan, and we stepped back as they got to work assessing Chase and hooking him up to monitors. “Oxygen is low,” one medic said. They put an oxygen mask on him. “How long was he under?”

“I don’t know,” I said, shaking. “He was moving when I first saw him.” So, it couldn’t have been long…right? It wasn’t too long. Right?

“He vomited a lot of water,” Ethan said.

“What’s his name?”

“Chase Jacobs,” Lachlan answered.

“He’s seventeen?” The medic asked.

“Eighteen,” I said, clearing my throat. “Eighteen today.”

The medic nodded. He rubbed the middle of Chase’s chest. “Hey, Chase, we are going to move you and get you onto our stretcher here, all right?” Though he spoke loudly, Chase didn’t respond. I felt arms around me and buried my face into Nolan’s chest while they lifted Chase onto the stretcher. “His oxygen still isn’t coming up,” the medic said. “AR?”

The other medic watched the monitors for a moment before nodding. “AR.” Then they pulled the mask off and opened Chase’s mouth. The other medic was getting a tube ready. He placed it in Chase’s mouth and twisted it into place before hooking up a bag to it. “Ready,” he said to his partner. One medic pulled the stretcher while the other squeezed the bag every few seconds.

I let go of Nolan and followed the stretcher out. “Where are you taking him? In town?”

“They’ll assess him here and may send him to the city,” the medic pulling the stretcher said.

The back of their truck was already open; they lifted the stretcher and pushed Chase’s lifeless body inside.

“I want to come with him,” I said.

“Are you family?” The paramedic asked.

My heart dropped. No…no, I wasn’t. “He can’t be alone,” I cried.

“You can meet us at the hospital, okay?”

“He hates being alone,” I told the medic.

He nodded. “He won’t be alone,” he promised me.

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